Prairie Folks Part 21

"Shouldn't wonder." Robie was busy at his desk, and not in humor for conversation on reminiscent lines. The two old war-dogs at the board had settled down to one of those long, silent struggles which ensue when two champions meet. In the silence which followed, the Judge was looking attentively at the back of the Colonel, and thinking that the old thief was getting about down to skin and bone. He turned with a yawn to Robie, saying:

"This cold weather must take hold of the old Colonel terribly, he's so d.a.m.nably thin and bald, you know,--bald as a babe. The fact is, the old Colonel ain't long for this world, anyway; think so, Hank?" Robie making no reply, the Judge relapsed into silence for awhile, watching the cat (perilously walking along the edge of the upper shelf) and listening to the occasional hurrying footsteps outside. "I don't know _when_ I've seen the windows closed up so, Hank; go down to thirty below to-night; devilish strong wind blowing, too; tough night on the prairies, Hank."

"You bet," replied Hank, briefly.

The Colonel was plainly getting excited. His razor-like back curved sharper than ever as he peered into the intricacies of the board to spy the trap which the fat Squire had set for him. At this point the squeal of boots on the icy walk outside paused, and a moment later Amos Ridings entered, with whiskers covered with ice, and looking like a huge bear in his buffalo coat.

"By Josephus! it's cold," he roared, as he took off his gloves and began to warm his face and hands at the fire.

"Is it?" asked the Judge, comfortably, rising on his tiptoes, only to fall back into his usual att.i.tude legal, legs well spread, shoulders thrown back.

"You bet it is!" replied Amos. "I d'know when I've felt the cold more'n I have t'-day. It's jest snifty; doubles me up like a jack-knife, Judge.

How do you stand it?"

"Toler'ble, toler'ble, Amos. But we're agin', we ain't what we were once. Cold takes hold of us."

"That's a fact," answered Amos to the retrospective musings of the Judge. "Time was you an' me would go t' singing-school or sleigh-riding with the girls on a night like this and never notice it."

"Yes, sir; yes, sir!" said the Judge with a sigh. It was a little uncertain in Robie's mind whether the Judge was regretting the lost ability to stand the cold, or the lost pleasure of riding with the girls.

"Great days, those, gentlemen! Lived in Vermont then. Hot-blooded--lungs like an ox. I remember, Sallie Dearborn and I used to go a-foot to singing-school down the valley four miles. But now, wouldn't go riding to-night with the handsomest woman in America, and the best cutter in Rock River."

"Oh! you've got both feet in the grave up t' the ankles, anyway," said Robie, from his desk, but the Judge immovably gazed at the upper shelf on the other side of the room, where the boilers and pans and washboards were stored.

"The Judge is a little on the sentimental order to-night," said Amos.

"Hold on, Colonel! hold on. You've _got_'o jump. Hah! hah!" roared Gordon from the checkerboard. "That's right, that's right!" he ended, as the Colonel complied reluctantly.

"Sock it to the old cuss!" commented Amos. "What I was going to say," he resumed, rolling down the collar of his coat, "was, that when my wife helped me bundle up t'night, she said I was gitt'n' t' be an old granny. We _are_ agin', Judge, the's no denyin' that. We're both gray as Norway rats now. An' speaking of us agin' reminds me,--have y' noticed how bald the old Kyernel's gitt'n'?"

"I have, Amos," answered the Judge, mournfully. "The old man's head is showing age, showing age! Getting thin up there, ain't it?"

The old Colonel bent to his work with studied abstraction, and even when Amos said, judicially, after long scrutiny: "Yes, he'll soon be as bald as a plate," he only lifted one yellow, freckled, bony hand, and brushed his carroty growth of hair across the spot under discussion. Gordon shook his fat paunch in silent laughter, nearly displacing the board.

"I was just telling Robie," pursued Brown, still retaining his reminiscent intonation, "that this storm takes the cake over anything"----

At this point Steve Roach and another fellow entered. Steve was Ridings'

hired hand, a herculean fellow, with a drawl, and a liability for taking offense quite as remarkable.

"Say! gents, I'm no spring rooster, but this jest gits away with anything in line of cold _I_ ever see."

