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GOING SOME

A ROMANCE OF STRENUOUS AFFECTION

BY

REX BEACH

SUGGESTED BY THE PLAY BY REX BEACH AND PAUL ARMSTRONG

ILLUSTRATED BY MARK FENDERSON




CHAPTER I

Four cowboys inclined their bodies over the barbed-wire fence
which marked the dividing-line between the Centipede Ranch and
their own, staring mournfully into a summer night such as only
the far southwestern country knows. Big yellow stars hung thick
and low--so low that it seemed they might almost be plucked by an
upstretched hand--and a silent air blew across thousands of open
miles of land lying crisp and fragrant under the velvet dark.

And as the four inclined their bodies, they inclined also their
ears, after the strained manner of listeners who feel anguish at
what they hear. A voice, shrill and human, pierced the night like
a needle, then, with a wail of a tortured soul, died away amid
discordant raspings: the voice of a phonograph. It was their own,
or had been until one overconfident day, when the Flying Heart
Ranch had risked it as a wager in a foot-race with the
neighboring Centipede, and their own man had been too slow. As it
had been their pride, it remained their disgrace. Dearly had they
loved, and dearly lost it. It meant something that looked like
honor, and though there were ten thousand thousand phonographs,
in all the world there was not one that could take its place.

The sound ceased, there was an approving distant murmur of men's
voices, and then the song began:

  "Jerusalem, Jerusalem,
  Lift up your voice and sing--"

Higher and higher the voice mounted until it reached again its
first thin, ear-splitting pitch.

"Still Bill" Stover stirred uneasily in the darkness. "Why 'n
'ell don't they keep her wound up?" he complained. "Gallagher's
got the soul of a wart-hog. It's criminal the way he massacres
that hymn."

From a rod farther down the wire fence Willie answered him, in a
boy's falsetto:

"I wonder if he does it to spite me?"

"He don't know you're here," said Stover.

The other came out of the gloom, a little stoop-shouldered man
with spectacles.

"I ain't noways sure," he piped, peering up at his lanky foreman.
"Why do you reckon he allus lets Mrs. Melby peter out on my
favorite record? He done the same thing last night. It looks like
an insult."

"It's nothing but ignorance," Stover replied. "He don't want no
trouble with you. None of 'em do."

"I'd like to know for certain." The small man seemed torn by
doubt. "If I only knew he done it a-purpose, I'd git him. I bet I
could do it from here."

Stover's voice was gruff as he commanded: "Forget it! Ain't it
bad enough for us fellers to hang around like this every night
without advertising our idiocy by a gun-play?"

"They ain't got no right to that phonograph," Willie averred,
darkly.

"Oh yes, they have; they won it fair and square."

"Fair and square! Do you mean to say Humpy Joe run that foot-race
on the square?"

"I never said nothin' like that whatever. I mean we bet it, and
we lost it. Listen! There goes Carara's piece!"

Out past the corral floated the announcement in a man's metallic
syllables:

"_The Baggage Coach Ahead,_ as sung by Helena Mora for the
Echo Phonograph, of New York and Pa-a-aris!"

From the dusk to the right of the two listeners now issued soft
Spanish phrases.

"_Madre de Dios!_ 'The Baggage Car in Front!' T'adora Mora!
God bless 'er!"

During the rendition of this affecting ballad the two cow-men
remained draped uncomfortably over the barbed-wire barrier, lost
in rapturous enjoyment. When the last note had died away, Stover
roused himself reluctantly.

"It's time we was turnin' in." He called softly, "Hey, Mex!"

"_Si, Senor!_"

"Come on, you and Cloudy. _Vamos!_ It's ten o'clock."

He turned his back on the Centipede Ranch that housed the
treasure, and in company with Willie, made his way to the ponies.
Two other figures joined them, one humming in a musical baritone
the strains of the song just ended.

"Cut that out, Mex! They'll hear us," Stover cautioned.

"_Caramba!_ This t'ing is brek my 'eart," said the Mexican,
sadly. "It seem like the Senorita Mora is sing that song to me.
Mebbe she knows I'm set out 'ere on cactus an