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Rex Beach
Adventure Stories
“Bitter Root” Billings,
Arbiter
By REX BEACH
Copyright by McClure, Phillips & Co.
ILLINGS rode in from the Junc-
B tion about dusk and ate his
supper in silence. He'd been
east for sixty days, and, al-
though there lurked about him the
bint of unwonied ventures, etiquette
forbade its mention, You see, in our
country that which a man gives vol-
untarily is ofttimes later dissected
ir smoky bunk houses or roughly
handled round tickering campfires,
but the privacies he guards are in-
violate. Curiosity isn't exactly a lost
art, but its practice isn't popular nor
hygienie,
Later 1 found him
whittling out on the porch, and as
the moment seemed propitious 1 in-
quired adroitly, “Did you have a good
time in Chicago, Bitter Root?"
“Bully,” sald he. relapsing
weighty absorption,
“What'd you do?’ 1 inquired, with
almost the certainty of appearing in-
sistent,
“Don't you never read the papers?’
he inquired, with such evident com-
passion that “Kink” Martin and the
other boys snickered This from
“Biiter Root,”
outside of the “Arkansas Printing.”
as he terms the illustrations!
“Guess I'l have to show you my
press notices,” and from a hip pocket
he produced a fat bundle of clippings
in a rubber band, These he displayed
jealously, and 1 stared agape, for
they were front pages of great metro-
politan dailies, marred with red and
black seare heads, in which 1 glimpsed
the words, “Billings, of Montana,”
* ‘Bitter Root’ on Arbitration,” “A
Lochinvar Out of the West” and
other things as puzzling.
“Press notices!” echoed “Kink”
scornfully. “Wouldn't that rope you?
He talks like Big lke that went with
the Wild West show. When a punch:
er gets so lazy he can’t earn a living
by the sweat of his pony he grows his
hair, goes on the stage busting glass
balls with shot ca'tridges and talks
about ‘press notices.” Let's see ‘em,
Billings. You pinch ‘em as close to
your stummick as though you held
cards in a strange poker game.”
“Well, 1 have set in a strange game,
amongst aliens,” Billings, disre-
garding the request, “and | ve held the
high cards; also I've drawed out with
meditatively
into
said
honors. I've sailed the medium high
seas with mutiny in the stokehole.
I've changed the lnws of labor, politics
and municipal econc: I went out
of God's country right into the heart
of the decaying east, and by the ap-
plication of a running noose in a
bemip rope 1 strangled oppression and
put 8,000 men to work.” He paused
es,
ponderously. ‘I'm an arbitrator!”
“The deuce you are!” indiguantly
cried “Reddy,” the cook. “Whe says
id
“Reddy” isn't up in syntax, aud his
unreasoning joyalty to Billings is au
established fact of such standing that
his remarks allord no conjecture.
“Yes; I've cut into the ‘nation’s peril’
and t ‘erring evil’ good and strong,
walking ont from the stinks of the
Union stockyards of Chicago into the
Mmelight of publicity vin the ‘drunk |
and disorderly’ route,
“You sce 1 got those ten carloads
of steers into the city all right, but
1 wis =o blame busy splattering
through the tracked up wastes of the
cow pens and inhaling the sewer gas
of the woot side that I never got to
see a newspaper. If I'd ‘a’ read one,
here's what I'd ‘a’ found--naipely,
the greatest, stubbornest, riotingest
strike ever known, which weans a
heap for Chicago, she being the wet
nurse of labor trouble,
“The whole river front was tied up.
Nary a steamer had whistled inside
the six mile erib for two weeks, and
8,000 men was out. There was hold-
ups and blood shedding and picketing,
which last is an alias for assault with
intents, and altogether it was a prime |
place for a cowmat on a quiet vaca- |
tion--just homelike and natural.
“It was at this peint that | enters.
busting out of the smoke of the stock-
ards, all sweet and beautiful, like
the gentle heeroine in the play as she
walks through the curtains at the
back of the stage.
