The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1902-01-24

many faster fiddle tunes than that.
"Alec rocked around in his seat quite
a lot while he played, but he didn't
make any breaks in his lingering or
bowling, and he tore off that tune
EASTERN a runaway Stag train going
down mountain side. Well, when
we saw the way the situation stood,
we began to sort o edge sidewise to-
ward the tent flap.
eve hadn't been asked to be made
umpires and none of us felt exactly
like pushing to the front and handing
down any decision as to the respective
virtuoso abilities of Biff and Alec. We
saw that Biff's eyes were blazing and
that his nigh hand was sort O. twid-
ding nervously in the direction Of
his gun. And so our tide just nat
urally set toward the tent flap.
"Alec set the fiddle and bow down
after he'd got through and grinned
quizzically and powerful irritatingly
at Biff. Biff had chagrined, evil
look on his map that ought to've
caused Alec to be careful, but Alec
was flushed with triumph and his
four days souse, and he kept right
on grinning in Biffs teeth.
"'Ombrey,' said Biff, Strengthening
himself up and glazing hard at his
partner, femme tell you somethin'
You're a ringer. You're -
"Now, it was at this very instant,
when the hands of both men were
noticed squat, heavy-set man, clad
in dark clothes, and with a fiat
topped derby pushed back from a
very bald head, standing in the en-
trance of the tent. 1 knew him right
away-had seen him in Denver the
week before.
1--WE of the bunch were just about
to execute our timely hike when Biff
and Alec were on the point of MAX
ing their gun play, when the little
man, who appeared to be quite aware
of what was in progress, walked jerk
lily up to where they stood confront
ing each other, and almost on the
pinpoint of plugging each other, and
he said, addressing them both, and
looking smilingly from one to the
other:
"I heard some blaying-nod? yes"
'Biff and Alec both turned and
gazed with open mouths at the queer
looking little man with the bald head.
Neither of them said a word, but
they just stared at him.
"'Oh, here is re veeoleen,' said the
squat man, picking up the instru-
ment from the bar and scrutinizing
it. Then he picked up the bow. Biff
and Alec continued to stare at him.
~' "'Vell, 1 blay for you,' said the lit
tie man, and he Struggled the violin
up under his chin like as if it was a
pet kitten, and he gave flourish with
the bow, and then he brought it down
for a crashing chord on all four
strings at once-and then Biff's and
Alec's guns went back into their belts
and they forgot about everything
else except the sounds that were COM
ing out of that catgut and, know
ing that the making of war medicine
was over for the time being, we all
gathered around the squat man.
'Did any of you ever hear Edouard
Remenyi, the Hungarian violinist,
play? Because that's who the squat
man was Remenyi. He had run down
from Denver to Cripple Creek to see
what a new American mining camp
was like, and prowling around, and
hearing Alec's scraping of The
DEVILS Dream he had just dropped
into the honkatonk on an impulse,
without any idea ofwhat was going on.
"WeI, Remenyi played all right.
He just nursed that old thing under
his fat neck like a boy cuddles a
guinea pig with broken leg, and he
hadn't been playing more than two
minutes before every man in the gang
looked as if he had sneaking sort
of feeling that he hadn't done right
with his life.
"Biff and Alec sided over to the
bar and leaned their backs against
it, side by side, and every time that
Hungarian squat man pulled out a
tremolo that was particularly meaty
and reproachful and full O. meaning,
they'd exchange kind O. entranced
smiles with each other and shake
their heads sadly at each other.
81 don't know what it was that
squat foreign man played. I never
will know. But [ know that what he
played made me feel like I'd been neg
lecting the folks back home, and when
l reached my shack [ sat down and
wrote 'em letters until daylight.
''When after ten minutes of straight
playing, he wound up with a lot of
low things way down on the G string
that sounded like brook gurgling
to itself in the night, and when he
took the violin from under his chin
with a sort of dreamy smile on his
pudgy face, there was an amount of
coughing from those fellows standing
around such as I never heard outside
of hotel for 'lungers.' And none
of the bunch seemed to want to look
at each other except, Biff and Alec.
"They looked at each other silently
and sheepishly for about two min
utes after Remenyi put down the vio-