Part 70

"So you're the son of this family!" says Old Man Wright, slow. "That can't be helped, neither. I--well, I didn't know. I--I thought you wanted her for her money. I'll go so far as to say that."

"It wouldn't of made any difference," says Bonnie Bell then. "I'd of married him anyway. It's just like he says--he never told me about it until just a little while ago. I thought he was some sort of a distant relative of the Wisner family. If you stop to think you can see how all these things happened easy enough. Especially you can when you stop to think that, on foot and off a horse, Curly is apt to do more fool things than a cageful of white rats--God bless him! Because nobody else but him could of done just what he's done!"

"Well, it does seem to me," says I then, "that most of this happened account of me. I reckon I made about as many fool breaks as any fellow could," says I. "Like I told your pa, I couldn't see a load of hay. But here's where I quit. It don't look like you need me no more, for things is mixed up now as bad as they can get," says I.

"Keep still, Curly," says Bonnie Bell to me. "Set down!"

About then I seen them two old men looking at each other. Without saying nothing, they both got up and went out into the parlor together. We couldn't hear what they said. For that matter, we couldn't hear what we said ourselfs, because of something that happened around in there.

Their collie dog, Caesar, was barking at us when we come in. He'd sort of got under the table. But now we heard another dog barking plumb crazy. And now in comes from somewhere, out in the garridge or the car maybe, that Boston dog, Peanut, of Bonnie Bell's!

He was looking for a settlement too. He don't hesitate, but he goes straight for this collie under the table, and they mix it plenty right then and there, till most of us was glad enough to get up on the chairs. I tried to stop them and the old lady and Bonnie Bell was both hollering at them; but the hired man he raised his hand.

"Let them alone!" says he. "They got almost human intelligence someways," says he. "Let 'em alone, so they can have it out."

So they had it out for quite a while there in the dining-room, under the table and among the chairs, and under the sofa, and pretty much everywhere, both of 'em enjoying of theirselfs plenty. Their dog, Caesar, had got older now and Peanut he had his hands full; but he was shore industrious and sincere.

By and by, after quite a while, they hauled apart and set looking at each other, their tongues hanging out, happy and smiling. Peanut he goes over to his mistress, and he was shaking a ear that was loose. Caesar he goes over to the old lady, limping and holding up his foot, him looking plumb contented.

"They'll get along all right now," says the hired man--James, or Jimmie, or Jim, whatever you ought to call him.

I couldn't believe he was young Mr. James Wisner. Sometimes I don't hardly even yet.

"You ought to be ashamed of yourselves," says Bonnie Bell. "I declare, men are brutes anyhow!"

"I know it, Bonnie Bell," says I. "I've made plenty of trouble, but not no more. I'm taking the morning train West," says I.

"Where to?" she ast me; and I can't answer--for me the whole world was upside down, same as this room here.

About then the two old men come back into the room, both of them serious; but you could see easy that they hadn't had no war--only some kind of a squaring and settling up; I reckon because of Bonnie Bell and this James, or Jimmie, or Jim, not being no hired man none after all, which maybe he had a strawberry mark on his arm--I don't know how they proved it.

Old Man Wright he stood up, with his hand on top of a chair; and he made a little after-dinner talk that cost him, maybe, several million dollars--not that he cared!

"I come here tonight," says he, "to maybe take the law into my own hands--anyways I reckon I come here to set in judgment; but I wasn't no good judge, because I was trying the case without having all of the facts. But I'm this kind of man," says he, "that when I've made a mistake, and know it, I'm game to stand up and say so. That's what I'm doing now. I reckon I been wrong. Some things you can't help. I ain't going to try to help this no more.

"The fact is, I reckon, maybe it's the best thing that could of happened. It didn't happen through me. I done my best to keep it from happening. That's where I was wrong. I'm glad of all this now and I take back what I said. I've been a twenty-two carat, pink-eyed, black-striped wild ass of the desert, though not halfway as big a fool as Curly. It was him that got us all in wrong."

Old Man Wisner he stands up too; and he makes his confession that's good for his soul. His Adam's apple kind of walked up and down his neck, but he come through.

"Don't say no more, Colonel," says he. "I'm to blame for all this myself. I was the biggest fool that ever was. That fence--why, that fence now----"

James, or Jimmie, or Jim, and Bonnie Bell they looks at each other then and laughs right out.

"You didn't build it high enough," says he; "you couldn't!"

"I'm glad I couldn't," says Old Man Wisner. "Things are going to come out all right, the way they ought to come. I've learned a lot tonight--a lot about being neighbors. Son, we had a neighbor and we didn't know it. Maybe it's that way plenty times. We had one neighbor that has saved your father from being broke and disgraced before all the world--before tomorrow night. That's what kind of neighbors we had all along," says he; "and we tried to build a fence and keep them away from us! Yes; thank Gawd, I couldn't build the fence high enough," says he.

"I knew something about this, dad," says James, or Jimmie, or Jim, then. "I could of told you long ago that ranch deal couldn't win. Scale it down, get at the real business and human values, and it ought to win--and win big!"

Old Man Wisner he's always rather strong for organization. He looks over at Old Man Wright and they both look at this young man; and they both nod.

"That's a good idea," says Old Man Wright--"a damn good idea! Now then, we're beginning to talk. Why can't we throw the two businesses in together and make one hand wash the other, and let this young gentleman take care of the reorganization on the spot?"

"That's the idea!" breaks in Bonnie Bell right then. "There ain't any better cow country out-of-doors than the Yellow Bull Valley. I know that. Give us a chance and we'll pull this whole business out of the hole," says she.