“Now, you know there's a heap of
difference between the stockyards
and Chicago—it's just like coming
from Arkansas over into the United | In the sbuffle Murdock shifts my bal- langwidge through a wire net at the
States,
“Well, soon as 1 sold the stock I
kit for the lake front and began to
ground sluice the coal dust off of my
palate,
“l was busy working my booze hy-
draulic when I see an arid appearing
pilgrim 'longside looking thirsty as ap
alkali flat,
“‘Get in,’ says I, and the way he
obeyed orders ‘cooked like he'd had
military training. 1 felt sort of
drawed to him from the way he
handled his licker’ took it straight and
sunning over, then sopped his hands | mislald. I got her out at last and try it anyhow,’ ind he smites the
work
| they'd
who scorns literature |
wouldn't get a cent for feeding the
| fives ueither,
a
on the bar and smelled of his fingers.
He seemed to just soak it up both
ways—reg'lar human blotter,
“You lap it up like a man,’ says I—
{ ike a cowman full growed. Ever been
| west?
| “‘Nope, says he; ‘born here.’
| ow ‘Well, I'm a stranger,” says I, ‘out
absorbing su~h beauties of architecture
and free lunch as offers along the line.
If 1 ain’t keeping you up I'd be glad
of your company.’
“‘I'm your assistant lunch buster,’
says he, and in the course of things
he further explained that he was &
tughoat fireman out on a strike, giv-
ing me the follering information about
the tieup: ‘It all come up over a dose
of dyspepsia’ "—
| “Back up” interrupted
| squirming. “Are you plumb bug? Get
| together! You're certainly the Raving
Kid. Ye must have stone bruised your
| heel and got concession of the brain.”
“Yes, sir—indigestion,” Billings con-
| tinued. “Old man Badrich of the Bad-
i rich Transportation company has it
! terrible. It lands on his solar every
morning about § o'clock, getting worse
| steady, and reaches perihelion along
about 11. He can tell the time of day
by taste. One morning when his mouth
felt like about 10:45 in comes a com-
mittee from Firemen and Engineers’
local No. 21 with a demand for more
witzes, prodding him with the intima-
| lent, but 1 was so weakminded in
“Kink,” |
, blazed away just a second after they
| dodged around the corner; then I
| hit the trail after ’em, letting go a
| few sky shots and getting a ghost
| dance holler off my stummick that had
been troubling me. The wallop on
the head made me dizzy, though, and
| 1 zigzagged awful, tacking out of the
Jatiey right into a policeman.
“ ‘Whee! says I iu joy, for he had
| Murdock safe by the bits, bucking
| consid'rable.
| ‘Stan’ aside and le’'mme 'lectrocute
{ Im,’ says I. I throwed the gun on
| him, and the crowd dodged it into all
| the doorways and windows conven-
the knees I stumbled over the curb
and fell down.
“Next thing 1 knew we was all
bouncing over the cobblestones in a
patrol wagon,
“Well, in the morning I told my
story to the judge, plain and un-
varnished; then Murdock takes the
stand and busts into song, claiming
that Le was coming through the alley
toward Clark street when I staggered
out back of a saloon and commenced
to shoot at him. He saw [| was drunk
and fanned out, me shooting at him
with every jump. He had proof, he
suid, and he called for the president
of his union, Mr. Heegan. At the
name all the loafers and stew bums
in the courtroom: stomped and said,
tion that if he didn't ante they'd tie
up all his boats.
“lI s'pose a teaspoonful of baking |
soda, assimilated internally around |
the environments of his appendix, |
would have spared the strike and
cheated me out of being a hero. As
the poet might have said, ‘Upon such
slender pegs is this our greatness
bhuug.'”
“Oh, Gawd!" exclaimed Mullins
piously.
“Anyhow, the bitteruess in the old
wan's inner tubes showed in the bile |
of his answer, and he told 'em if
they wanted more money he'd give
‘ems a chance to earn it—they could
nights as well as days. He
inthinated further that they'd ought
to be satisfied with their wages, as
undoubtedly foller the same
line of business in the next world and
“Next worning the strike was called,
and the guy that breathed treachery
and walkouts was one ‘Oily’ Heeguan,
further submerged under the titles of
president of the Federation of Fresh
Water Firemen; also chairman of
the United Water Front Workmen,
which last takes in everything doing
business along the river except the
wharf rats and typhoid germs, and
it's with the disreputableness of this
party that 1 infected myself to the
detriment of labor aud the triumph of
the law.
