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Title: Lady Luck

Author: Hugh Wiley

Release date: August 1, 2008 [eBook #26165]

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/26165

Credits: Produced by Audrey Longhurst and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LADY LUCK
***

LADY LUCK

BOOKS BY HUGH WILEY

JADE, and Other Stories
LADY LUCK
THE WILDCAT

LADY LUCK

By

HUGH WILEY

NEW YORK
ALFRED · A · KNOPF
1921

COPYRIGHT, 1921, BY
ALFRED A. KNOPF, Inc.

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

TO

MY FATHER

"When you 's travellin' heavy on de misery road
An' yo' back is breakin' wid de misery load,
Jes' figger dat yo' trouble 's boun' to end,
Cause Lady Luck is waitin' fo' you, 'roun de bend."

THE WILDCAT

LADY LUCK

CHAPTER I

Ah wuz a fiel' han' fo' Ah sailed de sea,
Wisht Ah wuz a fiel' han' now.
Dis konk'rin' hero business don' make no hit wid me
—
Wisht Ah wuz a fiel' han' now.

"Gimme back a nickel! How come coffee ten cents? Gimme back 'at nickel
befo' bofe ob us is on de same side ob de lunch counter."

"You an' a policeman, you means. Ca'm yo'se'f. If dis wah keeps up, coffee
g'wine cost fifteen cents nex' week."

"How come wah? Wah finished a yeah back. Me an' Cap'n Jack wuz de fust
men in de wah. Wah's done. Ah knows. Gimme back 'at nickel."

"Mebbe de wah is done, but de Democrats ain't. Git out ob heah wid dat
goat, fo' you ruins mah trade."

The Wildcat picked up Captain Jack's bed-roll from the floor beside the
lunch counter in the Memphis station. He accumulated Lily from where the
travelworn mascot goat was tethered to an adjoining stool. Together they
walked from the lunch room in which he had sought refreshment after an
arduous ride from San Francisco to Memphis.

"Come on heah, Lily. Ol' Cap'n Jack an' de lady done went home in a takes-
a-grab. Boy takes a grab at yo' money, an' if deys any lef', you gives it to a
policeman fo' arrestin' him. Us rides a 'spress wagon."

On the street fronting the station the Wildcat chartered a rickety express
wagon hauled by a languid black mule. "Whuf!" the driver grunted. "Sho' is
de ponderestest bed-roll Ah eveh lifted."

"'At bed-roll's full of iron helmets f'm dead Germans, fo' Cap'n Jack to
'membeh de wah by. De officehs craves to 'membeh de wah. Us 'listed boys
craves to fo'git it."

The driver of the express wagon looked sideways at the Wildcat. "When did
de goat die?"

"How come?"

"Sit him on de side ob me whah de win' ain't blowin'. Wuz he de Dove ob
Peace de wah'd go on fo'eveh. Whut's dem culled ribbons doin' on dat
goat?"

"De blue ribbon is mah mascot's quality. De red an' white ones is
patriotism."

"Thought mebbe dey wuz fus' an' secon' prizes fo' smellin'."

The Wildcat handed the driver of the express wagon a cigar.

"Smoke dis offsetteh," he said. Drifting along on a haze of conflicting
aromas, the outfit arrived finally at the residence of Captain Jack. "Heah's
de fifty cents," the Wildcat said to the express driver.

"Cost me dat to git de goat smell renovated off me. Wuth six bits."

"On yo' way. I'll six bits you! Quit whiffin' wid dat nose, befo' I busts yo'
loose f'm it. On yo' way! C'm on, Lily."

The Wildcat spent the rest of the afternoon shuffling furniture around inside
of Captain Jack's house. At four o'clock Captain Jack's wife arrived,
convoying a perspiring three-hundred-pound trophy which she had been
fortunate enough to capture.

"Yo' is de cook, is yo'?" the Wildcat said to the newly enthroned ruler of the
kitchen.

The ebony Amazon looked at him. "Who is you?"

"I's champion ration battler ob de world. Wait till I gits back." The Wildcat
returned presently with an armful of wood. "You claims you's a cook—well,
woman, I lights de fiah. Den you sees kin yo'."

"Kin I what?"

"Fust yo' barbecues 'at ham hangin' theh. When Ah gits th'oo, half of it will
be lef'. Whilst de ham's sizzlin' you th'ows enough cawn bread togetheh to
fill de big pan. When Ah gits th'oo dey'll be half of it lef'. When de ham
juice begins to git sunburned you makes some ham gravy. Ah spec' ham
gravy's de fondest thing Ah is of. I says 'Howdy, ham gravy!' an' afteh me
an' de vittles gits acquainted, mah appetite won't need grub no mo'n a fish
needs shoes."

"Cut de ham." The Wildcat carved off five or six thick slices.

The cook looked at him. "Is you fo'gittin' me?"

"You hungry? De way you looks, yo's et all de grub whut is."

"Nach'ral to be fat. Look at de elephant. How come you so skinny?"

"Wah mis'ry. All I et fo' two yeahs in France wuz Guv'ment rashuns. Dey
wuzn't fillin'. I et myse'f down to boy-size pants de fust yeah. Secon' yeah
dey lets me run wild 'cause dey couldn't find no unifawm small enough."

"Wuz yo' in de big drive?"

"I'll say I wuz. Us boys drove more railroad spikes at St. Sulpice dan a
colonel has cooties. Woman, how come you knows all about de names ob
de wah?"

"I had a husban' uplifteh in de wah whut wrote me letters. Mebbe yo' met
up wid him, name bein' Huntington Boone."

The Wildcat's jaw sagged open as far as the roots of his lolling tongue.
"Honey Tone! De uplifteh? He's yo' man?"

"You knows him?'

"Ah knows him some—goin' on a thousan' francs he lifted off me wid de
gallopin' ivory."

"Ain't de same one. Huntington saw de light an' swerve f'm de sin road to
de straight an' narrow in de Fall Revival five yeahs back—de time Sis Ellers
got drowned at de baptisin' an' stayed undeh till she blowed up at Vicksbu'g.
Mah man went oveh as a uplifteh."

"'At's de boy. He swerved back at de sinful life. De on'y upliftin' he done
wuz wid us boys' money an' coonyak."

The Wildcat was thoughtful for a moment.

"Whah at is he now?" he suddenly asked.

"I ain't seed him since he went away. Wore out mah black alpaca mournin'
dress an' spilt icecream all oveh de otheh at a social. 'At's how come Ah's in
calico."

"I ain't seed him neveh since—"

"Since when?"

"Since he sailed fo' N' O'leans on de iron boat."

"He done come back! Praise de Lawd!"

"Call de police, you means. Did he git back he's in de jail whah at he
belongs—all I seed wuz him leavin'."

In the face of the Wildcat's argument the Amazon's mood changed. "When I
gets th'oo wid' dat man de jail folks sho' have to pen him up in a barrel to
hol' de leavin's. He's 'bout as pop'lar wid me as smallpox. All he eveh done
wuz bear down hahd on de money when I come home wid mah wages."

At the moment the Wildcat did not feel constrained to explain that Honey
Tone's departure from Bordeaux had been one of the Wildcat's contrivings
—one in which Honey Tone had been battened down in the hold of the
cargo ship, together with a hundred French Colonial negro troops. "I
rec'lects he lef' Bo'deaux on a boat dey calls de Princess Clam, headed fo'
N' O'leans. Chances is he's in de N' O'leans jail right now."

The Wildcat decided that it might be well to encourage Honey Tone's mate
to souse the black mood of her mourning in the whitewash of jealousy.
"'Spect he might be married up again—mebbe. 'At boy gits 'gaged
wheheveh 'at he goes."

"Is he rampagin' roun' I makes two widows stid of one does I ketch him.
Cleah outen heah!"

Honey Tone's vindictive mate craved solitude in which to enjoy the misery
of her ambition for revenge.

The Wildcat cleared out, taking with him a substantial segment of corn
bread and two hot slices of ham. "Does Honey Tone live th'oo whut de
female 'ception committee g'wine to git ready fo' him I gives him mah Craw
de Gare an' all de woun' stripes whut is."

In the woodshed back of Captain Jack's house the mascot Lily patiently
awaited her proprietor.

"Blaa!" she said in greeting when the Wildcat appeared.

"Whut yo' mean? How come you always craves nutriment?" the Wildcat
demanded. "Heah." He gave the goat a fragment of corn bread. "Whuf! de
ol' cawn pone sho' is fillin'. I sleeps me now fo' a little while. Den I goes
downtown an' says Howdy to de boys. Lily, lay off dat hat! Eat de ham

grease offen it does yo' crave to, but ca'm yo' se'f when yo' gits to de hat
part."

The Wildcat reclined on a pile of hickory stove-wood and went to sleep.
Sleeping was his long suit. At ten o'clock that night he woke up.

"Sho' is late. Front do' de barber shop be locked, but de back do' ain't." The
Wildcat threaded the dark streets which led to Willie Webster's barber shop.
The shave-and-haircut part of the Webster establishment served but to
camouflage the darker industries which had their being in a room
contiguous to the one where shaves were a nickel and haircuts fifteen cents,
including musk.

At the back door of the barber shop the Wildcat hesitated for a moment in
an effort to recall the secret knock which gained admittance in the days
before the war. This element of the ritual finally came to him, and on the
rough panels of the door sounded three quick raps followed by two at more
deliberate intervals.

"I gits it 'fused up wid de time I wuz outeh guard to de Lodge ob Colored
Damons. 'At knock wuz fo' an' th'ee. Fish club knock wuz two an' two.
'Membehs dat. Dat's how de animals come off de Ark, time ob de flood."

The door opened an inch, and the slot of light from within was interrupted
by a rolling eyeball which surmounted a pair of questioning liver-coloured
lips. "Who dat?"

"Wildcat—Vitus Marsden." The door opened quickly, and the Wildcat
edged into the company of his former associates.

"Men, howdy!"

"Dogged if it ain't ol' Marsden! Boy, how is yo'? Is yo' back f'm de wah?"

"Heah us is, ain't I?"

Willie Webster, the proprietor of the establishment, came forward. "Don'
see no arms an' no laigs missin'. Yo' neveh used yo' haid nohow, 'ceptin' to
eat wid. Boy, how is yo'? Hail de Konk'rin' Hero!"

"Tol'able, Willie." The Konk'rin' Hero looked about him. At a table against
the wall, under the rays of a smoking coal oil lamp, a crap game was in
progress.

The Wildcat's fingers began to itch. He walked over toward the table. In the
outline of one of the figures standing beside the table the Wildcat identified
an acquaintance of his former days. "Seems like I knows de shape 'at boy's
got." The Wildcat edged up to the table.

The owner of the familiar silhouette faced the Wildcat. "Wilecat, how is
you? Hot dam, boy—is you back?"

Honey Tone Boone, the exile uplifter, was quick to conceal the
inconvenient recognition in the extended palm of cordial insincerity.

The Wildcat's mouth opened and closed in cadence with the wild leaping of
his Adam's apple. With difficulty he pacified his organs of speech, and
presently the honey of hypocrisy filtered from the tip of his tongue. "Honey
Tone! Honey Tone de uplifteh! Las' time I seed yo', yo' wuz in Bo'deaux."

"Las' time you seed me I wuz in trouble."

"How come?" A mask of surprise covered the Wildcat's face.

Honey Tone explained the method of his departure from Bordeaux.

"You kidnapped in de gizzard ob de ol' iron boat! Ain't it s'prisin'! Us boys
sho' missed you."

Honey Tone relapsed into the vernacular. "I'll say 'at's all you missed. After
you made de las' pass wid de gallopin' ivory you sho' lef me clean. All I had
on me wuz cooties. How come you heah, Wilecat?"

"Cap'n Jack brung me. I's still workin' fo' Cap'n Jack. Afteh us landed offen
de boat f'm France us rode de train clear across de country. Jes' broke loose
f'm de army in time to keep f'm gittin' sent to Russia—place whah dey bury
you. What you doin' heah?"

Honey Tone evaded a direct answer. "How's all de rest ob de boys?"

"Ain't seed 'em. Me an' Cap'n Jack came back casual."

"Whah at's he now?"

"Livin' heah. Memphis is de Cap'n's home town. Us jus' got in heah yes'day.
F'm now on I works fo' Cap'n Jack. Ain't much to do, an' Cap'n's lady sho'
foun' a good cook. I aims to eat heavy f'm now on to ketch up wid whut I
missed in de army. Whut is you doin', 'sides lookin' fo' easy money?"

Honey Tone, the ex-uplifter, was silent for a minute, and then his organizing
instinct welled strong.

"Me? I's organizin' a Returned Heroes' Parade. Us Konk'rin' Heroes what
wore de army unifawm jines in de gran' ruckus."

"Sho! Honey Tone, whut yo' mean army unifawm? You was 'fested with
letheh straps an' uppity talk when I knowed you fust. Now you talks plain
niggah."

"Sounds more homelike." Honey Tone did not feel constrained to explain
the finesse which prompted him to abandon the vocabulary which he had
derived from a year's schooling and considerable subsequent speech-
making.

"Aftah de parade mebbe us organizes de Colored Militarriers of America. I's
been ponderin' considerable how come some ob you ain't started dat lodge
yet? Dues a dollah a month. Parades fo' baptisn's, marryin's, and funerals.
Special buryin' department wheh you gits crematized or secluded in de
ground as you prefers, dependin' whether you pays fo' bits a week extra or
not."

"Sounds half gran'—mebbe folks takes up wid it. Ol' parade sho' sounds
noble." In common with other overseas veterans, the Wildcat listened strong
to the appeal made by the jingling hardware of heroism. He had visions of
himself prancin' along where white folks could look at him—visions which
included an O.D. uniform plentifully festooned with wound stripes,
coloured ribbons, service chevrons, and a few decorative military crosses.

The group about the crap table thinned out. The Wildcat picked up the dice.
"Does you crave high life, Honey Tone, read a chapteh f'm de clickers."

"I might ride a couple of r'ars," the uplifter conceded.

The Wildcat produced a bulky roll. Several pairs of gleaming eyeballs about
him testified to the exceptional dimensions of his capital.

To the Wildcat's surprise Honey Tone hauled out a wallet in which lay a
thick package of twenty-dollar bills. Hope burned strong in the Wildcat's
chest, and with the flame of hope the Wildcat warmed the dice within his
hand.

"Shoots ten dollahs. Fade me, Honey Tone, does you crave action."

"You's faded."

"Wham! Ah lets it lay. Shoots twenty dollahs."

"Roll 'em." Honey Tone dropped a twenty-dollar bill, which landed as
gently as a snowflake on the green surface of the table. "Bam! Five an' a
deuce."

Under the heat of the Wildcat's luck the uplifter's green snowflake melted
into his opponent's roll.

"Ah lets it lay. Shoots fo'ty. Fo'ty ways. Shower down, Honey Tone. Mah
luck builds homes fo' de ignorant poor. I's got de musk smell. Bam! Land,
little Dove ob Peace. Land wid yo' bill full ob greens. An' I reads fo' tray!"

The Wildcat gathered in his winnings. He laid a twenty-dollar bill on the
green table. "Fade me is you frantic."

Honey Tone covered the bet.

"Gallopers, pay de rent. Wham! Morning, rainbow. Wah just begun. Dove
ob Peace got one hot end, like a hornet. Gallopers, see kin yo' uplift de
Honey Tone Jack."

The dice raced on their victorious way.

Twenty minutes later Honey Tone Boone picked up the cubes. The capital
in his leather pocket book had dwindled to a pair of weak-looking dollar
bills. He reached into his pocket, and his hand came forth clutching a
rubber-banded cylinder of currency whose external unit was a yellow
obligation wherein the United States Government promised to pay the
bearer fifty dollars in gold coin, providing the Democrats overlooked that
much.

Honey Tone voiced his challenge.

"Shoots a hund'ed dollahs. De big coin keeps de pikers out."

The Wildcat batted his eyes, but rallied nobly and covered Honey Tone's bet
with five twenties. "Roll 'em," he said huskily.

Honey Tone, rolling 'em, neglected to advertise the fact that when he
reached for his new stake he had switched the dice.

"Seven. Shoots two hund'ed."

"Talk to 'em, Honey Tone." One of the uplifter's admirers offered verbal
encouragement.

"Dey does de talkin'. Shower down, Wildcat. Shoots two hund'ed."

The Wildcat hesitated.

"Shower down," Honey Tone repeated. "You craves action. Git in de collar.
Don't stan' theh poisoned on one foot, like de iron lady in de park."

The Wildcat glanced about him. He saw several pairs of heavy lips curling
in the bow of derision. He counted out a handful of greenbacks. "'At's two
hund'ed," he said heavily. "Roll 'em." His neck itched. He sensed the impact
of the axe. "How come I crazy?"

The rolling dice halted. The class in addition announced that four and three
made seven.

"I mows de lettuce." Honey Tone picked up his winnings. "Shoots a
hund'ed."

The Wildcat audited his capital. "Sixty's all I got."

"Shoots sixty."

The Wildcat took a deep breath and held on to it until he read on the
clicking cubes the final message of disaster.

"Whuf! 'At's me." Honey Tone looked at his victim, and in the glance of
triumph glowed the dull fire of accomplished revenge.

"Dem bones says who is de Konk'rin' Hero. Dey knows."

The Wildcat picked up the dice and looked them over carefully. "Dice, wuz
clothes a nickel I'se nekked—an' you done it."

Honey Tone reached for the dice. "How come?" he objected.

"Dese dice knows so much Ah thought mebbe dey's educated."

The uplifter was glad enough to ignore the remark in his effort to get the
dice under cover. He switched the subject quickly to one which would not
include an examination of his paraphernalia of chance. "I counts on you,
Wilecat, to be colonel ob de parade."

"Me?" The Wildcat sobered under the responsibility.

"You be de walkin' colonel leadin' de Konk'rin' Heroes."

"Whah at does you come in?"

"I's de ridin' gin'ral whut leads."

"Honey Tone, does you ride, I does. You an' me is 'quivalent, only I's mo' in
dis Konk'rin' Hero business. All de konk'rin' you eveh done wuz leadin' de
sleep squad o' else joyin' roun' in Bo'deaux. No suh! Does you ride, I does."

"De ridin' part's de hardest. I rides so you boys kin see me give signs whah
at to march. Does you ride, de nex' boy done crave to. He say, 'Whah at's
mah mule?' Fust thing yo' knows, all de Konk'rin' Heroes would be on
mules. Dey wouldn't be no more mules lef' in de world. Figgeh out what 'ud
happen to de Horn Band when de mules heard de toots an' started tromplin'
'em down. Figgeh out could a band ride mules and play, bofe. Figgeh out
some mo' wid yo' haid, 'stid of usin' it to eat wid so much, an' yo' might
figgeh out I's right."

The logic in Honey Tone's objections appealed to the Wildcat. His
imagination painted a contest between the Horn Department of the brunet
brass band and three or four hundred stampeding mules. "I guess yo' says
sense," he admitted. "Us boys walks."

For a little while he and Honey Tone discussed the details of the impending
parade. "When us passes de' gran'stan'," the uplifter specified, "I gives de
salute. You be leadin' de platoon. When you gits opposite de gran'stan' yo'
says 'Eyes right.' 'At's all you does, 'ceptin' to keep marchin'."

"Who's gwine to be in de gran'stan'?"

"In de gran'stan'? Fust dere'll be de 'ception committee, den all religious
organizations, den all de lodges an' grave clubs, den all de women an'
chillen whut ain't 'filiated wid nothin' but husban's an' kitchen stoves."

Throughout the discussion the Wildcat's unmounted disappointment ached
until it was suddenly quieted by a detail of the forthcoming ceremonies
which he did not impart to his associate. In the Wildcat's brain was born a
scheme which promised to balance the books between him and Honey
Tone.

"Yo' wife be sittin' in de gran'stan', I s'pose?"

Honey Tone laid himself open to the serious fall which is the common
sequel of deceit. "I ain't got no wife."

"Thought yo' tol' me you wuz a married man when Ah knowed you fust."
The Wildcat was indulging in a little exploration.

"Did I say I wuz married I must've been crazy o' lyin'."

"You is both," the Wildcat inwardly reflected. "'At's at," he said to Honey
Tone. "On'y, wid so much 'flooence, it 'pears like you'd furnish yo' own
mule."

"Ain't I made yo' Supreem Gran' Arrangeh? You p'vides de mule. I takes
care o' rentin' de' gran'stan' at de ball park an' spreadin' de publicity.
Afterwards us has a gran' rally. Mebbe I makes a speech."

With the details of the program accomplished, the defeated Wildcat left the
Konk'rin' Hero in the barber shop and made his way toward Captain Jack's
home and the woodshed wherein was tethered the mascot goat.

Halfway up the alley which led to the woodshed the Wildcat spoke aloud in
the darkness. "Konk'rin' Hero! Him ridin' de mule an' us boys ridin' ouah
feet. Huh! I's de Supreem Gran' Walkin' Arrangeh, is I? Well, tomorrow I
starts arrangin'." His monologue was suddenly interrupted by an explosive
braying which burst from the woodshed adjoining the one in which rested
Lily. The Wildcat surrendered to his racing legs and galloped a panic jazz to
the exit of the alley before his common-sense reacted. "Sho! Me a Konk'rin'
Hero!" He chuckled softly to himself. "Ol' mule whut b'longs to Cap'n
Jack's neighbour sho' unkonkered me."

He retraced his steps until he came to the door of Captain Jack's woodshed.
He opened the door and entered. From the darkness his mascot goat greeted
him.

"Blaa!" said Lily.

"Ain't yo' asleep yit? Mebbe dat damn ol' mule woke you up. Git to sleep!"
The Wildcat removed his shoes and lay down on a rickety bed in a corner of
the woodshed. "I'll do the arrangin', Honey Tone," he mumbled. His lower
jaw sagged, and into his open mouth whined a lone mosquito. At the portals
of sleep his night was again interrupted by the mule in the adjoining shed.

"Dat's de night-brayin'est jug-head Ah eveh seed. Wuss'n a midnight roosteh
drunk wid moonlight." He was about to launch a few burning curses from a
vocabulary which the mule could saggitate, when a new thought was born
to him. He lay silent, staring above him into the darkness.

"I's de Supreem Gran' Arrangeh!" he suddenly exclaimed. "I's de double
Grandes' Arrangeh whut is!" A faint bleat sounded from the darkness. "Shut
up, Lily! Fo' I gits th'oo arrangin', yo' an' me bofe rides de mule does us
crave to."

CHAPTER II

1.

The following morning the Wildcat gorged himself on a ponderous
breakfast. "Sho' is noble ham. Yo' sho' is de grandes' cook whut is. Wondeh
how come ol' Honey Tone neveh 'spressed himse'f about yo'?"

"'At niggah neveh wuz home enough to git 'quainted."

The Wildcat looked sidewise at the cook. "Last night I meets up wid a boy
in de barber shop whut knows Honey Tone pussonal. He says 'at triflin'
uplifteh claims to bein' single—claims he neveh had no wife."

The culinary Amazon picked up a frying pan and brought it down on the top
of the range with a resounding bang. "He claims, does he? Wunst Ah gits
mah hooks in 'at nigger's head, all he claims is funeral benefits!"

The Wildcat suggested that Honey Tone was probably far, far away and
established as the centre of another family circle. The cook reacted nobly.

He waited until the avoirdupois cyclone had cooled off. Something in the
cook's energetic rage suggested the activities of the Wildcat's former
landlady, Cuspidora Lee, from whom he had occasionally borrowed tobacco
money. He determined to visit his former boarding house and renew his
financial relations.

"You has my sympathy bofe ways," he said to the cook. "Yo' is married up
wid a no-account triflin' yellow uplifteh. Is he wid you, you is mis'able, an'
is he A.W.O.L. yo' is twice 'at much. Wuz I you, when you meets up wid

him I'd bleed him by han'. But don' you grieve. Neveh min'. Some day yo'
meets up wid him.... Den yo' pays him back."

2.

The Wildcat left the kitchen. He carried a bouquet of cabbage leaves to Lily,
who was tethered at the woodshed door. "Eat heavy, Lily," he commanded.
"Yo' neveh got no reliable greens like dis when yo' wuz in France." He
hazed Lily into the woodshed and departed on his way to visit Miss
Cuspidora Lee. He found the Lee personage perspiring darkly in the clouds
of heat that billowed from a red-hot cookstove.

"Cuspido', I bids yo' mawin'," he said briefly.

Cuspidora Lee turned upon him. "Fo' de Lawd sake, you scared me! If it
ain't Vitus Marsden. Prodigal, come heah! Whah at is you been?" The
Wildcat was engulfed in an embrace which reminded him of the time he had
been buried under seven tons of fermented hay.

He came to the surface. "Cuspido', sho' is glad to see you. Whah at's dem
pussonal preserves you 'scribed 'bout in yo' letteh?"

"Sit down till I feeds yo'. Is you as hungry as you always wuz I reckon you
massacrees all de vittles in de house."

After the Wildcat had eaten within an inch of his life he sat back from the
table and took a deep breath. "Whuf! Stomach's gittin' so big mah arms
won' reach pas' it. Does it keep on mebbe Ah's 'bliged to turn roun' an' eat
backwa'ds. Sho' is noble rashuns. Noblest rashuns I eveh et wuz heah."

He consumed an hour recounting his adventures in France for the benefit of
Cuspidora Lee. At the conclusion of the recital the Wildcat was invited to
make his abode in the Lee residence.

"Craves to, Cuspido', but Ah kain't. Ol' Cap'n Jack needs me. Wunst I leaves
ol' Cap'n, dat boy run wild an' Ah finds him out in San F'mcisco. Ah'll be
draggin' 'long now. Sees yo' in de gran'stan' at de ball park during de
Konk'rin' Heroes' Parade nex' Thursday."

"You sees me befo' dat. I's givin' a weegee pa'ty We'n'sday night, an' I bids
yo' welcome."

"How come weegee?"

"Ain't you know weegee—little boa'd whut points out is you or ain't you an'
how come in de pas', present, an' future?"

"Sho! How de boa'd know?"

"Spirits. Man whut sells de boa'ds runs de spirits."

"Is you tryin' to plague me?"

"You come heah Wensday night an' see is I."

The Wildcat returned to Captain Jack's residence. "Sho' is gran' to git
home," he reflected. "Parades, weegee pa'ties—fust thing I knows Ah'll be
claimed by de church sociables. Sho' beats France. Stays heah an' works fo'
ol' Cap'n Jack, eats me heavy, raises Lily, 'filiates at de barber shop wid de
boys. Sho' beats de A.E.F. wah bizness."

His daydreaming was interrupted by Captain Jack's commanding voice.

"Wildcat, come here."

"Cap'n, yessuh."

"I'm going away for three months," Captain Jack abruptly announced. Then
he added: "Keep your eye on things."

"Cap'n, yessuh. Goin' 'way!... When does us staht?"

"Us don't start. For once in my life I hope to go some place and come back
without being hounded by my Wildcat nigger."

"Cap'n, yessuh. Whut beats me is how yo' aims to git along widout me
takin' keer o' you. You neveh wuz no single thriveh."

"I'll get along without you. Go in and lock up the trunks."

"Mis' Cap'n Jack gwine wid you?"

"I'll say she is. Whither I goeth there shall she also go. Git those trunks
fixed up."

With the departure of the master of the house a cloud of melancholy settled
about the Wildcat which was not dispelled until suppertime.

3.

On Wednesday night the Wildcat soused himself with bay rum and musk.
About his neck, in lieu of a collar, he wrapped the spliced sleeves of a
discarded silk shirt whose cerise dyes had barred it from Captain Jack's
wardrobe. On his feet he wore a pair of patent leather violins whose tight
interiors had been plentifully massaged with axle grease.

He started out with his mascot. "C'm on heah, Lily—you stahts gittin' social
wid quality folks. How come dese shoes pinches all de time sho' beats me.
By rights I weahs twelves. Man whut sold dese shoes said dey wuz fifteens
—feels like sho' take bofe to make 'at much. But when dey sees dis heah
neckerchief dey won't notice de shoes."

Halfway to the weegee party he removed the shoes and carried them in his
hand to the portals of the Lee establishment. He sat down outside the door
of the ouija castle and put on his shoes. He tethered Lily at the step and
knocked at the door. A moment later he was being greeted by twenty friends
and half as many strangers.

"Befo' I turns down de lights," the hostess announced, "I wants you to meet
up wid Colonel Boone, one ob de culled heroes whut made de wah safe fo'
white folks. Colonel Boone, say howdy at Misteh Marsden."

The Wildcat and the uplifter again stood face to face. "Honey Tone, how
come Cuspido' calls you 'Colonel'?"

"By rights 'at's mah rank."

"By rights you is rank." The Wildcat turned to his brunette hostess. "Ah
knows dis Boone man. Met up wid him in France. How come he projectin'
roun' heah?"

Cuspidora was quick to sense a rift of jealousy in the social lute. "He's
aimin' to claim me fo' a weddin' mate."

She made haste to switch the deal.

"Blow out dat light, Sis' Mosby." She reached for a second coal oil lamp
and turned it down until the room was hardly light enough to distinguish the
black letters on the ouija board which lay on the table. The uplifter
deflected the impending embarrassment which might develop from
continued conversation with the Wildcat by functioning as master of
ceremonies.

