CHAPTER I

MARSHAL JIM RADABAUGH

Jim Radabaugh, the city marshal, that is to say, the chief of police, was a man not without honor in Hardiston. A good fellow, and a cool, brave officer. That he was a good fellow, every one who knew him could attest. He had no enemies. It was a pleasure to be arrested by him. There was an equable good nature in the man, and a drawling humor in the very tones of his voice which inspired good nature and good humor in return. He was a lean man, lazily erect, as though it were too much trouble to be stoop-shouldered. Black hair, black eyes.... A chronic bulge in his cheek that housed the wad of tobacco which he kept there. An intimate acquaintance with the intricacies of big-league baseball as set forth in the public prints; a repository of racing lore; a good pool player and a redoubtable hand at poker. All in all, a good man to keep the peace according to his lights.

People said he was easy-going, but every one knew he was no slacker of duty or of obligation. Three years back--that was before they elected him marshal--he had been under fire for the first time. It was on the interurban street-car line that ran from Hardiston “up the crick.” Radabaugh sat in the front of the car, facing the rear; and a man in the middle of the car ran amuck with a revolver, shooting wildly. He killed one man, wounded another, in the seconds it took Radabaugh to charge down the aisle and overwhelm him. The conductor of the car, at the moment, was hiding under a rear seat; and the motorman had jammed off his power and jumped overboard, into a ditch that had more water in it than he had counted on. Radabaugh knocked the man over with a cuff of his fist, and pinned him, and took his gun away.

His friends told him he ought to run for office after that. He said he didn’t mind. His business was not an exacting one. He and his brother were tailors, and his brother could handle the bulk of their work anyway. So Jim ran for marshal, and was elected. Thereafter, when he was not occupied with his official duties, he used to drop in at the tailor shop to help things along there. It was no sight for timid customers, trying on their new suits while Jim’s brother chalked them in mysterious places, to see Jim come in and go to work. He always came in casually, spat in the appointed direction, then produced from one pocket and another his gun, his handcuffs, and his club. He was accustomed to lay these on one of the bolts of cloth which stocked the shelves, then seat himself cross-legged on the table, with a little cloth apron on his knees, and pick up the first task that came to hand.

His duties as marshal were not pressing, for Hardiston folk commit few crimes, and usually commit those away from home. When he was wanted during the day, the telephone operator called the shop. If she wanted to locate him after dusk, she flashed a signal light which called him to the telephone. For the most part, his time was his own.

And this is not to say that Jim Radabaugh had nothing to do. There was the case, for example, of the darky who was wanted for burglary in one of the cities in the southern part of the state. Jim got word that he was drinking in a hovel down by the creek, with two other men. So he went down there and strolled in and told the man he was wanted. Jim’s hands, at the moment, were in his coat pockets. The darky pulled a revolver, jammed it against Jim’s breast, and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened; that is to say, nothing happened to Jim. The darky’s gun did not explode, but Jim’s did. It burned a hole in his pocket, and it bored a hole in the darky, neatly amidships, in such fashion that there was no further occasion to trouble with that man. His body, laid open with two slashes of the coroner’s knife that intersected on the bullet hole, was on view for a day or two in the undertaker’s back room; and small boys went in to see it. They thought Jim Radabaugh was rather more than mortal, after that.

As a matter of fact, it had been a narrow squeak for Jim, as an examination of the darky’s weapon proved. That unfortunate man had apparently been unable to buy revolver ammunition, so he had bought rifle cartridges of the desired caliber and whittled off the bullets to make them fit into the cylinder of the revolver. Perhaps he had hurried with this bit of preparation; at any rate, he left one of the bullets too long, and when he pulled the trigger, the bullet caught and prevented the cylinder from turning. Which undoubtedly saved Jim Radabaugh’s life.

People agreed that was a good thing; for Jim was a good fellow. Wint’s orders to clean up the town interested him. They meant some measure of excitement, and he liked excitement. He told two or three people, that night, and they spread the news. But Jim took no official step till next day. Then he set out to serve notice on those most concerned.

