Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-12-15

tended to 90 about the business of preserv-
ing law and order during the daylight hours
IN tombstone without taking any chances
on being bunked in a lonesome 'dobe amid
the depressing aroma OF drugs lotions,
ointments and unguents.
II was about a fortnight after O'Rourke
had been tucked away as Nick Bankstreets
NO. i In his new official capacity when
Jim pullman, a long-haul freighter from
the Cochise country and a middling danger
Gus mule quirter when he got good, hefty
cargo of the cochineal fluid slowed beneath
his surcingle, Hoped into Tombstone from
Tucson with a leftover.
Taking up good position on a little
sand mound at the head of the street. Jim
notified all hands within sound of his voice
that from that moment he had assumed
the reins OF government IN Tombstone and
the environs thereof and adjacent thereto.
To sort of emphasize his observations Jim
planted ball between the eyes of an I'M
fortunate little overworked burro that was
coming. btrdened, up the road. 1t was a
sixty-yard shot. and 1t showed that Bull
mans prolonged Jamboree hadn't filmed
his shooting eye any. The burro jumped
clear of the ground with all four feet. came
down on its side and passed II up without
@ kick.
Then Jim descended from his mound and
strolled to Juan Salazar's rum shack, where
headquarters as the plenty heap chief of
the camp of Tombstone. Jim clomped
around the half-breed Juan's plant for an
hour or so. intfmidating men who didn't
Sdic W ~ up dSalflSt MS StruNB gun game
and proclaiming that along toward noon he
allowed that he'd lunch on some marshal
meat. He calc'lated that after he'd bitten
an arm or two off'n the red-headed. ham,
mered-down coyote that thought he was
keepin' cases on the camp he wouldn't be
hungry no more till evenin'.
Jim was still delivering himself OF this
sort OF persifiage-and the man really was
almost as bad and dangerous as he pre-
tended to be-when he suddenly broke of.
His attention. and the attention of every
body in the place, was attracted by sound
that had never before. up to that time. been
heard In Tombstone. 1t was the music of
hand organ, and the hand organ was
being played right in front of Juan Salaz-
ar's place.
Jim BuIlman was the first man to reach
the swinging green shutters to get a look
at the hand organ and the player of the
same. He had just got outside the green
Leaves Begin to Fall suddenly ceased
right In the middle of the tune.
Drew a Bead on the Bad Man.
The player OF the hand organ was leaning
on the hurdy-gurdy to balance 1t on Its
supporting stick. and he had q straight
bead with both guns on the upper works
Of Bullman's massive frame.
You can call heaven t witness with both
O. them tamale hooks o. your'n. JIM" OBJ
served the day marshal, who had been
providing the music that sounded so strange
In the ears of the Tombstoners. I'm a
few of alcalde in this yere camp myself
twixt sun-up and shutdown, am
Bankstreet didn't finish that because
Bullman, with the unwisdom of a man who
has much dead alcohol floating about in his
nerve cells. instead of poking his hands up.
as he had been directed to, weEt after
both Of his guns-Jm was overproud OF his
quickness on the draw.
Bankstreet broke both OF Jim's forearms
as pullman was in the act of getting his
n IA xn fsayv NJ
Juan's green shutters, and four Of the
boys toted Jim down the street to the
office of the young man with the probe.
After this things moved along in a pretty
easy groove for Day Marshal Nick Bank
street until one day Sam Farrand, the fore
man of a bunch of claims to the south Of
the camp. got letter from one of his east
ern wives that touched him on the raw.
Sam jumped the reservation over the re-
cept of that letter. and Sam was a sure
enough helfon when he got real busy with
the dreanings of the coils. Two hours after
he'd romped in from the claims and
swooped upon Tombstone Sam was jumping
on his hat in the middle of the street. with
both guns out, and yelling that the flock OF
timber wolves that had the nerve to tackle
him would have to have their claws ground
to a razor edge with alligator files, and
that even then he would tear their teeth
out of their jaws with his naked fingers.
Then Sam constituted himself a sort of
battery Of light artillery parked at the
head Of the street. for he took up his po-
sftfon on the sand mound from which Jim
pullman had proclaimed himself the heap
Moqui and swept the thoroughfare with
both Of his guns every time he saw a care
less or unsuspecting man emerge from a
GROCERY
Sam had kept the street deserted for
about half an hour from his coign of van
tage on the mound, and he was informing
the baking breeze that was blowing that he,
that preferred to lap strongly impregnated
alkali water to slipping the cool. sweet
product of the freshest spring. when a pair
OF knobbed and freckled hands. holding a
couple of steel-blue guns and a cowlicky
red head. all belonging to a man lying
close to the edge Of the roof of the Morning
Moon hankatonk-Nick Bankstreet had got
into the place from the rear and climbed
to the roof-were seen by some of the
c ting In barber shop across
the street. The Tombstoners in the barber
shop were waiting for Sam to go away
from there before venturing out into the
street.
Called Softly to the Terror.
Bankstreets position, lying fiat there on
the roof and overlooking Sans mound. was
a pretty neat one.
"Oh, Sam" Bankstreet called down soft
ly to the painting Farrand.
Sam looked up with an expression of
justification in the direction whence he
had heard the voice. and, shading his eyes
with his hand, he saw the day marshars
hands and head.
Sam. shore don't want T. shatter you
up none" observed the day marshal in a
kindly tone. but what want t know is.
air you a-gon' Z be good now?"
For reply Mr.. Farrand announced that
he was a double-fanged sand moccasin and
that the pizen was bilin' in him, at TIL
same time snatching for his weapons
Bankstreet let Sam down easy. He mere-
y knocked him over with a couple of fiesf
wounds in both of his thighs, and then no
sprang to the ground, pretty good jump.
and when he reached Farrand. Sam was
sitting on the mound feeling of his thighs.
with his guns lying alongside OF him. He
helped to pack Sam TO the sawbones Office,
and Sam vas up and around a week or so
later
From that time on nothing In Tombstone
was too good for Nick Bankstreet, the day
He ran the camp by day for
two years. and when he handed In his
badge at the end of that time he had
record such as no marshal of a bad camp
ever achieved in the southwest. He had
served for two years as the daylight peace
oreserver of the worst camp, In Its day, In
The United States. and he had never once
been stuck up at the point of gun. Nor
had he killed a man. though he had been