"Rally roun'. Spirits is willin' if de flesh ain't weak. Wilecat, fondle de
weegee board an' take a ra'r at seein' whut de future holds."

"How come?"

"Dis corner says, 'Yes.' Dat corner says, 'No.' De little board slides Yes or
No, dependin' how de spirits answers whut yo' asks."

The cross-examination of Mr. Ouija and his talented aggregation of spirits
endured for an hour, during which time a number of interesting facts
concerning various members of the assemblage became public property.

The Wildcat, returning from an enjoyed battle at the refreshment corner of
Cuspidora Lee's parlor, wedged his way into the group about the ouija
board and laid a heavy hand thereon. The memory of Cuspidora's statement
concerning her love affair with Honey Tone rankled within him.

"Spirits," he said, "I axes yo' is I married?"

Ouija answered, "No."

"Is Honey Tone Boone married?"

The board became a battlefield. Presently the tight tendons of the uplifter's
hand showed grey against his skin, but without avail, because the Wildcat's
little finger lay tight against the perimeter of the moving planchette.
Impelled by the Wildcat's little finger the implacable spirits hazed Weegee
to the "Yes" corner of the board.

Honey Tone's defeated fingers relaxed. "Dat's de lyin'est board I eveh see.
How come yo' gits a lyin' weegee board, Mis' Lee?"

"Spirits neveh lies." The hostess defended her unseen assistants.

"Ain't no lyin' lef' to do afteh dese upliftehs gits th'oo," the Wildcat
commented.

A little later, apart from the other guests, the Wildcat asked Cuspidora Lee a
direct question. "O! Honey Tone been representin' he's single?"

The Wildcat's brunette hostess hesitated. "Tol' me he neveh seed nobody
befo'," she admitted—"tol' me his love-eye neveh seed nobody 'ceptin' me."

"All 'at boy's love-eye seed is de p'visions in yo' kitchen. Ah knows him.
Acts like de yelleh niggah whut he is—prancin' round uppity in France—
comes back heah callin' himself 'Colonel,' 'count he wore oilcloth leggin's
an' drunk coonyak whilst us boys wuz fightin' de battle of Bo'deaux."

Cuspidora Lee listened with eager ears. "I runs him out now, the flea-bit
houn'," she finally announced.

"Ca'm yo'se'f. Don' git to brindlin'. Come out to de ball park tomorr' at de
parade an' you sees him leadin' us Culled Heroes."

Honey Tone Boone meanwhile had charmed a dozen of his male and female
auditors with Mister Ouija's spiritual assistance.

At eleven o'clock the coal oil lamps were again lighted and the guests
employed themselves in the pleasurable business of consuming such
refreshments as the Wildcat had overlooked. The evening ended with a
general announcement from the uplifter, in which he invited the assemblage
to be present on the following day at the parade of the Konk'rin' Culled
Heroes.

"As de Supreem Gran' Organizeh Ah bids yo' welcome," he concluded.

From the darkness outside came a sardonic echo. "Blaa!" Lily the mascot
had seen fit to accept the uplifter's invitation.

When the party broke up, the uplifter showed an inclination to linger after
the Wildcat made his departure, but presently he realized the failure of his
ambition.

"Come on heah, Honey Tone," the Wildcat invited. "I walks a ways wid
yo'."

Once along the dark street Honey Tone sought to review the ouija
performance. "What fo' wuz you shovin' weegee an' makin' de spirits say
'yes' when they craved to say 'no'?"

"How come shovin'? Spirits does de shovin'. Ol' weegee tells de truf'. Yo'
sho' is married, ain't yo'?"

"I tells you once I ain't. I tells you now I ain't, Don' say no mo'."

"When you talks 'at way you sho' sounds lak a Cunnel, Honey Tone."

The Wildcat switched the conversation to the details of the parade.

"Is all de 'rangements done?"

"'Rangements done, 'ceptin' de mule I rides."

"Ah'll git de mule. Whah at does I meet you?"

"Parade stahts at noon f'm Willie Webster's barbeh shop. Us marches th'oo
town an' hol's de gran' review at de ball park."

A little farther down the street the two halted. "Whah at does you live,
Honey Tone?" the Wildcat inquired.

Honey Tone did not see fit to reveal the location of his present domicile.
"Down de street a ways," he said.

The pair parted. "Don' fo'git mah parade-leadin' mule fo' tomorrow," Honey
Tone admonished, "an' 'blige me by not referrin' no mo' to no wife whut I
ain't got."

"Ah'll 'blige him," the Wildcat mentally conceded. "Afteh tomorrow Ah
don't need to do no wife-referrin' 'bout Honey Tone."

The Wildcat went to sleep that night enjoying the details of a plan wherein
Honey Tone's radiant future was considerably overcast by the clouds of
retribution.

CHAPTER III

1.

At breakfast on the following morning he repeated his invitation to Captain
Jack's cook. "Ol' Cap'n an' de Lady bofe gone away. No need you stayin'
roun' here all de time. Git to de gran'stan' early an' git a front seat. Mebbe
you'll meet up wid one ob mah pussonal lady fren's—Cuspidora Lee, whut I
boa'ded wid befo' de wah claimed me. Cuspido' said she g'wine to weah a
big pink hat wid yaller feathers. 'At's how you knows her. You sees me an'
mah mascot when us swings pas' de gran' stan'. Ah'll be follerin' de
Supreem Leader. He be ridin' a mule."

The Wildcat spent the next half hour festooning his mascot goat with
raiment appropriate for the grand march. Lily's O.D. service coat was
brightened with a red tissue paper sash. The Wildcat sewed a turkey wing
fan to the mascot's overseas cap and wired the gaudy combination securely
in place between Lily's horns.

"Hot dam! I says you parades." For himself he borrowed a few things which
lay here and there in the trunk room of Captain Jack's house. He stowed his
own paraphernalia in a gunnysack. Leading Lily, he made his way to the
neighbour's woodshed wherein was stabled the overgrown night-braying
mule.

"Gimme dis heah mule, boy—an' a saddle," he said to the brunet guardian
of the neighbour's mule. "I needs him temporary."

"How come?"

"I craves him fo' de Culled Heroes' Parade. Some day I gives you two bits
does you lend him half a day. All he does in heah is eat you po' an' wake
folks up."

"Whah at's de two bits?" The exchange was effected, and presently, leading
the mule and the festooned mascot, the Wildcat arrived at the rendezvous in
front of Willie Webster's establishment. He tethered the mule to a hitching
post and led Lily into the barber shop.

"How come de goat?" one of the assemblage questioned.

"See dem stripes? Lily went th'oo more battles dan you has sense. F'm now
on, whah at I is, Lily is. Bible says, 'Whah at de goat, dere is Ah also goat.'
Stan' up heah, Lily."

The mascot was vainly endeavouring to eat the feathers from the top of her
own head.

"Ca'm yo'se'f. Whah at's de Supreem Parade Leadeh?"

Honey Tone Boone stepped out of the adjoining room. "'At you, Wildcat?
Whah at's mah steed?"

"Hitched outdoors. Sho' is rarin' to go. Parade-leadinest mule Ah eveh see."

Honey Tone took a look through the window at his conspicuous mount.
"Sure looms up. How come de goat?"

"'At goat's mah pussonal luck."

Honey Tone looked sideways at the Wildcat. "Does yo' feel like backin' yo'
luck wid a jingle, mebbe I 'bliges yo' sudden. Dey's a racetrack in de back
room does you crave to gallop yo' luck a couple of heats."

The Wildcat accepted the challenge. The pair walked quickly into the back
room.

"Shoots a dollah!" He explored himself for silver and revised his challenge.
"Shoots fifty cents. Ain't got but sixty, an' I needs a dime fo' goobers does I
lose."

"Boy, roll 'em." Honey Tone proffered a pair of anxious dice, but the
Wildcat paid no attention to the offer.

"I got mah pussonal weapons," he said. He fished a pair of dice from his left
shoe. "Dey speaks de language. Gallopehs, git right. Wham! Ah tol' you! Ah
lets it lay. Shoots a dollah."

Honey Tone faded the bet. "Roll 'em." The Wildcat touched the tips of his
fingers to Lily's head. "Goat, stan' by me." His swinging hand released a
pair of dice whose innocent upturned faces presently revealed a four and a
trey. "Seven! Ah lets it lay. Whole hog o' de squeal."

"Roll 'em!"

"Bam. Six an' five. Ah done climbed de luck tree. Honey Tone, shake me
out. Shoots fo' dollahs. Lily, stan' by me!"

"Blaa!" remarked Lily.

"Boy, roll 'em." Honey Tone began to itch for possession of the dice.

"Asleep in de snowdrift. When Lily says 'blaa' Ah lets 'em ride."

"An' seven! Ah lets it lay."

"Shoot, you fool, nobody neveh made five passes."

"Nobody but me." The Wildcat opened his dusky palm and a natural seven
leaped to the gaze of a waiting world. Honey Tone's eyes bulged with
surprise.

The Wildcat accumulated his winnings. From the crumpled handful of bills
he selected a dollar bill, which he twisted into a tempting little salad

bouquet. "Lily, eat this fo' luck. Ah reaps de greens to nutrify mah mascot!
Shoots ten dollahs!"

Lily munched delicately on the dollar bill while the Wildcat continued with
the harvest. The deeper Honey Tone sank into the bogs of chance, the more
he resented the introduction of the Wildcat's trained dice. Once, in the run
of hard luck, he showed signs of weakening, but the Wildcat was quick to
rally him with the adroit tongue of flattery.

"One thing I'll say fo' Honey Tone—win or lose, dat boy rides along. Sho' is
a vet'ran sport."

In the Wildcat's compliment Honey Tone's effort to unload from the
wreckbound train of chance found defeat. He rode along, hope springing
eternal, until his financial condition approximated zero.

"Shoots twenty dollars." The Wildcat's announcement leaped from a pair of
belligerent lungs.

"Ain't got but 'leven fifty." Honey Tone's voice was husky.

"Shoots 'leven fifty." The game was delayed a moment while the Wildcat
hunted for appropriate minor currency. "Heah's de fifty cents I stahted wid.
Lily, at ease!" The Southern Hemisphere of the mascot subsided.

"Honey Tone, you sin-'fested uplifteh, feel de axe. Bam! Dey reads four
trey. Lily, at res'."

The victorious Wildcat added the last of his winnings to the bulky roll
inside his pocket. "'At winds yo' up, big boy. De Supreem leadin' mule rides
easier now. Yo' weighs six hund'ed dollahs less."

A unit on the outer fringe of the pop-eyed audience pressed forward to
where the Wildcat stood. "Same ol' cyclone," he said in greeting. "Wilecat,
you 'membehs me? I ain't seed sich a fust-class cleanin' since us fit de battle
of Bo'deaux an' yo' win all de payday us boys got."

The Wildcat suddenly recognized the speaker. "Backslid! How come yo'
heah? Hot dog! I sho' is glad to see yo'."

"Ah come home casual, count of stummik mis'ry th'ee weeks afteh yo' lef
Bo'deaux," the Backslid Baptist explained. "Sho' is glad to see yo'."

"You 'membehs Honey Tone?" The Wildcat introduced the uplifter. "Honey
Tone leads de parade. Us starts in five minutes. Jine in, Backslid, an' yo'
marches 'longside ob me an' Lily."

"Sho' 'steem to, Wilecat, but I takes mah run dis aftehnoon."

"How come run?"

"I's back on de ol' job runnin' Pullman out of Chicago. I's due out on de
Fliah fo' Chicago at two-fo'ty. Any time yo' craves a ramble on de cushions,
roun' me up. Ah stakes yo' to a white coat an' yo' is aced in as mah helpeh.
Pullman service is crammed wid dead-head helpehs now de Guv'ment's
runnin' de lines. An' Boy—once us 'rives at Chicago de gran' ruckus
begins!"

"Backslid, 'at sho' sounds noble. Some day me an' Lily sho' make a trip wid
you."

The Wildcat and his former associate were interrupted by Honey Tone
Boone. "Wilecat, you's de Supreem Arrangeh, ain't you? Roun' up de
humans. Fawm de parade. Us starts."

The Wildcat threw back his head and addressed the gathering in the barber
shop. "Company, 'tenshun! All de niggahs in de room whut's gwine to jine
de gran' parade, fall out de do' an' fall in!" He led the rush for the exit.
Outdoors he repeated the announcement. "Gran' parade led by Honey Tone
Boone. Followin' me an' Lily comes de brass ban'. Den comes de Sons ob
Damon. Sons ob Damon wearin' de yellah belly ban's walks ahead.
Followin' de Sons ob Damon, de Knights wid de Red Pants falls in. Parade
marches fo' an' fo', ladies outside. Keep off de car tracks. Followin' de
Knights wid de Red Pants comes de 'Filiated Toilers.

"Cornet Club comes nex', 'ceptin' de big bass drum. Fetch dat bass drum
oveh heah. Yo' marches by me."

He turned to a group of human beings whose sole common characteristic
was their colour and the colour of the sashes which were tied about them.
"Whut outfit is you boys?"

"Us is de Committee ob Culled Democrats."

"How come they let you out ob jail? Fall in behin' de lunch wagon. 'At's
whah you gin'lly is."

The drum-bamming giant took his place opposite the Wildcat. The Wildcat
turned to the Supreme Organizer of the Culled Militarriers of America. "Git
abo'ad 'at steed, Honey Tone," he said.

Honey Tone clambered on to the mule with the assistance of a pair of agile
bystanders. The Wildcat closed his eyes and lifted his head high in the air.
"Company, 'tenshun!" He turned to the drum-bammer opposite him. "Le-e-
t's go!"

"Bam!" The crash inside the bass drum found a deafening echo in a blare of
exploding horns and cornets. Lily shied close beside her master. Honey
Tone's mule drooped a languid ear over a bulging eyeball as if to shut out a
vision of impending disaster, and then, at the second note from the bass
drum, the mule leaped into a wild gallop. Before the marchers had covered
a hundred feet Honey Tone and his jug-head mount had passed the fire hall
three blocks down the street.

The parade marched steadily toward the ball park. Ten minutes later Honey
Tone and the mule clattered past the parade. "Ol' mule sho' steers noble, but
he kain't stop," the Wildcat announced to the drum-bammer opposite him.

On Honey Tone's third visit the Wildcat called loudly to him. "Head 'at
mule roun' nex' time an' back him in de ball park." The Supreme Organizer's
reply was lost in a clatter of hoofs.

2.

At the ball park the parade waited for the intermittent uplifter. As Honey
Tone galloped past the head of the column he did a Brodie and landed
breathless against the big bass drum. "Boom!"

"Whuf!" he said. "Ketch dat mule!" The hero blood pulsed strong in the
veins of the Knights with the Red Pants. They rallied to the rescue. The
organization deployed, and presently the big night-braying mule was again
delivered into Honey Tone's reluctant hands.

"Wait till Ah 'ranges 'at steed." The Wildcat loosened the saddle girth.
Unseen by Honey Tone, he removed a small horseshoe from between the
saddle blanket and the mule's epidermis. "Sho' brings de luck. Some boy
got de luck hunch figgered wrong. Git aboa'd, Honey Tone.—Blanket got
wrinkled. He done ca'm down now. Ah knows him. Git aboa'd an' lead de
parade into de ball park an' pas' de gran'stan'."

In the face of the assemblage Honey Tone could not back down. He
mounted the mule. To his surprise the animal walked slowly and with all the
peculiar dignity that a mule can summon. The uplifter looked down at the
Wildcat. "Line 'em up fo' de gran' entry," he said.

The Wildcat turned and called loudly to the marching column. "Company,
'tenshun! Heads up fo' de gran' entry." He turned to his companion. "Keep
de drum goin'. Ah waits to see de parade git by an' is eve'ything arranged
right." The Wildcat faded out. When the end of the marching column passed
him he walked quickly to a policeman who was standing near the portals of
the entrance to the ball park.

"Cap'n, suh," he said to the policeman, "'at mule leadin' de parade b'longs to
Misteh Joe Carroll, whut's de neighbour ob Cap'n Jack Stuart, whah at I
wucks. Ah ain't sayin' 'at ridin' niggah stole 'at mule, but Ah knows Misteh
Carroll neveh lent him. 'At niggah's no good. Ah knows him."

"What outfit is this parade?" the officer asked.

"Ain't no outfit. 'At triflin' niggah on de mule claims he's organizin' a new
lodge—gits folks wild to jine, and den lif's de 'nitiation money. Nex' day
mebbe turns up in Vicksburg o' some place else whah some mo' fool
niggahs craves to jine on wid him. He sho' don' b'long here. Ah knows
him!"

A record is a record. An arrestis an arrest, and the capture of a mule thief is
a star of magnitude in any one's official crown. The policeman walked into
the ball park and headed across to where a companion officer was standing
in front of the grandstand. At the moment, in the grandstand Cuspidora Lee
and Captain Jack's cook, seated together, were just beginning to get
acquainted. "Seems like I knows dat boy," the cook remarked. "'At boy on
de big mule."

"I knows him too." The tenor of pride rang in Cuspidora's pronouncement.
"Ah knows him well. He's de Supreem Parade Organizeh. 'At man's rich—
on'y las' night at de weegee 'semblage in mah house he showed me nearly
six hunn'ed dollahs. When de social visitin' part starts afteh de parade I
gives yo' a howdy-do, does yo' crave to meet up wid him; but don' git triflin'
wid him, woman. 'At's all. He's mah man."

"How come?"

Cuspidora brindled engagingly.

"Us aims to git married soon as de local organizin' is finished."

"Ain't it gran'? Whut yo' say his name is?"

Honey Tone and his trailing parade were plodding along toward Cuspidora
Lee and Captain Jack's cook. When Honey Tone came closer Cuspidora
waved archly at the Supreme Organizer.

"Whut yo' say his name is?" The ponderous cook at Cuspidora's side
repeated her question.

The Lee lips answered absently. "Boone—Huntington Boone."

The cook swept the back of her hand across her eyes. "Boone! 'At's him!"
She turned to Cuspidora. "You aims to marry him, does you? Well, marry
him sudden. Ah aims to kill him. 'At niggah an' me married each other two
yeahs befo' he went to wah!"

The cook bellowed hoarsely once in the Supreme Organizer's direction.
"Honey Tone!" A shrill echo came from Cuspidora's lips. The Supreme
Organizer wilted from the deck of his mule. Without looking around, he
started for the entrance of the ball park, but before he had covered half the
distance he was overtaken by a furious tigress. Cuspidora Lee had
outdistanced Honey Tone's wife in her pursuit of the Organizer, and to her
went first blood. At Cuspidora Lee's hands Honey Tone took the count just
in time to get his chattering teeth full of his enraged wife's crunching heels.
"Stan' back, Cuspido'! Ah aims to tromple 'at snake in de dust!"

Thereafter, for a space of minutes the massacre proceeded with systematic
fury. It ended only when the policeman unlimbered a wicked sap and
forcibly dragged the battling brunettes from their crumpled victim.

"Git to hell away from that nigger," the officer yelled at the two women.
With the assistance of a hearty boost from the policeman, the Supreme
Organizer struggled to his feet.

"Lemme go—lemme go!" he gasped.

Wham! The two-foot swagger stick in the hand of the police officer found
its target. "Shut up, you mule-stealin' baboon. Come on here! You git fifty
years in jail if we don't lynch you!"

Honey Tone Boone, the uplifter, trailed along with the policeman.

The Wildcat, with his mascot goat close beside him in the shadows of the
entrance to the ball park, witnessed the consummation of his plans. "Ah'll
say I's de Supreem Gran' Arrangeh!" he exulted. "Grandes' 'rangeh whut is!
Eve'ything sho' is 'ranged noble."

He tied a leading-string around the mascot's neck. "Come on heah, Lily. Us
fades befo' Honey Tone busts loose f'm de jail. Us rides de Fliah to Chicago
wid ol'Backslid. He's mah fren'. Le's go!"

CHAPTER IV

"Memphis, let me miss you! Feet, see kin you trod de good-bye jazz! Lily,
le's go! Git in step! C'm on heah befo' Ah jerks yo' head loose f'm yo'
horns."

Lily lagged. No guilty conscience impelled the mascot goat. In addition to
this, lacking mental momentum, her progress was considerably impeded by
a parade uniform consisting of an O.D. army shirt which dangled loosely
about her forelegs.

Half a block down the street Lily's parade raiment slipped. Her hobbles
tripped her. The galloping Wildcat felt an added drag on the leading string.
He glanced backward in his flight.

"Goat, how come you lose the cadence? Doggone you, see kin you skid till
you gits in step."

Lily bought the next fifty yards with an expenditure of some epidermis and
two ounces of goat hair.

She regained her feet, staggering under a ponderous ambition for revenge.
Forty feet from the Calhoun Street curb she took careful aim at the Wildcat
and stepped on the accelerator. The Wildcat coasted into Calhoun Street
with his parade-leading Prince Albert flapping straight out behind him. He
skidded over the curb in a pose which cost his army pants half of their
seating capacity.

Inertia claimed him. He rolled his head slowly over his shoulder and gazed
in bewilderment upon his prancing Nemesis.

"Lily, at ease!" The goat ambled up beside him. "At res'!"

The Wildcat grabbed for the mascot's leading string. "You an' me declares
peace. Ah done wrong when Ah drug you, but now see kin you ramble. Ah
craves to reach de Chicago Fliah whah at de ol' Backslid Baptis' is porter, so
us kin leave town without leadin' no mob."

"Blaa!" Lily answered in forgiveness.

About the mascot's chest the Wildcat adjusted the O.D. shirt with its three
service stripes. He tilted the little overseas cap which Lily wore to a rakish
angle between the mascot's horns.

With Lily clicking along at the Wildcat's heels, the pair entered the portals
of the Grand Central Station.

The Wildcat accosted a Red Cap of his own colour. "Whah at kin I find de
Backslid Baptist whut takes care o' de white gen'men on de Chicago Fliah
'at leaves at 2:40?"

"I knows 'at boy dey calls Backslid, but dey ain't no Fliah leavin' at 2:40.
'At boy runs Pullman on de Panama Limited, leavin' heah at 10:10 tonight.
Ol' Backslid neveh shows up till half-past nine to take his cah out."

Confronted by seven intervening hours of life in Memphis, which might
include the release of Honey Tone Boone, whose temporary confinement in
the jail had just been accomplished, the Wildcat's ambition flopped. His sole
desire for the moment was for a high-grade segment of camouflage or the
sanctuary of a close-fitting black cave.

"Whah at kin me an' Lily hide out till mah fren' Backslid shows up?"

The Red Cap looked at him. "What you done—outrun a bullet f'm some
white man's gun, o' mebbe busted jail?"

The Wildcat's skin shrank a size or two at the mention of jail. "I ain't done
nuthin'. Fo'git dem jail words. All I got is business in Chicago, an' I aims to
ride wid de Baptist."

The Red Cap came to realize that the Wildcat sought to avoid publicity. "I
knows a place whah you kin crawl undah a five-dollah bill an' hide."

"Whah at's de place?"

"Whah at's de five-dollah bill?"

The Wildcat produced the greenback. The Red Cap took it.

"C'm on heah wid me." He led the Wildcat and Lily to the rooms where Red
Caps shifted from their civilian raiment to the uniform of their calling.

"Nobody but us boys neveh comes heah. Ah'll pass de word to de Backslid
Baptis' to hunt you up when he 'rives f'm uptown tonight."

Until nine o'clock that night the Wildcat and Lily lay under cover. Shortly
after nine o'clock the Backslid Baptist arrived at the station to board his
Pullman, which would be cut into the Panama Limited.

He encountered the Wildcat in the latter's retreat.

"How come? When Ah seed you dis aftehnoon you an' Lily wuz in de
parade-leadin' business, followin' Honey Tone Boone on de mule."

"Us changed since den, Backslid. Ol' Honey Tone done unconsecrate hisself
f'm de parade-leadin' mule."

"Whah at is he now?"

"Safe in jail, whah at Cuspido' Lee an' de otheh wild woman kain't claim de
remains. Whut time does us leave?"

"How come de 'us'?"

"I craves to furlough mahself loose f'm Memphis fo' a while. Does ol'
Honey Tone git free mebbe he uprises agin' me."

"C'm on.... Us is due out at 10:10."

Before the Backslid Baptist was into his uniform a boy brought an order
slip to him. He read it and handed it to the Wildcat.

The Wildcat looked at the paper.

"You knows Ah kain't read, Backslid. What 'at paper say?"

"Ah switches to a N'O'leans cah—de Mazeppa. Otheh boy's sick."

"How come he sick?"

"Some boys gits sick so as to miss Ol' Man Trouble. Might have made a
cleanin' wid de bones. Might crave to meet up wid some fren's in Memphis.
Kain't say how come. Us finishes de boy's run. Come on!"

The Backslid Baptist led the way to the platform in the long train shed.
"Don't know kin I deadhead 'at goat."

"Sho' kin, Baptist. 'At mascot don't take up no room. 'At goat traveled f'm
N'Yawk to San F'mcisco in de vegetable bin on a dinin' cah. Lily ain't no
rampager."

When the Panama Limited roared into the train shed Lily cringed against
the Wildcat's legs. "Stan' up theh! How come you scared at de ol' train?"

Followed by the Wildcat and Lily, the Backslid Baptist sought his car.
"Whah at's de Mazeppa?" he asked the first porter whom he encountered.

"Hello, Backslid. Is you runnin' Mazeppa?"

"Aims to."

"Menagerie cah."

"How come?"

"Dogdest cahload ob folks Ah evah see. Wait till mawnin' an' you sees yo'
passengers. 'At's de ol' battleship, five cahs back."

The Wildcat and Lily, in the wake of the Backslid Baptist, presently
boarded the Mazeppa.

Once inside the car, the porter sniffed heavily. "Gin trip. Thank de Lawd
ain't no kids. Don't smell no bananas. Lis'sen. Heah dat boy snore?"

"Snores lak he's chokin' to death."

"Ain't chokin'. 'At's a fat boy wid de alcohol snorts."

The Backslid Baptist sniffed again. "Sho' is."

"Is what?"

"Chorus girl lady, o' mebbe one ob dem movin' picture ladies."

"Ah'll say you does."

"Does what?"

"Sees an' heahs wid yo' nose. Did anybody bust you in de beak dey'd knock
you deaf an' blind."

"Wilecat, Ah run Pullman ten yeahs—boy sho' gits deprived ob a lot ob
ignorance in dat time. Sho' gits so he knows de folks on his cah quick. Gits
to be a reg'lah mind readeh."

The Wildcat looked at the Backslid Baptist. "Whut dat fat boy wid de
alcohol snorts thinkin' about?"

The mind-reading porter looked at the Wildcat. A slow smile cut a red gash
in his face.

"Same as you—de half bottle whut's left."

"Ah'll say you's a mind reader. Read an' see does de half bottle need a
guardeen."

"Fo'get dat guardeen business. Tomorrow mawin' he gives it to you does
you crave it. 'At boy wouldn't look cross-eyed at you in town, but when you
weahs de unifawm mos' likely does you crave a dram o' his liquor he be
proud to give it to you. When him an' de headache wakes up tomorrow—"

Zing! From above the Wildcat's head an electric bell rang with the
suddenness of a striking rattlesnake.

"Whut dat?"

"Ca'm yo'sef. Some passengeh ringin' fo' de porteh. Store dat goat in heah
befo' de ol' train conductor comes th'oo."

The Backslid Baptist opened the door of the linen closet. Lily the mascot
was ushered into the dark cave beneath the shelves.

"Lily, at res'! See kin you sleep whilst Ah learns de porter business." The
Wildcat began to absorb the free ice-water.

Zing! The annunciator rang again with an impatient note.

"Put dis white coat on you whilst I sees who wants whut." The Backslid
Baptist handed the Wildcat a white linen coat. The Wildcat removed his
long parade-leading Prince Albert with the red plush sash and the yellow
epaulets and donned the white jacket.

The Backslid Baptist returned from the far end of the car. "Fat boy in
Loweh 7 wid de alcohol snorts craves ice-wateh. Fill a papeh cup an' carry
it back to him."

The Wildcat filled a paper cup with ice-water and started down the aisle of
the car. He returned presently.

"Kain't find whah at is 'at boy."

"You looks till you sees '7' on de curtains. 'At's whah he is."

The Wildcat essayed a second attempt with his life-saving ice-water. He had
proceeded half the length of the car when, above the muffled rattles and
creaks of its fabric, there lifted a wild shrieking laughter.

The paper cup in the Wildcat's clutching hand was crushed flat. From the
cup there gushed a geyser of ice-water straight for the parted curtains of
Lower 7.

CHAPTER V

The wild laughter from somewhere across the aisle continued, but now it
was punctuated by three voices.

"F'r Gawd's sake, dearie, be quiet!"

"Spluff! What th' hell—"

"Lady Luck, whah at is you?"

The Wildcat galloped back along the swaying aisle to the protection of the
Backslid Baptist.

The high-pitched laughter pursued him.

"Pull de stoppin' string, Baptis'! Ah craves to git off dis train."

"Ca'm yo'se'f. Whut ails you?"

"Heah dat laffin'? Heah dat crazy—"

Zing! Zing! ZING!

"Doggone 'at Loweh 7. Did you wateh dat boy?"

The Wildcat looked at the crushed cup in his hand. "Ah'll say so. Missed 'at
boy's neck, but de ol' ice-wateh sho' baptized him."