One of these people most concerned was a man named Lutcher. His place of business was on the second floor of a building that fronted on one of the alleys in the heart of town. You climbed an outside stair from the alley to Lutcher’s door. Wint and Jack Routt went there, that night of Amos Caretall’s first home-coming, from their interrupted billiard game. Lutcher’s place was perhaps the best in town; that is to say, the surroundings were least sordid, and the wares he sold most meritorious. He was financed, of course, by Kite.

Radabaugh went there first. He had been there before, in his personal capacity. He had no scruples about such visits. Lutcher was a lawbreaker, of course; but the lawbreaking was tacitly accepted. There had been no orders against it. And Jim Radabaugh had no objection to a drink now and then. So he climbed the stairs from the alley to Lutcher’s door, and knocked, and Lutcher opened the door and admitted him. This Lutcher was not a bad fellow, say what you will of his business. A big, bald man with a husky, whispering voice, and a habit of appearing in his shirt sleeves. He wore rather attractive silk shirts, chosen with no mean taste; and his vests were often remarked. Also, he smoked good cigars, instead of the well-nigh universal stogie of Hardiston; and he gave these cigars freely to his regular customers.

Lutcher had not heard the news, the night before. So he greeted Marshal Radabaugh good-naturedly, and told him it was pretty early in the day for a drink, and that he would lose his reputation if he came here by daylight in this fashion. Jim laughed at that, and asked cheerfully whether Lutcher had a good stock on hand.

“Ice chest full, and a sawdust bin packed with bottles,” Lutcher told him. “What’s yours? The same.”

“Any reserve supply?” Radabaugh asked. Lutcher said there was no reserve; that he was expecting a shipment in a day or two. Radabaugh nodded.

“Got bad news for you, Lutch,” he said.

Lutcher beamed. He was always an amiable man. “Can’t make me feel bad, Jim,” he said. “Shoot the wad.”

“Going to close you up,” said Radabaugh.

Lutcher laughed. “Fat chance, I guess. What’re you trying to do? Work me for a snifter. All right. Say the word.”

“Straight goods,” Radabaugh assured him. “Mayor’s orders.”

“Wint’s orders? That’s a hot one.” Lutcher chuckled, his gay vest heaving with his mirth. “Why, Wint’s one of my regular customers.”

“Ain’t been in lately, has he?” Radabaugh suggested.

“No, not just lately. It wouldn’t look right.”

Radabaugh nodded. “He’s in earnest, I’d say,” he told Lutcher. “Anyway, I do what he says. He didn’t say anything about confiscating the stuff, or destroying it. Said to stop the sale. So I’ve got to seal you up, Lutch.”

Lutcher had been losing some of his amiability. He told Radabaugh so. “I’m a good-natured man,” he said. “But this is no joke.”

“No,” said Jim. “It’s no joke. Where’s your ice box?”

“What in time do you think you’re going to do?”

“Put a seal on it, and on that bin of yours. And drop in and look at the seals every day or two. And I’ll take charge of shipments that come in, unless you cancel them. If you bust the seals, I’ll have to take you into court, and Wint will soak you.”

“You’ve got a Chinaman’s chance,” Lutcher told him scornfully. “Why, I’ve given that pup his pap for two years. I’m not going to stand for this. Not for a minute. You tell him so.”

“If you’d rather have it so,” Jim said mildly, “I’ll pour it all out of the window, right now.” He said this mildly, but Lutcher knew Jim’s mildness was apt to be deceptive. In the end, he surrendered to the inevitable, because it was the inevitable. Jim placed his seals, and strolled away. Lutcher boiled out after him and hurried off to see V. R. Kite.

The marshal bent his steps toward the Weaver House, that infamous hostelry where Wint had spent the night of his election, and where he had been found next day. Radabaugh knew Mrs. Moody, the presiding genius of that place, as well as he knew Lutcher. He had always made it his business to know such folk. But Mrs. Moody did not receive him with the good nature Lutcher had shown. She had heard some rumors of what was to come.

