Short Plays

he did his first duty he’d hang himself. This is a rotten town. Your fathers came here on a false alarm of gold-digging; and when the gold didn’t pan out, they lived by licking their young into habits of honest industry. Strapper If I hadn’t promised Elder Daniels here to give him a chance to keep you out of Hell, I’d take the job of twisting your neck off the hands of the Vigilance Committee. Blanco With infinite scorn. You and your rotten Elder, and your rotten Vigilance Committee! Strapper They’re sound enough to hang a horse-thief, anyhow. Blanco Any fool can hang the wisest man in the country. Nothing he likes better. But you can’t hang me. Strapper Can’t we? Blanco No, you can’t. I left the town this morning before sunrise, because it’s a rotten town, and I couldn’t bear to see it in the light. Your brother’s horse did the same, as any sensible horse would. Instead of going to look for the horse, you went looking for me. That was a rotten thing to do, because the horse belonged to your brother⁠—or to the man he stole it from⁠—and I don’t belong to him. Well, you found me; but you didn’t find the horse. If I had took the horse, I’d have been on the horse. Would I have taken all that time to get to where I did if I’d a horse to carry me? Strapper I don’t believe you started not for two hours after you say you did. Blanco Who cares what you believe or don’t believe? Is a man worth six of you to be hanged because you’ve lost your big brother’s horse, and you’ll want to kill somebody to relieve your rotten feelings when he licks you for it? Not likely. Till you can find a witness that saw me with that horse you can’t touch me; and you know it. Strapper Is that the law, Elder? Elder Daniels The Sheriff knows the law. I wouldn’t say for sure; but I think it would be more seemly to have a witness. Go and round one up, Strapper; and leave me here alone to wrestle with his poor blinded soul. Strapper I’ll get a witness all right enough. I know the road he took; and I’ll ask at every house within sight of it for a mile out. Come, boys. Strapper goes out with the others, leaving Blanco and Elder Daniels together. Blanco rises and strolls over to the Elder, surveying him with extreme disparagement. Blanco Well, brother? Well, Boozy Posnet, alias Elder Daniels? Well, thief? Well, drunkard? Elder Daniels It’s no good, Blanco. They’ll never believe we’re brothers. Blanco Never fear. Do you suppose I want to claim you? Do you suppose I’m proud of you? You’re a rotten brother, Boozy Posnet. All you ever did when I owned you was to borrow money from me to get drunk with. Now you lend money and sell drink to other people. I was ashamed of you before; and I’m worse ashamed of you now. I won’t have you for a brother. Heaven gave you to me; but I return the blessing without thanks. So be easy: I shan’t blab. He turns his back on him and sits down. Elder Daniels I tell you they wouldn’t believe you; so what does it matter to me whether you blab or not? Talk sense, Blanco: there’s no time for your foolery now; for you’ll be a dead man an hour after the Sheriff comes back. What possessed you to steal that horse? Blanco I didn’t steal it. I distrained on it for what you owed me. I thought it was yours. I was a fool to think that you owned anything but other people’s property. You laid your hands on everything father and mother had when they died. I never asked you for a fair share. I never asked you for all the money I’d lent you from time to time. I asked you for mother’s old necklace with the hair locket in it. You wouldn’t give me that: you wouldn’t give me anything. So as you refused me my due I took it, just to give you a lesson. Elder Daniels Why didn’t you take the necklace if you must steal something? They wouldn’t have hanged you for that. Blanco Perhaps I’d rather be hanged for stealing a horse than let off for a damned piece of sentimentality. Elder Daniels Oh, Blanco, Blanco: spiritual pride has been your ruin. If you’d only done like me, you’d be a free and respectable man this day instead of laying there with a rope round your neck. Blanco Turning on him. Done like you! What do you mean? Drink like you, eh? Well, I’ve done some of that lately. I see things. Elder Daniels Too late, Blanco: too late. Convulsively. Oh, why didn’t you drink as I used to? Why didn’t you drink as I was led to by the Lord for my good, until the time came for me to give it up? It was drink that saved my character when I was a young man; and it was the want of it that spoiled yours. Tell me this. Did I ever get drunk when I was working? Blanco No; but then you never worked when you had money enough to get drunk. Elder Daniels That just shows the wisdom of Providence and the Lord’s mercy. God fulfils himself in many ways: ways we little think of when we try to set up our own shortsighted laws against his Word. When does the Devil catch hold of a man? Not when he’s working and not when he’s drunk; but when he’s idle and sober. Our own natures tell us to drink when we have nothing else to do. Look at you and me! When we’d both earned a pocketful of money, what did we do? Went on the spree, naturally. But I was humble minded. I did as the rest did. I gave my money in at the drink-shop; and