"See whut he wants again."

"You betteh see, Baptis'. I's just learnin'."

"Dearie, be quiet before I wring your neck!" A strident feminine voice
addressed the author of the laughter. "Shut up! There, there, dearie.... Oh,
you feen, leggo! My gawd, he bit me!"

"Purty purty burd. Purty purty burd."

"You feen!"

"Quawk!"

Down the length of the car, from between the berth curtains there began to
appear an assortment of human heads.

Above the scene there sounded the flutter of beating wings.

The Backslid Baptist dived into the centre of the Pullman.

"What is it, porter?"

"Jes' gittin' into Carbondale." The porter's calm voice dispelled the terrors
of the night.

"Leggo! Leggo! Doggone you. Backslid! Come heah!"

A furore of acrobatic groaning marked a scene wherein the Wildcat was
doing the best he could to pry himself loose from something that clung to
various parts of his anatomy with a beak and eight sharp claws.

"Come heah! Light de light. Some varmint's got me."

The Backslid Baptist retraced his steps. "Ain't no varmint. One ob dem
parrot birds."

The Backslid Baptist made a grab for the parrot, and from the bird's throat
into the night again there lifted the wild laughter.

The porter opened the door of the linen closet wherein Lily the mascot goat
was quietly eating her third pillow case. He cast the parrot from him into

the darkness of the linen closet. "Wilecat, tell de lady in Lo' 10 Ah'll take
keer de parrot till mawin'."

The parrot landed on Lily's neck. From behind the slammed door came a
muffled "Blaa!" followed by the subdued noises of a large number-nine-
sized ruckus.

Zing! Zing! ZING!

"I's coming. I's coming." The Backslid Baptist filled two cups of ice-water
and started toward Lower 7 with them.

"Heah you is.... Yessuh. No suh. Yessuh, Ah'll git you some mo'."

"Here's a half bottle of that blasted stuff. Take it away where I can't smell it.
That ice-water sure is good. Were you ever zippo on gin?"

"No suh. Ah'll git you some mo' ice-water."

The Backslid Baptist, conveying half a bottle of gin, neglected to state that
he had never been able to accumulate enough gin at one time to get himself
zippo.

He encountered the Wildcat in the smoking room. He handed the Wildcat
the half bottle of gin. "Ah'll say I's a mind reader."

"See whut de good Lawd done sent!"

"Afteh de storm comes de quiet waters."

"Comes de gin, you means. Ol' fat boy drink de watehs. Us drinks de gin.
Gin, how is you?"

The Wildcat soothed himself with three strenuous gulps. "Whuf! Liquor,
how de do!"

The Backslid Baptist departed with the third cargo of ice-water for the
gentleman in Lower 7. He returned after a little while. Dangling from his

fingers and carried in his arms were a dozen pairs of shoes.

He threw the shoes down on the end seat in the smoking room. "Start to
work on de shoes, Wilecat. Don' do nothin' to de new shoes—much—an' hit
de ol' ones light. De middle-grade shoes gits a good shinin'. Folks whut
weahs middle-grade shoes is ol'-time travellers an' gin'ally comes up strong
wid de income tax fo' us boys."

The bell in the passageway sounded its summons.

"Doggone! See who dat is."

The apprenticed Wildcat read the indicator. "Ain't no numbeh. De little
hand turned on de letters."

"Whut de letters say?"

"Backslid, you knows I kain't read."

The Backslid Baptist set the nearly empty bottle of gin on the washstand
and walked into the passageway.

"'Partment B," he announced upon his return. "Dey's two 'partments, A and
B, and a drawin' room. You knows 'B' when you sees it. Knock at de do' an'
ask whut is it."

The Wildcat departed on his mission. At the door of Compartment B he
encountered a bald-headed gentleman clad in violent pink pajamas. The
gentleman's face was festooned with a long, blond mustache. He thrust a
coat, a vest, and a pair of trousers through the door at the Wildcat.

"Have these pressed," he ordered. "Here's a brace of shillings for you. Fee
the tailor chap."

"Cap'n, yessuh."

The Wildcat returned to the smoking room. "Boy in de 'partment room whut
gobbles lak a turkey says, 'Press de clo'es, boy, an' heah's a dollah.' Dollah,

how is you? Sho' is easy money."

"English boy. Dey's de clo'es-pressin'est folks in de world, 'ceptin' actors."

"Whah at does I git dese fixed up?"

"No place. Hang de coat up. Sprinkle de pants wid wateh an' lay 'em undeh
a pile ob sheets in de linen closet. By mornin' dey's pressed. You charges
anotheh dollah."

"Sho' is easy money." The Wildcat hung the Britisher's coat and vest in the
smoking room. He walked into the passageway and opened the door of the
linen closet. A four-legged cyclone burst from the dark depths of the linen
closet. Riding the cyclone was a bedraggled parrot. The parrot showed the
wear and tear of travel.

The Wildcat called loudly at the cyclone.

"Lily, halt! 'Tenshun! Whah at's de mil'tary bearin' you got in France? Come
heah!"

The mascot walked to the Wildcat's side. From Lily's cringing back the
Wildcat lifted the battle-scarred parrot.

The Wildcat boosted Lily back into the solitude of the linen closet. "Lily,
'tenshun. At ease! At res'!"

The goat executed the commands with the military precision which had
come from long months of training in the A.E.F.

"'Tenshun! At ease. One mo' false move an' I th'ows you oveh-boa'd off de
train."

The Wildcat retrieved a piece of string and turned his attention to the parrot.
"You green debbil. Lay off 'at goat. Ah ties you on de top shelf. One mo'
move an' us has fricasseed green chicken afteh de dinin' cah man gits you."

"'Tenshun!" mocked the parrot. "At ease!" Lily, prone in the depths of the
linen closet, obeyed the commands.

The Wildcat tied the string around the parrot's leg. "Dere, dat holds you, an
quit mockin' me befo' I knocks yo' beak down yo' throat."

"At rest!" the parrot gurgled.

The Wildcat closed the door of the linen closet. The parrot lost no time in
biting the string loose from about her leg, after which she rejoined her four-
legged companion.

"'Tenshun!" she squawked. "At res'! Tenshun! At res'!"

Thereafter until dawn, obeying the perfect counterfeit of her master's voice,
Lily the mascot goat came to attention and subsided at rest with the
persistent rhythm of a man on a hand-car.

CHAPTER VI

The Wildcat returned to his shoe-shining. "When does us boys sleep,
Backslid?" "When de chance comes," the Backslid Baptist returned. "You
sleeps between stations an' 'twixt jobs of work. Gin'ally when de bell rings
at night you pay no 'tenshun to it. Folks is finicky. Dey gits along just de
same does you answer de bell or don't you. Hurry up wid de shoes. When
you gits 'em done come on up th'ee cahs ahead. Dey's some res'less ivory on
dat cah, an' mebbe us collects some money whut's lonesome to change
managers."

The Backslid Baptist departed for the third car ahead, where in the smoking
room the galloping ivory was clicking strong on the linoleum.

The Wildcat finished his work on the shoes of the passengers on the
Mazeppa. He carried the shoes forward with him until he came upon the
crap game.

"Heah's de shoes, Backslid," he said. "Men, howdy."

"Whut fo' you bring dem shoes all de way up heah?"

"Ah kain't read yo' numbehs whah at to distribute 'em."

"Lay 'em down. Ah'll take 'em back afteh while. Gimme dem bones. Shoots
five dollahs." The Backslid Baptist launched himself into an energetic arm-
swinging struggle, wherein presently he lost after his third pass.

"Take a ra'r, Wilecat. See is you still 'fested wid luck like you wuz in de
A.E.F."

The Wildcat was a stranger to everybody present except the Backslid
Baptist.

"Who dat boy?" one of the group of porters asked.

"Learnin' boy f'm Memphis. Ah knows him." With this endorsement the
Wildcat was plunged into the game.

"Gimme dem bones. Hind laigs at res'." The Wildcat subsided to the floor.
"Fingehs, lemme see kin you play de pickpocket jazz. Shoots five dollahs.
Wham! Ah reads a feeble five. Five stay alive. Five Ah craves. Lady Luck,
boon me. P'odigal five, come home whah de fat calf waits. Bam! Th'ee an' a
deuce. Ah lets it lay. Shoots ten dollahs. Shower down ten dollahs an' see de
train robbeh perform. Shower down, brothers. Bam! Seven! 'At's twins, but
mah luck comes triple. Shoots de twenty. Shoots twenty dollahs. Heah de
bloodhoun' bay. An' Ah reads ten miles. Chicago bound! Pay day, whah at is
you? Lady Luck, don' git feeble. Angil leanin' on a cloud. De cloud busts!
Angil, heah you is—readin' de five an' five. Five twins, how is you? Shoots
fo'ty dollahs."

One of the group spoke to the Backslid. "Mebbe 'at boy's learnin' de porter
business, but he sho' got old in de bone school a long time back."

The Backslid Baptist grunted his reply.

The Wildcat raked down all of his winnings except a five-dollar bill.
"Shoots five dollahs. Shower down. Windy talk don't shake no possums
loose. Come an' git me on de top limb. Shoots five dollahs. Dynamite dice,
bust de ol' safe do'. Ah craves action. Shoots ten dollahs. Fifty dollahs."

"How much you got?" A cinnamon-coloured Crœsus in the group spoke
softly into the clamour.

The Wildcat turned to him. "Shoots a hund'ed does you crave speed. Shoots
five hund'ed dollahs."

The cinnamon-faced porter produced a roll of bills and stripped a handful of
greenbacks therefrom.

"'At's five hund'ed dollahs. Roll 'em."

"Gallopers, git right."

The Wildcat gave the dice a Turkish bath, a manicure, and a careful
massaging between the perspiring palms of his hands.

He cast a handful of prepared ivory from him. The dice were festooned with
equal parts of luck and technical skill, but their precise trajectory was
interrupted by a string of high joints and low centres in the track over which
rambled the Panama Limited.

"An' I reads—ace and deuce."

The cinnamon-coloured boy picked up the money on the floor.

"'At'll learn you."

The Wildcat was silent. The Backslid Baptist, sharing the shadow of his
associate's sudden cloud of black luck, spoke slowly to him.

"C'm on heah, Wilecat. Us is nex' do' to bein' busted."

In the wake of the Backslid Baptist the Wildcat ambled back through the
swaying cars to the Mazeppa. He carried on his bowed shoulders a load of
misery big enough to bust a bottle of dynamite gin.

The Backslid Baptist stretched himself full length on the long leather seat of
the smoking room.

"Baptist, how come it I don' know. De baby gallopehs wuz spinnin' fo'
seven."

"Rough track an' de rocky road swerved 'em. Git to sleep. Us is due at
Champaign at 8:10. Money come, money go. Whuteveh sleep you gits is

that much to de good."

The Wildcat flopped down on the floor of the smoking room, but sleep
would not come to him.

At half past seven the Backslid Baptist on the leather seat began mumbling
to himself. A little later he awakened.

"Wilecat, whut dat noise?"

"Ain't heard no noise." All the Wildcat had heard was the accents of his
bank-roll bidding him a last farewell.

"'At thumpin' noise." The Backslid Baptist's ears, keenly attuned to the
turmoil of travel, distinguished in the sounds about him some unfamiliar
puncture of the normal din.

"Sounded lak beatin' a board wid a stick."

"Kain't heah nothin'."

The Backslid Baptist yawned. "Some ob dem early risers f'm de tall sticks
sure to be up by now. When Ah starts makin' up de berths you kin sweep
out de cah an' 'cumulate de sheets an' pillow cases. Stick 'em in de canvas
bag in de linen closet an' take back de boy's clo'es he gin you to press."

The Wildcat traversed the length of the aisle back of a swinging broom. On
the return trip he encountered the Backslid Baptist busily engaged in
making up Lower 1.

"Backslid, who dem two boys half way down de cah wid de red hats?"

"You means de boys wid de red fezants? Dem's a couple ob Potent Nobles
ob de Mysterious Mecca. All de Mysterious Mecca boys in de world is
havin' a gran' ruckus next month on de Pacific Coast."

"How come dey start so early?"

"Dey falls by de wayside heah an' dere, an' dey starts early so as to git
picked up by some worthy Brother wid steady laigs. 'At fat boy wid de red
fezant is de one whut had de gin hiccoughs."

"Kain't see did he."

"Gin'ally dey carries it noble. Dere's de little lady whut owns de parrot
bird."

The owner of the parrot bird was a left-over soubrette who had bust in
Havana with a road production of The Sillies of 1492. The little lady had
completed her spring drinking and was now en route to a big-time meal-
ticket scheduled to start from Chicago.

She saw the Wildcat.

"Porter, where is little Polly?"

"Yessum. I secluded 'at green chicken in de linen closet. Does you crave
him now?"

"Yes. I want to have her with me for breakfast—the poor lonesome
darling."

"Accordin' to de words 'at varmint used last night, he's too tough to make
much of a brekfus'."

The Wildcat went to the end of the car and opened the linen closet wherein
he had cached the parrot.

With the opening of the door the mystery of the thumping noise which he
and the Backslid Baptist had heard was explained. In a low falsetto the
parrot was repeating the two military commands which she had learned.

"'Tenshun! At res'! 'Tenshun! At res'!"

Lily, the mascot goat, was contributing the last fragment of muscular energy
to the business of obeying orders. In response to the parrot's commands the

goat languidly flopped at rest on the floor of the linen closet and came to
her feet at attention.

"Lawd Gawd, Lily! At res' an' stay 'at way!"

Gratitude rang in the answering "Blaa" of Lily the goat.

The Wildcat reached for the parrot. "You green debbil! Whut you mean,
exercisin' mah mascot all night?"

"Quawk!" The parrot made a vicious swing at the Wildcat's reaching hand.

"Leggo, you debbil!"

The green parrot, fuming in a rage compared to which nitric acid was a
cream puff, was restored to its Spring-drinking owner.

"Lady, heah's de green demon."

"Pretty Polly. What made her little feathers all mussed up?"

The Wildcat returned to his exhausted mascot.

"'At green chicken's lucky does he git by widout gittin' his health an' stren'th
mussed up befo' dis trip ends. At res', Lily, till I brings you some nutriment.
Doggone ol' bird must have near wore you out. 'At's de way wid dem
mil'tary commands. Res' yo'se'f, Lily, till Ah brings yo' brekfust."

"Blaa!" answered Lily, weakly.

The Wildcat detected a tone of hypocrisy,—something of false gratitude—
in the mascot's reply. He returned from the dining car carrying two heads of
lettuce for the mascot. He placed the lettuce under the nose of the
recumbent goat, but Lily refused to eat.

"Fust time Ah eveh seed you slow up when de mess call blowed. How
come?"

An instant later his roving eye discovered the "how come" of Lily's loss of
appetite. In a dark corner of the linen closet he saw a dozen fragments of
white cloth. He hauled them out, and the light revealed the hems of a covey
of sheets and a half dozen pillow cases. Then the web of a home-spun
disaster met his eye. From the lower shelf of the linen closet dangled the
shredded legs of the trousers which the occupant of Compartment B had
given him to be pressed.

"Goat, doggone you, come to 'tenshun! No wondeh you kain't eat lettuce,
wid yo' insides crammed wid a ton ob linen an' half a pair ob pants fo'
dessert. Me sympathizin' wid you, an' you an' de green chicken banquetin'
all night on 'spensive raiment! 'Ceptin' foh havin' to scrub de flo', I'd
barbecue de blood outen yo' veins heah an' now."

The sudden necessity of hiding the evidence confronted the Wildcat.

"By rights I ought to ram de rest ob de pants down yo' neck." The Wildcat
picked up the ragged and frazzled trousers. A moment later he opened the
door of the car platform and cast the remnants of Lily's banquet into the
fleeting right-of-way.

"'Spect some boy find dese an' say, 'Whah at's de man whut de train cut de
laigs off of?' 'At's his trouble. Me—Ah's Chicago bound wid a cahload ob
trouble ob mah own. Main thing to do is to git off de train widout lettin' 'at
boy in 'partment B know we's landed."

He discussed the disaster of the trousers with the Backslid Baptist.

"'At's de on'y way," the porter conceded. "When us gits in we fo'gits 'bout
de boy widout de pants. Dey wuz his pants, Wilecat. Havin' no pants is his
grief. He kin borrow some overalls f'm de cah cleaners, o' else he kin play
he's a Injun an' roam nekked till de police gits him. Does us meet up wid de
ol' Pullman 'spector Ah says 'No suh, Ah dunno how come.' 'At's 'at."

"Sho' don't crave words wid no 'spector," the Wildcat returned. "Dis porter
business de best job in de world. Ridin' all de time, seem' de country—eatin'

heavy, free ice wateh, gran' raiment, talkin' to folks—No suh! Main thing
Ah craves is to git hired by de Pullman boss. 'Spect Ah makes it all right,
Baptis'?"

"You makes it easy. You's done learned de business dis mawnin', ain't you?
Well, I gits you five recommendin' letters f'm a boy whut writes 'em on
Prairie Avenue, an' you gits hired.

"Fust letter says, 'Ah knowed Wilecat goin' on ten yeahs, an' he don't drink.'
Nex' letter say, 'Wilecat jined de church when he wuz four yeahs old an' bin
a soldier ob de Lawd eveh since.' Nex' letter say, 'Boy got to take keer ob
his wife, mother an' father, an' six small chillen.' Nex' letter say, 'Wilecat
sho' beats de worl' fo' readin', writin', an' 'rithmetic.'"

"Backslid, you knows Ah kain't read."

"'At don't make no difference. Letter says so, don't it? Last letter says you's
honest, industrious, an reli'ble."

"How come you so friendly wid dat Democrat letter-writin' boy?"

"How come 'Democrat'?"

"F'm whut you says he's champion liar ob de world. Sounds Democrat to
me. Don' make no difference, though—just so's I gits de job."

CHAPTER VII

Zing!

The owner of the red fez and the night-blooming hiccoughs craved another
pillow and a table. The Wildcat delivered the table and fixed it into place.
He returned to the linen closet to retrieve a pillow case therefrom. When the
door opened, Lily the mascot goat, tired of the dark confines of her retreat,
burst forth and galloped down the aisle of the car.

The Wildcat abandoned his pillow case industry and spent the next two
minutes in rounding up his protégé.

"You ramblin' wreck, come back heah befo' Ah makes a rug out ob yo'
skin."

He returned Lily to her jail and proceeded to deliver the second pillow to
the owner of the alcohol snorts. In common with the rest of the occupants of
the car, that individual voiced his curiosity concerning the animated mascot.

"Son, who owns the goat?"

"Cap'n, suh, Ah owns him now, but some slaughter house man gwine to git
him 'less he ca'ms down."

"What'll you take for him?"

The Wildcat suddenly remembered his financial status. Hard money at the
moment made a strong appeal.

"Cap'n, suh, you means you craves to buy 'at goat?"

In the mind of the Potent Noble of the Mysterious Mecca had bloomed a
Great Idea, wherein the galloping Lily would provide entertainment in
carload lots for the Convention-bound brethren of the Conclave.

"Some days Ah'd sell 'at goat fo' a thin dime. Otheh days Ah'd give a boy a
hund'ed dollahs for killin' him."

"What'll you take for him cash down, f.o.b. Lower 7, car Mazeppa?"

The Wildcat studied for a moment, and then long months of association
clinched the tie which Lady Luck had woven between him and the prodigal
Lily.

"Cap'n, suh, Ah spec' Ah wouldn't sell 'at goat fo' mo'n a million dollahs.
Me an' Lily fit so many battles togetheh in France and on boa'd de ol' iron
boat comin' home 'at Ah kain't see no money big enough to 'suage mah grief
is we divo'ced. Bible says, 'Whither the goat goes, me too.' 'Spec Ah kain't
sell him."

The companion Noble across the table from the hiccoughing gentleman
offered a suggestion. "Round 'em both up for the trip. The Pullman gang'll
fix it for us."

"Good scheme, Jim. The old bean isn't any too clear this morning or I'd
thought of that myself." The owner of the red fezant turned to the Wildcat.

"What's your name, son?"

"Dey named me Marsden, suh—Vitus Marsden—but folks calls me
Wilecat."

"If I can't buy the goat, I guess we'll have to negotiate the custody of your
feline corpus from the Pullman organization for the duration of the Big
Show."

"Yessuh." The Wildcat did not understand the big words, but whenever he
did not understand it was his principle to smile and agree to anything that
white gentlemen said.

"Yessuh. Ain't it de truf'?" He returned to the smoking compartment, where
the Backslid Baptist was auditing his tips.

The Backslid Baptist was busy at the moment excavating a busted cork out
of the neck of a queer looking square bottle.

"Baptis', whut you got?"

"Smells lak equalizer. Wait till Ah gits dis cork out, an' us sees."

"Whut dat sign say on de bottle?"

The Backslid Baptist inspected the label affixed to the flat side of the bottle.
"Ol' sign reads 'Acrobatic Spirits of Pneumonia.' Bam! Un-konkered de ol'
cork. Smell dat. 'At learns you not to believe in signs. When yo' eyes sees
one thing an' yo' nose sees another you betteh believe yo' nose." He took a
long drag at the bottle and passed it over to the Wildcat.

"Whuf! Ol' lady in Lower 6 felt poo'ly dis mawnin', but she 'sorbed th'ee
drams f'm dis heah bottle, an' so far she's et twelve dollahs' wuth ob grub up
ahaid in de dinin' cah."

The Wildcat swung on to the "Acrobatic Spirits of Pneumonia," lingering at
the spout for several disappointing seconds after the contents of the bottle
had gurgled down his neck.

"Whuf! Ah missed de pneumonia, Backslid, but Ah sho' feels acrobatic.
How come de lady lose de bottle?"

"She done got careless when de spirits come. You better th'o 'at glassware
away now an' git ready fo' tellin' de boss how you craves a porter's job."

Half an hour later, leading his mascot goat and closely convoyed by the
Backslid Baptist, the Wildcat walked down the platform in the dark

trainshed of the station in Chicago. Throughout the long ride down Prairie
Avenue to the habitation of the forger from whom the recommending letters
were to be obtained the Wildcat's woolly bean spun with the momentum
which he had drained from the bottle abandoned by the careless lady in
Lower 6.

An hour later, armed with five ironclad letters, he returned along the route,
arriving finally at the portals of the office building on West Adams Street
wherein Pullman porters are created from select brunet humanity.

Presently, across a wide desk he confronted Authority. A kindly gentleman
questioned him, and to the questions he replied with an assortment of
impromptu lies whose range and ingenuity busted every previous record for
careless language.

Ten minutes later he was a hired man.

"C'm on heah. 'At's all." The Backslid Baptist at his elbow sensed the
successful conclusion of the interview.

"You mean Ah's a porter?" the bewildered Wildcat asked when the pair had
gained the street level.

"Ah'll say you is."

"An' all de tips I gits is mine to keep?"

"Dey is previdin' you gits outen yo' trance an' takes yo' cah on de 4:10."

"Hot dam, Lily! C'm on heah. Us weahs a blue coat all de time an' don't do
nuthin' but spend de money whut de white folks showers down."

"You betteh make arrangements at some livery stable to p'vide board an'
room fo' Lily whilst you is A.W.O.L."

"How come? Whah at I goes de goat goes."

"Not on de Pullman run. Ah dead-heads you once, an' de goat lak to ruined
eve'ybody in de cah. No suh! Kain't run no trains an' no mascot at de same
time. De rule book leaves out goats, but does you lug Lily wid you, yo' fust
run sho' is yo' last."

The Wildcat faced the moment of a great decision. "Den dey won't be no
fust trip. Cm on heah, Lily. Much 'bliged, Baptis'. Me an' Lily looks fo' a
job whah at dey ain't no rules again' mascots."

The Wildcat headed south along Michigan Avenue, and in a little while he
and Lily were adrift in a sea of humanity.

The Backslid Baptist grunted his disgust and went about his own affairs.

CHAPTER VIII

At midnight the Wildcat and Lily pitched their lonely camp behind a
billboard in South Chicago.

"Sho' craves mah rations. You done noble wid de grass, Lily, but Ah kain't
eat grass. Seems lak you kin nutrify yo'se'f wid whuteveh vittles is laying
'round."

In the dawn the Wildcat realized that his appetite had sprung up like a
mushroom over night.

"Wisht us wuz back wid ol' Cap'n Jack in Memphis, whah at de ham-tree
blooms th'ee times a day."

At noon his stomach was the residence of a hunger panic. With his mascot
trailing behind him, he headed toward the heart of the city.

"Doggone 'at crap-shootin' hound. How come he clean me to mah last
nickel, Ah don' know. Lady Luck, whah at is you?"

An instant later, wearing a policeman's uniform and speaking a wild Irish
language, Lady Luck descended upon the Wildcat. The Michigan Avenue
traffic cop abandoned his post long enough to pounce upon his prey.

"What th' hell do yez mean prowlin' round th' Loop in broad daylight wid
ivery man on th' force goin' crazy lookin' f'r yez? Come along wid me."

Ten minutes later, with the echoes of the patrol gong still ringing in his ears,
the Wildcat and Lily were hazed through the black portals of an unfriendly

looking police station. They faced the desk sergeant.

"Boy, is your name Vitus Marsden?"

"Cap'n, yessuh. Folks gin'ally calls me Wilecat."

The desk sergeant busied himself with the telephone at his elbow. Two
minutes later he turned to the Wildcat.

"Sit on that bench over there," he said.

The Wildcat sat down, and a black cloud of surmise floated across his
immediate horizon.

"Lily, Ah 'spect us is 'rested mebbe on 'count ob dem pants you et offen de
man in old 'partment B. Mebbe I'se took fo' 'sorbin' dem Acrobatic Spirits
whut Backslid consecrated to me. Mebbe de lady wid de green chicken
whut you et de feathers off ob done craved revenge. Mebbe de ol' Pullman
car man aims to make you work out de price of 'at laundry you et in de linen
closet."

The Wildcat had no difficulty finding a dozen good reasons for his present
embarrassment. He addressed a police officer near by.

"Cap'n suh, whut fo' is me an' Lily sequestered heah in de jail?"

Before the policeman could answer, the march of events made reply.
Through the swinging doors of the station filed a dozen strange looking
men. These men wore baggy red trousers, and on each man's head was the
red fez which marked him as being a Potent Noble of the Mysterious
Mecca.

They descended upon the Wildcat. "Come on here, boy. Bring that goat.
You and the mascot are due out on our special train twenty minutes from
now. Here's your orders from the Pullman Company. You're on the payroll,
and so is the mascot goat."

"Cap'n, suh, you means me an' Lily is headed west wid de red fezant
gen'men?"

"That's it."

"Hot dam! Lily, 'tenshun! Lady Luck, how come I doubt you?"

CHAPTER IX

The Wildcat expanded in the sunlight of Lady Luck's smile.

"Lady Luck, how come I doubt you? Police folks, good-bye. Lily, 'tenshun!
Come on heah. Us is a Pullman poteh. Ah craves mah rest. Le's go."

Surrounded by an escort of Potent Nobles of the Mysterious Mecca, the
Wildcat marched from the portals of the Chicago police station, headed for
a west-bound train wherein he aimed to do the best he could in the rôle of
porter for his carload of nobles.

At the train gates the party was delayed five minutes to permit the entrance
of a motley crew of manacled aliens.

"How come them boys festooned with so much jinglin' hardware?"

One of the Potent Nobles made reply.

"Bad actors."

"Cap'n, suh, who's dat black boy wid de straight hair and his head tied up in
de white rag?"

"Hindoo."

"Some boy sho' must ob busted his head open, to need tyin' up so bad."

Following the line of undesirables headed away from the land of the free,
Lily, the Wildcat, and the Potent Nobles filtered through the gates into the

train shed. They made their way down a long string of coaches, arriving
finally at the Mazeppa.

"Here's the car."

"Car, howdy. Lily, git aboa'd."

"Slip out and get me a box of cigars before we leave."

A Potent Noble shoved a banknote at the Wildcat.

"Cap'n, yessuh. Would you mind tyin' Lily on de front vegetable ob de car
till I gits back?"

Twelve minutes later, carrying in his hand a box of cigars, the Wildcat's
second entrance was blocked by a ticket chopper who had a square jaw and
a sense of duty.

"Where's your ticket?"

"Ain't got no ticket. I's de poteh wid de Mysterious Mecca gen'men. Le' me
by."

"Don't try to pull none o' that stuff around me."

"Man, leave me by!"

Armed with the conviction of authority and clad in a parade-leading Prince
Albert whose brass buttons reassured him, the Wildcat violated one of the
first principles of his life, which was never to oppose a white man. He slid
past the ticket chopper, ducked into the gate, and boarded the train wherein
rolled the Mazeppa. He caught a tourist Pullman three cars apart from the
rolling residence of the Mysterious Mecca delegation and landed breathless
in the open vestibule.

"Fust thing old Backslid, what learned me de po'teh bizness, said to do was
to close up de vegetable."

This he proceeded to do. He turned and entered the car. For a second time
he slid past blue-coated authority, in the form of a United States Deputy
Marshal who was temporarily chaperoning the departing aliens.

"Hold on, there: where you headed for?"

"I's de poteh what takes care ob de Noble Fezant boys in de blue pants."

The deputy marshal temporarily on guard had a fixed official rule of
conduct: never take a chance. The Wildcat's words sounded crazy enough to
entitle him to a membership card in the Traveling Nut Club.

