The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-08-29
CIRCUS MAN GETS REVENGE
STARTS 4 "HEY, RUBE' IN
 THE TOWN

Who Had Done Him tP TWO Months Before-Tae Tent Mans Story. i've been tangled up in good many Hey, Rube' fights in the West and Southwest, and we got myself pretty badly cIawed apart in some of them, at that" said Yonkers man who used to be a boss tentman with circus, ''but the worst fifteen-minute Hey, Rube' scrimmage thath ever fell under my eye happened in Mexico. The scrap gave me a pretty exact line on the fighting ability of white men in con- tests with mutts, mongreis, half-breeds or whatever you want to call 'em. The battle was started to satiate the venge- ful spirit of one man, and the tidy way with which he brought it off was sure a caution This man was in my gang. He joined the show up in the northern part of Starr county, Tex. He was new at the circus business, but he was worker. and he didn't want to do all the talking himself. His head was done up in bandages when he hitched onto the outfit, and I asked him who had been slugging him.
 ' "'Greasers,' he replied, shortly, and as a sort of hard, steely light crept into his eyes when he snapped out the word I didn't press him for details.
 we had a kind of a half-baked Hey, Rube,' fight down in the middle of Starr county-we were working toward the border-and l noticed that the new man didn't take any part in 1t. I took occasion to call him down for holding out on us.
 "sYou've got to do your bit in these rnix-ups,' told him. When you hear the Hey, Rube hoot it's part of your job to grab the heaviest thing you can swing and rap the first juniper that doesn't belong to the show with it. Hey, Rube means all hands around, and every man that draws wages from the show is expected to give club swinging exhibition when that yell goes up'
 "Im saving myself for a game that's coming later on,' the man told me, with another of those flinty glares stealing into his eyes. The shows go- ing to Camargo, Mexico, isn't it?'
 q told him that Camargo, Mexico, was on the date book-that it was prob ably the last town the show would ap- pear in before going into winter quar- ters.
 "That's what understood when I joined the show, and that's why took the job said the man quietly. You just let me out of whatever scraps comes off between here and Camargo When I get there I'll do what can to keep my end up.'
 Ut struck me then that this chap { had probably been in Camargo, Mexico, before, and that he'd got the worst of it there. But I didn't say what thought to him. He wasn't talkative chap, anyhow.
 When the show struck Rio Grande CitY-which Is directly across the Rio Grande, on this side, from Camargo Mexico-my still-tongued tentman came to me, while the night perform ance wos on and said:
 ..I told you awhile back that I wasn't bunting for any trouble until the show reached Camargo. The show crosses over to Camargo tonight. To- morrow I'll be looking for trouble, and a whole lot of it. Just thought I'd tell you
 ' T4oking for it, eh?" said l. Well you don't want to get the show into any unnecessary mix-up. The Hey Rube yelp don't go unless the Greasers in side the tent start the fracas You can dig up all the trouble you want on ypur own hook, but don't get the show mixed up with the Mexican authorities, that's all.'
 "Then the man opened up and told me why he had it in for Camargo.
 GA Greaser tried to pink me with a knife in the back 8 couple of months ago, over in Camargo,' he said Don't know why. had never seen the gopher before. I was too speedy for him, and planted a ball in his shoulder. Then < about hundred of his pals hopped me, and they came near kicking me in- side out. That's what ailed my head when I joined the show. When they got through with me the half-Injin con- stables got hold of me and chained me to the floor of a dirty dungeon. I was there two weeks on bread and water, and not much of that, when I got the steel out of one of my boots and sawed myself loose. I broke out of the dun- geon and swan the Rio Grande to get on American soil. While was chained one of the guards made it his business to come into my dungeon every, day and punch my head. Oh, I'm going to have some trouble over in Camargo to- morrow, all right. Just thought I'd tell you
 Now, 1t was my business as one, of the responsible workingnnen of the out fit to peach on this fellow and have him fired before the show crossed to Camargo. But I didn't. A lot of old pals of mine in the circus business had often told me how they had got the worst of it on many occasions at the hands of the Mexicans, and as I had along with me in my gang about the toughest bunch of fifty and odd rough and-tumblers that ever hit up dirt road, and as, besides, I felt that this tentman had pretty good grievance, just chewed a straw and walked away when he handed me this talk about the way the Greasers had put it on him. But I knew there would be something doing when the tent was full across x the way, all the same.
 "A huge crowd of half-breed Greas- CTS turned out for the show in Camargo There was but one perform ance the night one and the rancheros