Charles Portis

I was just fourteen years of age when a coward going by the name of Tom Chaney shot my father down in Fort Smith, Arkansas, and robbed him of his life

a cotton house made over into a little cabin. It had a good roof.

“Who is the best marshal they have?”

The sheriff thought on it for a minute. He said, “I would have to weigh that proposition. There is near about two hundred of them. I reckon William Waters is the best tracker. He is a half-breed Comanche and it is something to see, watching him cut for sign. The meanest one is Rooster Cogburn. He is a pitiless man, double-tough, and fear don’t enter into his thinking. He loves to pull a cork. Now L. T. Quinn, he brings his prisoners in alive. He may let one get by now and then but he believes even the worst of men is entitled to a fair shake.

over the mounts, then at the spare

ney set about unsaddling the gray horse. He said, “I will be riding behind Bob?”

“No, it will be too chancy with two men up if it comes to a race. When we reach

Perhaps you can imagine how painful it was for us to go directly from that appalling scene to the undertaker’s where my father lay dead.

He said he wished he could do more.

It was around 5:30 P.M. when I got to the depot. The days were growing short and it was already dark. The southbound train was to leave some few minutes after 6 o’clock. I found Yarnell waiting outside the freight car where he had loaded the coffin. He said the express agent had consented to let him ride in the car with the coffin.

He said he would go help me find a seat in a coach but I said, “No, I will stay over a day or two. I must see about those ponies and I want to make sure the law is on the job. Chaney has got clean away and they are not doing much about it.”

Yarnell said, “You can’t stay in this city by yourself.”

I said, “It will be all right. Mama knows I can take care of myself. Tell her I will be stopping at the Monarch boardinghouse. If there is no room there I will leave word with the sheriff where I am.”

He said, “I reckon I will stay too.”

I said, “No, I want you to go with Papa. When you get home tell Mr. Myers I said to put him in a better coffin.”

“Your mama will not like this,” said he.

“I will be back in a day or two. Tell her I said not to sign any

I WAS SICK the next day. I got up and went to breakfast but I could not eat much and my eyes and nose were running so I went back to bed. I felt very low. Mrs. Floyd wrapped a rag around my neck that was soaked in turpentine and smeared with lard. She dosed me with something called Dr. Underwood’s Bile Activator. “You will pass blue water for a day or two but do not be alarmed as that is only the medicine working,” she said. “It will relax you wonderfully. Grandma Turner and I bless the day we discovered it.” The label on the bottle said it did not contain mercury and was commended by physicians and clergymen.

Along with the startling color effect the potion also caused me to be giddy and lightheaded. I suspect now that it made use of some such ingredient as codeine or laudanum. I can remember when half the old ladies in the country were “dopeheads.”

Thank God for the Harrison Narcotics Law. Also the Volstead Act. I know Governor Smith is “wet” but that is because of his race and religion and he is not personally accountable for that. I think his first loyalty is to his country and not to “the infallible Pope of Rome.” I am not afraid of Al Smith for a minute. He is a good Democrat and when he is elected I believe he will do the right thing if he is not hamstrung by the Republican gang and bullied into an early grave as was done to Woodrow Wilson, the greatest Presbyterian gentleman of the age.

I stayed in bed for two days. Mrs. Floyd was kind and brought my meals to me. The room was so cold that she did not linger to ask many questions. She inquired twice daily at the post office for my letter.

Grandma Turner got in the bed each afternoon for her rest and I would read to her. She loved her medicine and would drink it from a water glass. I read her about the Wharton trial in the New Era and the Elevator. I also read a little book someone had left on the table called Bess Calloway’s Disappointment. It was about a girl in England who could not make up her mind whether to marry a rich man with a pack of dogs named Alec or a preacher. She was a pretty girl in easy circumstances who did not have to cook or work at anything and she could have either one she wanted. She made trouble for herself because she would never say what she meant but only blush and talk around it. She kept everybody in a stir wondering what she was driving at. That was what held your interest. Grandma Turner and I both enjoyed it. I had to read the humorous parts twice. Bess married one of the two beaus and he turned out to be mean and th

Potter said they had found it saved time. We come

Papa had an idea they would make good deer-hunting ponies,