"Git in that car and sit down before I blow your head off! Where's your
handcuffs?"

"Cap'n, how come? Handcuffs seems so confidential."

Here, for some reason unknown to the Wildcat, was the hand of the law.
Inside of his parade-leading Prince Albert the Wildcat shivered and shrunk
three sizes. His brow wrinkled in perplexity beneath the velvet hat, and the
bright yellow plumes thereon dropped in sudden melancholy.

"Lady Luck, whah at is you?"

"Mumblin' to himself and wearing the craziest rig in the car—good thing I
rounded up that bird."

The deputy marshal added another star to his crown. "Plumb bughouse."

He cast his eye over the occupants of the car. "Back to Russia. Try some of
your ideas on them Bullshevik birds."

He again addressed the Wildcat.

"Cut out that mumblin'. All you got to do is keep still."

"Cap'n, yessuh." The Wildcat removed his velvet hat and subsided in a seat
beside the Hindoo agitator.

"How come you got your head all tied up, boy?" he asked the Hindoo.

The Anarchist didn't see fit to reply.

At Omaha the guards from the western division relieved their homesick
eastern brothers.

"Twenty-three of them," announced the man who had captured the Wildcat.
"Watch that rag-head Hindoo and that nigger in the fourth seat. He's gittin'
bad, all the time mumblin' to himself about Lady Luck and Lily; he believes
he's a porter."

Over the miles official carelessness rode in the carload of bad actors. Only
when the train stopped were the guards vigilant.

Sagged down in his seat beside the Hindoo, the Wildcat reviewed a
tolerably measly past.

"How come?"

There was no accounting for what white men would do to a boy, but
somewhere in the jumble the Wildcat sensed that he had been the victim of
a mistake.

"Mebbe I's headed fo' jail 'count o' runnin' past de man at de gates."

After a thirty-minute delay at Granger the Wildcat saw a train leave the
yards. On the platform of the observation car, surrounded by half a dozen
Blue Fezant Nobles of the Mysterious Mecca, he saw Lily speeding away
into an isolated future.

"Lily, you hoodoo, good-bye. Lady Luck, here I is."

CHAPTER X

1.

In the early days of detachable cuffs and ten-cent whisky there had been a
difference of opinion manifest in the railroad surveying party at Granger.

Part of the gang headed northward to the salmon country; the rest of them
blazed a trail to the southwest, where the sand fleas live on artichokes.

Lily and her escort were headed southwest towards San Francisco.
Presently the Wildcat's car was cut into a train whose trail led northward
through Idaho and Oregon.

Lady Luck meanwhile had a hard time keeping up. Exhausted finally with
her efforts, she set the stage a few hundred miles ahead and lay down and
went to sleep. While she was sleeping a pair of hard boiled actors in the
drama rummaged around in the woodshed back of a log house near the
banks of the Columbia river.

Pete, a skinny character with ears like a loving cup, raked three wheat sacks
out of a pile of lumber.

Into two of these sacks he cut a pair of holes two inches in diameter and
about four inches apart. The third sack he left intact. He handed one of the
sacks to his partner.

"Here she is; see if it fits you."

A fat bad actor by the name of Bill slipped the sack over his head. "Little
narrow between the eyes."

Three hours later these two agents of Lady Luck engaged in a little hard
work in their search for easy money. The product of their energy took shape
in the form of a pyramid of old ties piled between the rails of the line over
which the Wildcat was approaching in his twelve-wheeled cage.

Ten minutes before the train was due and while her crossing whistles could
be heard in the dusk five miles up-stream, the two bad actors scrambled up
the south bank of the Columbia. The skinny one poured a quart bottle of
coal oil on the pile of ties and lighted it. The fat man lighted a cigarette.

Both of them drew the wheat sacks over their heads. The fat man carried the
third wheat sack slung at his waist on a string which went around his
shoulder.

The stillness of evening was broken by the roar of a locomotive whistle,
and an instant later the wheels of the train smoked and screeched against the
chattering brake shoes. In the cab ahead the handle of the air valve was
slammed into the big notch.

The flagman swung down from the rear end of the train and ambled back
along the track for half the regulation distance. He set his lantern in the
middle of the track and rolled a cigarette. Three lanterns flashed along the
train, where the train countered a locked door. Inside the car, on a seat to
see what was going on.

Presently they found out and took their places beside the fireman and
engineer, hands raised.

With his wheat sack dangling more heavily on his hip as he progressed
through the train, the fat bad actor skimmed the Pullman cream on his way
forward to the plated jewelry in the day coach.

On the vestibule of the Wildcat's car he encountered a locked door. Inside
the car, on a seat beside the rag-head Hindoo, the Wildcat curled himself up

as a preface to twelve long chapters of easy sleep.

"Sho's noble when de train stops; boy can sleep peaceful 'thout gittin' his
insides scrambled."

"Bam!"

The fat bad actor shot the lock off the door of the Wildcat's car.

"Boy sure can sleep noble. Good mawnin—"

The rest of the sentence was action and not words. On the echo of the shot
from the fat bad actor's gun the Wildcat leaped automatically. He ran fast
enough to sidestep two more shots that crashed into the night after him. The
Hindoo passed him in the darkness.

Down along the track the Wildcat's feet tore up great gobs of right-of-way.
He passed the flagman, going like a brunet typhoon ten days overdue. After
the first mile he began putting his feet down a little slower before he
stepped on them. At the second mile his hind legs were dragging, and then
suddenly, instead of the hard ground beneath his feet, there was nothing but
a black void.

He rolled a few times like a 'possum falling off a limb. He landed on the
hard sand of the river bank. Night had fallen.

"Lady Luck, here us is. Whah at is we?"

The Wildcat curled up and went to sleep.

He woke up five minutes later. "Sho' is peaceful. How come I's so thirsty?"

Beside him the river offered him a solution to his thirst problems. On all
fours he crawled to the river edge. He shoved his bow under the water and
nearly sank himself absorbing as much of the Columbia river as could flow
into his wide mouth.

"Whuff! Sho' is noble water."

The black rippling water before him was suddenly shot with silver. Then it
became a solid glistening black. A school of smelt, seeking the quiet water
of the bank, fought their way upstream. The Wildcat reached a tentative
exploring paw into the stream of fish.

"Fish, howdy. De table sho' is set. Come out heah."

With his bare hands he snatched ashore a breakfast four sizes too big for his
optimistic estimate of his stomach's capacity.

"Quit floppin'. Ole Wilecat's done caught you." He felt for the box of
Pullman matches in the pocket of his shirt, beneath the folds of the parade-
leading Prince Albert. Here was food and a chance to sleep. With the
Wildcat, all was well.

He accumulated a pile of firewood from the river bank, and presently a
great fire was blazing. For an hour he gorged himself on smelt.

"Whuff! Sho's noble fish. Now I sees kin I sleep me."

The twinkling stars rattled in their orbits in cadence to the Wildcat's snores.
Sufficient unto the night was the evil thereof. Here, except for a few sand
fleas, was peace. The Wildcat snuggled deeper into the intimate
environment of the sand about him. His lower jaw dropped, and his tongue
lolled out less than a foot. Three or four mosquitoes landed on him and did
a little boring, but the Wildcat slept on. Presently the halo of fish about him
quit flopping. In the dark waters of the river's margin their myriad brethren
fought their way upstream. The Wildcat mumbled in his sleep,

"Lady Luck sure done noble.
I sleeps mos' all de time.
I don' give a dog-gone
If de sun don't nevah shine."

2.

In the Cascades there had been berries enough for the bears and for the
Indians. Now that the salmon run was heralded in the Columbia by the little
fish scouts, all of the scattered members of the Flathead tribe not otherwise
engaged coagulated from their several loafing grounds and headed for
Memloose Island to pay their annual respects to the ghost of the King
Salmon.

Included in the tribe were a few solid citizens. Some of these were college
graduates. John Running Bear, better known to the business men of The
Dalles as John Franklin, left his tailored clothes at home and painted his
brown body with yellow ochre. He stained his arms and face with the tribal
marks of his people. He drove in his twelve-cylinder car to a point near the
upstream tip of Memloose Island, whereon the Flathead salmon dance was
to be held. He parked his car in a thicket of willows.

"Safe enough," he said to his companion. "If some bundle-stiff or some
drifter from a sheep camp up the line needs the old wagon more than I do,
he's welcome to it. Let's go."

At dawn Running Bear and his companions encountered a hundred of their
fellows. From the camp the smoke of the cooking fires lifted in the still air.
Running Bear opened a tin of chicken. He sighed.

"This is the last civilized meal for the next six days."

He breakfasted slowly, lingering over his coffee, and then half reluctantly
the last trace of civilization's veneer was cast aside.

"Clee Hy Yah Skookum Kum chuck. Waugh!"

3.

Half a mile upstream from the Indian camp the Wildcat greeted the dawn.
Building a quick fire, he looked about him at the wrinkled little fish, drying
in the early morning sunlight. Slithering past him in the water still persisted
the mad rush of racing myriads. He threw the dead fish back into the stream
and raked out a fresher breakfast.

He poulticed a dozen fish with maple leaves and threw them in the glowing
coals of his fire. Ten minutes later he again began the business of gorging
himself on free fish.

"Don't cost me nuthin'." He clawed the water for another dozen handfuls.
"Free fish, howdy doo.

"I eats when I can git it.
I sleeps mos' all de time."

Gorged to the bursting point, the Wildcat rolled over in the warm sunlight.
He preferred not to go to sleep again, but in five minutes he was snoring
along at his old sixty-mile gait. He slept all day.

He was discovered and surrounded at evening by Running Bear and the rest
of the tribe.

Running Bear sized up the situation and pulled off a pow-wow with three or
four of his companions. They arrived at a verdict.

"A little black-face vaudeville might liven things up. These blasted tribal
ceremonies need a cabaret attachment to jazz them up. How about it,
redskins?"

"Let's go."

The verdict was unanimous.

Somewhere in the Wildcat's dreams there presently developed a rhythm in
which the cadence of dancing feet punctuated his slumbers. His eyes
opened finally, and within the range of his vision passed a parade of leaping
figures. To his ears came the regular booming beat of a deerskin tom-tom,
punctuated by an occasional blood-curdling yell.

His memory failed him.

"How come dis voodoo bizness?"

He sat up. He got to his feet and instinctively crouched to a running
position.

The ring of dancing warriors about him tightened up.

"Lady Luck, whah is you?"

Running Bear lifted a flint-tipped spear over his head and emitted a shriek
compared to which the Rebel yell was a chirp from the weakened lungs of
the dove of peace.

In spite of his fish-distended anatomy, the Wildcat shrivelled to boy's size.

Running Bear emitted several mouthfuls of language.

"Naw suh, not me." The Wildcat denied everything. "I ain't only a field han'.
Lemme by, boy. Whah at's yo' pants? How come you runnin' around
nekked?"

"Waugh!"

Six Indians seized the Wildcat, and a moment later he was seated in the
stern of a twenty-foot skiff, which presently embarked upon the surface of
the Columbia. Beside the Wildcat sat Running Bear, speaking a fluent
mixture of Flathead and Chinook.

In time with Running Bear's measured periods, the Wildcat rolled his eyes.
Now and then when the Indian's sense of humour got the best of him he
varied his Chinook jargon with Wild shrieks of laughter.

"Sounds like dem crazy folks in dat car comin' from Chicago. Seems like de
whole worl' done got crowded wid fools. What you laffin' at, boy?"

In a little while the party landed at Memloose Island. Before them, rising
sharply against the evening sky, drooping cottonwoods lifted high above an
undergrowth of willows. The party marched down a little trail for half the
length of the island, and then, at a point where the trail divided into the
sombre interior of the wooded terrain, they left the sunlight.

After a march of a hundred yards they came upon a clearing. About the
clearing in the fringing woods were fifty rickety structures lifted on poles.
On each of these, with its grinning skull lying towards the east, lay a
skeleton.

The Wildcat began to sweat. He counted a dozen skeletons and added a few
dozen prayers to his perspiration. In a green alcove opening from the wider
clearing seven skeletons stood erect in a ring about a flat stone.

His captors carried the Wildcat to this stone and held him. A little apart
from him Running Bear opened the services with a yell which echoed like a
chorus from the inferno.

The Wildcat gave up hope.

"They sho' got me. What dey is I don' know. Lemme go, boys."

The smoke from a dozen fires lifted in the clearing. Staggering in from half
a dozen paths came as many painted warriors, each bearing on his back a
salmon nearly as long as its red-skinned carrier.

Running Bear abandoned the vernacular for a moment and dropped into
English.

"The Gods of the waters have sent the salmon. The black man can feast
with his red brothers."

"Them words sure sounds noble. How come you pester me talkin' voodoo
talk?"

"After the feast the fires of sacrifice will be lighted. It is written that one of
our number shall be burned at the stake."

To the Wildcat's ears this sounded homelike, but not reassuring.

"Lemme go! Lemme go!"

He leaped from the rock and plunged through the fringing skeletons.
Running Bear and a dozen of his companions loped along after the Wildcat.
The galloping party covered the length of the island. Running Bear and his
companions deployed in open order, to permit the Wildcat to double on his
trail; but that panic-stricken individual had fixed his course, and he sailed
true to it.

He headed for a twenty-foot bank, and his racing legs did not stop until the
swirling waters of the Columbia had closed heavily over them.

Running Bear, who had followed as swiftly as his civilized muscles would
permit, gazed anxiously at the swimming Wildcat for a moment, to reassure
himself of his victim's safety.

"Go to it," he commented. "You'll make the mile in nothing flat with that
panic crawl." He watched the Wildcat until the current swept him around
the bend downstream.

"He's safe," Running Bear commented. "On with the dance."

He resumed the redskin rôle of a distant yesterday.

"Waugh!"

4.

In the gathering dusk the Wildcat swam and floated for a mile downstream
in the currents of the Columbia; then under the insistent drag of a wide-
swinging eddy he headed for the leading fences of a great salmon wheel
whose plunging buckets dived into the black currents and lifted with their
gamble of fifty-pound salmon. Now and then a heavier fish would
punctuate the monotony of the catch.

Flopping among their more substantial companions a fleet of leaping steel
heads added splashes of silver to the Chinook background.

The swimming Wildcat saw above him the descending framework of the
fish wheel. He tried vainly to escape from the cage of wire netting falling
from the sky upon him, but he was captured like a moth lost in a butterfly
net.

"Lady Luck, good-bye."

The Wildcat dragged in a deep lungful of air as he went under. Five seconds
later, preceded by three heavy-set salmon, he slithered down a trough into
the storage bin in the hull of the fish wheel. About him were plunging fish.
He looked at the square of evening light which glimmered through the
hatch.

"Whah at is I?"

A fifty-pound salmon, sliding down the trough, struck fairly against the
Wildcat's stomach.

"Fish, how come?"

Another leaping salmon slapped the Wildcat with his tail.

"Don't kick me wid yo' tail. I'll bust you in de haid."

The Wildcat struck wildly at the offending salmon. He slipped and fell into
a vast fighting mass of lively fish. He wrestled with fins and tails.

He called loudly for Captain Jack and for Lady Luck. Once he thought his
call was answered, but for half an hour the Wildcat led an unstable slippery
life. He sought a bed of inert fish, only to awaken five or six gasping
demons who flopped upon him heavily. He reached in vain for the hatch
coaming five feet above him.

Half erect and with the deck timbers almost in his grasp, time and again his
feet slipped from the back of a wriggling salmon.

"Dog-gone you, stand still; get pacified." He hauled off and slammed a kick
at a salmon which had tripped him.

"I'll bust you in de belly."

He landed with his equator submerged by nine nervous fish. He sought to
embrace a giant salmon. The Chinook slapped at him with his tail.

"Don' kick me wid yo' tail. I'll bust you in de nose."

He swung wildly at the salmon and was completely submerged. He came
snorting to the surface of the mass.

"Whuff! Fish, git ca'm. Does yo' lay still I does."

5.

On deck near the hatch coaming in the early night Mr. Ogaloff Skooglund,
the proprietor of the fish wheel, massaged his front teeth with Copenhagen
snuff and figured his winnings.

"If de salmon fisk been running like dis tree day more Aye cleans oop sax
t'ousand doller."

An echo from some unseen source seemed to reply.

Mr. Skooglund called loudly to the echo and then decided that he was crazy,
for the call was repeated from the river bank.

The proprietor of the fish wheel yelled a greeting into the darkness.

Down the bank into the circle of light cast by a dim lantern came a fat man
and a skinny individual with ears like a loving cup.

The fat man carried a wheat sack whose heavy contents jingled when he sat
it on the deck of the fish wheel.

The pair were out of breath. The owner of the fish wheel stepped forward to
try his English on his nocturnal visitors.

"Hello, fellers," he said.

The fat man answered, "Evenin'."

The skinny man tightened up on his ears for an instant and swung at Mr.
Skooglund with a short club.

"Good evening," he said, accenting the blow. The Swede took the count
with a grunt.

The fat man and the skinny one picked up Mr. Skooglund and carried him
to the open hatch. Feet first they dropped him upon the slithering mass of
salmon five feet below.

"He might drown. What did you hit him so hard for?"

"No chance. He ain't hurt—he'll sleep two or three hours. I only hit him
light. You can't kill these fish fighters hittin' 'em in the head, anyway. Ivory
—who's that?"

The fish wheel was being boarded by another visitor.

"Talk fish. You an' me owns the boat. We ain't seen nobody." The skinny
man whispered quickly to his companion. "Kick that sack in the hold."

The wheat sack with its clinking contents was cast into the open hatch.

The Wildcat made another futile leap at the hatch coaming, just in time to
catch the impact of the wheat sack and its jingling contents.

"How come?"

Then he twisted away from there and groaned a groan in which rumbled the
anguished accents of horror. In the dim light he saw Mr. Skooglund's face
festooned completely by floundering salmon. Fear froze him.

"Salmon wid a man's face. I sho' is crazy."

Then to his ears from the deck of the fish wheel came the diverting tones of
a voice which he had heard before. "The fat bad actor!"

"The fat bad actor!"

He listened for a moment to reassure himself, and then the motive of
revenge was added to the other sources of inspiration which tensed the
muscles of his legs. He leaped once more for the hatch coaming. This time
he grabbed it. Silently he swung himself to the deck of the boat. Panting
with his efforts, he lay quiet in the darkness.

In the dim lantern light he saw three figures.

The fat bad actor was speaking. "Naw, sir. Sheriff, we ain't seen nobody. We
just bought this here wheel from the fellow that owned it yesterday. What
did you say them train robbers looked like?"

The Wildcat snaked himself forward toward the fat bad actor. On the way
his hand encountered the blade of an oaken oar. Thereafter for the next
twenty feet he trailed the oar after him. He came within range and above the
head of the fat bad actor lifted the heavy handle of the oar.

"Bam!"

On the instant the Sheriff leaped for the shadows. Out of the darkness came
his voice.

"Don't move! Nobody!"

"Cap'n, I don' crave to move, an' de fat boy kain't, any more dan de dead
man in de cellar."

The Sheriff's voice came out of the night clear as the cold stars. "Cut a piece
of that rope and tie this man's hands."

The Wildcat was a little slow about tying a white man's hands, but he
glanced at the blue-nosed equalizer dimly outlined in the Sheriff's steady
hand and accelerated his gestures.

"Tie up that other man layin' on the deck. Tie them two men together."

"Cap'n, yessuh. How 'bout de dead boy layin' in de boat cellar?"

The Sheriff, fearing a ruse, hesitated for only a moment.

"Drop a rope down there and crawl down where he is. Tie it under his arms
and then come back and haul him up."

"I's skeered to touch dat boy; feared he come back and follow me."

The Sheriff swung the gun at the Wildcat.

"Hurry up, before I spatter a hole through you."

"Cap'n, yessuh." The Wildcat made a line fast and threw the end of it into
the hull of the fish wheel. He retrieved Mr. Skooglund from his
environment of flopping salmon and tied the line under the arms of the inert
man. He scrambled back on deck and hauled the Swede after him.

"Get a bucket of water and throw it on him."

Under this ungentle treatment the victim presently opened his eyes. He
reached an unsteady hand to his head and inspected a knob thereon the size
of an egg.

"Yust ven I hear de little angels iss singing, de earthquake troo de church
down on me."

His vision encountered the Sheriff and the Wildcat.

"Was any salmon saved?"

The Sheriff reassured him.

"You had a wallop on the head. You're all right now." He abandoned Mr.
Skooglund for a moment and turned to the Wildcat.

"Where's the dividend?"

"Cap'n, how come?"

"Come through with the clean up. You got enough watches and rings from
them passengers to sink this craft."

"Mebbe it's de bag."

Convoyed by the swinging muzzle of the Sheriff's gun, the Wildcat dived
again into the open hatch and returned presently with the jingling wheat
sack swung about his shoulders.

The Sheriff inspected the contents.

"That's it."

He turned to the Swede.

"You able to walk?"

It seemed that Mr. Skooglund could navigate on his hind legs. The fat bad
actor still lay unconscious on the deck. The Wildcat had done a good job

with the oar, and it took six buckets of water to bring the fat man out of his
slumbers. The quartette preceded the Sheriff down the narrow gang plank to
the bank. They made their way a mile upstream and came upon the Sheriff's
horse, hitched fast to a cottonwood on the river bank. The Sheriff fired his
revolver three times in the air. Half an hour later he yelled loudly, and an
answering call came from the distance through the night.

"That's the rest of the gang."

The party was joined presently by half a dozen riders. Two hours later the
Wildcat, heavily ironed, rode beside Mr. Skooglund in the smoking car of
the train headed for The Dalles. Dawn was breaking as the Sheriff and his
companions marched up the street from the station.

Presently, in a cell apart from the rest of the world, the Wildcat heard the
clanking of the heavy bolts which made the cell door a barrier.

"Lady Luck, how come?"

6.

Lady Luck was on the job. At eleven o'clock that morning the fat bad actor
confessed, and in his confession the Wildcat was cleared.

A Deputy brought a telegram to the Sheriff. The Sheriff read it.

"Thousand dollars, hey? Looks to me like that nigger deserves the reward."
The Sheriff was honest. "Fetch him in here."

The Wildcat was hazed into the Sheriff's presence.

"The railroad is paying a thousand dollars reward for roundin' up them two
men. Maybe they'd got loose if you hadn't nailed that one in the head. I'll
give you a letter to the Portland office and you can go down there and get
your money."

"Cap'n, yessuh. Hot dam! Fish always was lucky with me."

Mr. Skooglund augmented the reward with a personal offer.

"Any time you wanting a salmon fisk I give you one free."

"Cap'n, suh, I sho' is much obliged, but if I neveh see a fish again, dat's
twice too soon fo' me."

CHAPTER XI

The Wildcat felt noble. Against yesterday's clouds tomorrow's skies lay
blue. The Sheriff's office at The Dalles was a comfortable place wherein to
wait for the thousand-dollar reward which Lady Luck had showered down
on her prodigal protégé.

Half asleep, the Wildcat mumbled to a buzzing fly. "'At's it. Tryin' to bust
yo' brains out on de window glass. 'At's how come you ain't got none.
Cravin' to git loose all de time. S'pose you git loose? Whah at would you
go? Some ol' spidah'd git you de fust mile. Ca'm yo'se'f. Heah you is in de
sunshine an' all warmed up. You jess like folks—neveh knows when you's
lucky."

The Wildcat's soliloquy was interrupted by a verbal volley from the Sheriff.
"Here's your letter. Take it down to the railroad office in Portland; they'll
pay you the thousand-dollar reward for helping capture that pair of train
robbers."

"Cap'n, yessuh. Neveh seed so much money. Sho' come easy."

"Come easy, go easy. I suppose you'll load yourself up on square-face gin
and get rolled the first night you're in town."

"No, suh, not me! I aims to 'vest mah money in de fried smelt business.
Right now I's a Pullman porter. In Poteland mebbe I sees kin I buy myself
free. Anyway, I starts me a smelt fish business. River's full ob ol' smelt fish.
I ketches me a wagon load. I builds me a fire in mah fish wagon, an' when

de fish is fried I sells 'em two bits a pan to de Poteland niggers. Neveh seed
a nigger 'at wouldn't trade two bits fo' a belly full o' fish."

"Good-bye. Good luck with your smelt fish enterprise." The Sheriff
terminated the interview.

The Wildcat stowed his thousand-dollar-reward letter in the inside pocket of
the parade-leading Prince Albert which had seen temporary service as a
Pullman porter's uniform.

He made his way to the railroad station and sat down at a point where a
splash of sunlight dived into a pool of heat which radiated from the wall of
the depot. For a little while his neck muscles held his head erect, and then,
with his drooping eyelids, his head fell forward.

His meandering tongue offered an irresistible invitation to the mumbling fly
which had escaped with the Wildcat from the Sheriff's office. The fly
enjoyed the viscous environment until he succeeded in getting himself all
squashed up in an instinctive gesture back of which were the clutching
fingers of the Wildcat's swinging hand.

"Fly, how come you so confidential? 'At's mah pussonal tongue. On yo'
way." The buzzer was batted into oblivion.

A moment later the roar of an incoming train sounded in the Wildcat's ears.
"Fly sho' was handy. Sho' did me a good turn wakin' me up. Mebbe dey's
got brains just like folks, else how come dey knows when it's train time?"

He boarded the train and settled down in a seat in the smoking car.

A Pullman porter from the twelve-wheeled battleship on the aft end of the
train came forward and encountered the Wildcat. "Mawnin', boy; whah at
you bound?"

"Poteland."

"You a Poteland boy?"

The Wildcat indulged in a little autobiography. "Not me. I 'filiates wid de
Pullman company a long time back, conveyin' a westbound carload of
Potent Nobles ob de Mystic Mecca wid blue Fezants. Us got divo'ced
somewhere. Dey an' mah mascot goat gits drug to San F'mcisco. I gits
penned up wid a rag-head Hindoo boy an' some crazy folks in anotheh train.
I jines me in a ruckus wid train robbers. Den I busts loose, an' some Indian
boys starts in to barbecue me. I swims myself free an' de ol' Sheriff gives
me a thousan' dollahs fo' ketchin' 'em. Wish they'd been a dozen."

"Boy, I seed so many liars I got so I b'lieves lies, but yo' sho' strains me."

The Wildcat fished around in his parade-leading Prince Albert and produced
the evidence. "Read dis letter. See does I strain you."

The infidel read the letter. He looked at the Wildcat. "Is yo' name Vitus
Marsden?"

The Wildcat acknowledged his verbal label. "Folks gin'ally knows me as
Wilecat, 'count o' me bein' de mil'tary Wilecat ob de Fust Service Battalion
in France fo' so long."

The Pullman porter extended his hand. "Sho' glad to meet up wid you,
Mistah Marsden. Mah name's Daniels. Dey gin'ally calls me Dwindle."

"Proud to meet you, Mistah Daniels. Did you come out ob de lion's den or
de Navy?"

"Neither one. I'se a Bummin'ham Republican."

The Wildcat reached for his letter. "Gimme back dat letter. No boy f'm
Alabam' is safe wid a money letter."

"How come?"

"Wust cleanin' I ever got in a' cube ruckus come off a Bummin'ham boy."

"Money come, money go. What you gonna' do when you gits yo' thousan'
dollahs?"

"Fish business. I aims to start me a fried fish wagon in Poteland. Figgah out
de profits. Heah's de ol' rivah dusty wid smelt fish. Heah's de Poteland
niggahs cravin' to 'sorb fish mawnin', night, an' noon. I gits me some fryin'
pans an' I cooks me up some fresh fish every day. Dey don't cost me nuthin'.
I collects two bits a panful. 'At runs into big money."

Dwindle Daniels did some fast financial thinking.

"How does you aim to cook fish an' ketch 'em bofe, wid de Columbia river
six miles f'm Poteland?"

The Wildcat hadn't thought of this detail. He made his associate a
proposition.

"Dwindle, s'pose you 'filiates with me. Us ketches de fust wagon-load; den I
fries fish an' collects de money whilst you ketches mo' fish."

"De fust day 'at's all right. Second day I's treasurer."

"Suits me."

For the next twenty miles the two fish financiers dived into the details of
their commercial venture, and when the train slowed for the bridge leading
across the Willamette to Union Station in Portland their plans were
completed.

At the street gates of Union Station a policeman directed the Wildcat to the
railroad offices. He lost the trail and wandered around for half an hour, but
finally, with the assistance of a hundred questions, he made port.

An elevator boy directed him to the treasurer's offices, wherein presently he
received a slip of blue paper in the lower right hand corner of which was the
treasurer's signature.

"Cap'n, suh, what's dat?"

"That's a check for a thousand dollars."

"Dis papah?"

The Wildcat looked sideways at the check. "Whah at does I git de hard
jinglin' money?"

"Any bank. Sign your name on the back of that check and any bank will
cash it."

"Cap'n, suh, I ain't nevah learned to write. Kin you all help me wid dis
papah?"

The clerk signed the Wildcat's name and underneath the signature the
Wildcat made his mark.

"Stick here a minute and I'll get the money for you."

The clerk departed and returned presently with two thick packages of ten
dollar bills.

"Money, howdy doo! 'At's more cash den I seed since payday in Bo'deaux."

Twenty minutes later the Wildcat languished in the lobby of a ramshackle
hotel below Burnside Street, where he had a meeting date with his fish
partner.

