The Worcester spy. [volume] (Worcester, Mass.) 1898-1904, 1899-08-20
PROOF OF NERVE.
Luke Short Dared Wear a Plug Hat to
Dodge City.

Dodge City.
you wouldn't think, would you, that
the mere wearing of a plug hat on a
single occasion would constitute the
most remarkable test of nerve that the
famous Luke Short ever underwent
especially after rejecting that Short, as
marshal of some of the worst towns in
the southwest, had been compelled to
kill as many as % men?" said a gen
tleman connected with the Indian SER
vice, in the Washington Star. We'll,
it was, and Short several times told
me so himself. 1t happened in Dodge
>ity, when Dodge City was about the
worst town on the map of the world,
let alone in this country, Short had
been spending some time in La Junta,
Col. and one day he met there a
freighter who had just got in from
Dodge City. Short got into talk with
the freighter, and asked him about the
town he had just left behind him.
=" I hear it's right smart bad down
that way said he How about it?
Was thinking some of sOing there
Stay away, podner, replied the
freighter They'll git you sure. They
git two or three every night in Dodge.
Put it to a eastern Teller tn other day
FIR nothin' but wearin' a plug hat
That so? said Short, who was I'M
known to the freighter. I guess I'll go
there tomorrow, and l guess I'll wear
a plug hat when I get there
1.-THE freighter sized the small, sandy
bearded Luke up out of the tail of his
eye, seemingly trying to determine
whether he was crazy, or just a bluff
fer.
I got $500 tibet says you won't so to
no Dodge with plug hat on he said,
pulling out his roll.
you're on said Short, pulling out
his Wad instantly.
THE freighter was puzzled to have
his wager picked up so quickly. but he
stood for it, and both men put up their
money with the La Junta agent of the
express company They arranged to
start for Dodge City the next week.
Short sent up to Denver for a $40 silk
hat, and it reached him a couple of
days later Two days after that they
took the train in company for Dodge,
the freighter still being unaware of
Shorts identity as the quickest man on
the trigger in the whole west, as well
as the most dangerous man in a knife
tight. AS the train drew close to Dodge
City the freighter said to Short
q Podner, yo' had better take my ad-
vice and not git off with thet thing on
yo' head. Yo' kin pull yo' bet down. 1
don't know nothin' about yo' family
or even if yo' got one, but eff the boys
shoot yo' up. as they're boun' t do, it'll
sort O. stick by me, and amt no kill
er myself. Better git off with yo' reg
ular evryday hat on
| Luke smiled
1.-The bet stands said be, and he
reached down to the handbook, pulled
out the silk hat stroked it with the
sleeve of his blue flannel shirt and put
| 1t on. He had two guns strapped to his
waist top boots and all that sort of a
makeup, but yet, with it all, he looked
the quiet, unassuming little chap he al
ways was.
There was the usual crowd of men
around the station when the train
pulled up, and the usual number of
them were drunk and boisterous.
" I reckon I'll stay aboard an watch
tn game, said the freighter when he
saw the crowd.
stepped out to the car platform, a queer
picture, with the plug hat set jauntily
on one side of his head and his makeup
of frontiersman.
rHowdy, Luke, said Lafe' Towers,
the night marshal, who was in the
crowd at the station. Towers was the
only man there who knew Short, and
he didn't say anything about it.
The eyes of every man in that
crowd of nearly a hundred men were
on Luke Short as he calmly. stepped
from the train, and not man said a
word. There was something in SHORTS
serious countenance, in his determined
carriage, and probably in the incongru-
ity of the shiny silk hat in combination
with the blue flannel shirt and the
other strictly western effects in dress,
that seemed to hold them off. 1t would
have been quite in keeping with the
customs and practices of Dodge City
for the bunch of men at the station to
shoot that silk hat into ribbons as
Short deliberately walked down the
main street. without once turning
around, but this is just the thing that
didn't happen. 1t didn't happen at any
stage of the game, either; there wasn't
even a single shot fired. Short walked
into the 'Gilded Grub saloon, still with
that shiny hat set on one ear, strolled
up to the bar and asked for a drink
There were lot of bad men in the sa-
loon, but they just looked. They didn't
say anything about the hat, and they
didn't shoot. Short took his drink, and
then he removed his hat and held it in
his hands for a minute.
I don't seem to get any action on
this thing, he said out loud, and so it's
of no further use to me-
"Whereupon he placed it on the floor,
brim down and jumped on it until it
was pulp. Meanwhile the freighter
had followed him up, noticing that
there was no shooting, and he took
Short by the hand
'Podner' said he, yo' win, and yo'
kin TELEGRAPH th's man at La Junta t.
send the dust along to We. Vile 1 re-
speck yo' FIR bein' a man O. nerve, 1
KANT respeck yo' FIR bein' a d--n
fool, witch the same, begin y'r par
din, l thinks 70 is
Nobody ever made any lunges at
Luke Short while he was in Dodge, it's
needless to add"