The Arkansaw traveler., 1885-10-31

from one of the Mexican drivers, and be- fore any one knew of it, Thompson was uproariously, boisterously, abusively drunk. The occasion was one to warrant more than usual lenience, and much for bearance was displayed toward the man. Finally, however, be came to where the women and children sat awaiting the start and insolently ordered a lady to prepare fresh breakfast for him. My father came to us, and tried to lead him away, when Thompson sprang upon him and hurled him backward to the very brink of the salt we'll, some fifty feet deep. Thompson was more than six feet tall !; my father below the average height ot men, but the smaller man held his own, and was even forcing his antagonist away from the well, when Thompson reached to his hip and drew his cooked revolver. The women screamed, the men came running but from too far away. do not remember thinking the matter out; fancy my legs acted in ad- vance of my juvenile brain; but it ap- peared a moment for decisive action. and dashed forward, wrested the pistol from the drunken grasp, and was back again with the weapon tucked under the ouffalo-robe sat upon, before the fore most man reached the struggling pair. I rode into Cienegas with that pistol be- heath the cushion of my seat in the coach l presume that it was ultimately returned to Thompson.
 That worthy was unceremoniously bundled into one of the carretas. Prior to that time Thompson had been temper ate while in our employ; but that one lapse seemed to break do Un his self con- trol. He drank hard, and his conduct became so in'olerable that he was dis charged at Durango. He hung about the old plateau city for several weeks, insisting upon re employment, and being refused, he vowed with savage impreca. tions, to wreak his vengeance upon my father by means of his family. Much as we shrank from his uncouth roughness, we children had been much impressed by the quaint turns of Thompson's speech, and many of his picturesque idloms are household words in our ma turer years.
 know a man whom seem to see al- ways in two-fold character. He is handsome, of rare social gifts, composed, accomplished, debonair, versatile a dawdler on silken cushions, the idol of women, and given to posing -lazily-as a squire of danes. l happen to have trodden, at later day, the ground of this lawless youth, and can but smile at thought of the consternation amoog the fair if they knew the record of his life as l know it. Watching his languid repose in correct parlor precincts or sardonically contemplating the eagerness of his re- cephon Tn a gay party of dancers, pictured him in my fancy as the hero of certain mad ride out of San Antonio de Bexar, before d crowd who clamored for his life; seem to see him in the street of a frontier town, facing score of men with three corpses, lfeless through his hand, lying at his feet; remember what his whilom comrade told me of this mans coolness and desperate courage as he knelt all one long summer day loading and firing across his brothers body-one of the little group besieged by Indians on the Staked Pains. But keep his coun- sel. Even the urgency of two women his mother and she who owns hi, ale giInce-hss wrung rem me no account of his lite in lands unquiet For while his eyes gleamed strong distrust of my dis. cretion, but at last my reticence won his conf fence and faith We were driving one day across the wide, bare plains in one of our southern counties, when, in ans yer to some satirical prediction of spips,erhood in penance for my whims, sad:
 Pray, don't say that you 'disencour- age' me-"
 A shadow drifed across his face; his voice was several tones lower when he said:
 Do you mind telling me where you found that word? You use 1t often, bat never heard it from another person save one"
 Nor l. And assure you use it in bravado largely, for with every utteraace of the word feel the sh .dow of dark cloud Of fear that has hung over me for years"
 He turned to look at me.
 You afraidI Ofwhat2 You h andle mice, and dead snakes and a gun as readily as do. What else, then, does a woman fear '"
 "No, but indeed meaut it, am mis- erabiy -abj ectly-afra,d of one man."
 And thea told him. brie riy and sketch fly, of ou. adventure at the salt we'll, and my subsequent, ever-present terror of the man Thompson. When had finished, he looked absently at the distant moun- tains, with strained look in his blue eyes, and his face, for all the heat, was pall,d.
 "Do you remember your drivers given
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