Dwindle Daniels at the moment was meshed in the net of official business.

To pass the time the Wildcat got fraternal with a languid brunet known as
the Spindlin' Spider. The Spider's loose anatomy was draped with a
complicated checked suit.

"Pardner, whah at kin a boy git a slug ob gin?"

"Cuba, mebbe. Gin comes high 'round heah, I knowed one drink to cost a
boy ninety days."

"Ninety days, ninety dollars. Sometimes ol' square face gin sho' is worth it."

"Does yo' crave licker ten dollars' worth, sometimes dey's a white mule
hitched in de back room."

The Wildcat pulled off a diplomatic boner. He displayed his thousand dollar
roll and peeled therefrom a ten-dollar bill.

"Whah at kin I trade dis frog skin fo' a ra'r o' licker?"

Internally the Spindln' Spider suddenly awakened. He showed no outward
sign of the agitation which the sight of the money had inspired, but for half
an hour he played heavy politics, and thereafter, in a company of half a
dozen hard-boiled crap shooters, the Wildcat began to pay for the indiscreet
display of his cash.

"Leave dis Pullman boy take a r'ar at de clickers."

"'At's me. Hand me dem bones. C.O.D.—come on, dice! Field han's, rally
round. Shoots fifty dollars. Shower down, brothers. Eagle bones, see kin
you fly. Bam! I reads seven. I lets it lay. Shoots a hund'ed dollars! Fade me
crazy, folks, fade me! Bam! I reads six—four. Slow death. Resurrection
dice, an' I reads four—six."

The Wildcat hauled down part of his winnings.

"Shoots a hundred dollahs. Shower down, brothers. Spark in de powdeh!
Both barrels. Right an' left. Bam! An' dey reads 'leven. Mowin' money. Us
does a cash business. I lets it lay. Shower down yo' money!"

The Spindlin' Spider faced the Wildcat. "Boy, you donates."

"Don't sass me. Headed home wid feathers in yo' teeth. Telegraph dice,
click fo' de coin. Bam!"

The Spider exercised his privilege of grabbing the dice before they had
stopped rolling. As far as the Wildcat's naked eye could see, the same dice
were rolled back at him, but as a matter of fact the Wildcat's dice nestled
close against the epidermis of the Spindlin' Spider's right palm.

The dice that had been returned were festooned with misfortune. The
Wildcat had overlooked a bet. He curried the gallopers to blood heat in his
magenta palm. "Houn' dog headed home wid rabbit hair in yo' teeth! Turkey
dice, gobble dat coin. Bam!—How come!"

An ace-deuce bloomed in the garden of chance.

The Spindlin' Spider faced the Wildcat. "Loses nuthin' but yo' money, boy.
Roll 'em."

The Wildcat clipped his roll for another hundred. "Shoots a hund'ed.
Shower down, fiel' han's! Dice hammer, drive de gold spike! Ten-o-see! An'
I reads ace-dooce. How come I miss?"

The Spider repeated his comforting reminder: "Loses nuthin' but yo' money,
brother. Roll 'em."

The Wildcat pared another stratum from his dwindling roll. "Shoots a
hund'ed dollars. Grass cuttehs, reap dem greens! Fade me an' die poor.
Bam! An' I reads—ace-dooce! Doggone, how come I set fire to de
Chris'mus tree?"

"Ca'm yo'se'f." The Spindlin' brother dished out a little advice as he picked
up his winnings. "What fo' you talk so much? You must think dis is a peace
conflooence. Roll 'em."

Starting in the sunshine of Lady Luck's smile, the Wildcat cleared the
hurdles of financial ruin and rambled into the stretch soggy with a
cloudburst of hard luck. He staked his last pair of ten dollar bills on a throw
whose momentum carried him to the cleaners.

The Spindlin' Spider urged him to lay further contributions on the altar of
chance.

"I'se done. How come? Neveh seed such a hog for money. I'se cleaned now
an' hung on de line. All I craves is five minutes wid Lady Luck, so I kin
beat dat woman to death."

Thereafter for half an hour the Wildcat flopped dejected and inert in a chair
in the lobby of the ramshackle hotel.

He tried vainly to borrow lunch money from the victorious Spindlin' Spider.
"Ain't puttin' out nuthin' today." The Spider exhibited a heart of flint.

"Dem train robbehs sho' kain't learn yo' nuthin'." The Wildcat subsided in
his chair. "Wish't ol' Cap'n Jack was here. Wish't dat doggone mascot goat
hadn't lost me."

The lobby of the hotel was warm, and presently the pain of the Wildcat's
financial bruises dissolved in the heated air. "Anyhow, I don't botheh work,
work don't botheh me. I lost my money when de bones read three—

"I eats when I kin git it,
I sleeps mos' all de time.
I don' give a doggone
If de sun don't neveh shine."

The Wildcat's head dropped forward, and presently he was doing the best he
could to sleep for ever.

CHAPTER XII

The Wildcat's siesta was interrupted by a rumbling voice which emanated
from a chesty policeman who was engaged in dishing out a little earnest
advice to the proprietor of the hotel. The officer raised his voice for the
benefit of the brunet assemblage.

"Trouble is trouble. If yez have business on th' street, attind to ut, but save
th' loafin' f'r another day. Wid all thim I.W.W. bugs, this nigrah parade
tonight is apt to flash into a race riot. If it does, th' chief ain't goin' to stan'
no foolin'. The guns'll begin barkin' worse than a Chinee New Year. Don't
look for no trouble an' you won't find it. You boys ain't much in favour in
this town right now, an' wan false move in tonight's parade might make a
stampede out of it, wid all th' dark complexions in town three jumps ahead
of some red-hot buckshot."

The Wildcat shrivelled up in his chair. The policeman's warning made him
homesick. He resolved to stick close to the home plate. "Ah don't crave no
paradin' roun' whah at white folks is. Dese uppity yaller niggahs sho' heads
fo' trouble when dey starts speakin' white folks' talk. Wish't ol' Cap'n Jack
was here. He'd sho' learn 'em, did dey start sumpin'. Like as not ol' Cap'n
Jack tear down a lamp post an' beat de parade ovah de head wid it. Parades
is all right fo' crematizin' ceremonies. All right fo' de Ahmy boys. All right
fo' funerals an' lodges. Outside o' dat dey's dangerous. Me, Ah sees kin I
sleep me some mo'."

His slumbers were again interrupted by the entrance of the porter whose
acquaintance he had made en route from The Dalles to Portland.

"Boy, howdy."

The Wildcat sat up and blinked a pair of heavy lids over his bulging eyes.
"Doggone if it ain't mah ol' fish podneh. Sho's glad to meet up wid you.
How is you?"

"Tol'able, 'ceptin' I's rushed. Us got to work dis fish business fast. I don't git
me no lay-over. Ol' Pullman boy's done switched me to de midnight run fo'
San F'mcisco on de train what leaves at one o'clock in de mawnin'. Dat's
why I ain't change' my unifawm. How is you? Did de man give you de
money fo' de train robbeh letter?"

The Wildcat's face, which had lightened in greeting his partner in the smelt
fish business, was suddenly overspread with a mask of melancholy. "Easy
come, easy go. I's busted."

"How come you bust now, when dis mawnin' yo' back was broke wid a
thousand-dollah letter?"

"Met up wid a Spindlin' boy what hit me wid some C.O.D. dice. Cleaned
me."

"Sho' ha'd luck. You sho' got action. Neveh min', I'se got 'nuff to start de
fish business wid. Dey's a parade tonight, and us cleans up big, sellin' fish
to de parade niggers."

The pair launched into the working details of their fried fish business.

"Wilecat, I got me some rubbah boots. Us hires a wagon and rambles over
to de C'lumbia River. We loads up on smelt fish an' rambles back. We fries
de fish in de back end ob ol' wagon on a oil stove."

"Whah at's de oil stove? Whah at's de wagon?"

"Us rents de wagon from a livery stable boy I knows, fo' four bits. I knows
where us kin git a oil stove f'm a boy on Front Street. Temporary, that is. Oil
stoves comes high now."

"Le's go."

"Wait 'til I gits my rubbah boots."

The porter reappeared from his room wearing a pair of knee-length rubber
boots.

"Sho' is de biggest boots I ever seed," the Wildcat commented.

The Wildcat held the door open until his companion had navigated the
channel with the brace of ponderous violins which festooned his feet and
trotted along towards the livery stable in cadence with the tromping
extremities of Dwindle Daniels.

"Sho' is de biggest foot caves I ever seed. Was you in de army yo' could
come from parade rest to 'tenshun without movin' dem boots."

At the livery stable Dwindle Daniels financed the rental of a light wagon
and a heavy-set mule. The Wildcat gathered up the reins. "Set down fo' I
starts," he advised. "Kain't tell about dese jug-heads."

The pair discovered presently that the mule's maker had omitted the high
gear from the animal's mechanism, and the six-mile trip was accomplished
at a four-mile gait. The mule was equally indifferent to leather and
language. "'Spec' mebbe he's delicate. Some is. Comin' back I gits me a
saplin' an' sees is he. No mule neveh konkered me yit."

They arrived presently at the bank of the fish-crowded Columbia River,
where the business of loading their wagon with smelt occupied them for
less than an hour.

"Neveh seed so many fish. Ol' river sho' is dusty wid fish. Did dese fish
have laigs a boy couldn' git down de road past 'em."

With the work of the moment completed, Dwindle Daniels obeyed some
instinct of neatness. He threaded his way out along an overhanging piece of

driftwood to the clear water of the river, wherein he proposed to wash his
hands.

The Wildcat watched him for a while and then broke into criticism. "How
come yo' so neat? Yo' acts like a barber shop boy, all de time cleanin' up.
Next thing you'll be cravin' bear grease fo' yo' hair an' a sprinkle o' bay
rum."

"I craves to smell human," the porter returned. "All right fo' fish to smell
like fish, but I prefers to let 'em win any smell race dey starts."

In replying to the Wildcat, Dwindle Daniels on his slippery perch half
turned his head, and this carelessness precipitated a disaster which engulfed
him. One of the ponderous boots slipped from the branch of driftwood and
dragged the wearer's leg into the river. Thereafter for ten seconds the porter
staged a windmill scene compared to which a cyclone in Holland looked
like a quiet night on the Dead Sea. Finally the drag of old man Gravity won
all bets. The Wildcat's bulging eyes witnessed a high dive entirely
surrounded by frightened fish and the soft mud which lay two feet below
the water surface. From the crater of the mud volcano the writhing form of
the neat Dwindle Daniels finally emerged. His form-fitting environment of
mud churned and splashed in a blast of agitated language. Somewhere in
the vortex of the intimate ooze he had lost all traces of his religious training.
He combed great handfuls of mud from his plastered features and snorted
deep draughts of fresh air.

He excavated his eyes and then, disdaining the unstable footing offered by
the driftwood, he ploughed his way ashore, up to his arm pits in water and
mud.

On the bank the Wildcat had launched into his third conniption fit. He
calmed down sufficiently to choke some language out of his vocal organs.

"Yo' sho' looks neat now. Ain't seed such a ruckus since de flood hit
Memphis. I knowed dem was hoodoo boots. Bam! Down yo' goes like a ol'
hell diver. Mawnin'! Up yo' comes like a ol' mud turtle. Git in de wagon,

Mud Turtle. On de way home you dries out. Leave dat mud git dry befo'
you tries to brush it off."

Dwindle Daniels spent an hour on the way home in hatching himself out of
a shell of mud.

"Neveh min', ol' Mud Turtle," the Wildcat comforted. "Us cleans up big
money when us sells dese fish tonight."

At eight o'clock, under a sputtering arc light on Front Street, the Wildcat
and Dwindle Daniels were established in the business of selling fried fish
and waiting for the rush of trade that would come when the parade passed
them.

"Stan' close to de oil stove, ol' Mud Turtle. I cracks de shell off o' you befo'
de train leaves. Dis sho' is de slow dryenest mud I ever seed. Leave them
pants on you. Does you take 'em off you neveh gits 'em back. Stan' still."

The Wildcat broke a few pounds of mud from the porter's uniform.

"Stan' close to de blaze. When de mud dries you peels easy as a shell-bark
hick'ry nut."

The success of the peeling process was all gummed up at nine o'clock by
the Portland humidity, which won its usual bet. From the heavy skies a light
rain began to fall.

At half past nine, with the booming drums of the parade sounding up the
street, the shivering form of Dwindle Daniels was again sogged down to its
original saturation point.

"Wilecat, I don' see how kin I make mah run to San F'mcisco."

"Yo' makes yo' run all right. Yo' dead-heads me, an' I does yo' work whilst
yo' hangs out de front vegetable ob de car. Ol' wind dry yo' out sudden. Git
ready fo' de gran' rush. Here's de head ob de parade."

The Wildcat threw back his head and bawled into the evening air: "Fried
fish! Smelt fish! Here you is, two bits a pan!"

He lowered his head to gratify his curiosity concerning the technique of
beating a bass drum. "Sho' craves 'at boy's job. Some day when I gits rich I
buys me a bass drum. 'At drum bammer sho' swings a mean club."

"Fried fish! Smelt fishes! Two bits a pan!"

Following the band and leading the parade, heavily laden with a false
dignity which had completely eradicated his spinal curvature, there
appeared the rag-head Hindoo who had escaped with the Wildcat from the
carload of undesirable aliens on the night of the train robbers' fiesta below
The Dalles.

A little before the head of the parade reached the arc light under which the
Wildcat and Dwindle Daniels had inaugurated their fish business, the
Hindoo turned and raised his arms.

The parade stopped.

The rag-head signalled for his companions to come close about him.

In precise English he broke into a violent harangue wherein the least radical
of the evil doctrines which he preached would have been sufficient to
transform the United States into a second Russia.

Midway of his speech one of the accompanying platoon of police officers
stepped up to him.

"Can that stuff, you Anarchist! Come wid me!"

The officer reached for the Hindoo, and this gesture of the law's hand was a
signal which launched a riot into being.

"Boy, dis looks like a bad ruckus!" The Wildcat spoke quickly to Dwindle
Daniels. "Wish't ol' Cap'n Jack was here. Chances is, us niggahs gits
lynched."

On the tense instant of conflict a solution to the threatening disaster was
born to the Wildcat. With all the energy of his lungs, he bawled his peace
message into the turmoil of the night.

"Free fish! Hot fish free! Come an' git it!"

Fifty feet from him the rag-head Hindoo broke loose from the police officer.
The Wildcat witnessed the escape. The Hindoo raced towards him, and it
was then that mutual recognition was accomplished. The Wildcat leaped
into the fugitive's pathway and extended his foot.

The Hindoo Anarchist pulled a galloping somersault. He revolved twice in
the air, and then his face ploughed heavily into the pavement.

"Hot dam! Neveh seed a boy so agile!"

The police officer exercised the good judgment common to the majesty of
the law in moments of great mental stress.

He made a swing at the Wildcat with his stick.

"Plunk!"

The locust club impacted heavily on the Wildcat's skull.

The Wildcat blinked his eyes. "How come? Cap'n, suh, I thought yo' craved
to ketch dat rag-head boy!"

He pointed at the inert Hindoo lying on the pavement.

"Didn't aim to hit you."

"Cap'n, yes, suh." The Wildcat hoped that the next time the policeman
would aim straight at him. He turned to the crowd and renewed his
pacifying propaganda.

"Free fish! Come an' git it. Here you is, boys!"

The Wildcat's invitation and the smell of the frying smelt won the field
against the doctrines of the defeated agitator. A minute later the fish wagon
was ringed about with a hundred brunet fish eaters. The riot had evaporated.
Here was the end of the trail.

Serious thinking gave place to heavy eating. Crazy ideas no longer
tormented heads whose owners' object in life was to eat more fried smelt
than the men next to them.

The sergeant commanding the platoon of police sized up the situation.
"Looks to me like the end of a perfect day."

A brother officer addressed the sergeant. "Better take this rag-head in with
us. How about it?"

"Sure. Book him as a vag until we see who he is. Tell Jimmy to hold him on
an A and B charge if any of them jail-breaking law sharks try to spring
him."

The Wildcat broke in with a little testimony.

"Cap'n, suh, I knows dat boy. He bust loose from a travellin' jail on de train
comin' from Chicago. The guv'ment men ketched him some place."

The sergeant of police looked quickly at the officer whose fingers were
closed about the chain attached to the handcuffs of the Hindoo's wrists.

"Hear what this boy says? Maybe this rag-head is that agitatin' alien that got
loose from the carload that landed here three days ago."

"How about holdin' this fellow for a witness?" The officer nodded his head
towards the Wildcat. The Sergeant debated for a moment, during which the
Wildcat's freedom wavered in an unstable balance.

Finally the Sergeant spoke, and with his words the Wildcat's liberty was
assured. "We don't need him. We've got enough to hold this rag-head with—
and the bull pen is crowded anyhow."

The Wildcat got the drift of the crisis which had passed. "Cap'n, suh, I sho'
is obliged to you. Me an' ol' Mud Turtle here aims to take our midnight run
to San F'mcisco."

The Mud Turtle, who was busy dealing out free fried smelt, paused long
enough to crack a few segments of dried mud from his uniform. He hit
himself on the chest, and another nickel-plated button in an area of blue
cloth was revealed in the light of the street lamp.

"Us sho' do," he confirmed. "Me an' dis Wilecat boy's Pullman men."

A few minutes later the Wildcat augmented the disappearing supply of free
fish with a little sound advice to his patrons.

"Neveh seed such fool niggers. Was ol' Cap'n Jack here he sho' would ca'm
you down wid a club. You gits yo' haids full ob crazy notions, an' after de
ruckus dey hauls you out feet fust. Think like white folks does if you craves
to, but unless you aims to festoon yo' health an' strength wid a funeral box
an' lead a graveyard procession, stop wid de thinkin'. Think like white folks
does, but don't act dat way. Next time, befo' you 'filiates wid any wild men,
say howdy to a mess o' vittles. De river's full o' free fish, an' de jail's full o'
crazy folks like dat rag-head Hindoo boy. Next time anybody tells you you's
de same as white folks, bust him in de nose an' walk away fast. 'At's all."

The Wildcat ended his preaching and turned to his associate.

"Come on heah, ol' Mud Turtle. Le's take dis mule an' wagon back to dat
liv'ry stable boy befo' us gits 'rested fo' lendin' him permanent."

CHAPTER XIII

The Wildcat drove to the livery stable. The Mud Turtle, seated beside him,
spent the time en route to the place in scraping the mud from his southern
hemisphere.

At the livery stable he removed his ponderous rubber boots and sloshed his
feet with a hose. He paid the rent for the mule and wagon. "Heah's fo' bits
mo'. Take dat oil stove back to dat sto' by de riveh," he directed.

Carrying the boots in his hand, he walked beside the Wildcat toward the
ramshackle hotel below Burnside Street.

In the cold night a summary of the day's misfortunes settled heavily on the
marching pair. "Sho' turned out rough," the Mud Turtle remarked.

The Wildcat sought a smile in the frown which had gathered on Lady
Luck's features.

"Sho' might been worse. S'posin' you'd been drowned in de riveh. S'posin'
dat policeman had took me to jail. S'posin' I'd a had two thousan' dollars
'stid o' one when 'at boy cleaned me. Naw, suh! Us is half lucky. Wish't I
could meet up wid 'at boy now an' give him a ride wid a pair o' taper bones
like de Backslid Baptis' used to make."

The Mud Turtle looked sideways at the Wildcat. "Boy, you an' me is
podnehs. Confidential, I tells you does you crave taper bones I has me a
pair."

"Is you? Lemme see, Mud Turtle, lemme see!"

The porter fished around in an inside pocket of his soggy uniform and
produced a pair of green dice.

"Heah dey is. I dassn't use 'em. Ain't learned de thumb twist yit, an' dey sho'
means trouble is you ketched workin' 'em."

"Gimme dem bones, boy. I craves trouble wid dat Spindlin' niggah what
cleaned me. Gimme ten dollahs. Pray to Lady Luck to have dat boy waitin'
at de hotel. By rights 'at's my money. Does I meet up wid dat boy I sho'
cleans him rough!"

The Mud Turtle handed the dice and ten-dollar bill to the Wildcat. "Lady
Luck don't have to do nuthin'. That boy nevah is anywhere else 'cept at de
hotel. Does you start sumpin' finish quick! It's midnight now, an' 'at San
F'mcisco train pulls out at one o'clock."

The Wildcat paid no heed to his companion's words. He was engaged in
twisting the dice in the nervous fingers of his right hand.

"Dey feels right! Dey sho' feels right! Boy, de thumb twist come to me befo'
I was nine yeahs old. When I was fo'teen mah uncle Gabe learnt me neveh
to dooce, trey, or twelve. Wid dese bones an' yo' ten-dollah bill, when I gits
th'oo wid 'at nigger he won't have no mo' money than a frog has feathers."

The pair entered the hotel.

The Mud Turtle went directly to his room, wherein he began the difficult
business of oozing his number twelve feet into a pair of number ten shoes.

The Wildcat sought the Spindlin' Spider in whose web he had sacrificed his
thousand dollars earlier in the day.

He found his man leaning against a pool table in a room adjoining the lobby
of the hotel.

"Howdy, boy." The honeyed accents of gentle forgiveness dripped from the
Wildcat's quiet salutation.

The Spindlin' Spider looked at him. "Howdy. How is you?"

"Me? I's noble—an' bustin' wid a cravin' fo' revenge." The Wildcat raised
his voice. "Shoots ten dollahs!"

Under the flat nose of the Spindlin' Spider he waved the ten-dollar bill
which he had borrowed from the Mud Turtle.

The Spider produced a roll of bills and peeled a ten spot therefrom. "Roll
'em! You an' me both craves action."

The Wildcat had hooked his fish.

He twisted the green taper dice in a handful of fingers whose tips bulged
with a fine technique that had distilled from years of study and practice.

Here on the green cloth of the pool table was his field of battle.

Before him lay his entire capital, matched by an equal amount from the
Spindlin' Spider's roll.

"I's a Wildcat for revenge, an' I's on my prowl! Pay-day dice, speak mah
name! Bam! Five and a dooce. I lets it lay. Shower down!"

The Spindlin' Spider covered his bet.

"Gallopers, stay lame on seven. Train robber babies, fo'ty dollars in de sack.
I reads six-five! Rally roun', boys. Shoots fo'ty dollars. Fade me, boy. Bugle
dice, blow de cash call. Harvest babies, pick yo' cotton! Bam! An' I reads fo'
trey!"

The Wildcat stowed away a trio of ten-dollar bills as an insurance policy
against accident.

"Shoots fifty dollars!"

The Spindlin' Spider shaved five ten-dollar bills from his roll, "Roll 'em,"
he said.

The Wildcat lifted his brace of tapered cubes high above his head.

"Honey-bee babies, git yo' stinger hot. Shotgun dice, spout yo' lead. Key
cubes, unlock de han'cuffs. Bam! Dey reads seven. I lets it lay. Shower
down, boy. Fade me. Shoots a hund'ed dollars!"

"You're faded." The Spider had his feet wet, and now he waded deeper into
the river of revenge.

The Wildcat rolled the dice against his legs.

"Squirrel dice, ketch de top limb! Ham cubes, drip yo' gravy! Mule bones,
resurrection morn. Breakin' on de B. & O.—Bust an' out. Baptisin' babies,
hold his head under."

The gallopers rattled across the pool table and went to sleep with a six-five
staring the Spindlin' Spider in the face.

"I lets it lay! Shoots two hundred dollars. De gin dice makes de big boy
sick. Fade me, ol' mule-lip. What fo' is yo' mouth draggin'?"

A look of doubt began to travel across the Spindlin' Spider's features, but
the moral pressure of the crowd about him forced him into the slaughter
house. He counted two hundred dollars from his roll and laid it beside the
Wildcat's stake.

The Wildcat breathed the hot breath of hope upon the twin cubes in his
hand. "Lady dice, git lovely. Snake babies, coil 'roun' de coin. Grub cubes,
'semble yo' rations! Army gallopers, as you was! Bam!"

The green clickers subsided near the end cushion of the pool table. A five
spot smiled on the top side of one and a helpful dooce laughed cheerfully at
the Wildcat from the other.

"Hot dam! Weddin' dice done rung de bell. 'At's fo' hund'ed dollars. Shoots
fo' hundred! Fade me! You says yo' blood is hot fo' action. Fade me!"

The lower jaw swinging from the Spindlin' Spider's face drooped something
less than a foot. His expression was suddenly full of quinine. He craved an
exit while the exit business was good, but a reputation created by
considerable indiscreet language had locked the door.

From his depleted roll he laid down forty ten-dollar bills.

"'At about cleans me." He looked at the remains of his stake. "'At about
cleans me."

His voice had lost the aggressive quality which had marked his oratory five
minutes earlier.

"'At's eight hund'ed dollars. More like I's used to shootin'." The Wildcat
rubbed his fingers' tips quickly across the taper cubes.

"Eight hund'ed iron men. Lady Luck, stan' by me! Preacheh bones, make
'em bow down. Riveh dice, high an' dry. Over de riffle. Whuff! Bam! An' I
reads seven."

"Ump!" The Spindlin' Spider grunted an accompaniment to a wave of grey
which lightened the ebony of his features.

The Wildcat picked up the mass of banknotes and straightened them out. He
turned to the Spider. "Mule Lip, how much is you got left? Shoots you fo'
what you's got. Mebbe you builds up. Neveh can tell. Mah luck's boun' to
break sometime."

The Spider replied weakly, "I'se got mine. 'At's plenty."

"What you mean you's got yours? Thought you claimed you was a spo't.
You's got money, ain't you? You ain't got yours till you goes broke. Ain't I
right, boys?"

The Wildcat made a quick survey of the faces about him.

From the lips of the Mud Turtle, who had silently joined the group, came a
come-on verdict. "You sho' is."

"Hear dat?" The Wildcat turned again to the Spindlin' Spider. "Hear dat?
You ain't got yours till you goes broke. How much is you got? Shoots it all.
Double or nuthin'."

The Spider weakly disgorged his roll. He counted out a total of two hundred
dollars.

"Boy—one pass an' I cleans you. Li'l snow flakes, sof'ly fall. Come on,
dice, C.O.D.—Bam! An' de black specs read—seven. Hot dam! Boy, you's
done. Lady Luck, heah you is!"

The Wildcat pocketed his roll of bills and covered the money with a wide
palm wherein lay the taper cubes. He edged through the crowd. With his left
hand he reached for the Mud Turtle.

"Come on heah, boy. Dat San F'mcisco train gits nervous doggone soon."

In the vestibule of the Mud Turtle's car on the San Francisco train the
Wildcat held out the taper cubes and a handful of winnings. "Ol' Mud
Turtle, heah's yo' victory dice an' fo' hund'ed dollars. Dat gits you a new
unifawm. Git in dere by de steampipes whilst I tells dem passenger folks
where de San F'mcisco train goes to. Hot dam! I knowed dem smelt fish
was lucky!"

The Mud Turtle pocketed his dice. "Wilecat, I's lucky too. Fall in de riveh
an' comes out wid fo' hund'ed dollahs! You sho' got speed!"

"Call dat speed—wait till us 'cumulates mah mascot goat. Den us heats up
dem C.O.D. dice, an' Ah shows you what me an' Lady Luck kin do when de
speed bell rings. You ain't seed no speed yet!"

CHAPTER XIV

Leaving Portland an hour after midnight, the deadhead Wildcat sat in the
smoking room of the Mud Turtle's San Francisco bound Pullman. The
Passengers were in bed. On the window end of the leather seat, shivering
himself out of a coating of Columbia river mud which he had accumulated
that afternoon during the smelt harvest, was the Mud Turtle.

"Boy, dem shivers is workin' overtime. Neveh seed such a partial-shiverin'
fool. How come yo' mis'ry gits you by fractions? Shiver all over an' git done
wid it. Is you cold inside?"

The Mud Turtle forcibly arrested his chattering teeth. He calmed his vocal
organs and answered the Wildcat, but when he became articulate his feet
assumed the staccato movement.

The Wildcat looked at him. "Stan' up befo' you loses dat step. Leave me
learn 'at new foot work. I nevah seed feet so anxious. Don't waste dem
steps." The Mud Turtle grabbed his knees and shoved his feet firmly against
the floor of the car. "Wilecat, what I needs is gin till I gits warmed up."

"You an' me bofe. Any boy needs gin. I been needin' it since away back.
You sho' looks cold. Was you a' ice man you'd be rich. I'se seed folks cold
an' I'se seed 'em shiver, but it sho' looks to me, Mud Turtle, like you'se de
champion shimmy king ob de worl'. Ketch dat leg! Doggone, boy, you sho'
would be pop'lar durin' de hot spell down where us comes f'um. You makes
me cold lookin' at you."

The Mud Turtle's jaws started on another chattering ruckus.

"Dere you goes agin! Now you cain't talk. Whilst you'se dumb I'se a mind
to use some cuss words on you what ol' Cap'n Jack learned me. Sho' would
use 'em, 'ceptin' dey'd burn you to a cinder. Stay here whilst I 'vestigates an'
sees kin I 'cumulate some stove juice to heat you up wid."

The Wildcat walked ahead through the train. He sought strong drink from
every porter he encountered, but his search was unsuccessful until he came
to the dining car.