The sunken office of the old hotel was little changed, when the marshal strolled in, since that night of Wint’s election. The light of day, fighting its way through the dingy windows, served only to make the interior more squalid. The same old men played their interminable game of checkers on the table in the corner. The miserable dog that bore Marshal Jim Radabaugh’s name sprawled beneath the table, its bony legs clattering on the floor when the creature stirred in its sleep. The boy, that boy who had been so painfully reading the literature of brewing on the night of the election, was not to be seen. It is to be hoped that he was out about some wholesome play. Radabaugh had a suspicion, founded on experience, that the boy was not in school. He never was. Mrs. Moody sat behind the high, bar-like counter. When Radabaugh came in, she got up with a quick, deadly movement like the stir of a coiling snake; and she smiled at the marshal with those hideously beautiful false teeth gleaming in her aged and distorted countenance.

“Why, good morning, deary,” she said, terribly amiable. “I don’t often see you down here any more.”

“Morning, Mrs. Moody,” said Jim. And stalked past the counter toward the door that led to that back room which overhung the creek. Mrs. Moody bustled after him and caught his arm at the door.

“Where you a-going, Jim Radabaugh?” she demanded. “You say what you want, and say it here.”

Radabaugh shook his head. He knew such measures as he had used with Lutcher would not serve with Mrs. Moody. The patrons of the Weaver House had little respect for such flimsy things as seals. He knew, also, that there was no possibility of relying upon the word of Mrs. Moody. Many women, especially such women as she, have the attitude toward promises that the Kaiser had toward treaties. They consider them interesting only when broken. Radabaugh meant to destroy her stock of liquor; and he told her so.

Then she began to scream at him. The old men at the checkerboard brushed at their ears as though her screaming were a swarm of flies, harassing them. Jim pushed her to one side and went through to the back room. When he set about his business there, she attacked him with a billet of wood; and Jim subdued the old warrior as gently as might be, and told her to mind what she did. So she began to weep and wail and scream hysterically; and Jim emptied bottles through the trap-door into the creek, knocking off the neck of each bottle so that there might be no survivors. All the while, Mrs. Moody wailed behind him.

When it was done, he turned to her, brushing his hands. “Orders are, no more selling, ma’am,” he said gently. “If you start up again, I’ll have to take you in.”

She was trying to placate him now. “Whose orders, deary?” she wheedled. “Who’s doing this to old Mother Moody, anyhow?”

“Mayor,” Jim told her; and she wailed:

“Wint Chase. Little Wint that I’ve put to bed here amany a time. He’d never go and do this, now. Who was it? Honest.”

“Mayor,” Jim repeated. “Straight goods. Hardiston has gone dry. This is serious, too. Don’t you go to start anything, ma’am. Because I always did hate to arrest a lady.”

“You’ll just have to--you might just as well take me right off to the poor farm, Jim Radabaugh. I’m not making ends meet, even right now.” Her withered old hands covered her face, and she rocked and wailed: “Eh, poor old Mother Moody! Poor old Mother Moody! You wouldn’t take me in if I sold just a little bit, would you, now?”

He said he would; and when she saw he meant it, she dropped her attempts to conciliate him; and she cursed him through the corridor and through the office; and she stood in the door of her hostelry and cursed him as long as he could hear, so that even Jim Radabaugh’s hardened ears turned red and burned with shame. It takes a brave man to face without inward shrinking the revilements of a thoroughly angry woman. Jim was glad to be rid of her.

He stopped, on the way back uptown, to warn a fly-by-nighter who ran a lunch cart near the station and served stronger drinks than coffee. This man denied any interest in Jim’s warning; and the marshal could find no liquor about the cart. Nevertheless he served notice, and made a mental memorandum to see to it that the notice was obeyed.

Remained only V. R. Kite. Radabaugh grinned as he thought of Kite. Kite would take this matter hard; and when V. R. Kite took a thing hard, the sight was worth seeing.

But Kite was not in the Bazaar when he got there, so Jim strolled back up street and dropped in on B. B. Beecham. The editor greeted him as courteously as he greeted every one. “Good morning,” he said. “Have a chair. Anything I can do for you?”

