Tramps of the range

The first faint flush of dawn was creeping over the Mission River hills, as the Overland train drew to a stop at the little town of Moon Flats. It was only a moment’s pause, but in that length of time a man had dropped off the rods of the baggage-car, crept between the trucks and walked slowly down the main street.

The town was deserted at this time in the morning, and the man seemed to study the dimly outlined, false-fronted buildings as if he had been there before.

Moon Flats was a cow town--nothing more nor less. It was a shipping-point for the Mission River ranges, which also made it an outfitting point. Like the majority of the old cow towns it had one street, narrow wooden sidewalks, the tops of which were never securely nailed down, long hitch-racks and a pavement of deep, yellow dust in the Summer and a quagmire of mud and slush in the Winter.

As the light grew stronger it illuminated the faded and battered signs of the Moon Flats Gambling House, Buck Franey’s Place, Bill Eagle’s General Merchandise, Jakie Dick’s Élite Café and Restaurant, Trail End Gambling House, Mission River Stage-Office and General Post-Office.

The stronger light also illuminated the features of the man who studied them--a young face, although deeply lined and with a slight pallor, as if from sickness.

His eyes were dark, and his black hair showed slightly silvered at the temple, as if lightly brushed with a white powder. His nose was slightly hooked, and his lips seemed molded into a thin line above a strong chin.

He was slightly above the average in height, but just a trifle stooped. His garb was nondescript, dirty and greasy from travel. As he studied the signs a half-smile passed across his face and he sat down on the sidewalk in front of the Moon Flats Gambling House. By turning a pocket inside out, he managed to collect enough tobacco to roll a thin cigaret, which burned with the unmistakable odor of lint, but the man did not seem to mind.

Across the street, in the two-story, ramshackle Cattlemen’s Hotel, an alarm-clock started its tin-panny whirr, and in a moment a man’s voice was raised in sleepy profanity. The man on the sidewalk smiled.

There was silence for a few minutes, and again the clock shattered the silence. A moment later the cheap curtains were flung aside, an arm described an outward arc and the faithful despoiler of slumber splintered on the sidewalk.

This time the man on the sidewalk laughed softly. It was all so human--and he was unused to human things. And as if the splintering of the clock was a signal, Moon Flats began to wake up. From behind the Élite Café came the sounds of some one splitting kindling, and over at the livery stable the sliding doors creaked as the stable man came out and looked around. Doors slammed in the hotel.

A sleepy-eyed, uncombed cowboy came around a corner from a corral, leading two horses which he watered at the livery stable watering trough. He paid no attention to the man on the sidewalk as he went past, but on his return trip he stared hard and rubbed his ear with a rope end, as if wondering or thinking. The man on the sidewalk spat dryly.

The door behind him opened and a man came out, carrying two wooden buckets, while another lounged in the doorway, holding a broom in both hands. They were swampers, getting ready to clean out the place. The man with the buckets crossed to the pump beside the stable, where he filled the buckets, accompanied by much creaking protest from the old pump.