"Whah at you think you is? Heavin? Cuba? Ain't nuthin' to drink on dis
car." A burly chef answered the Wildcat's inquiry.

"Dey's a cold boy back dere. Fell in de river an' stood out in de night rain in
Poteland. Can't git near him for' chips o' teeth flyin' through de air. When he
gits to shiverin' good he looks like him an' two twin brothehs."

"White boy?" The chef ventured a casual inquiry.

"Is I said white boy? White boy packs it wid 'em. It's mah ol' Mud Turtle
podneh what craves de gin."

"'At's diff'unt." The chef grunted and got up from the poker game which
was raging. "Come wid me." He led the Wildcat into the kitchen of the car.
From one of the cupboards against the partition he lifted a pint bottle full of
a light yellow fluid. He poured some of this into a smaller bottle. Out of
another bottle containing a brown aromatic liquid he filled the third bottle.
He shook the smaller bottle until the two liquids in it were mixed. He
handed the bottle to the Wildcat. "Give dat boy dis."

"Sho' will. What's de name o' dis licker?"

"Ain't got no public name. Us boys calls it 'hoof oil.' It kicks—some. Better
tie 'at boy's hind laigs does he take mo'n two drinks."

"What's de 'mgredients?"

"Dat's a church secret. Don't ask me no questions. 'At's five dollahs."

"Five dollahs! What you mean church secret?"

"I'se a hooch rabbi, off de run. I leads a Oakland ginagogue. I said five
dollahs. How you spec' us rabbis gwine to thrive, 'ceptin' by takin' up de
collection now an' den when we issues dis here rabbi juice?"

"How come dat rabbi name?"

The chef looked at him. "You sho' is a' ignorant niggah. Ain't you met up
wid no rabbis yet?"

"Cain't say I is. What is dey?"

In the chef's gaze was an expression of contempt. "Boy, when you sees me
you sees a rabbi. I works at de rabbi business between trips. De rabbi lodge
was o'ganized wid all de culled bartenders. Now days mos' all we rabbis is
union bootleggers. Git back dah wid dat hoof oil befo' it blows up.
Whereat's de five dollahs?"

The Wildcat handed the chef a five-dollar bill and returned to his car, where
the Mud Turtle was doing the best he could to shake his arms off.

"Hot dam! Heah you is, ol' Mud Turtle. You sho' got a noble rattle in yo'
right han'. 'Pears like wid a pair o' gallopin' cubes you might throw some
killin' sevens. 'Sorb one drink o' dis heah rabbi juice an' resurrect yo'self."

"One drink! Boy, gimme dat bottle. I handles mah licker!" The Wildcat
uncorked the bottle and held it to the Mud Turtle's chattering lips. The Mud
Turtle took a whiff of the liquid. Its perfume seemed to inspire a new set of
internal calisthenics in the Mud Turtle. After he had quit writhing the
Wildcat again pressed the remedy upon him. "Drink it, fo' I drips it on you.
Go ahead an' drink. I'll hol' yo' nose." He succeeded in pouring the contents
of the bottle into the Mud Turtle.

The Mud Turtle absorbed the hoof oil as far as his equator. Then he reacted
with a series of undulations in which was all of the reserve energy of the

surging deep. Then he suddenly became quiet, except for his rolling
eyeballs, from which gleamed an exalted light.

"Dat sho' tamed you. Is yo' insides hot?"

The Mud Turtle's only reply was a sudden stiffening of his right leg,
followed a second later by a similar movement with his left. His right arm
extended violently; then the ham-sized fist on the end of his left arm went
through the plate glass window beside him. He leaped to the centre of the
smoking compartment. For a moment he danced on both feet, and then he
began to stage a movement compared to which a cyclone was only a boy's-
size disturbance. He combined the activity of a whirling dervish with the
technique of an earthquake.

The Wildcat retreated to the safety of the tapestry curtain which hung in the
doorway. There for a little while he conducted an innocent bystander
business, which presently ended in disaster. Up to the moment, the Mud
Turtle had been silent, but now from his throat came a yelp which drowned
the rattle of the train.

The Wildcat sought to calm him down. "How come? Boy, git tame. You'll
wake de white folks in dis car an' dey'll massacre you. Shut up befo' dey
gits you."

The Mud Turtle's only answer was a renewed succession of yells. Suddenly
he stopped short where he stood, and for a space of minutes he regarded his
companion with a pair of glassy eyes under whose hypnotic spell the
Wildcat began to shrivel.

"Don' look dat way. You's got de graveyard eye. You took too much hoof
oil," he said weakly. "Lemme put 'at blanket 'roun' you." He took one step
towards the centre of the compartment, and on the instant the Mud Turtle
leaped at him.

The Wildcat had been in many a ruckus abroad and at home, but home was
never like this, and the worst he saw in France was a busy time at Château

Thierry. This was different trouble and worse. The Wildcat abandoned his
tactics of fair fighting. He kicked and struck wildly at the Mud Turtle
without effect. He despaired of conquering the tornado which writhed on
the floor beside him. Then he succeeded in obtaining the blanket in which
the Mud Turtle had been wrapped. He manœuvered for three seconds and
threw a hitch around the Mud Turtle's neck and another one around his leg.
An instant later the whirlwind was trussed up and confined with a hard
square knot.

The Mud Turtle's yells gave place to a series of snarling grunts, punctuated
now and then with the yowling scream invented some years back by the
female panther. The Wildcat secured a folded towel from the rack above his
head, and in a moment the panther was muffled. The victor stood panting
for a little while, gazing at the conquest which still writhed and rolled on
the floor.

The Wildcat reached for the empty bottle and inspected five or six drops of
liquid which remained in it. "Hoof oil, you sho' is double dynamite. Rabbi
juice, I saves you. Mebbe sometime I meets up wid a army whut starts a
ruckus wid me. Den I'll 'sorb two drops an' win de battle."

He replaced the cork in the bottle and stowed it carefully in his pocket.
"Does I need to I figger dat wid fo' drops ob dis hoof oil I kin conquer de
worl'."

He turned again to the Mud Turtle. The Pullman blanket lashed around the
Mud Turtle cramped his style to a considerable degree, but for all of his
impedimenta he was still active enough to threaten the peace-on-earth
theory. The Wildcat spoke to him, "Boy, I sequesters you till de debbil
leaves you. Mebbe by de time us gits to San F'mcisco you'll be human
again."

He stepped into the passage way, and at the end of the open section of the
car he opened the door of the linen closet. He returned to the smoking room
and dragged the Mud Turtle out of the room wherein the ruckus had been
staged. At the door of the linen closet the Wildcat encountered a difficult

problem, in that the least dimension of the Mud Turtle in his present pose
was greater than the width of the door.

He grabbed the door framing with both hands and applied his right foot to
the Mud Turtle's anatomy. "Whuf! Git in dere!" He strained hard at his task,
and presently a heroic effort was rewarded by the disappearance of the Mud
Turtle into the dark interior of the linen closet. The Wildcat stooped down
and removed the towel from about the Mud Turtle's mouth. "Yell yo' head
off, ol' debbil. You kain't soun' loud in heah. Folks'll think de ol' engine is
whistlin'."

Before the Wildcat shut the door the Mud Turtle took advantage of his vocal
freedom and emitted a strenuous howl. A middle-aged gentleman half way
down the car stuck his head through the berth curtains. He called to the
Wildcat. "Is she whistlin' for Ashland?"

"No suh. 'Spec' it was a cow on de track or sumpin'. 'At's all. I wakes you up
neah Ashlan'." The Wildcat neglected to say which side of Ashland would
be selected for the awakening ceremonies.

He walked to the far end of the car, and on his return journey he
accumulated the shoes of his passengers.

"I shines me dese heah shoes an' den I sees kin I sleep me some. I bet was
ol' Mud Turtle a aig, chances is he'd hatch out in dat linen closet—so hot."

In the smoking compartment the Wildcat spent an hour shining shoes. He
distributed them with more or less accuracy, and presently he was stretched
out sound asleep on the long leather seat.

"I eats when I kin git it,
I sleeps mos' all de time.
I don't give a doggone
If the sun don't neveh shine."

CHAPTER XV

The Wildcat slept until the first grey light of dawn announced the day. He
got up and stretched himself and drank five or six slugs of free ice water.
"Lemme see," he yawned, "whah at is us." His mind covered the events of
his immediate past and collided heavily with the battle which had been
fought in the night. "Wondeh how ol' Mud Turtle is? I betteh git him fo' de
passengers gets up. Wid all dat hoof oil in 'im, 'spec' he'll crave mo' wateh
dan a mule."

He opened the door of the linen closet. In the far corner, propped against the
wall, sat the Mud Turtle. The dazed expression on his face was completely
surrounded by brunet skin and surmounted by a pair of owl-like eyes which
blinked at the sudden light.

The Wildcat whispered at him, "Is you pacified? Dast I leave you loose?"

The Mud Turtle replied with a question, "Was many folks hurt in de
wreck?"

"Ain't been no wreck, 'ceptin' you like to wrecked me. Come out heah till I
helps you 'membeh yo' sinful past."

He hauled the Mud Turtle into the passage way and resurrected him from
the interior of the blanket cocoon.

"Come on back heah," the Wildcat directed. "Stretch yo' laigs an' come on
back heah whilst I 'splains about you. Take 'at ol' coat off an' put on dis
white coat."

The Mud Turtle removed his mud-caked blue coat and donned a crisp white
jacket. For a while he sat quiet on the leather seat of the smoking car.
Finally he turned to the Wildcat.

"All I 'members is takin' one drink."

"All I 'members pusson'ly is what you did after you took 'at one drink.
Thought you said you could handle yo' licker. I neveh seed such a wild
man. Boy, you started single, but when you an' 'at drink got confidential you
sho' was a' army. Handle yo' licker! Huh! You couldn' handle de bottle, let
alone what was in it. How come you lie such a big lie? Start out gentle nex'
time."

"Must a bin some new kin' o' licker."

"Sho' acted new. Wid one drink like dat in me when I was fightin' in France,
de ole guv'ment wouldn't need no mo' soldiers. I seed de night ob de big
wind what blowed New Awl'uns clean up de Mississippi River. I know'd a
mule what couldn't live in de mountains 'count o' kickin' 'em over, but las'
night when you was goin' good, I says, 'If a mule married a cyclone an' had
a boy, he'd be you.' 'Hoof oil,' dey calls it. 'At niggah what chefs in de dinin'
car an rabbis when he lays over in Oaklan' give it to me."

The Mud Turtle looked at the broken window beside him. "Did I bus' 'at
window?"

"Bust 'at window—you sho' did. All you did was blow yo' breaf at it. I tell
you you was bad. I's seed folks what was plastered wid luck. You thinks
you's plastered wid mud, but it ain't mud; it's real ol' luck. You had all de
luck in de worl' gettin' out ob de claws ob that rabbi juice. Dat stuff is tiger
blood. You had enough wild time las' night to last you all de res' ob your life
does you live fo' evah."

"Wilecat, you sounds right. When us gits to Oaklan' I craves to settle down.
Mebbe I shows you a business I aims to 'vest in."

"You don't show me no business, boy. Only business I craves is to find Lily
and Lady Luck. Lily's ramblin' loose somewhere in San F'mcisco wid dem
Blue Fezant boys. Does I meet up wid dat goat I'll sho' bust him in de haid
fo' leavin' me. Every time me an' Lily gits a divo'ce ol' man Hard Luck
camps on my trail. Business sounds good, but me, I 'cumulates Lily an' den
I takes dem Blue Fezant boys back to Chicago. Mebbe when I comes back
heah nex' time us starts some business. Not now. Naw, suh—not me!"

"Wilecat, some business ain't so bad. All you does is set dere an' take in de
money."

"All you does is set dere, you mean, an' listen' to some triflin' niggah
wantin' groceries or mebbe wantin' to eat whilst you supplies free grub,
does you run a restaurant. Dem boys what buys easy never is got money.
Naw, suh, I don't want no business, Mud Turtle. All I want is Lady Luck an'
mah mascot goat."

The Mud Turtle continued his business dream without paying much
attention to the Wildcat's arguments. "Dere's de anti-hair-kink business; all a
boy does is buy some things at the drugsto' an' mix 'em up an' sells 'em at
fifty cents a bottle. All de niggahs in de worl' craves to buy anti-kink juice.
I's seed some remedies what took off de scalp an' some what removes de
brain, but it don't make no diff'unce—niggahs keep on buyin', no matteh
how deep de remedy digs in."

"Dat business is ol'," the Wildcat objected. "Dat's too ol' to ketch folks any
mo'."

"So's kinky hair ol'," answered the Mud Turtle. "Dat business still ketches
'em. While de kinky hair las', so does de anti-kink business. Dat ain't de
only business I knows. You an' me had luck wid fish—part bad luck an' part
good luck. Here's de ocean an' here's San F'mcisco bay crowded wid fish.
'Spose us gits a wagon an' some hooks fo' ketchin' fish an' comes home
eve'y day wid a wagon load."

"Don' say fish to me, boy! All de bad luck I'se had lately come f'm fish. See
kin you talk 'bout some good-luck business does yo' crave to. Ah ain't got
oveh mah fish luck yit."

"How 'bout de boot-leggin' business, Wilecat? Dey sho' is big money in
dat."

"Nobody to sell to no mo'. Eve'ybody's boot-leggin' now. You steps up to a
man on de street an' says 'How 'bout it?' an' he thinks you's tryin' to buy.
Eve'ybody's boot-leggin'! See kin you think ob some business what's got
some customers, instead ob eve'ybody runnin' de business deyself. Naw,
suh, I aims not to let no business 'flooence me. I rounds me up Lily an'
meets up wid Lady Luck, an' someday I sees ol' Cap'n Jack agin', an' den I
quits worryin'. What I craves mos' is to ketch Lily an' den git some regulah
run where I sleeps mos' all de time. 'Less I fin's mah mascot I aims to quit
de whole Pullman business an' let 'em git on de bes' dey can widout me."

"Boy, how come you so tame? When we lef' Poteland all you talked about
was startin' a sinful life an' bustin' all de speed records on de road to hell.
Now all you craves is to settle down. Has de itch got you? 'Pears like you
needs quinine."

"I don' need nuthin' 'ceptin' Lily an' Lady Luck—an' mebbe a slug o' gin."

"Cain't git no gin now days."

"Mud Turtle, when us gits to Oaklan' you follow me. I'll bet dat rabbi boy
what chefs on dis train knows whah at is some gin. Any man what kin
throw a dose ob hoof oil together on short notice what makes a nigger look
like a cyclone sho' can dig up a drink o' gin. Quick as us gits to Oakland I
trails 'at boy down. Chances is he starts de rabbi business soon as he gits his
apron off. I depends on him fo' gin. I's jined up wid de chu'ch when I was
sixteen, but now I aims to git backslid back enough to take de road what
leads into dis rabbi place. You goes in an' takes off yo' hat, an' as quick as
you gits baptized, the ol' preacheh says, 'Boys, what'll it be?' I says, 'Make
mine gin.' Ol' Mud Turtle say, 'Make mine gin.' We says 'at 'bout six times,

an' away us goes lookin' fo' Lily. At's better'n any business talk you'se
talkin'."

"I'll say so, Wilecat—fo'get de business. Us has money, anyhow. There's
that fo' hund'ed dollahs you give me an' whatever you'se got left off de
Spindlin' Spider boy you cleaned in Poteland. I agrees wid you—fo'get de
business."

With the arrival of the train in Oakland, about four minutes sufficed to clear
up the Mud Turtle's official obligations to the company. Immediately
thereafter he and the Wildcat set out to overtake the dining car chef, whom
they had seen leaving the terminal. The Wildcat edged up beside the rabbi.
"Boy," he said, "how 'bout some licker? Me an' the Mud Turtle here craves
to git baptized wid a couple o' slugs o' gin. Is de gin included in de rabbi
business?"

The chef looked at the Wildcat. "Us rabbis handles some gin, but it sho'
comes high."

"Boy, us aims to pay high. You ain't talkin' to no busted steamboat niggahs.
Us ain't fiel' han's. Me an' my podneh got money; all we craves is gin."

The chef's gaze left the Wildcat's face for a moment and seemed to travel to
some more distant point. The Wildcat's statement of his finances had
aroused the rabbi's cupidity. "Come on heah," he said briefly.

The three made their way up town and presently entered the door of a
ramshackle structure standing midway of a block lined by similar buildings.
They walked into a darkened room, and the Wildcat saw a fresco of
gleaming white eyeballs ranged about him.

"Whah at is us?" he asked the rabbi.

"Dis heah's de Oaklan' Pleasure Club, sort of a social off-shot f'm de
chu'ch."

"What chu'ch?"

"Chu'ch is called Banded Brothehs ob de Loose Barrel Hoop. I rabbis fo'
dem when I's in town. When I'se away dey's got another boy what does de
rabbi work."

The chef turned to the assemblage. "Boys, meet up wid de Mud Turtle. I
'spec' some o' you all knows him. Dis heah other boy travels under de name
ob de Wilecat."

A voice from a corner of the room bellered into the midst of the
assemblage. "What'll it be, boys? Dis is on de Wilecat."

The Wildcat put on the financial brakes. "How come?"

"Dis heah's de initiation drink. Eve'ybody what joins de Banded Brothehs
buys a drink fo' de congregation."

The Wildcat's eyes had become more accustomed to the darkness. "'Pears
like I gits lifted fo' goin' on fo'ty drinks."

Presently half a dozen bottles were mingling around with the congregation,
and the Wildcat's words to the Mud Turtle beside him were drowned in a
chorus of gurgling throats. The gulping ceased. Out of an obscure corner of
the room came the Auditor's tones. "Eighty-two dollars. Wilecat, pay me
befo' de long green gits wilted."

The Wildcat was no piker, but the bill hit him pretty hard. "I's seen saloons
you could buy complete fo' half de money," he remonstrated. He walked
over to where a narrow square of light broke through the wall. He fished out
a big roll of bills from which he proceeded to count ninety dollars. He
replaced the money in his pocket. As he did so a yellow electric light
flashed in another part of the room and burned steadily above a small table
upon which was stretched a green cloth. A man beside the table called to the
newcomer. "Wilecat, de pleasure part ob de entertainment now starts. Now
you gits action."

"How come action? Action what wid?"

"Action wid de freckled bones what knows 'rithmetic."

The Wildcat accepted the invitation. Here was a chance to retrieve the price
of the drinks. He walked over to the corner. "Whah at's de bones?"

In allowing his opponent to supply the weapons he had committed a serious
technical error, but the only other dice in the crowd were the taper cubes
belonging to the Mud Turtle, and the Wildcat knew that the production of
these dice in that congregation would probably result in his immediate
disintegration under the blades of some hungry social razors.

The boy on the opposite side of the table spoke. "Shoots fifty dollahs!"

"You sho' starts blooded." The Wildcat peeled fifty dollars from his roll.
"You'se faded. Roll 'em."

The boy rolled them, and an ace-dooce bloomed under the electric light.

A grunt of disappointment went up from several interested veterans of the
Banded Brothers gathered around the table, and the rabbi plunged his way
into the crowd. He used a few words not commonly included in a rabbi's
vocabulary. "Git out o' de way. Gimme dem dice. How come you makes dis
mistake?" He took the dice from the loser. "Wilecat, Ah shoots fifty
dollars!"

The Wildcat divided his winnings and laid fifty dollars on the table. "Rabbi,
roll 'em."

The rabbi breathed a fervent prayer upon the speckled cubes and cast them
away from him into the outer darkness. "Freckle tops, git right! Bam! I
reads seven. Lets it lay. Shoots a hund'ed!"

"Roll 'em, you'se faded." The Wildcat trimmed himself for another hundred.

The rabbi made another throw. "Luck dice, ketch dat Wilecat. Whuff! An'
dey says five an' a six. Dey sho' is lucky."

The Wildcat grunted. "Lucky fo' you."

"Pussonel luck is de luck I likes best," the rabbi returned. "I lets it lay. You
has yo' chance. Shoots two hund'ed."

The Wildcat skinned his roll for two hundred dollars. "Dese heah frog skins
sho' has got de quick dwindles. You'se faded. Roll 'em."

The rabbi abandoned his ecclesiastical lingo and fell into the vernacular.
"Tiger dice, claw me! Turtle dice, off de log! Soap dice, git slick. Clean dat
Wilecat. Gun dice, pull de triggah—wham! An' I reads six-ace."

The Wildcat's fingers began to itch for the possession of the bones. He
turned to the Mud Turtle, who was close beside him. "Hot dam, boy, dat
talk sho' sounds nat'chul! Dat boy growed up someplace else befo' he
started de rabbi business."

The rabbi raked in his winnings. He slipped half the roll and laid it on the
green cloth. "Shoots two hund'ed. Fade me is you reckless!"

The Wildcat was in too deep to back out. He pared two hundred dollars
from his roll and laid it beside the rabbi's stake. "Boy, yo' luck's got to bus'
sometime, even is you a rabbi. Roll 'em an' see kin you roll to de po' house."

The rabbi spoke confidentially to the dice for a few moments and then his
voice lifted above the murmur of the congregation. "Snow babies, let de
soot specs read seven. Rooster dice, crow de pay call! Hen dice, hatch de
money eggs. Mule dice, kick dat boy into de rivah! Bam! An' I reads five-
dooce."

This triumph of the rabbi was a signal for a revolt on the part of the
Wildcat. "I quits. I craves to handle dem bones pussonal. Does you own 'em
all de time I quits."

The rabbi handed a pair of dice to the Wildcat. "Roll 'em does you crave
to," he said. The concession was made only after he had switched the dice.
The Wildcat got hold of twin dice which were loaded to come out dooce,
trey, or twelve on the first throw. He warmed the dice to a functioning
temperature in the palm of his right hand. In his left he held the remainder

of his roll. He laid the money on the centre of the table. "Shoots it all. Two
hund'ed dollars. Fade me, boy."

The rabbi counted out two hundred dollars, but before the Wildcat threw the
dice the Mud Turtle beside him spoke up. "I shoots fo' hund'ed on the
Wildcat's luck. Shoot's fo' hund'ed. Fade me, boy."

The rabbi grunted and dug into his roll for another four hundred.

The Wildcat turned to the Mud Turtle. "Boy, us is bust does I lose!"

"I been bust befo', Wilecat. So is you. Roll 'em see kin you git double or
nuthin'."

The Wildcat said a few words to the dice, and an instant later they rattled
across the green cloth. "Cyclone babies, blow dat rabbi to hell! Whuff! An' I
reads—ace-dooce. Doggone, Lady Luck, whah at is you?"

The Mud Turtle grabbed the Wildcat by the arm. "Come on heah befo' dey
gits yo' clothes."

The Wildcat turned away from the table. "Us sho' needs 'at mascot goat.
Was hard luck a minny us done ketched a whale. Trouble wid luck, it's
always changin'. Don' stay on de good side long enough fo' a boy to git
settled down." He bade farewell to the rabbi. "You sho' was right. I'll say
gin comes high. Fo' hund'ed dollars a drink!"

The rabbi laughed a hollow laugh. "Come on back sometime an' try de
thousan' dollah gin when you feels strongeh."

"Does I find Lily an' Lady Luck I comes back an' shows you some million-
dollar gin—mebbe."

"On your way, boy—at's de quinine talkin'!"

CHAPTER XVI

Launched by the rabbi's parting taunt, the Wildcat and the Mud Turtle made
their way out of the ginagogue. On the street the Wildcat set the course
toward Twelfth Street. His companion pounded along as best he could for a
while and then voiced a protest. "What for is you got such a hot foot?"

"Come on heah, ol' Mud Turtle. I craves to meet up wid dat Lily goat befo'
any mo' calamity ketches up wid me."

"Whah you spec' to fin' dat doggone goat?"

"San F'mcisco some place. Ah tol' you once. De Blue Fezant boys went to
San F'mcisco on de train, an' de las' I seed ob Lily she was penned up along
wid 'bout nine ob dem boys. 'At goat's in San F'mcisco."

"How long you spec' it take you to fin' 'at mascot in San F'mcisco? You
know how big 'at town is?"

"Boy, I been dere. I been clear from downtown out to de Presidio whah at
dey keeps de ahmy boys an' de gin'rals. I seed 'at town befo'."

The Mud Turtle grunted. "You ain't seed nuthin'. 'At town's ten times 'at big.
Was Lily fo' years ol' when you started lookin' she'd be eight hund'ed fo'
you foun' her, 'less you had luck."

"Does I fin' her I gits all de luck I needs. Us wins bofe ways, 'cause all de
bad luck I could git wouldn't be no worse'n what us has now. I'se plum
busted. How is you?"

The Mud Turtle audited the depths of his pocket. "Nuthin' but some ravelin'
lint an' fo' bits."

"'At's enough. Don' look so mean, ol' Mud Turtle. Does us see another rabbi
walkin' down de main street us better take de alley fo' he sees us. Dem rabbi
boys is just like a ticket to de po' house. Dem ginagogue gin rabbis is de
wust of all."

At eleven o'clock the pair landed at the ferry building in San Francisco. As a
precaution against lunch money, they saved the change from Mud Turtle's
half dollar and walked towards the centre of the town.

They landed finally in Union Square.

The Wildcat flopped down on the grass, and the Mud Turtle joined him.
"Mud Turtle, what's dat big house oveh there?" He pointed at the St. Francis
Hotel.

"Boy, thought you told me you was here once befo'. Dat's de St. Frantic
Hotel."

"How come de boy frantic what dey named de hotel fo'?"

"'Spec' he drunk some hoof oil, o' mebbe met a gin rabbi. Sho' is a fine
day."

"All de days I seen in de town was fine days, 'ceptin' some evenin's when de
fog gits heavy."

"Ol' fog comes in mighty handy does you owe money. Boy kin lose hisself
f'm a bloodhoun' easy in de fog."

The Wildcat stretched himself out and prepared to go to sleep, but before he
had accomplished his purpose he was interrupted by his companion.

"Wilecat, look at dem two boys on de hotel steps. Dey sho' looks like dem
Blue Fezant Nobles you was speakin' 'bout."

The Wildcat rose to his knees and looked across Powell Street. Sure
enough, there before his eyes stood two of the Blue Fezant gentlemen. He
lost no time in going towards them. "Come on heah, Mud Turtle! I knowed
we'd meet some o' dem Blue Fezant boys. Come on heah!"

A moment later the Wildcat and the Mud Turtle confronted the two Nobles
of the Mysterious Mecca. Each of the nobles was festooned with a golf bag.
The pair were headed for Lincoln Park. The Wildcat spoke to the larger of
the two gentlemen. "Cap'n, suh," he said, "I was de po'tah on a special car
f'm Chicago what hauled some of you Blue Fezant gen'men out heah. Kin
you tell me whah at Lily mah mascot goat is?"

The Blue Fezant gentleman looked at the Wildcat for a moment. "Seems to
me I heard about that goat. Some of the boys got him some place."

The second man interposed some additional information. "You mean the
white goat? He's out with Jim and Frank on the golf links."

The first Potent Noble turned toward the Wildcat. "He's out where we're
going now. Come with us and maybe you'll find him. Is he your goat?'

"Cap'n, suh, you sho' soun' good! Does I meet up wid dat Lily I beats 'at
goat to death—mebbe. Lily sho' is mah goat. I raised him clean f'm France."
He turned to his companion. "Mud Turtle, take 'at bag fo' de gen'men.
Cap'n, suh, we carry dis stuff."

The Potent Nobles smiled at each other. "These boys can caddy for us. Do
you boys want to caddy for us?"

Without knowing exactly what it was, the Wildcat signed quite a contract.
"Cap'n, yessuh. Whatever you wants, us does. How come dis caddy
business?"

"You carry the bag around while we go golf hunting."

The Wildcat spoke lowly to the Mud Turtle. "Golf hunting? What's dis heah
golfs? Neveh seed one pussonally."

"Boy, don't you know what golfs is? Sumpin' like a dog, only smaller. Born
wild. Dey gin'ally gits wilder when dey grows up."

"How big does dey git?"

"Dog size—some bigger, sometimes."

"Neveh seed none in Memphis."

"Dey's tame down dere; out heah dey grows wild. Some parts, de wild golfs
run 'roun' so thick a man hardly kin plough his fiel', 'thout carryin' six or
eight shotguns on de plow. Dis country was 'fested wid golfs till de Indians
got heah."

"'Fested wid Indians till white folks got heah, too. I guess could de Indians
kill a golf us is safe."

He turned to one of the Potent Nobles. "Cap'n, suh, what does you kill dese
here golfs wid?"

The Noble was quick to take up the deception. "We beat 'em to death with
those clubs. If you get a small blue golf, you beat him with an iron club. For
the savage red ones you use that club with the piece of brass on it. The
whisky golf is the worst, though; he sort of sneaks up on you. You use those
little clubs for them. They're called putters. They're shorter so you can use
'em in close places. Short and deadly."

The quartette were presently seated in an automobile which was retrieved
from Powell Street. On the way to the Lincoln Park golf course the party
detoured through Golden Gate Park. The car drove past the enclosure
wherein leaped a dozen full grown kangaroos. One of the Potent Nobles
pointed to the awkward animals. "There's some golfs now if you boys never
seen any."

A restless kangaroo made a thirty-foot leap. "Lawd Gawd, Cap'n, does you
kill dem debbils wid clubs? I craves a cannon an' forty miles' range, or else
one o' them airplane flyin' things."