Radabaugh spat into the stove. “No,” he said, readjusting the bulge in his cheek. “Just dropped in. Waiting to see Kite.”

B. B. nodded. “Anything new with you?” he asked, for everybody was a source of news to B. B. Beecham. That was why the _Journal_ was popular.

“We-ell, I have got a sort of an item for you,” Jim told him. “Might be worth printing, maybe.”

B. B. asked what it was; and Jim told him. “Wint’s give orders that the town’s going dry.”

B. B. said: “H’m! Is that so?” And Jim said it was so.

“Guess that’ll be an item folks will read,” he remarked.

The editor shook his head. “We don’t feel we can print such things,” he said. “You see, it’s bad for Hardiston, outside. Legally, the town is already dry.”

“I never did have much of any use for laws,” Jim drawled.

“I suppose this means some work for you.”

“Can’t say. Don’t think so. There won’t be much of it done, except a little, on the sly. Not after the word I’ve passed around.”

“Well, it won’t do Hardiston any harm. Even as things are, they are better than they used to be. I can remember thirteen saloons here at one time. How many have there been, under cover?”

“Three-four, regular,” Jim told him.

“Very few people will really miss them,” B. B. said. “People do so many things, just because they’re in the habit, and the things are waiting to be done. It’s surprising how much a man can give up without realizing that he’s giving up anything. I don’t suppose you ever thought of that.”

“Can’t say I ever did,” said Jim, and spat into the stove.

“Like the horse in the story. You’ve heard about the horse?”

“What horse?”

“Oh, you haven’t heard it? The horse that was trained to live without eating.”

Jim looked mildly interested. “I’ll say that was some horse,” he remarked. “What happened to him?”

“Why, just as the man got him trained, the horse died,” said B. B.; and Jim chuckled, and B. B. laughed in the silently uproarious way habitual to him. Then Jim saw V. R. Kite pass by on the way to the Bazaar and got up quickly.

“There’s Kite,” he said. “See you later.”

He overtook the little man just inside the Bazaar; and Kite heard his step and turned and looked at him, and Jim saw that Kite knew. But he only said:

“Hello, Kite. Want to talk to you a minute.”

“Come back to my desk,” said Kite, and led the way, walking stiffly, head high, ever so much like a turkey. Jim marked this peculiarity to himself.

“Exactly like a man looking over a high fence,” he thought. “I’ll declare, it is.”

Kite sat down, tugged at his side whiskers, and bade Jim speak. The marshal looked for a place to spit, saw none, swallowed hard, and said:

“Guess you’ve heard the orders.”

“What orders?” Kite asked harshly. But his face was livid, and the veins stood out on his forehead with his effort at self-control.

“Mayor calls me up last night and tells me to stop whisky selling. Hardiston’s gone dry.”

“What has that to do with me?” Kite demanded.

The marshal did not grin. If Kite wanted to act that way, all right. It was the little man’s privilege. After all, he was outwardly respectable enough, a pillar of the church, and all that.

“Thought you might be interested,” said Jim.

“I am,” said Kite. “I believe in the free sale of liquor. Every man must have an opinion, one way or the other.”

Jim considered that. Then he got up. “Well,” he said, “I’ve passed the word around. Don’t know any one that’s planning to keep on selling, do you?”

“No, of course not.”

“Because if you do,” said Jim slowly, “tell ’em not to do it. Because if there’s any turns up, any selling, I’m going to come and ask you about it, Kite.”

Kite boiled up out of his chair and waved his fist. “Get out of here, you rat!” he raged, holding his voice to a monotonous whisper that was more deadly than an outcry would have been. “Get out of here, before I....”

“Before you what?” Jim asked; and Kite checked himself, and pulled at his side whiskers, and sat down abruptly, staring at the desk before him.

Jim left him there. As he emerged into the street, he began to whistle. The whistle was ragged, but the tune could be identified. Jim was whistling:

“‘There’ll be a Hot Time in the Old Town To-night.’”