ondouble hisself, I throwed the saddle on him. I spliced the girths with the rest of my lariat, and put Brother Rembrandt in the saddle and clumb on behind and we headed for Teton Gulch.
After a hour or so Brother Rembrandt come to and says kind of dizzily: 'Was anybody saved from the typhoon?'
'Yo're all right, Brother Rembrandt,' I assured him. 'I'm takin' you to Teton Gulch.'
'I remember,' he muttered. 'It all comes back to me. Damn Jake Roman! I thought it was a good idea, but it seems I was mistaken. I thought we had an ordinary human being to deal with. I know when I'm licked. I'll give you a thousand dollars to let me go.'
'Take it easy, Brother Rembrandt,' I soothed, seeing he was still delirious. 'We'll be to Teton in no time.'
'I don't want to go to Teton!' he hollered.
'You got to,' I told him. 'You got to unite yore niece and Blink Wiltshaw in the holy bums of parsimony.'
'To hell with Blink Wiltshaw and my--niece!' he yelled.
'You ought to be ashamed usin' sech langwidge, and you a minister of the gospel,' I reproved him sternly. His reply would of curled a Piute's hair.
I was so scandalized I made no reply. I was jest fixing to untie him, so's he could ride more comfortable, but I thought if he was that crazy, I better not. So I give no heed to his ravings which growed more and more unbearable as we progressed. In all my born days I never seen sech a preacher.
It was sure a relief to me to sight Teton at last. It was night when we rode down the ravine into the Gulch, and the dance halls and saloons was going full blast. I rode up behind the Yaller Dawg Saloon and hauled Brother Rembrandt off with me and sot him onto his feet, and he said, kind of despairingly: 'For the last time, listen to reason. I've got fifty thousand dollars cached up in the hills. I'll give you every cent if you'll untie me.'
'I don't want no money,' I said. 'All I want is for you to marry yore niece and Blink Wiltshaw. I'll untie you then.'
'All right,' he said. 'All right! But untie me now!'
I was jest fixing to do it, when the bar-keep come out with a lantern, and he shone it on our faces and said in a startled tone: 'Who the hell is that with you, Elkins?'
'You wouldn't never suspect it from his langwidge,' I says, 'but it's the Reverant Rembrandt Brockton.'
'Are you crazy?' says the bar-keep. 'That's Rattle snake Harrison!'
'I give up,' said my prisoner. 'I'm Harrison. I'm licked. Lock me up somewhere away from this lunatic!'
I was standing in a kind of daze, with my mouth open, but now I woke up and bellered: 'What? Yo're Harrison? I see it all now! Jake Roman overheard me talkin' to Blink Wiltshaw, and rode off and fixed it with you to fool me like you done, so's to git Blink's gold! That's why you wanted to hold my Winchester whilst I saddled yore cayuse.'
'How'd you ever guess it?' he sneered. 'We ought to have shot you from ambush like I wanted to, but Jake wanted to catch you alive and torture you to death account of your horse bitin' him. The fool must have lost his head at the last minute and decided to shoot you after all. If you hadn't recognized him we'd had you surrounded and stuck up before you knew what was happening.'
'But now the real preacher's gone on to Wahpeton!' I hollered. 'I got to foller him and bring him back--'
'Why, he's here,' said one of the men which was gathering around us. 'He come in with his niece a hour ago on the stage from War Paint.'
'War Paint?' I howled, hit in the belly by a premonishun. I run into the saloon, where they was a lot of people, and there was Blink and a gal holding hands in front of a old man with a long white beard, and he had a book in his hand, and the other'n lifted in the air. He was saying: '--And I now pernounces you-all man and wife. Them which God has j'ined togither let no snake-hunter put asunder.'
'Dolly!' I yelled. Both of 'em jumped about four foot and whirled, and Dolly jumped in front of Blink and spread her arms like she was shooing chickens.
'Don't you tech him, Breckinridge!' she hollered. 'I jest married him and I don't aim for no Humbolt grizzly to spile him!'
'But I don't sabe all this--' I said dizzily, nervously fumbling with my guns which is a habit of mine when upsot.