"All you have to do is to stand right close behind me and you'll be safe."

The Wildcat's training had taught him to trust the word of a white man.
"Cap'n, yes, suh." As far as he was concerned, the conversation was ended,
but in spite of the Potent Noble's reassuring words, a feeling of uneasiness
seemed to undermine him.

At the hunting preserves in Lincoln Park it became evident that luck was
not with the two golf-killing Nobles of the Mysterious Mecca, because
about all these two gentlemen did was to continue the monotonous business
of knocking a couple of innocent looking white balls across the landscape.
Every now and then they would come upon a grass lawn with an iron cup in
the centre of it, and then each Potent Noble would waste a lot of time urging
his ball into the cup with the short and deadly putter which was normally
used for slaughtering whisky golfs which sneaked up on you.

After the first mile or two the zest of the chase was dulled by the Wildcat's
habitual languor. He edged over towards the Mud Turtle. "Mud Turtle,
'spec' dese gen'men gwine to give us fo' bits, mebbe, fo' he'pin 'em hunt
dese golfs what we ain't seed. Ah feels dismal. Every time dey shoots 'at
ball, s'posin' you an' me shoots ten cents?"

"How come, Wilecat? You knows us cain't monkey wid dis huntin' game."

"I don't mean monkey wid de huntin'," the Wildcat returned. "Is you got a
lead pencil? 'Sposin' us marks de li'l white balls wid de dice freckles an'
reads 'em when dey drops. Fust you take one time, den I takes anotheh. Us
plays some mountain dominoes. Got to do sumpin', else us goes to sleep.
Den like as not some ragin' golf sneak up an' eat yo' innards fo' you has a
chance to wake up. Le's try shootin' some sevens at de scenery."

Action followed the Wildcat's words, and presently the two golf balls then
in use were marked with a pattern of black dots running from the gentle ace
to the belligerent six spot. Thereafter the two Potent Nobles had reason to
wonder at the sudden industry exhibited by their caddies, who leaped after
each ball almost before the club had touched it.

"Bam! Look at that boy go, Jim! I wish we could get caddies like that in
Chicago; the lazy devils never would go after a ball. These fellows are
bears."

"They're all good,—the best caddies I ever had were niggers in the south,—
after you get 'em woke up, that is."

Meanwhile, out at the destination of the golf ball the Wildcat and the Mud
Turtle were inspecting it where it lay. "Three up." The pair raced to the
point where the other ball had fallen. "She reads fo'. Fo' an' three is seven.
Wilecat, doggone you, you wins again."

"Sho' I wins! Didn' dem Blue Fezant boys say dis heah mascot goat ob mine
was roustin' roun' out heah? Whaheveh dat goat is, so is Lady Luck. Fo'
long I meets up wid Lily, an' den I shows you some winnin' what is."

The two Potent Nobles holed out at the ninth, and the party crossed the road
under the trees to the tenth tee. "Cap'n, suh," the Wildcat asked, "what's 'at
rock oveh dah, widout no roof an' de rock wall?"

The Potent Noble looked over at the Chinese tomb. "That's where some
Chinaman is buried," he said. "That's a Chinese tomb."

"Tomb! Some dead boy layin' in it?"

"I'll say so—maybe a dozen of 'em. This whole golf pasture is built over a
graveyard."

The Wildcat stiffened and looked at the Mud Turtle. "Lawd Gawd, Mud
Turtle! Us cravin' to meet Lady Luck an' walkin' 'roun' in a graveyard! Sho'
makes me dwindle up inside! No wondeh dem man-eatin' golfs is so ragin'
out heah. Wish I could fin' dat doggone Lily Goat." He turned to one of the
Potent Nobles. "Ain't we startin' down town, Cap'n, fo' it gits dark?"

"It'll be two hours yet before it gets dark. We've got time to hunt another
golf or two. Shut up while I drive."

"Cap'n, yessuh."

At the sixteenth tee the Potent Noble looked down at the heavy fog which
was rolling in through the Golden Gate. He addressed the ball. He jumbled
around on his feet and took a couple of practice swings. Perfection was in
every movement. Then, as he drove, the Wildcat sneezed. There followed a
blast of profanity whose equal the Wildcat had not heard since his army
days. He edged over towards the Mud Turtle. "Neveh seed a boy change so
quick. Heah he is, pleasant one minnit, an' den he hits dat ball an' goes hog
wild. Seems like—"

He was interrupted by the Potent Noble, who had calmed down. "Git the
hell out in the rough there and find that ball I sliced."

"Yes, suh." The Wildcat started out through the fog to find the freckled
white sphere. He threshed around in the trees and underbrush for a while,
and then to his mind came a memory of the horrible words which the Potent
Noble had spoken. "This place was a graveyard!" The Wildcat shuddered
extensively and abandoned the search for the golf ball.

He looked up, and there before him was a tombstone!

"Lawd Gawd, Lady Luck, whah is you?" Automatically his feet began to
work, and they were aided an instant later by his racing legs. He went away
from there through the fog. The next thing he knew, he had made a forty-
foot dive over a sand bank. He rolled for a moment in the shifting sand
before he brought up against a stunted cedar.

"Whah at is I?"

The fog cleared, and the Wildcat saw the sand dunes stretching below him.
At the edge of the slope were the waves of the Golden Gate. Then the fog
closed in again, and everything about him faded out of the picture. Above
his head, out of the drifting fog, a flight of sea gulls started a little gossip.
To the Wildcat's ears came their shrieking remarks. He stopped his wild
shuddering and began to moan.

"'At's dem ghost boys! I know 'em! Lady Luck, take dem boys away. I ain't
talkin' wid no ghosts." He turned and started up the bank. He began
throwing sand out from under his feet like a record-busting rotary snow
plough. His legs ran for ten minutes, but his wind was crippled, and in the
shifting sand he covered a space of less than twenty feet. Exhausted with
his effort, he flopped down on the sloping bank. "Dey's got me," he
moaned, "dey's got me! I knowed it. I knowed dem graveyard ghosts would
git me, once I gits divo'ced f'um dat mascot goat. Lady Luck, here I is!" The
Wildcat curled up and covered his head with his arms.

He lay in repose for less than ten seconds; for suddenly, out of the fog in
mid channel, came the booming siren whistle of a liner, heading out of the
Golden Gate. "Whoom! Wha-om!"

The Wildcat moaned. "I heahs you, Gabriel, I heahs you! Heah I is, Lawd—
heah I is."

"Whooom! We-ow-oom!"

"It's me. It's ol' Wilecat. What fo' you askin' who? You knows who! Ghosts
got me, Gabriel! Here I is! Lady Luck—Good-bye!"

Then from Fort Miley crashed the report of the evening gun that marked
retreat, and a moment later the clear notes of a bugle floated out of the fog.
For a moment life on earth again claimed the Wildcat, and instinctively he
responded to his army training. He got to his feet and stood rigidly at
attention. Into the fog to an unseen company he yelled a series of
commands. "Come to 'tenshun! Silence in de ranks! Shut up an' stan' up!
'Tenshun! Lily, come to 'tenshun! Cap'n Jack, suh, de company is fo'med."

He saluted and made an about-face as perfectly as he could in the shifting
sand beneath his feet.

As he did so he felt his brain rattle. Ten feet above him, tangible as iron,
real as gold, festooned with hair and horns, stood Lily the mascot goat.

The Wildcat stood fixed for an instant looking with incredulous eyes at the
mascot. Then he made an excess demand on the motor muscles of his legs,
and in six wild leaps he had gained the goat's side.

"Lily, is you back? Goat, hot dam! Lady Luck sho' heard me!" The Wildcat
grabbed the leading string which dangled from the mascot's neck. "Come
heah—I aims to git me some han'-cuffs an' lock one end 'roun yo' neck an'
de otheh roun' mah laig. Goat, us sho' is proud to meet up wid you! Does
you leave me once mo' nex' time I knocks yo' hawns down yo' throat."

Lily evidently approved the arrangement. She looked at the Wildcat, and
then from her skinny throat a faint bleat sounded.

"Say dat again! You sounds noble!"

"Blaaa," answered Lily.

The Wildcat looked around him. His fear of the shrieking ghostly voices
from the sky overhead had melted into the fog. No longer did the howling
devils of mid channel disturb him. No longer did he fear the raging golf.
With his mascot goat at his side, no evil luck could touch him. Courage
returned, and with it extravagant language. "Lily, no doggone ghos' better
git uppity wid me. I'd bus' a ol' ghos' in de haid did I ketch one."

With Lily beside him, he gained the level ground of the fairway. Then, over
a wide expanse of golf links, the fog had lifted clear. The Wildcat saw the
two Blue Fezant Nobles poking around near the Chinese tomb in search of
the ball which had been lost a little while before.

"Come on heah, Lily." He dragged the mascot to the Chinese tomb, near
which the Mud Turtle was halted.

"Ain't you foun' 'at little white ball yit, Mud Turtle?"

"Not me, Wilecat. Dat ball landed inside dis heah graveyard tomb. You
don't git me in dere fo' a million dollahs. What's 'at! You foun' yo' goat!"

"Boy, out o' mah way!" The Wildcat walked toward the Chinese tomb as
fast as Lily could cover the ground. "Git out o' mah way. Me an' Lily looks
in dat tomb place. Us ain't scared o' no ol' ghosts no mo'."

One of the Blue Fezant gentleman called to the Wildcat. "Son, where in hell
have you been?"

Something in the Potent Noble's tone made the Wildcat think of Captain
Jack and the gone-away days in France. "Cap'n, suh, no place. I was jes'
'cumulatin' mah mascot goat."

He entered the roofless Chinese tomb, and there on the stone floor lay the
golf ball. "Cap'n, suh," he yelled, "heah's yo' freckled pill." He called less
loudly to the Mud Turtle. "Otheh ball read three. Dis one heah's got de fo'
spot up. 'At's seven! Mud Turtle, you loses. Come in heah an' look at it."

The Mud Turtle's dread of the Chinese tomb was still with him. "I 'cepts yo'
word fo' it, Wilecat. Doggone you. Boy, you wins fo' times runnin'."

"Boy, f'm now on I wins steady. Lady Luck done sent back mah mascot
goat. I cain't lose!"

He turned to his four-legged companion. "Kin us, Lily, whilst you's wid
me?"

"Blaaa!" answered Lily. "I should say not."

CHAPTER XVII

1.

"Lead me to de woods whah de luck trees grow,
Han' me de axe when it's time to chop.
Lead me kinda gentle,—git me started slow;
When I gits to goin', watch de luck trees drop."

While the Wildcat was doing his best to forget the cares that nominally
infested his official day as porter on the Blue Fezant special car, sidetracked
in San Francisco, Honey Tone Boone, the brunet uplifteh, languished in the
Memphis jail.

There were two sides to every jail. To the Wildcat, the loser in the law's
game generally occupied the inside. Honey Tone was different. The inside
of a jail for Honey Tone was often a place of sanctuary from which the
occupant might sneer serenely at the disappointed female perils who
gnashed their teeth outside the bars.

In San Francisco the days were warm, and Lily the mascot goat had
returned to her master's side.

The Wildcat was playing even in the matter of daily rations. Trailing along
in the wake of a pair of the golf-playing Nobles of the Mysterious Mecca at
the Lincoln Park Golf course provided a cash surplus which enabled the
Wildcat to discard his winter-weight Prince Albert and to adorn his person
with a retiring suit of clothes three shades lighter than a sunburned pumpkin
and embellished with six-inch checks. Life wasn't so bad. Ol' railroad

sleepin' car was probably doin' all right. Reasonably sure that tomorrow
would lug in new brands of trouble to pester a boy with, the Wildcat steered
his somnolent mentality clear of the shoals of surmise and let tomorrow
take care of itself.

A boy never could tell about Lady Luck. Every time the Wildcat did
something that clearly entitled him to free board in some permanent jail,
like as not next day he would wake up all festooned with gold watches.
Take a preacher's advice and head down the straight and narrow path, and
the chances were that some deppity sherriff with a shotgun, or else a bear,
would be waiting in the path right where the heaviest canebrakes
discouraged detours.

2.

"One man's pizen is anotheh man's meat,—
Mah troubles neveh botheh you.
Hog needs wings like a snake needs feet:
De question ain't why, but who."

Honey Tone Boone's downfall had been accomplished in Memphis
immediately subsequent to a Konk'rin' Heroes' parade. There had been
some talk about the ownership of the mule which Honey Tone rode. The
line of march headed straight for Honey Tone's wife and his potential soul
mate and culminated in a ruckus from which Honey Tone emerged, safe in
the talons of a policeman. The two women, comparing notes, had gummed
up the leader's grand entry to a degree which left Honey Tone thankful for
the mule-stealing charge that had landed him safe in the jail and out of the
clutches of his wife and Cuspidora Lee. He enjoyed sanctuary in jail for two
months and then, threatened with an embarrassing and abrupt release, he
concentrated on a hurried mental incubation. Hard pressed, he sought to
hatch from the bad egg of circumstance some new enterprise which would

take him away, sudden and safe, from where his memorizing wife awaited
him.

His mind roamed wild through the fields of questionable enterprises opened
to him by a combination of easy conscience and the flashy part of a
"college" education. On the day of his release he half regretted his
education. Ignorance cursed the individual with work, but it left him free of
the higher responsibilities and the more acute penalties of transgressions,
and just then Honey Tone wished devoutly that he was a field hand. He
craved a black complexion instead of the halfway colour that barred him
from the unquestioning comradeship of white and black alike.

On the night of his release from jail he beat the barrier, and by morning he
was well on his way to St. Louis, resolved to explore the Pacific coast for
fields wherein his peculiar abilities might enable him to reap the harvest of
cash without which life to him was naught.

En route West, Honey Tone managed to keep one state ahead of his
reputation. Thus he avoided the iron impedimenta which the laws of the
land drape around the ankles and feet that stray from the straight and
narrow trail—around wrists and hands whose idleness affords the devil
welcome opportunity to function as a labour agent.

Honey Tone's first week in Oakland found him preaching to a small
congregation. On the following Sunday he announced to his flock that
subscriptions for a church building fund would be accepted, beginning
forthwith.

"Temp'rary an' perm'nent." The announcement followed a long prayer
during which the uplifter's face wore the same holy expression as that
which adorns the first stages of a sneeze. "Rev'und" Honey Tone Boone
opened his eyes and tamed his vocabulary to the vernacular current among
his hearers. "Temp'rary an' perm'nent. Weekly refun's on all temp'rary
subscriptions, togetheh with int'res' at a hund'ed per cent. You doubles yo'
'vestment, like de boy wid de ten talents."

The dangling bait was presently engulfed.

The subscription books were kept open throughout the week. Facilities for
subscribing were offered through agencies established in the pastor's
quarters, in two barber shops and three pool rooms.

On the following Sunday, after a service devoted largely to discussion of
temporal problems which afflict the flesh here in this vale of tears, Honey
Tone paid his subscribers their original contributions and added an equal
sum for interest at a hund'ed per cent.

The books were flooded with new subscriptions within the next fifteen
minutes. The six agencies did a rushing business all during the week. On
Friday Honey Tone counted his cash and decided that another week could
be managed. Then—exit.

After the next Sunday services, owing to an eight that looked like a three,
he was short five hundred dollars in the item of interest.

Explanations led to retreat, and Honey Tone retreated to a hotel in San
Francisco. His flight therefrom was interrupted by a delegation from a mob
which visited him on the following night. He beat the delegation out of the
lobby of the hotel because, in the emergency, his feet acted more quickly
than his head. He went away from there leading his flock.

Mentally he shipped his remains to his next of kin four times in the next
fifty yards. Out of the corner of his eye he caught the gleam of a piece of
light-coloured steel swung by a dark-coloured investor who craved to
collect his investment, plus interest, one way or another.

Honey Tone's racing legs, impelled by an acute ambition, functioned
successfully in their owner's single endeavour to lead the flying wedge of
razor-bearing blood hunters by at least two jumps more than a slashin'
reach. The fugitive turned into Mission Street; and here in the long stretch
the saddle-coloured financier saw a chance to do some thinking. Galloping
was his main business just then, but he carried a side line of quick thoughts.

With members of his own race Honey Tone asked no greater odds in the
money game than those which served from the theory that mind was
superior to matter. But in this, too, time was the essence. Just then he
needed time. Ten minutes were worth a million dollars and lots of other
important things like health and strength and blood. Time was that without
which the best laid plans died in the egg.

For the next five blocks, running something less than a mile a minute, the
uplifter's brain functioned with the cunning which enables the fragrant fox
to overcome the handicap with which nature has equipped him, when the
hounds begin the cross country obesity cure. During this time a plan had
flowered in Honey Tone's brain whereby victory might be snatched from
what had looked like a total loss of all the blood that would run out of
where a razor had nestled.

In a shadowed area midway between two street lights Honey Tone stopped.
He stopped abruptly, like a golf ball hitting the north side of Gibraltar. He
bounced back, absorbing his momentum in a twisting motion which left
him squarely facing the oncoming pack. Now it was, or never!

When they were upon him he raised his arms.

He orated. "Hush! Git calm! Now us kin talk! Money! Cash! Rest easy!"

His voice lifted one notch higher than the undertone which welled about
him. The peak load of peril was confronted and passed, but still his speech
ranged over the bait words most potent as verbal sedatives. "Easy money—
lissen—gin—seven dice—fancy clothes—chicken an' gin fo' one an' all
soopreem members."

He discarded his college-bred dialect and adopted the vernacular of the
majority about him. "Lissen heavy! Git calm. Len' me yo' ears. Men an'
brethren, you knows me. Fo'gettin' de peril o' de tar bar'l an' de p'cessions at
night wid blazin' pitch knots an' de chokin' rope whut folks uses when dey
uprises, an' chosin' fo' ouah guide de lives ob de ol'-time martyrs, safe an'

serene in de circle ob fate cast 'roun' mah fragile form by dis yere rabbit's
foot—Ah tells you—lissen!"

The speaker waved his rabbit's foot. He beckoned at the loose fringe of
sceptics which milled on the margin of the group. "Gether together, dat ye
can hear de words ob wisdom. De prophet knowed whut he said when he
perdicted dat somebody was comin' to lead his chillun f'm darkness into
light. 'At's me! Somebody. I leads you out ob darkness into de promised lan'
whah flows de milk an' honey. In passin' lemme add dat milk is f'm de ol'
language used by de Sanskrits, meanin' gin. Honey f'm de ancient Check-
Slowfat word 'Honito.' Dat's de word fo' chicken—fried chicken, to be mo'
preciser.... Men, you is sons ob Kings f'm Africa. How come you all
redoosted to de state ob slaves? How come bird shot cain't pester a
cinnamon bear? Because yo' brains and yo' brawns is all spread out,
desiccated on triflin' things like cotton crops an' cawn, sweatin' undeh heavy
loads 'stid of rulin' at de seat of guv'ment an' dictatin' whut's whut."

The orator dragged in another lungful of midnight fog and broke into the
stretch. "Heah's de answeh, graved on de gol' tablets an' dug up in de
midnight moon wid a luck spade. Gran' oaks f'm li'l acorns grow. Heah in
San F'mcisco wid de aid of you all we starts de new movement towards de
Canaan land. Fust off, us o'ganizes de Temple o' Luck. Den de fust annex is
de Swamick Chu'ch, based on de mystic teachin' of Swami de Indian
Budda. Nex' do' in de Temple de Soopreem Faith Healer thrives an' collects
money f'm folks whut only thinks dey's sick. 'Cross de hall is de Chief Palm
Readin' Magi, predictin' pas', present, an' future fo' a dollah. In de Temple
Annex is de offices ob de 'Filiated Culled Union ob de worl'. Dis Union is
mitigated into th'ee gran' divisions—de Bullshevik, de P'litical, an' de
Social. De Social has de Ladies' Annex."

Honey Tone's eyes played steadily across his audience, horizontally, and his
voice shot straight at the ears of the assemblage, but his imagination started
up, and now it made its final flight. "Dat's all I tells you, 'ceptin' my own
humble efforts will be directed at organizin' a New World Af'ican Colony in
de free country of Barzil. Dat's all. Fo' each an' ev'ry project us needs a

Deppity Soopreem Leadeh. Dese will be 'pointed f'm amongst you. Each
Deppity Soopreem Leadeh adorns hisself wid de gilt-edge robes ob de
'propriate responsibility an' collects de cash. Deppity Collector fo' each
Deppity Leadeh likewise weahs de robes whut de ritual describes. Ritual
c'mmittee gits a percentage ob de receipts. Deppities gits one dollah fo'
ev'ry three whut's took in. Any income oveh twenty dollahs a day goes to de
Social an' Festive departments."

The orator pulled a little book out of his pocket. "Hopin' you elects steady
an' reliable frien's fo' de 'sponsible offices, us now opens de 'scription books
fo' de Temple Fund, payin' int'rest a hund'ed per cent ev'y week. Pussonally,
I donates a hund'ed dollars to staht de ball rollin'—"

Honey Tone knew his crowd.

"How much, brotheh? Sign yo' name. Cash. C'tificate in green an' yaller wid
de gol' seal will be conferred at de Fust Conclave ob de Soopreem Leadehs
of Departments an' de Gran' Deppities.... Gimme dat bill; I has change,
brotheh...."

Late that night, escorted by a committee a little more soopreem than the
body of the mob, Honey Tone walked back to his hotel room. Everything
was organized to a degree which had deprived the mob of blood hunters of
all of their ready cash.

On his way to the hotel the uplifter pondered the question of conduct
affecting his immediate future. "To blow or not to blow"—that was the
question. He reviewed the hills and valleys of the land of promise over
which his galloping vocal organs had hauled the hopes of his hearers. He
decided that the business of making good would involve considerable work.
The work part failed to attract him. He decided to bid the committee a long
farewell at the hotel, without their knowing it, but his decision suffered a
veto in the persistence with which the three Soopreem Deppities stuck to
their walking treasury department.

In his room Honey Tone made a final effort to side-step the escort. He
removed his coat and hung it on a chair. "Now wid de cares whut infests de
day relegated to de bosom ob de past, I lays me down an' sleeps. Brothehs, I
hopes you all enjoys de boon ob ol' lady nature's sweet restorer, an' I sees
you tomorr' at—"

"You sees us now." A heavy-set deppity grunted a verdict. "Gimme 'at quilt,
an' I makes down mah pallet on de flo'."

Without implying anything pussonal, another of the soopreem trio laid
himself down close against the door.

The uplifter knew a bear trap when he saw it. He pillowed his rangy jaw on
the comforting outlines of the lumpy treasure in the pocket of his vest,
folded beneath his head. "Talk sure is cheap," he reflected. "Talk is cheap,
but sometimes you can trade big words for big money."

A violent snore answered him, and again hope mounted to his heart, but
presently he realized that only one of his associates was sleeping.

With the sleepers changing shifts every hour or so, the long night passed.

By dawn Honey Tone was resolved to give his schemes a run for their
money. You never could tell how a scheme might turn out; and the
colonization business sounded pretty good, even to its overstressed
inventor.

CHAPTER XVIII

1.

The convention of the Nobles of the Mysterious Mecca dwindled into the
final stage that attends all conventions. Golf was eliminated, and business
was the order of the day. The Mud Turtle left him; and thereafter the
Wildcat suffered indirectly, being threatened with a resumption of his
responsibility as porter on the special car that had brought the Chicago
contingent west to San Francisco. A sense of restraint gradually killed off
the wild free business of roaming the Lincoln Park golf course at so much
per roam, eating heavy on the proceeds, and sleeping twelve hours a day.

Arrayed in his yaller raiment, he sought the offices of the Pullman company
and got confidential with the office boy. "I's de po'teh fo' de blue fezant
boys—dis heah Mysterious Mecca business. Dey tells me us leaves fo'
Chicago real soon. Ah jus' been down at de deepo lookin' fo' de cah. Whah
at is dat cah? Me 'an Lily aims to git it swep' out befo' de gen'men comes."

The office boy took the Wildcat's message to an inner office. Two minutes
later the answer came back in the person of a gentleman who was trying to
hold his temper. "You're fired! You started with your car in Chicago, left it
in Wyoming, and here you are! Git out of here before I—"

"Cap'n, yessuh!" The Wildcat knew a gesture when he saw it. He retreated,
dragging his mascot goat a little too fast for Lily's comfort.

"Goat, doggone you, whut fo' did you go A.W.O.L. an' git us bofe loose f'm
dat railroad job? Heah us is wid only fo' bits, an' all yo' fault."

Lily admitted the charge in a plaintive bleat which softened the harsh
language which her master was bellowing at his mascot in the din of Market
Street. Presently the Wildcat forgot the acute misery of not having any hard
work staring him in the face. "Us has fo' bits. 'Ats mo' money dan mos'
folks has. Lily, us eats.

"I don't bother work, work don't bother me.
I'se fo' times as happy as a bumble bee.
Us eats when us kin git it, sleeps mos' all de time—"

At a lunch counter on Sutter Street much frequented by members of his race
the Wildcat spread the fifty cents out over rations that made up in mass
what they lacked in delicacy. Half way through the meal he slacked up
enough to get talkative. The boy next to him at the lunch counter was
confronted with enough food to hold him for a few minutes; and it was at
this more fortunate individual that the Wildcat directed his remarks.
"Podneh, whah at kin a boy locate a job of work in dis yere town?"

"Whah you f'm?"

"Me an' mah mascot hails f'm Memphis."

"How come you so fah f'm home?"

"Boy, whah at did you meet up wid so much wantin' to know?"

"Good many jail niggers loose. Thought maybe—"

"Don't think no mo'. Don't think 'nuther word 'bout me an' Lily. I come f'm
de ahmy. Two yeahs in France, an' lately I lef' de Pullman railroad people
whut hires sleepin' cah po'tehs. 'At's all. Ain't no jail connected wid me. All
I craves is a job whut pays money."

"De wages at de docks unloadin' steamboats is ten dollahs a day. Depen's on
how much money you needs. Dey wants stevedores bad. Dey's a strike."

"Boy, dey has me! I'se a bad stevedo'. Whah at is dis boat-unloadin'
bizness?"

The boy revealed the location of the ten-dollar job. "You trails along afteh
you gits to de wateh whah de big boats is. Half a mile f'm de ferry buildin'
you sees a gang standin' round. Them's strikers. You goes through, an' de
boss shows you whah to head in. Does you know de stevedo' business?"

"I'll say us does. Me an' de res' ob de Fust Service Battalion unloaded all de
boats whut landed in France durin' de wah. How come you ain't workin'
yo'self at de ten-dollah job?"

"I'se a 'vestor. 'Vested some cash in a new o'ganization whut was instigated
heah lately. Pays big. Two fo' one ev'y week. You gives de ol' Soopreem
Leadeh fifty dollahs, an' nex' week back he comes wid a hund'ed. You hol's
out some an' 'vests de res'. Nex' week you reaps agin. Pays fifty, gits a
hund'ed."

"Whah at is dis Soopreem man?"

"Thought you tol' me you was broke. How come you lie so?"

"Ain't said no lie."

"You's broke, ain't you? What good does dis Soopreem man do you 'less
you kin 'vest wid him? Git yo' job, an' when you has beginnin' money I
meets you an' reveals whah at is de gol' mine."

"Meet you heah nex' Sat'dy night. 'At's pay night, I s'poses."

"You s'poses right. Ah meets you Sat'day."

"Sho' will. Podneh, whut name is you favored with? I goes by name Wilecat
—by rights I was baptized Vitus Marsden." The Wildcat held out the hand
of brotherhood.

"Call me Trombone when you calls confidential," his companion replied.
"By rights I is Pike Canfield, but folks calls me Trombone eveh since me
an' de name got famous. Mebbe you is heard of me. I plays de slip horn."

"Sho' I is—many's de time! So you is Trombone, is you? Sho' proud to meet
up wid you. Sho' 'bliged fo' de knowledge concernin' de ten-dollah job.
Soon as I 'cumulates some payday me an' Lily meets you heah nex' Sat'day
night. Den us 'vests wid de Soopreem Leadeh an' mebbe has a gran' ruckus
wid de profits."

That night the Wildcat slept free and chilly on a park bench, covered only
with the blanket of fog which rolled in at midnight.

Shortly after dawn, with Lily at his heels, he walked to the entrance of the
pier against which lay a cargo ship loading for a famine area in Europe.
"Whah at is de man whut hires de han's?" he asked.

Two hours later the foreman of the dock gang was pointed out to him, and
in ten minutes, with Lily tied to a barrel of nutritious pickles, the Wildcat
took his place in the long line of stevedores that hustled freight out of the
pier shed and into the nets under the cargo booms of the ship. "Lily—
tonight us eats on credit, an' sleeps inside some place whah de fog weatheh
don't git."

All the stevedore crew were members of the Wildcat's own race. Before
noon he had affiliated with enough friends to make the matter of noontime
lunch a simple business of accepting part of what was offered him, while
Lily did the best she could on enough assorted nutriment to feed six
mascots.

Considering the start he had made that morning, the Wildcat realized, with
his seventh sandwich, that life isn't so bad if you manage to live through it.
When he began the afternoon shift his ancient philosophy had returned, and
to the clatter of the activity about him he contributed his rambling voice.
Presently the words of his song recruited a few converts from the gang
about him; and by four o'clock, with the freight moving faster than it had
for many a day, the hollow spaces in the long pier were filled with the
echoes that lifted from an intermittent chorus which proclaimed that

"I kin load a steamboat, load it full wid freight;
I kin load a steamboat when it's leavin' late.
Dat's de reason I'se as happy as a bee,
I don't botheh work, an' work don't botheh me."

