earthly realization of all our heavenly aspirations; to the low-browed man-of-hands something less, since his aspirations are less, but still good to cure all social ills. When Pecos Dalhart entered the Geronimo County jail he turned it into his own idea of the revolution—a fighting man's paradise, like the Valhalla of the ancients, where the heroes fought all day and were made good as new over night; but when he woke up from his long sleep, behold, Angy had established a philosophical revolution in its stead! At first he was so glad to wake up at all that he did not inspect the new social structure too closely—it had saved him from a terrible beating, that was sure—but as the day wore on and a gang of yeggs began to ramp about he shook his head and frowned.
"Say, Angy," he said, "what did you tell them fellers last night to make 'em take on like this?"
"Told 'em the same old story, Cumrad—how the monopolistic classes has combined with the hell hounds of the law to grind us pore men down. Ain't it glorious how the glad news has touched their hearts? Even within the walls of our prison they are happy!"
"Umph!" grunted Pecos, and scowled up at a tall Mexican who had ventured to call him compadre. "What's all this compañero talk that's goin' on amongst the Mexicans—are they in on the deal, too?"
"Surest thing!" responded Angy warmly.
"Huh!" said Pecos, "I hope they don't try no buen' amigo racket on me—I was raised to regard Mexicans like horny toads."
"All men is brothers—that's my motto. And they's good Mexicans, too, remember that. Just think of Joe Garcia!"
"Yes!" rejoined Pecos, with heat, "think of 'im! If it wasn't for that saddle-colored dastard I'd be free, 'stead of rottin' in this hole. I says to the judge: 'I bought that cow and calf off of Joe Garcia—there he is, standin' over there—I summon him for a witness.' 'Is that your calf?' says the judge. 'Kin savvy,' he says, humpin' up his back. 'Did you sell him to this man?' 'Yo no se!' says Joe, and he kept it up with his 'No savvys' and his 'I don't knows' until the dam' judge throwed me into jail. Sure! I'm stuck on Mexicans! I'll brother 'em, all right, if they come around me—I'll brother 'em over the head with a club!"
"Jest the same, it was Mexicans that saved your bacon last night," retorted Angy, with spirit. "Some of these white men that you had beat up were for pushin' your face in while you was asleep, but when I made a little talk in Spanish, touchin' on your friendly relations with the Garcia family, the Mexicans came over in a body and took your part. That was pretty good, hey?"
"Um," responded Pecos, but he assented without enthusiasm. Barring the one exception which went to prove the rule, he had never had much use for Mexicans—and Marcelina was a happy accident, not to be looked for elsewhere in the Spanish-American world. Still, a man had to have some friends; and a Mex was better than a yegg, anyhow. He looked around until he found the tall man who had called him compadre and beckoned him with an imperious jerk of the head. The Mexican came over doubtfully.
"You speak English?" inquired Pecos. "That's good—I want to tell you something. My friend here says you and your compadres stood up for me last night when I was down and out—hey? Well, that's all right—I'm a Texano and I ain't got much use for Mexicanos in general, but any time you boys git into trouble with them yeggs, jest call on me! Savvy?"
The tall man savvied and though Pecos still regarded them with disfavor the Mexican contingency persisted in doing him homage—only now they referred to him as El Patrón. Patrón he was, and Boss, though he never raised a hand. Interpreting aright his censorious glances the sons of Mexico confined their celebration of the Dawn of Freedom to a carnival of neglect, lying in their bunks and smoking cigarritos while the filth accumulated in the slop cans. Under the iron rule of Pete Monat they had been required to do all the cleaning up—for in Arizona a Mexican gets the dirty end of everything—but no sooner had Babe sung his clarion call for freedom than they joined him, heart and hand. If the Society of the Revolution was at all related to the Sons of Rest they wanted to go down as charter members—and they did.
The time may come when cleanliness will be an inherited instinct but at present most of the cleaning up in the world is done under compulsion. Parents compel their children to wash and change their clothes; employers compel their wage-slaves to scrub and clean and empty; cities compel their householders to dispose of sewage and garbage; but not even among members of the capitalistic classes is there shown any clean-cut desire to do the work themselves. The Arizona Indians escape their obligations by moving camp at intervals, and God's sunshine helps out the settlers; but in the Geronimo jail there was no sunshine, nor could any Indian break camp. They were shut in, and there they had to lie, three deep, until the judge should decide their fate. For two days they had luxuriated in anarchy, philosophical and real, but neither kind emptied any garbage. The jail was the dwelling place of Freedom, but it smelled bad. That was a fact. Even the Mexicans noticed it, but they did not take it to heart. It was only when Boone Morgan came down for a batch of prisoners that the community got its orders to clean up.
These were busy days with Boone—opening court, arraigning prisoners, summoning witnesses, roping in jurymen, speaking a good word for some poor devil in the tanks—and it kept him on the run from sun-up to dark. He knew that Pecos Dalhart had broken up his Kangaroo Court and that Angevine Thorne had pulled off some kind of a tin-horn revolution on him, but he didn't mind a little thing like that. Jail life had its ups and downs, but so long as the cage was tight the birds could do as they pleased—short of raising a riot. At least, that was Boone Morgan's theory, based on the general proposition that he could stand it as long as they could—but when at the end of the second day he caught a whiff of the sublimated jail-smell that rose from the abiding place of liberty he let out a "whoosh" like a bear.
"Holy Moses, Bill," he cried, "make these rascals clean up! M-mmm! That would drive a dog out of a tan-yard! What's the matter—is somebody dead?"
"Not yet," responded Bill Todhunter, "but they will be, if we don't git some trusty in there. Them fellers won't do nuthin'—an' I can't go in there and make 'em! You better appoint another alcalde."
"What's the matter with Pete?"
"His head is too sore—he won't be able to put up a fight for a month."
"Umm, and Mike is fixed worse yet—where's that crazy cowman, Pecos Dalhart?"
They found Pecos comfortably bestowed in the bunk of the end cell, philosophically smoking jail tobacco as a deodorizer.
"Say," said the sheriff, brusquely addressing him through the bars, "things are gittin' pretty rotten around here—somebody ought to make them Mexicans clean up. You put my Kangaroo Court out of business—how'd you like the job yourself?"
Pecos grunted contemptuously.
"Don't want it, hey? Well, you don't have to have it—I can get that big sheep-man down from the upper tanks."
A cold glint came into Pecos Dalhart's eyes, but he made no remarks—a big sheep-man would just about fall in with his mood.
"I got to have some kind of a trusty," observed Morgan, but as Pecos did not rise to the bait, he passed down the run-around grumbling.
"He's a sulky brute," said Bill Todhunter, as they retreated from the stench, "better leave him alone a while and see if we can't stink him out."
"Well, you order them Mexicans to clean up," rumbled the sheriff, "and if this here Pecos Dalhart makes any more trouble I'll see that he gits roped and hog-tied. And say, throw old Babe out of there as soon as he gits his supper. Them two fellers are side-kickers in this business and we got to bust 'em up.
