Hygeia at the Solito.docx

1、Hygeia at the SolitoHygeia at the Solito If you are knowing in the chronicles of the ring you will recall to mind an event in the early nineties when, for a minute and sundry odd seconds, a champion and a would-be faced each other on the alien side of an international river. So brief a conflict had

2、rarely imposed upon the fair promise of true sport. The reporters made what they could of it, but, divested of padding, the action was sadly fugacious. The champion merely smote his victim, turned his back upon him, remarking, I know what I done to dat stiff, and extended an arm like a ships mast fo

3、r his glove to be removed. Which accounts for a trainload of extremely disgusted gentlemen in an uproar of fancy vests and neck-wear being spilled from their pullmans in San Antonio in the early morning following the fight. Which also partly accounts for the unhappy predicament in which Cricket McGu

4、ire found himself as he tumbled from his car and sat upon the depot platform, torn by a spasm of that hollow, racking cough so familiar to San Antonian ears. At that time, in the uncertain light of dawn, that way passed Curtis Raidler, the Nueces County cattleman-may his shadow never measure under s

5、ix foot two.The cattleman, out this early to catch the south-bound for his ranch station, stopped at the side of the distressed patron of sport, and spoke in the kindly drawl of his ilk and region, Got it pretty bad, bud?Cricket McGuire, ex-feather-weight prizefighter, tout, jockey, follower of the

6、ponies, all-round sport, and manipulator of the gum balls and walnut shells, looked up pugnaciously at the imputation cast by bud.Gwan, he rasped, telegraph pole. I didnt ring for yer.Another paroxysm wrung him, and he leaned limply against a convenient baggage truck. Raidler waited patiently, glanc

7、ing around at the white hats, short overcoats, and big cigars thronging the platform. Youre from the Noth, aint you, bud? he asked when the other was partially recovered. Come down to see the fight?Fight! snapped McGuire. Puss-in-the-corner! Twas a hypodermic injection. Handed him just one like a sq

8、uirt of dope, and hes asleep, and no tanbark needed in front of his residence. Fight! He rattled a bit, coughed, and went on, hardly addressing the cattleman, but rather for the relief of voicing his troubles. No more dead sure tings for me. But Rus Sage himself would have snatched at it. Five to on

9、e dat de boy from Cork wouldnt stay tree rounds is what I invested in. Put my last cent on, and could already smell the sawdust in dat all-night joint of Jimmy Delaneys on Tirty-seventh Street I was goin to buy. And den-say, telegraph pole, what a gazaboo a guy is to put his whole roll on one turn o

10、f the gaboozlum!Youre plenty right, said the big cattleman; more specially when you lose. Son, you get up and light out for a hotel. You got a mighty bad cough. Had it long?Lungs, said McGuire comprehensively. I got it. The croaker says Ill come to time for six months longer-maybe a year if I hold m

11、y gait. I wanted to settle down and take care of myself. Dats why I speculated on dat five to one perhaps. I had a tousand iron dollars saved up. If I winned I was goin to buy Delaneys cafe. Whod a tought dat stiff would take a nap in de foist round-say?Its a hard deal, commented Raidler, looking do

12、wn at the diminutive form of McGuire crumpled against the truck. But you go to a hotel and rest. Theres the Menger and the Maverick, and-And the Fith Avnoo, and the Waldorf-Astoria, mimicked McGuire. Told you I went broke. Im on de bum proper. Ive got one dime left. Maybe a trip to Europe or a sail

13、in me private yacht would fix me up- pa-per!He flung his dime at a newsboy, got his Express, propped his back against the truck, and was at once rapt in the account of his Waterloo, as expanded by the ingenious press.Curtis Raidler interrogated an enormous gold watch, and laid his hand on McGuires s

14、houlder.Come on, bud, he said. We got three minutes to catch the train.Sarcasm seemed to be McGuires vein.You aint seen me cash in any chips or call a turn since I told you I was broke, a minute ago, have you? Friend, chase yourself away.Youre going down to my ranch, said the cattleman, and stay til

15、l you get well. Six monthsll fix you good as new. He lifted McGuire with one hand, and half-dragged him in the direction of the train.What about the money? said McGuire, struggling weakly to escape.Money for what? asked Raidler, puzzled. They eyed each other, not understanding, for they touched only

16、 as at the gear of bevelled cog- wheels-at right angles, and moving upon different axes.Passengers on the south-bound saw them seated together, and wondered at the conflux of two such antipodes. McGuire was five feet one, with a countenance belonging to either Yokohama or Dublin. Bright-beady of eye

