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Page 39
"McClintock waves his hand affectionately at one of his mules, and
then hurls a few stickfuls of minion type at the mob of shoppers.
"A gutta-percha Indian man, with a lady hanging on his arm, with three
strings of my fish-scale jewelry and imitation marble beads around her
neck, stands up on a block of stone and makes a talk that sounds like
a man shaking dice in a box to fill aces and sixes.
"'He says,' says McClintock, 'that the people not know that gold-dust
will buy their things. The women very mad. The Grand Yacuma tell
them it no good but for keep to make bad spirits keep away.'
"'You can't keep bad spirits away from money,' says I.
"'They say,' goes on McClintock, 'the Yacuma fool them. They raise
plenty row.'
"'Going! Going!' says I. 'Gold-dust or cash takes the entire stock.
The dust weighed before you, and taken at sixteen dollars the ounce--
the highest price on the Gaudymala coast.'
"Then the crowd disperses all of a sudden, and I don't know what's up.
Mac and me packs away the hand-mirrors and jewelry they had handed
back to us, and we had the mules back to the corral they had set apart
for our garage.
"While we was there we hear great noises of shouting, and down across
the plaza runs Patrick Shane, hotfoot, with his clothes ripped half
off, and scratches on his face like a cat had fought him hard for
every one of its lives.
"'They're looting the treasury, W. D.,' he sings out. 'They're going
to kill me and you, too. Unlimber a couple of mules at once. We'll
have to make a get-away in a couple of minutes.'
"'They've found out,' says I,' the truth about the law of supply and
demand.'
"'It's the women, mostly,' says the King. 'And they used to admire me
so!'
"'They hadn't seen looking-glasses then,' says I.
"'They've got knives and hatchets,' says Shane; 'hurry !'
"'Take that roan mule,' says I. 'You and your law of supply! I'll
ride the dun, for he's two knots per hour the faster. The roan has a
stiff knee, but he may make it,' says I. 'If you'd included
reciprocity in your political platform I might have given you the
dun,' says I.
"Shane and McClintock and me mounted our mules and rode across the
rawhide bridge just as the Peches reached the other side and began
firing stones and long knives at us. We cut the thongs that held up
our end of the bridge and headed for the coast."
A tall, bulky policeman came into Finch's
shop at that moment and leaned an elbow on the showcase. Finch nodded
at him friendly.
"I heard down at Casey's," said the cop, in rumbling, husky tones,
"that there was going to be a picnic of the Hat-Cleaners' Union over
at Bergen Beach, Sunday. Is that right?"
"Sure," said Finch. "There'll be a dandy time."
"Gimme five tickets," said the cop, throwing a five-dollar bill on the
showcase.
"Why,'' said Finch, "ain't you going it a little too--"
"Go to h--!" said the cop. "You got 'em to sell, ain't you?
Somebody's got to buy 'em. Wish I could go along."
I was glad to See Finch so well thought of in his neighborhood.
And then in came a wee girl of seven, with dirty face and pure blue
eyes and a smutched and insufficient dress.
"Mamma says," she recited shrilly, "that you must give me eighty cents
for the grocer and nineteen for the milkman and five cents for me to
buy hokey-pokey with--but she didn't say that," the elf concluded,
with a hopeful but honest grin.
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