Everybody in the wedding party started ducking out of line, and Blink said hurriedly: 'It's this way, Breck. When I made my pile so onexpectedly quick, I sent for Dolly to come and marry me, like she'd promised that night, jest after you pulled out for Yavapai. I was aimin' to take my gold out today, like I told you, so me and Dolly could go to San Francisco on our honeymoon, but I learnt Harrison's gang was watchin' me, jest like I told you. I wanted to git my gold out, and I wanted to git you out of the way before Dolly and her uncle got here on the War Paint stage, so I told you that there lie about Brother Rembrandt bein' on the Wahpeton stage. It was the only lie.'
'You said you was marryin' a gal in Teton,' I accused fiercely.
'Well,' says he, 'I did marry her in Teton. You know, Breck, all's fair in love and war.'
'Now, now, boys,' says Brother Rembrandt--the real one, I mean. 'The gal's married, yore rivalry is over, and they's no use holdin' grudges. Shake hands and be friends.'
'All right,' I said heavily. No man can't say I ain't a good loser. I was cut deep, but I concealed my busted heart.
Leastways I concealed it all I was able to. Them folks which says I crippled Blink Wiltshaw with malice aforethought is liars which I'll sweep the road with when I catches 'em. I didn't aim to break his cussed arm when we shaken hands. It was jest the convulsive start I give when I suddenly thought of what Glory McGraw would say when she heard about this mess. And they ain't no use in folks saying that what imejitly follered was done in revenge for Dolly busting me in the head with that cuspidor. When I thought of the rawhiding I'd likely get from Glory McGraw I kind of lost my head and stampeded like a loco bull. When something got in my way I removed it without stopping to see what it was. How was I to know it was Dolly's Uncle Rembrandt which I absent-mindedly throwed through a winder. And as for them fellers which claims they was knocked down and trompled on, they ought to of got outa my way, dern 'em.
As I headed down the trail on Cap'n Kidd I wondered if I ever really loved Dolly, after all, because I was less upsot over her marrying another feller than I was about what Glory McGraw would say.
Chapter X - THE HAUNTED MOUNTAIN
THEY SAY when a critter is mortally wounded he generally heads for his den, so maybe that's why I headed for Bear Creek when I rode out of Teton Gulch that night; I'd had about as much civilization as I could stand for awhile.
But the closer I got to Bear Creek the more I thought about Glory McGraw and I bust into profuse sweat every time I thought about what she'd say to me, because I'd sent her word by one of the Braxton boys that I aimed to bring Dolly Rixby to Bear Creek as Miz Breckinridge Elkins.
I thought about this so much that when I cut the Chawed Ear road I turned aside and headed up it. I'd met a feller a few miles back which told me about a rodeo which was going to take place at Chawed Ear, so I thought it was a good way to pick up some easy money whilst avoiding Glory at the same time. But I forgot I had to pass by the cabin of one of my relatives.
The reason I detests tarantulas, stinging lizards, and hydrophobia skunks is because they reminds me so much of Aunt Lavaca Grimes, which my Uncle Jacob Grimes married in a absent-minded moment, when he was old enough to know better.
That there woman's voice plumb puts my teeth on aidge, and it has the same effect on Cap'n Kidd, which don't otherwise shy at nothing less'n a cyclone. So when she stuck her head out of her cabin as I was riding by and yelled: 'Breck-in-ri-i-idge!' Cap'n Kidd jumped like he was shot, and then tried to buck me off.
'Stop tormentin' that pore animal and come here,' commanded Aunt Lavaca, whilst I was fighting for my life agen Cap'n Kidd's spine-twisting sunfishing. 'Always showin' off! I never see such a inconsiderate, worthless, no- good--'
She kept on yapping away till I had wore him down and reined up alongside the cabin-stoop, and said: 'What you want, Aunt Lavaca?'
She give me a scornful stare, and put her hands onto her hips and glared at me like I was something she didn't like the smell of.
'I want you to go git yore Uncle Jacob and bring him home,' she said at last. 'He's off on one of his idjiotic