While this communication was being received in ruminative silence, Steve was holding his ears in his hand and gazing at the intent champions at the board. There they sat; the old Squire panting and wheezing in his excitement, for he was planning a great "snap" on the Colonel, whose red and freckled nose almost touched the board. It was a solemn battle hour. The wind howled mournfully outside, the timbers of the store creaked in the cold, and the huge cannon stove roared in steady ba.s.s.

"Speaking about ears," said Steve, after a silence, "dummed if I'd like t' be quite s' bare 'round the ears as Kernel there. I wonder if any o'

you fellers has noticed how the ol' feller's lost hair this last summer.

He's gittin' bald, they's no coverin' it up--gittin' bald as a plate."

"You're right, Stephen," said the Judge, as he gravely took his stand behind his brother advocate and studied, with the eye of an adept, the field of battle. "We were noticing it when you came in. It's a sad thing, but it must be admitted."

"It's the Kyernel's brains wearin' up through his hair, I take it,"

commented Amos, as he helped himself to a handful of peanuts out of the bag behind the counter. "Say, Steve, did y' stuff up that hole in front of ol' Barney?"

A shout was heard outside, and then a rush against the door, and immediately two young fellows burst in, followed by a fierce gust of snow. One was Professor Knapp, the other Editor Foster, of the _Morning Call_.

"Well, gents, how's this for high?" said Foster, in a peculiar tone of voice, at which all began to smile. He was a slender fellow with close-clipped, a.s.sertive red hair. "In this company we now have the majesty of the law, the power of the press, and the underpinning of the American civilization all represented. h.e.l.lo! There are a couple of old roosters with their heads together. Gordon, my old enemy, how are you?"

Gordon waved him off with a smile and a wheeze. "Don't bother me now.

I've got 'im. I'm laying f'r the old dog. Whist!"

"Got nothing!" snarled the Colonel. "You try that on if you want to.

Just swing that man in there if you think it's healthy for him. Just as like as not, you'll slip up on that little trick."

"Ha! Say you so, old True Penny? The Kunnel has met a foeman worthy of his steel," said Foster, in great glee, as he bent above the Colonel. "I know. _How_ do I know, quotha? By the curve on the Kunnel's back. The size of the parabola described by that backbone accurately gauges his adversary's skill. But, by the way, gentlemen, have you--but that's a nice point, and I refer all nice points to Professor Knapp. Professor, is it in good taste to make remarks concerning the dress or features of another?"

"Certainly not," answered Knapp, a handsome young fellow with a yellow mustache.

"Not when the person is an esteemed public character, like the Colonel here? What I was about to remark, if it had been proper, was that the old fellow is getting wofully bald. He'll soon be bald as an egg."

"Say!" asked the Colonel, "I want to know how long you're going to keep this thing up? Somebody's dummed sure t' get hurt soon."

"There, there! Colonel," said Brown, soothingly, "don't get excited; you'll lose the rubber. Don't mind 'em. Keep cool."

"Yes, keep cool, Kunnel; it's only our solicitude for your welfare,"

chipped in Foster. Then, addressing the crowd in a general sort of way, he speculated: "Curious how a man, a plain American citizen like Colonel Peavy, wins a place in the innermost affections of a whole people."

"That's so!" murmured the rest.

"He can't grow bald without deep sympathy from his fellow-citizens. It amounts to a public calamity."

The old Colonel glared in speechless wrath.

"Say! gents," pleaded Gordon, "let up on the old man for the present.

He's going to need all of himself if he gets out o' the trap he's in now." He waved, his fat hand over the Colonel's head, and smiled blandly at the crowd hugging the stove.

"My head may be bald," grated the old man with a death's-head grin, indescribably ferocious, "but it's got brains enough in it to skunk any man in this crowd three games out o' five."

"The ol' man rather gits the laugh on y' there, gents," called Robie from the other side of the counter. "I hain't seen the old skeesix play better'n he did last night, in years."

"Not since his return from Canada, after the war, I reckon," said Amos, from the kerosene barrel.

"Hold on, Amos," put in the Judge warningly, "that's outlawed. Talking about being bald and the war reminds me of the night Walters and I---- By the way, where is Walters to-night?"

"Sick," put in the Colonel, straightening up exultantly. "I waxed him three straight games last night. You won't see him again till spring.

Skunked him once, and beat him twice."

"Oh, git out."

"Hear the old seed twitter!"