



Produced by David Widger from page images generously
provided by the Internet Archive







WEBSTER--MAN'S MAN

By Peter B. Kyne

Author Of “Cappy Ricks”

“The Three Godfathers,” Etc.

Illustrated By Dean Cornwell

[Illustration:ustration: 0006]

[Illustration:ustration: 0007]

New York

Doubleday, Page & Company

1917





WEBSTER-MAN'S MAN




CHAPTER I

|WHEN John Stuart Webster, mining engineer and kicker-up-of-dust on
distant trails, flagged the S. P., L. A. & S. L. Limited at a blistered
board station in Death Valley, California, he had definitely resolved to
do certain things. To begin, he would invade the dining car at the first
call to dinner and order approximately twenty dollars' worth of ham and
eggs, which provender is, as all who know will certify, the pinnacle of
epicurean delight to an old sour-dough coming out of the wilderness with
a healthy bankroll and a healthier appetite; for even as the hydrophobic
dog avoids water, so does the adventurer of the Webster type avoid
the weird concoctions of high-priced French chefs until he has first
satisfied that void which yawns to receive ham and eggs.

Following the ham and eggs, Mr. Webster planned to saturate himself from
soul to vermiform appendix with nicotine, which he purposed obtaining
from tobacco with nicotine in it. It was a week since he had smoked
anything, and months since he had tasted anything with an odour even
remotely like tobacco, for the August temperature in Death Valley is no
respecter of moisture in any man or his tobacco. By reason of the fact
that he had not always dwelt in Death Valley, however, John Stuart
Webster knew the dining-car steward would have in the ice chest some
wonderful cigars, wonderfully preserved.

Webster realized that, having sampled civilization thus far, his debauch
would be at an end until he reached Salt Lake City-unless, indeed, he
should find aboard the train something fit to read or somebody worth
talking to. Upon arrival in Salt Lake City, however, his spree would
really begin. Immediately upon leaving the train he would proceed to
a clothing shop and purchase a twenty-five-dollar ready-to-wear suit,
together with the appurtenances thereunto pertaining or in any wise
belonging. These habiliments he would wear just long enough to shop in
respectably and without attracting the attention of the passing throng;
and when later his “tailor-mades” and sundry other finery should be
delivered, he would send the store clothes to one Ubehebe Henry, a
prospector down in the Mojave country, who would appreciate them and
wear them when he came to town in the fall to get drunk.

Having arranged for the delivery of his temporary attire at the best
hotel in town, Webster designed chartering a taxicab and proceeding
forthwith to that hotel, where he would engage a sunny room with a bath,
fill the bathtub, climb blithely in and soak for two hours at least,
for it was nearly eight months since he had had a regular bath and he
purposed making the most of his opportunity. His long-drawn ablutions at
length over, he would don a silken dressing gown and slippers, order up
a barber, and proceed to part with enough hair and whiskers to upholster
an automobile; and upon the completion of his tonsorial adventures he
would encase his person in a suit of mauve- silk pajamas, climb
into bed and stay there for forty-eight hours, merely waking long enough
to take another bath, order up periodical consignments of ham and
eggs and, incidentally, make certain that a friendly side-winder or
chuck-walla hadn't crawled under the blankets with him.

So much for John Stuart Webster's plans. Now for the gentleman himself.
No one--not even the Pullman porter, shrewd judge of mankind that he
was--could have discerned in the chrysalis that flagged the Limited
the butterfly of fashion that was to be. As the ebony George raised
the vestibule platform, opened the car door and looked out, he had no
confidence in the lean, sun-baked big man standing by the train. Plainly
the fellow was not a first-class passenger but a wandering prospector,
for he was dog-dirty, a ruin of rags and hairy as a tarantula. The only
clean thing about him was a heavy-calibred automatic pistol of the army
type, swinging at his hip.

“Day coach an' tourist up in front,” the knight of the whiskbroom
announced in disapproving tones and started to close down the platform.

“So I perceived,” John Stuart Webster replied blandly. “I also observed
that you failed to employ the title _sir_ when addressing a white