Throughout the late hours of the afternoon the eyes of the foreman were on
the Wildcat. "Hustlin' nigger. Make him a straw boss tomorrow if this keeps

up."

2.

Honey Tone realized that rank imposes commensurate obligation before his
Temple of Luck campaign had lived a week. Too much rank imposed too
much obligation, and so the Swamic Church and the Faith Healing and the
Palm Reading Magi and several other verbal branches of his project were
discarded before the several deppity soopreem leaders got too soopreem to
handle. The backbone of his income was at once the Temple Fund; and this
important business demanded and received all of his energy except that
demanded by his elaborate pictures of the New World African Colony in
Brazil.

The Temple Fund, paying all investors a hundred per cent a week, was
popular from the start. On the first dividend day Honey Tone made the
grade without difficulty, and all subscriptions were repaid, together with a
bonus of a like amount. Immediately after the ceremony of repayment was
completed, the backwash of investment began to roll in, and by the evening
the promoter counted more than a thousand dollars in his hip pocket
treasury. On the next day a new group of subscribers to whom the news had
been retailed milled about the doors of the temporary Temple for a chance
to register and donate their investments. Honey Tone, operating in a rented
house, herded the investors into a room where his voice could pulverize the
sediment of reluctance which remained in his hearers' minds, leaving no
dregs of doubt that might cloud the nectar of hope.

He donned a serious looking coat, long and black, and swept a broad yellow
sash across his chest. On his head rested a Manchu mandarin cap purchased
in Chinatown and revised with ornament suitable for the insignia of the
Soopreemest. About his waist was the equator part of a Sam Brown belt,
and from it dangled a Civil War cavalry sabre whose scabbard had suffered
two coats of gilt paint, not quite dry. He retained his ordinary street shoes;
life was a battle, and you never could tell when the bugles of fate might

blow recall. Street shoes came in handy when there was any heavy running
to be done.

In his uniform he addressed the herded investors. "Breth'rin, de books is
closed fo' de present week. All whut paid yistiddy gits dey money back,
'long wid de same amout fo' intres' nex', Satidy mawnin'. Dem whut pays de
'scriptions now gits de 'vestment an' de hund'ed per cent intres' de Satidy
afteh nex'. De books is now open, de gol' seal c'tificates is ready. Fawm in
line an' git yo' money ready.... Ten dollahs, brotheh. Heah's yo' papeh. Now
you is a Deppity Soopreem Leadeh, 'titled to de red sash.... Nex' Satidy us
'lects de ten Soopreem Gov'nors fo' de leadin' districts in de New Worl'
African Colony at Barzil. Boat leaves wid de 'ficials an' de p'visions nex'
month. 'Lection is by de lucky numbehs. Soopreem 'ficials gits a house an'
ten thousan' milrice—dat's Barzil dollahs—ev'y month to travel roun' wid
an' see is de distric' doin' O.K.... Fifteen dollahs—dat 'titles you to de Yaller
Sash of Trust. Chances is you sho' will be a Soopreem Gov'nor. Nex'
brotheh...."

On the following Saturday Honey Tone managed to postpone the election of
the Soopreem Governors for the ten districts of the colony and to sidestep
the various vague promises that he had sown so lavishly throughout the
preceding two weeks, but in the department of finance there was no
evasion, short of flight, and in the white light that forever beat about him
escape for the moment was impossible. He sensed the growing pyramid of
final retribution and began to formulate plans whereby the mantle of
responsibility might be transferred to other aspiring shoulders.

The cumulative financial problem was a simple matter of geometrical
progression, at the far end of which lay a solution consisting of several
quarts of blood. He faced a wire-edged razor, seeking a gilt-edged dodge,
and so far his brain had failed to formulate the safe way out.

His attempts at transferring the long end of the load to the strutting
deppities who hung around the Temple of Luck met with less success.

"Long as you stays Soopreem enough to wrassle wid de financial
department, us leaves you run it. You is soopreem now. Stay dat way."

Later on Brother Livingstone approached Honey Tone and warned the
leader to stay Soopreem or pay the charges on one life-size mistake.
"Confidential like, Honey Tone, I tells you stay soopreem o' else tell de
grave committee de facts fo' yo' tombstone."

The person of the Soopreem Leader became the object of watchful care on
the part of three shifts of Deppity Gardeens. Day and night there were two
or three watchful waiters on the job.

The fourth pay day was approaching and with it an obligation to pay out
more than four thousand dollars. Receipts were falling off. On Wednesday
night Honey Tone's bankroll audited less than three thousand dollars. He
tried to split the pot with the Deppity Gardeens in return for liberty. In this
he failed.

On Thursday night, as near as he could see, all the gates were closed. He
was on a one-way road.

CHAPTER XIX

1.

"All I does is follow mah feet,
'Ceptin' when de boss says, 'Stop an' eat!'
Follow mah feet de whole day through;
Follow mah feet 'till I burns a shoe,
Shovin' a truck load o' po'k an' beans,
Loadin' de boat fo' New O'leans."

Back of his truck on the dock the Wildcat set the pace for his fellows. The
man in front of him found the Wildcat forever at his heels. The man
following had a hard time keeping up.

Now and then the Wildcat's feet abandoned the steady trot for a gait which
included considerable prancing, embellished with a new series of fancy
steps, limited only by the inertia of the freight truck with which the
stepper's ambition was retarded.

"On de down-hill drag let yo' hind legs slide;
Mawnin', Mistah Debbil, git aboa'd an' ride.
Git behin' me, Satan, on de up-hill road,
I'se a one-horse sinner wid a two-horse load."

Late in the afternoon the Wildcat's tactics had converted a group of
admirers who had discovered in the prosaic business of rustling freight a

first-class chance to make a laughing game of it. Meanwhile, they were
moving record tonnage.

At evening the pier foreman sent for the Wildcat. "Tomorrow morning you
take a gang down to Section Seventeen and start moving flour into the West
King. There'll be five a day extra in it—that'll buy grub for the goat."

"Cap'n, yessuh—you means I'se fo'man?"

"That's what I mean. Keep your niggers rustlin'."

"Yass suh! Sho' will!" The Wildcat jerked at Lily's string halter. "Goat, say
you'se 'bliged to de cap'n. Stan' roun' theh, fo' I shows you who's de boss
wid a club!"

"Blaaa!" returned Lily.

The pier foreman smiled. "You might round up some more men if you can
find 'em," he continued. "We can use a lot more. I'll give you twenty dollars
a man for all you can get. Tell 'em ten a day, with grub and quarters
furnished here on the dock."

"Cap'n, you means I gits twenty dollars fo' ev'y stevedo' nigger whut I
'cumulates?"

"That's it."

"How much is a hund'ed niggers, suh?"

"Two thousand dollars."

"Cap'n, you gits 'em tomorr'. Us kin rule dat many single handed—me
'suadin' an' Lily rammin'. Mebbe two hund'ed. Come on heah, goat! Le's
go!"

The Wildcat left the pier with visions of a military formation of a million
men, marching steadily toward a place where they were worth twenty
dollars apiece to him. In his dream of being king of all labour agents he

failed to include the difficulties with which his pathway was beset. The
stevedores' strike, gaining strength each day, now included a floating
committee whose duty it was to discourage the enlistment of new labour.

The Wildcat borrowed a dollar and ate supper at the lunch counter where he
had met Trombone, hoping that he might again encounter that individual.
Ranged about him were ten or fifteen hearty eaters; and to this group, at the
termination of his own meal, he addressed his invitation to participate in the
business of loading steamships with outbound freight. "Ten dollahs a day,
boy, comf'table place fo' sleepin', an' all de grub you kin eat."

His oration fell on barren ground. He left the lunch counter without having
gained a single recruit. "C'm on heah, Lily. Dese city niggers sho' is triflin'.
Whut us needs is fiel' han's, o' else some heavy 'suader like a hoe handle. Us
aims to sleep some now. Mebbe tomorr' Lady Luck boons me wid men
whut craves a job wid rations an' ten dollahs a day."

For a while the next morning the work of loading the West King with flour
lagged a little under the direction of the new foreman. At eleven o'clock,
noting the epidemic of reluctance to move out of a slow drag which had
afflicted his gang, the Wildcat climbed to the top of a tier of flour barrels.
He took out his knife and whittled through the hoops of a barrel. He
resumed his place on the pier. "Break down dat top line. Git movin'! Haul
out 'at bottom bar'l! Stan' back when dey comes!"

They came. An avalanche of rolling barrels rolled wildly across the deck of
the pier. The top one on which the hoops were cut landed with a smash in
the centre of an explosive spray of flour. The atmosphere was suddenly
white dust.... Black complexions presently became grey.

Perspiring freight jugglers began to laugh at their fellows. In three minutes
the roof of the pier was echoing back the volleys of high-pitched laughter
which lifted from below. Until noon, and then through the long afternoon,
all that the Wildcat's men did was to laugh their heads off at the slightest
provocation and move more freight than the ship's cargo booms could
handle.

"Ah likes biscuits an' Ah likes bread,
Doan' like 'em plastered on mah head,
Craves to have 'em spread around on mah inside,
'Sted of havin' dough a-drippin' off mah hide."

The pier foreman, passing the Wildcat's crew late in the afternoon, paused
to look the deal over. "Everything all right?"

"Cap'n, yessuh. Dey's good boys. 'Clined to mope some at fust, but dey got
laughin' some way. Since den dey's been movin' 'long."

Without knowing it, the Wildcat had mixed the essence of all the theories of
efficiency into one barrel of flour. The results of the administered dose were
showing on the tally boards in the freight office at the end of the long pier.
The transportation superintendent sent for the pier foreman. "Jim, who is
handling the flour into the West King?"

"Young nigger called Wildcat—right name is Marsden. Got him yesterday."

"Keep him forever. The Empire docks tomorrow for a mixed cargo for New
Orleans. Sixteen thousand tons. Let this Wildcat boy handle all of it—as
long as he lasts."

2.

On Friday morning Honey Tone groaned himself awake, realizing when his
eyes were open that less than thirty-six hours lay between his fragile form
and blood-tinted trouble. It seemed to him that his self-appointed guardians
clung closer with the passage of the hours, as if they suspected their
soopreem treasury of perfecting a plot which might include his exit. The
obligations of the moment were four thousand dollars, and in Honey Tone's
bulging pocket but three-fourths of that amount awaited the pay hour which
would come with Saturday night.

Saturday dawned, and with it the sprout of an idea had shoved through the
graveyard ground of Honey Tone's dejection. In mournful tones, hardly
hoping that success would attend his latest scheme, he announced it to his
guardian deppities. "Brethren, yo' leadeh's efforts has been rewarded like de
oil in de widow's croose. F'm now on us pays back de original 'scription wid
a hund'ed per cent intres', an'—hearkin' unto dese words—oveh an' above
de 'riginal an' de intres', a bonus equal to de 'vestment! Doan ask what de
Lawd means when de blessin' showers down. Git in de rain an' git wet wid
cash. Th'ee fo' one—dat's whut pays!"

At evening, before he took his place at the pay table, he repeated the
announcement. The rooms of the Temple were crowded and the flock was
silent, hanging with acute interest on the Soopreemest's words. Honey Tone
held up his hand. He bowed right and left, and the glittering tinsel on the
mandarin cap reflected the colour of minted gold from the yellow lights. He
held aloft the hilt of the gilded sword that swung from his yellow belt. He
sheathed his sword and parked his nervous left hand in the folds of the
yellow sash that draped across his chest. "Brethren ob de Temple: Sow an'
reap. As you sows, you likewise reaps. De Goddess of Gold, an' de lady's
husban' ol' man Midas, has smiled agin upon ou' humble efforts. Tonight Ah
makes a momentous announcement befo' Ah returns wid intres' de
'vestments you made las' week. Up to now de 'financial repayments has
been two fo' one. F'm now on us pays twice dat much!"

He paused to let his words sink in. "Fo' eve'y dollah you 'vests you gits de
dollah back, anotheh dollah for intres', an', as a special bonus, anotheh
dollah whut makes de th'ee fo' one. Dis Special 'Vestment Depahtment is
open now an' will be run wid de lef han' whilst de right, not knowin' whut
de lef' han' does, pays out yo' las' week's cash. Fawm in line. Ah pays an'
receives at de same table. Who is de fust brotheh? Yass indeed! Heah's yo'
money—an' you says you craves to 'vest it in de th'ee fo' one fund. Praise de
Lawd! De los' sheep sees de light."

Some there were who failed to see the light, but by strenuous persuasion
Honey Tone managed to reclaim enough of his payments to piece out the

missing thousand.

Over and above the success he enjoyed in keeping his epidermis free from
the parked razors of revenge, he pouched a few hundred dollars' surplus
before the hour of payment ceased. With it, including the borrowed and
juggled thousand, he had incurred an obligation to repay another staggering
sum on the following Saturday night.

Thankful for his escape from the crisis of the moment and a little bit shaken
by the acute peril which had confronted him, he sat heavily at the pay table,
and sagged down in his soopreem robes. He ran his eye over the pay list,
and for the first time he noticed an unpaid investor. "Pike Canfield—
$100.00."

A knock sounded at the outer door. The outer guard clattered in. "Brotheh
Canfield, an' a strange brotheh who desires to be led straight."

"Tell Brotheh Canfield to enteh unto de Soopreem presence," Honey Tone
returned, according to the ritual. Then, under his breath, "Dam 'at Trombone
nigger. How come he so promp' at de las' minute?"

CHAPTER XX

1.

A little late at the Sutter Street lunch counter by reason of his added
responsibilities at the dock, the Wildcat had found his friend Trombone
impatiently awaiting him.

"Wilecat, does us miss de meetin' Ah loses a hund'ed dollahs. Grab yo'
vittles an' eat on de run!"

"Whut time is you due at de Temple?"

"De meetin' done stahted a houah back—'less us gits dah in fifteen minnits
de do's closed."

"Trombone, us has plenty ob time. Ah 'sorbs mah nutriment in five minnits
—'at leaves ten fo' de trip. Ain't et me nothin' all day, 'ceptin' breakfus' an'
some san'wiches at noon time. Sho' been busy loadin' de ol' Empire fo'
N'Awl'uns. Dey made me de gang boss—I'se got mo' niggers dan ol' cunnel
had in de Fust Service Battalion. Sho' is busy. Niggers craves to mope—ah
un-craves 'em like de Lootenant used to—gits 'em all laffin' so ha'd dey
forgits de wuk. Fo' long dey ain't no mo' w'uk, an' eve'ybody feels noble.
Dat's all de talk—heah's mah ham, sizzlin' in de gravy.... Stan' up heah,
Lily; eat dese lettuce greens."

The Wildcat did an hour's eating in three minutes. "Whuf—ol' rations sho'
tastes noble. Whah at's yo' soopreem ol' leadeh whut pays out de money?

Ah craves to 'vest some mahse'f. Tonight I has money. Las' week me an'
Lily was bust. Le's go!"

Ten minutes later Trombone and the Wildcat, leading Lily, were at the outer
door of the Temple of Luck. There followed the ritual business of three
knocks and the ceremony of admittance.

2.

Honey Tone saw the Wildcat one second before that individual saw the
Soopreem paymaster. One second was enough for Honey Tone. In his brain
was born a scheme whereby the heavy mantle of leadership, including the
ponderous pyramid of financial obligations, might be shifted to the
Wildcat's shoulders. He got up from his throne at the paytable and plowed
his way toward the Wildcat. He held out the hand of fellowship. "Wilecat,
how is you? How is de Worshupful Potentate f'm de distant lan'?"

"Honey Tone! Honey Tone Boone! How come you heah?"

Honey Tone took the Wildcat by the arm. "Brothehs, in de humble yaller
raiment of a plain nigger de long-looked-fo' Barzil Leadeh has come to
'scort you all to de promis' lan'."

He half dragged the Wildcat to a little room opening off the larger hall, and
thereafter for five minutes Honey Tone used some private eloquence on his
old-time acquaintance. The Soopreem Leader took pains to omit the detail
covering the four-thousand-dollar obligation that went with the job. Finally
the Wildcat weakened. "Sho' sounds noble, Honey Tone. Tell me de res'."

"You is de head boss ob de New Worl' Af'ican Colony, an' weahs de robes,"
Honey Tone concluded. "You is Temp'rary Soopreem Leadeh ob de Temple
whilst I 'tends to some private business a sho't ways out ob town. When de
Barzil Colony is runnin' you gits de job ob Soopreem King. All you does
now is keep yo' mouth shut an' look soopreem. Dis steamboatin' you says

you is 'gaged in comes in handy. You tells de membehs at de propeh time
dat you is loadin' de boat fo' de Barzil Colony."

Honey Tone left his convert and prepared the way for the transition with the
assembled audience.

Half way through his discourse he was interrupted by Trombone Pike, who
craved to get his hundred dollars before the flight of Honey Tone's
imagination lifted the soopreem one above paltry things like financial
obligations. Honey Tone paid him with three quick movements—a dig for
the roll, an outstretching of a handful of cash, and the grip of eternal
brotherhood. "'At's dat. Dah you is."

Meanwhile the Wildcat's languid brain had stumbled over an idea as big as
a church. "Ah leads de brethren to de dock—an' gits twenty dollahs fo'
every man!" When Honey Tone returned, the Wildcat eagerly succumbed to
the rôle imposed on him. "Sho' kin, Honey Tone. Sho' glad to be Temp'rary
Soopreem Leadeh. Ah learns dese brethren de steamboat bizness. Sho' glad
to show 'em all I knows an' git 'em stahted."

"Wait heah till I 'suades 'em to let you handle everything." Honey Tone left
the Wildcat alone for the second time and made a further announcement to
the brethren. "De Wo'shipful Temp'rary Soopreem Leadeh suggests, wid de
high knowledge he has fo' suggestin', dat if he has de treasury department in
his han's de payments on 'vestments will increase up to fo' to one. Dat alone
shows you whut a big man he is. Nex' week he pays you all yo' 'vestments,
intres' at a hund'ed per cent, a bonus ob de same amount, an' a special
dividend equal to one an' all. Ah hereby 'spectfully resigns de robes ob
office, an' names a 'nishiation c'mmittee ob twelve brothehs to 'dorn de new
Soopreem Temp'rary Leadeh wid de raiment of his rank."

Honey Tone returned to the Wildcat. "You's been 'lected unan'mous. De
'nitiation cer'monies is ready. You gits de Gran' Degree right away. Heah's
de treasury. Ain't no bills due—yet. Don't owe nuthin'."

Honey Tone split his roll, being burdened with the rudiments of the
principle of safety first. He shoved the money at the Wildcat and hurried the
candidate to the door before the victim had a chance to count the cash.

There followed an impromptu initiation ceremony, interrupted but once by
Lily's bleating, after which the Wildcat realized that he was the head of
something that he knew mighty little about. He looked around for Honey
Tone, seeking the moral support that might derive from the presence of his
old friend and enemy.

Honey Tone had explained himself loose from his guards. Honey Tone was
gone.

The Wildcat fumbled around with some oversized words, and then the real
object of his speech came to him. "Dese niggers means twenty dollahs
apiece—on de dock." He launched into a wild description of the New World
African Colony. He pictured a life of ease in which each charter member of
the colony who believed in heaven would be reluctant to trade heaven for a
stevedore's career. He added the time phrase which was the essence of the
whole affair. "You meets me heah tomorr' mawnin' at six o'clock. Ah leads
you to de boat whah you sees how fas' kin' you git de freight aboa'd. So as
yo' gits de wages yo' labour is worthy ob, like de Bible says, I 'ranges dat
ev'y man gits ten dollahs a day an' grub."

3.

Before the light of dawn began to chase the San Francisco fogs up the bay
the charter members of the New World African Colony began to assemble
at the gates of the Temple. When the Wildcat appeared at six o'clock he was
greeted by more than two hundred worthy brethren, all of whom craved to
learn the boat-loading business at ten dollars a day. He marched his gang to
the Embarcadero, yelling orders in a manner that made some of the veterans
of the A.E.F. homesick.

"Silence in de ranks!" The clamour subsided. "When Ah columns you lef',
head fo' de big buildin'!" The big building was the entrance to the pier
against which, eating charter money faster than the banks could loan it and
hungry for her sixteen thousand tons of mixed freight, lay the Empire.

At half past seven the Wildcat reported to the pier foreman at the office in
the end of the long building. "Cap'n, suh, heah's more'n two hund'ed
twenty-dollah niggers. How much does dat come to, suh?"

The pier foreman ran his eye over the crowd without answering. He
disappeared into the office, where he spoke quickly to his clerk. "Cut all the
labour-grabbers off the payroll. Call 'em in. Here's more men than I've seen
in a year."

Outside there began the brief business of distributing the new supply of
much-needed labour. This accomplished, the Wildcat came in for his share
of attention. "We can use another gang like this. Can you get 'em by
tomorrow?"

"Cap'n, suh, Ah gits fo' times dis many does you crave 'em. When does Ah
git de money?"

Fifteen minutes later the Wildcat received a piece of blue paper. "Cap'n,
suh, Ah cain't read whut de papeh says. Kin you read fo' me, please, suh?"

"That's a check for four thousand and eighty dollars—two hundred and four
men at twenty a throw."

"Lawd gawd, Lady Luck, you sho' showered down dis time!" The Wildcat's
brain could surround the eighty-dollar part, but the four-thousand end was
something not yet real. He stowed the check in his pocket with the fragment
of the treasury roll of the Temple of Luck.

On Saturday, unable to restrain his anxiety to see what so much money
looked like, he persuaded the pier foreman to send the clerk to the bank to
get the check cashed. The cash was handed to the Wildcat. He stowed it

away in various pockets of the yaller suit. "Ol' money sticks out like a stole
chicken. Neveh did see so much money."

That night, under the stress of prosperity, the Wildcat quit an hour early. He
drifted to the Temple of Luck, intending to sit easy and smoke a cigar and
talk big talk to the evening assembly of brethren. Two or three of Honey
Tone's former guardians were busy loafing at the Temple when the Wildcat
arrived. After a period of silence, following the salutations appropriate for
the Soopreem Leader, a deppity led up to the matter of meeting the financial
obligations which fell due that evening. "Ah figgehs, Soopreem, dat dey's
somethin' like fo' thousan' dollahs to be paid out tonight. Sho' is a lot o'
money."

The Wildcat was interested. "Fo' thousan'? Whah at is de money comin'
f'm?"

Five anxious brethren sat up. It was all right for the Soopreem Leadeh to
enjoy himself on whatever subject pleased him, as long as there were no
personal dollar signs attached to the subject.

"You knows whah it comes f'm. You's jokin', Soopreem! Go 'long wid yo'
talk. 'Scuse me fo' speakin' so familiah, but de money question sho' is in de
fust rank. Specially since you pays fo' to one. De Pas' Soopreem Leadeh
strained hisse'f to pay th'ee fo' one."

In the course of the next five minutes the Wildcat's eyes were opened
concerning the generous ease with which Honey Tone had relinquished
what appeared to be a position of prominence second to none for social and
political status. He sought to make his escape, only to discover the same
restraint which had defeated Honey Tone's plans of flight.

"Come easy—go easy." The Wildcat surrendered to the clutch of
circumstance. He felt the diminishing weight of the four thousand dollars.
"Ah kep' it a week—dat's longeh den Ah eveh had such big money befo'!
Now Ah has to buy mahse'f free wid it, 'stead ob usin' it fo' rations an' sech.
Doggone! Whah at is Lady Luck?"

The hour for the meeting came. The Wildcat adorned himself with his
soopreem robes. He cut a long end from the yaller sash and tied it around
the mascot's stomach. "Heah, goat, doggone you. Git ca'm. Stan' still till Ah
adorns yo' wid de soopreem belly band. See kin you make Lady Luck heah
you. Dat woman sho' fo'got mah name."

"Blaaa!" Festooned with the yellow sash, Lily did the best she could to
make Lady Luck respond, but Lady Luck was deaf.

Lady Luck was A.W.O.L. Thereafter for an hour the Wildcat sat at the
Soopreem table, watching his stack of greenbacks melt out before him on
four-to-one obligations incurred by the absent Honey Tone.

For a while, with every disappearing dollar, the Wildcat mentally showered
the absent Honey Tone with epithets picked up during overstressed
moments of an active life. Then to the Temp'rary Soopreem Leader's mind
there came a faint resolve to try the ultimate arrow of his pack in an effort
to reclaim his melting money. "De clickers!"

At the conclusion of his misery he made an announcement covering the
programme of an attempt to defeat the evil which had run him down.

He stood up on the chair where he had been sitting. "Brethren, befo' us gits
too deep into de evenin' us devotes a social hour to Lady Luck. Count off
into squads, dig deep in yo' raiment fo' ammunition an' de clickin' weapons,
den for'd march—into de battle whah de top sides means vick'ry o' else de
grave-diggin' squad! Afteh de squad leadehs decides who is de bes' man, as
yo' Soopreem Leadeh I claims de priv'lege o' meetin' de victors on de
clickin' fiel' of battle. Dat's all. Git faded an' shoot fas'."

A battle royal. Thereafter for half an hour the air was thick with prayer.
Presently most of the four thousand had been prayed into the hands of half a
dozen squad leaders.

Then the Wildcat spoke. "Winners! Lady Luck sho' smiled down on you.
Now your Soopreem Leadeh makes 'at woman laff at you. Stan' by me,

Lily!"

The mascot goat bleated her message of encouragement. Spectators rallied
around. Out of his left shoe the Wildcat hauled his personal weapons. On
the floor before him he cast the last fragment of his four-thousand-dollar
roll. In the narrow circle of victors exploded his point-blank challenge.

"Shoots a hund'ed! Shower down. Ah craves action!

"You neveh kin tell till de gallopers stop
Whut de numbehs reads dat lays on top.
Comin' out a top side seven or 'leven
Is Wilecat talk fo' a payday heaven.
Seven's a winner when it shows up fust,
But afteh yo' point a seven means bust.
Comin' out fust wid a dooce, twelve, o' trey
Is jes' like throwin' yo' money away,
'Cept you keeps de dice an' stahts once mo'
By layin' yo' money on de gam'lin' flo'.
Suppose you releases a fo', six, eight,
You tries yo' bes' to duplicate.
De same hol's true fo' a five, nine, ten,
But a seven's boun' to git you now an' then.
As I said befo' does a seven come fust
Befo' you makes yo' point, it means you's bust."

In fifteen minutes six ex-victors had joined the circle of innocent bystanders
and were hunting for phrases to explain to themselves just how it happened.
The Wildcat, stowing away the incoming money with his left hand, swept
his victorious right high above his head. In his moist palm nestled his
pussonal dice.

"I lets it lay. Shoots it all!"

"Ain't got dat much." The last man was suffering from reduced
circumstances.

"How much is you? Shoots de fifty! I'se faded. Gallopers, stan' by me! Stay
soopreem. Bam! An' I reads, six-ace. Deppity—you's done!"

The Wildcat, perspiring copiously in his official robes of supremacy, got to
his feet. He parked the gallopers in his inside pocket. He reached for Lily's
leading string. "Brethren—me an' Lily stahted soopreem when we come
heah. Dat's de way we finishes. I bids you—good night!"

4.

With Lily at his heels, the favourite of Lady Luck made his way into the
midnight fog which lay above the city. He walked to Market Street, and at
the ferry building he headed down the Embarcadero toward the pier where
the Empire was loading. In the deep shadows cast by a post in the long pier
he removed his trailing robe. He rolled his insignia under his arm. Under
the arc lights along the pier the men of the night shift were rustling the last
of the freight to the Empire's side.

With Lily at his heels, the Wildcat went aboard the ship. The officer on
watch recognized him. "What you doin' out so late, boy? Thought you run
the day shift?"

"Cap'n,—yessuh,—I does. Me an' Lily was projectin' roun' some. Us ain't
got no place to go."

The Wildcat lingered on this last statement. "No place to go." Then he
summoned courage enough to voice a request which expressed a longing
that had developed since he had first known the Empire's destination.

"Cap'n, suh," he said slowly, "kin me an' Lily ride wid you to New Awl'uns?
—Us craves to git south."

"I'll say you can. We need about nine good waiters for the trip."

"Cap'n, suh, dat's me! When us starts I'se de same as nine."

"You're hired. Sign on tomorrow."

In his eagerness the Wildcat jerked heavily at Lily's leading string. "Come
on heah, goat, le's git down in de ol' boat's cellar whah de kitchen is an' git
to work. Say you's 'bliged to de cap'n."

"Blaaa!" Lily voiced her gratitude.

On the third deck down, the Wildcat tied Lily to a stanchion. He threw his
official costume on the deck in front of the mascot goat.

"See kin you eat dis soopreem raiment. Us is done bein' soopreem. Hot
dam! New Awl'uns boun'! Den Memphis—dat's home!"

The Wildcat felt the thick packages of bank notes in the inside pockets of
his yaller suit. "Sho' big money. Money—dis time stan' by me."

"I kin ride a steamboat—I don' pay no fare,
I kin ride a steamboat—anywhere.
Dat's de reason I'se as happy as a bee,
Me an' Lily's Memphis boun'—Memphis, Ten-o-see."

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