17、, bony of cheek and jaw, scarred, toughened, broken and reknit, indestructible, grisly, gladiatorial as a hornet, he was a type neither new nor unfamiliar. Raidler was the product of a different soil. Six feet two in height, miles broad, and no deeper than a crystal brook, he represented the union o

18、f the West and South. Few accurate pictures of his kind have been made, for art galleries are so small and the mutoscope is as yet unknown in Texas. After all, the only possible medium of portrayal of Raidlers kind would be the fresco-something high and simple and cool and unframed.They were rolling

19、 southward on the International. The timber was huddling into little, dense green motts at rare distances before the inundation of the downright, vert prairies. This was the land of the ranches; the domain of the kings of the kine.McGuire sat, collapsed into his corner of the seat, receiving with ac

20、id suspicion the conversation of the cattleman. What was the game of this big geezer who was carrying him off? Altruism would have been McGuires last guess. He aint no farmer, thought the captive, and he aint no con man, for sure. Wats his lay? You trail in, Cricket, and see how many cards he draws.

21、 Youre up against it, anyhow. You got a nickel and gallopin consumption, and you better lay low. Lay low and see wats his game.At Rincon, a hundred miles from San Antonio, they left the train for a buckboard which was waiting there for Raidler. In this they travelled the thirty miles between the sta

22、tion and their destination. If anything could, this drive should have stirred the acrimonious McGuire to a sense of his ransom. They sped upon velvety wheels across an exhilarant savanna. The pair of Spanish ponies struck a nimble, tireless trot, which gait they occasionally relieved by a wild, untr

23、ammelled gallop. The air was wine and seltzer, perfumed, as they absorbed it, with the delicate redolence of prairie flowers. The road perished, and the buckboard swam the uncharted billows of the grass itself, steered by the practised hand of Raidler, to whom each tiny distant mott of trees was a s

24、ignboard, each convolution of the low hills a voucher of course and distance. But McGuire reclined upon his spine, seeing nothing but a desert, and receiving the cattlemans advances with sullen distrust. Wats he up to? was the burden of his thoughts; wat kind of a gold brick has the big guy got to s

25、ell? McGuire was only applying the measure of the streets he had walked to a range bounded by the horizon and the fourth dimension.A week before, while riding the prairies, Raidler had come upon a sick and weakling calf deserted and bawling. Without dismounting he had reached and slung the distresse

26、d bossy across his saddle, and dropped it at the ranch for the boys to attend to. It was impossible for McGuire to know or comprehend that, in the eyes of the cattleman, his case and that of the calf were identical in interest and demand upon his assistance. A creature was ill and helpless; he had t

27、he power to render aid-these were the only postulates required for the cattleman to act. They formed his system of logic and the most of his creed. McGuire was the seventh invalid whom Raidler had picked up thus casually in San Antonio, where so many thousand go for the ozone that is said to linger

28、about its contracted streets. Five of them had been guests of Solito Ranch until they had been able to leave, cured or better, and exhausting the vocabulary of tearful gratitude. One came too late, but rested very comfortably, at last, under a ratama tree in the garden.So, then, it was no surprise t

29、o the ranchhold when the buckboard spun to the door, and Raidler took up his debile protege like a handful of rags and set him down upon the gallery.McGuire looked upon things strange to him. The ranch-house was the best in the country. It was built of brick hauled one hundred miles by wagon, but it

30、 was of but one story, and its four rooms were completely encircled by a mud floor gallery. The miscellaneous setting of horses, dogs, saddles, wagons, guns, and cow-punchers paraphernalia oppressed the metropolitan eyes of the wrecked sportsman.Well, here we are at home, said Raidler, cheeringly.It

31、s a h-l of a looking place, said McGuire promptly, as he rolled upon the gallery floor in a fit of coughing.Well try to make it comfortable for you, buddy, said the cattleman gently. It aint fine inside; but its the outdoors, anyway, thatll do you the most good. Thisll be your room, in here. Anythin

32、g we got, you ask for it.He led McGuire into the east room. The floor was bare and clean. White curtains waved in the gulf breeze through the open windows. A big willow rocker, two straight chairs, a long table covered with newspapers, pipes, tobacco, spurs, and cartridges stood in the centre. Some well-mounted heads of deer and one of an enormous black javeli projected from the walls. A wide, cool cot-bed stood in a corner. Nueces County people regarded this guest chamber as fit for a p