don’t need contradiction! I’m kind o’ makin’ holiday these times. Guess you ain’t never heerd tell o’ the ‘rest cure’?”
A rough laugh broke on the drowsy atmosphere.
“Sunny’s overworked just now,” said another voice, amidst the rattle of poker chips.
“Wher’ you bin workin’, Sunny?” inquired the harsh voice of the man addressed as Bill.
“Workin’!” cried the loafer, with good-natured scorn. “Say, I don’t never let a hobby interfere with the bizness of life.”
A half-smothered laugh answered him. Even the exigencies of a poker hand could not quite crush out the natural humor of these men, who always followed on the golden trail of the pioneers.
“Say, what’s your bizness?” demanded another voice presently.
“Restin’!” the man on the veranda answered easily.
The shuffle of cards and rattle of chips came with a snigger. And the answering lazy smile of Sunny Oak was good to see. It lit his unshaven face from his unwashed brow to his chin. And to an onlooker it might well have appeared a pity that an intense bodily indolence should so dominate his personality. He looked vastly capable, both mentally and physically.
But his eyes never left the on-coming Scipio. The little man moved with bowed head and trailing footsteps. The utter dispiritedness of his gait stirred even the self-centered watcher. But Scipio saw nothing of Sunny Oak. He saw nothing of anything but the despairing picture in his own mind. The ramshackle shanties which lined one side of the trail were passed unheeded. The yapping of the camp dogs at the unusual sight of so deplorable a figure at this hour of the day was quite unnoticed by him. The shelving rise of attenuated grassland which blocked the view of Suffering Creek on his left never for a moment came into his focus. His eyes were on the trail ahead of him, and never more than a few feet from where he trod. And those eyes were hot and staring, aching with their concentration upon the hideous picture which filled his brain.
As Scipio drew near Sunny Oak further bestirred himself, which was a concession not often yielded by that individual to anyone. He sat up, and his smile broadened. Then it faded out as he beheld the usually mild expression of the yellow-haired prospector now so set and troubled.
“Gee!” he murmured in an undertone. Then, with an evident effort, he offered a greeting.
“Ho, you, Zip! Drawn a blank way up ther’ on your mudbank?”
Scipio looked up in a dazed fashion. Then he halted and seemed to pull himself together. Finally he spoke.
“Howdy?” he said in a mechanical sort of way.
“Guess I’m a heap better,” responded Sunny, with twinkling eyes.
Scipio gazed up at the store in a bewildered way. He saw the great letters in which Minky’s name and occupation were inscribed on its pretentious front, and it seemed to bring back his purpose to his distracted mind. Instantly the other’s words became intelligible to him, and his native kindliness prompted him.
“You been sick?” he demanded.
“Wal, not rightly sick, but–ailin’.” Sunny’s smile broadened till a mouthful of fairly decent teeth showed through the fringe of his ragged mustache.
“Ailin’?”
“Yep. Guess I bin overdoin’ it.”
“It don’t do, working too hard in the heat,” said Scipio absently.
“Sure,” replied Sunny. “It’s been a hard job avoidin’ it. Ther’s allus folk ready to set me workin’. That’s just the way o’ things. What I need is rest. Say, you ain’t workin’?”
Scipio started.
“No. I’m looking for Wild Bill.”
Sunny Oak jerked his head backwards in the direction of the window.
“Guess he’s at work–in ther’.”
“Thanks.”
Scipio mounted the veranda and passed along to the door of the store. Sunny’s eyes followed him, but he displayed no other interest. With ears and brain alert, however, he waited. He knew that all he required to know would reach him through a channel that was quite effortless to himself. Again he stretched himself out on the bench, and his twinkling eyes closed luxuriously.
Minky’s store was very little different from other places of its kind. He sold everything that could possibly be needed in a newly started mining camp. He did not confine himself to hardware and clothing and canned goods, but carried a supply of drugs, stationery and general dry goods, besides liquor in ample quantities, if of limited quality. There was rye whisky, there was gin, and there was some sort of French brandy. The two latter were in the smallest quantities. Rye was the staple drink of the place.
The walls of the store were lined with shelves on every side, and the shelves were full, even overflowing to a piled-up confusion of goods which were stacked around on the floor. In the somewhat limited floor-space there were tables and benches which could be used for the dual purpose of drink and cards. But wherein Minky’s store was slightly out of the usual was the fact that he was not a Jew, and adopted no Jewish methods of trading. He was scrupulously honest with his customers, and fairly moderate in his charges, relying on this uncommon integrity and temperateness of disposition to make personal liking the basis of his commercial success.
It was perhaps a much further-sighted policy than one would suppose. Several men had endeavored to start in the store business in opposition to him, but in each case their enterprise had proved an utter failure. Not a man in the place would trade elsewhere. Minky was just “Minky,” whom they liked and trusted. And, what was much more to the point, who was ever ready to “trust” them.
Wild Bill was at the poker table with Minky, Sandy Joyce and Toby Jenks when Scipio entered the place. He was a gambler out and out. It was his profession. He was known as Wild Bill of Abilene, a man whose past was never inquired into by even the most youthful newcomer, whose present was a thing that none ever saw sufficient reason to question, and whose future suggested nothing so much as the general uncertainty of things human. He was a man of harsh exterior and, apparently, harsh purpose. His eyes were steely and his tongue ironical; he possessed muscles of iron and a knowledge of poker and all its subtleties that had never yet failed him. He was a dead shot with a pistol, and, in consequence, fear and respect were laid at his feet by his fellow-townsmen. He was also Minky’s most treasured friend.
Sandy Joyce had to his credit a married past, which somehow gave him a certain authority in the place. He was expected to possess a fund of wisdom in matters worldly, and he did his best to live up to this demand. He was also, by the way, an ex-cowpuncher suffering from gold fever, and between whiles played poker with Wild Bill until he had lost the result of his more regular labors. He was a slight, tall, bright-eyed man of thirty, with an elaborate flow of picturesque language. He was afraid of no man, but all women.
Toby Jenks was as short and squat as his friends were long and thin. He was good-tempered, and spent large remittances which reached him at regular intervals in the lulls which occurred in his desultory search for gold.
Minky, a plain, large man of blunt speech and gruff manners, looked up swiftly as Scipio entered, and a moment later three more pairs of eyes were fixed inquiringly upon the newcomer.
“Struck