“D. O'Hara Heegan is an able man,
and inside of a week he'd spread the
strike till it was the cleanest, dirtiest
tieup ever known, The hospitals and
morgues was full of nonunion men,
but the river wns empty all right.
Yes; he had a persuading method of
arbitration quite convincing to the
most calloused. involving the laying
on of the lead pipe.
“Things got to be pretty fierce by
and by, for they had the police buf-
faloed, and disturbances got plentyer
than the casualities at a butchers’
plenie. The strikers got hungry, too,
finally, because the principles of
unionism is ike a rash on your me-
chanfe, skin deep-—-inside, his gastries
works three shifts a day even if his
outsides is idle and steaming with
socialism,
“Olly fed ‘em dray loads of elo-
quence, but it didn't seem to be real
filling. They'd leave the lectures and
rob a bakery.
“He was a wonder, though; just sat
inn his office and kept the shipowners
waiting in line, swearing bitter and
refined cuss words about ‘ignorant
flend' and ‘cussed pedagogue,’ which
last, for ‘Kink's’ enlightenment, means
a kind of Hebrew mecting house,
“These here details my new friend
give me, ending with a eulogy on
‘Olly’ Heegan, the ‘idol of the idle.
“If he says starve we starve,” says
he, ‘and if he says work we work.
See! Oh, he's the goods, he is! Let's
go down by the river. Mebbe we'll see
Lim." So me and Murdock hiked down
Water street, where they keep mos-
quito netting over the bar fixtures and |
spit at the stove.
“We found him, a big mouthed,
shifty kind of man, ‘bout as cynical
looking in the face as a black bass
and full of wind as a toad fish. 1 ex-
changed drinks for principles of so- |
! cialism and doing so happened to dis- |
, play my roll. Murdock slipped away |
and made talk with a friend: then
when Heegan had left he steers me
out the back way into an alley. ‘Short |
cut,’ says he, ‘to another and a better
place.’
“I follers through a back room; then
as [ steps out the door I'm grabbed
by this new friend, while Murdock
| bathes my head with a gas pipe billy,
| one of the regulation, strike promoting
kind, fe they use for decoying mem-
bers into the glorious ranks of labor.
| “1saw a ‘burning of Rome’ that was
ia dream and whole cloudbursts of
! shooting stars, but 1 yanked Mr. En-
| thusiastic Stranger away from my sur- |
| eingle and throwed him agin the wall.
—
| last, though, and steams up the alley
| with my greenbaeks, convoyed by his
| friend. |
“‘Wow-ow,' says |, giving the dis- |
tress signal so that the windows
rattled and reaching for my holster.
I'd 'a’ got them both, only the gun
caught in my suspender. You see,
not anticipating any live bird shoot,
I'a put it inside my pants band,
under my vest. for appearances, 21
45 is like fresn air to a drownding
man—generally has to be drawed in
baste—and neither one shouldn't be
| Clerk, $10 and costs.
‘Hear. hear!" while up steps this Napo-
leon of the hoboes.
“Sure, he knew Mr. Murdock, had
kzown bim for years, and he was per-
fect!ly reliable and houest. As to his
desk. ‘Collins, what d'ye say if we
tow the Detroit out? Her crew has |
stayed with us so far, and they'll
stick now if we'll say the word. The |
uulous are bungry aud scrapping
among themselves, and the men want
to go back to work, It's just that
devil of a Heegan that holds ‘em. If |
they see we've got a tug crew that'll |
i
gu they'll arbitrate, and we'll kill the |
strike.’ |
“Yes. sir’ says Collins. ‘But !
|
where's the tug crew, Mr. Badrich?
*“*Rizht here! We three and Maur- |
phy. the beokkeeper. Blast this idle- |
ness! 1 want fight? |
“I'll take the same, says I, ‘when |
I get the price.’ !
“*That’s all right. You've put the !
spirit into me, and I'll see you through.
Can you run an engine? Good! I'll!
take the wheel, and the others 'll fire.
N's geing to be risky work, though. |
You won't back out, eh?
“Reddy” iuterrupted Billings here
loudly with a snort of disgust, while |
“Bitter Root” ran his fingers through |
his hair before continuing. Martin '
was listening intently.
“The old man arranged to have a
squad of cops on all the bridges, and
I begin anticipating bilarities for next |
day.
“The news got out, of course,
through the secrecies of police bead- |
quarters, and when we ran up the river
for our tow it looked like every striker
west of Pittsburg had his family on !
the docks to see the barbecue, accom-
panied by enough cobblestones and
1
i
|
i
i
robbing me, it was preposterous, be-
cause he himself was at the other end |
of the alley and saw the whole thing,
| just as Mr. Murdock related it.
I jumps up. ‘You're a line, Heegan, |
I was buying booze for the two of
you,” but a policeman nailed me, chok-
ing off my rhetorics. Mr. Heezan
leans over and whispers to the judge,
while 1 got chilblains along my spine.
*“*look here, kind judze. says I,
real winning and genteel, ‘this mau is
80 good at explaining things away, ask
him to talk off this bump over my ear.
I surely didn't get a buggy spoke and
laminate myself on the nur.’
“That'll do,’ says the judge. ‘Mr.
Charge, drunk
and disorderly. Next!
“*Hold on there. says 1, ignorant of
the involutions of justice, ‘1 guess I've
got the bulge on you this time. They
beat vou te me, judge. 1 ain't got a
cent. You ean go through me and be
welcome to half you tind. I'l mali
you ten when I get home though, hon-
est.’
“At that the audience giggled, and
the judge says:
**Your humor deesn't appeal to me,
Mr. Billings. Of course you have the
privilege of working it out,’ OL, glory,
the ‘privilege!
“Heegan nodded nt this, and 1 real-
ized what I wns against, |
* ‘Your honor.” says 1. with sarcastic |
refiuements. ‘science tells ns that a |
perfect vacuum ain't possible, but after |
watching you I know better, and for |
you, Mr. Workingman's Frieud, us to
the floor, and I run at Heegan.
“Pshaw! [1 never got started. nor
I didn’t rightfully come to till 1 rested
in the workhouse, which last figger of
speech is a pure and beautiful para-
dox.
“1 ain't dwelling with glee on the
next twenty-six days—$10 and costs,
at four bits ‘a day—but 1 left there
saturated with such hatred for Hee-
i
i
{
{
“} got her out at last and blazed away.”
gan that my breath smelled of 'em.
“1 wanders down the river front,
hoping the fortunes of war would
deliver him to me dead or alive, when
the thought. hit me that I'd need
money. It was bound to take an-
other ten and costs shortly after we
met, and probably more, if 1 paid for
what 1 got, for 1 figgered on dis-
tending myself with satisfaction and
his features with uppercuts, Then 1
see a . ‘Nonunion Men Wanted—
Big Wages.” In | goes and strains
“‘I want them big wages’ says Il.
“ ‘What can you do?
“‘Anything to get the monev,’ says
{. ‘What does it take to liquidate an
“There was a white baired man in
the cage who began to sit up and
take notice.
“ ‘What's your trouble? says he, and |
1 told him.
“‘If we had z few more like you
we'd bust the strike’ says he, kind
of sizing me up. ‘I've got a notion to
aud I turied
we got going up was repartee, but I
tiggoered we'd need armor getting back.
“We passed a hawser to the Detroit, |
the was into the tug, |
blowing for the Wells street bridge. |
Then war begin. 1 leans out the door |
just in thme to see the mob charge the |
bridge. The cops clubbed ‘em back, |
while a roar went up from the docks |
i
serap fron to ballast a battleship. All
1
|
cand roof tops that was like a bad
[Continued on page 7. Col. 1.}
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