The Wide World Magazine, Vol. 22, No. 130, January, 1909

THE WIDE WORLD MAGAZINE.

Vol. XXII. JANUARY, 1909. No. 130.

The Beulah County “War.”

BY H. M. VERNON.

One of the most striking characteristics of the Westerner is the high regard in which he holds womankind. Even in the roughest mining camps a woman is absolutely safe, and is treated with a consideration unknown in many more civilized centres. This remarkable story illustrates the Westerner’s innate chivalry in a very striking fashion. Sooner than drag the name of a young schoolmistress into a quarrel, a resident of Three Corners, Montana, allowed himself to be made an outlaw, and for weeks defied the population of a whole county to arrest him, even when a field gun was brought out to shell his fastness. How in his extremity the girl he had befriended came to his rescue and put an end to this extraordinary “war” is graphically told in the narrative.

In the extreme western part of the State of Montana, U.S.A., in the County of Beulah, lies a little town called Three Corners. At first only a junction on the Rio Grande Railway, from which point countless thousands of cattle were shipped to all parts of the world, Three Corners grew to be a flourishing place. The wooden shanties, gambling “joints,” and dance halls gave way to brick buildings, several banks, a school, and other signs of progress, as respectable settlers moved farther toward the Golden West. Of course, a part of the old town remained, and with it a few of the characters typical of a Western “cow town.” Among these was a tall, raw-boned man who had drifted West in the ‘eighties, settling at Three Corners and opening a gambling-house. His name was “Jim” Cutler. He was a man of very few words, but with one great failing--he would shoot first and argue afterwards. Yet this gambler, who was known and feared far and wide as a “gun-fighter,” was at heart the mildest of men, beloved by all the children in the town, to whom he gave coppers galore. Furthermore, Cutler would put up with all manner of insult from a man under the influence of liquor, or from “Tenderfeet” who did not know their danger. Cutler’s shooting propensities were directed solely toward avowed “bad men” or those who delighted in being known as bullies. In the course of his altercations with such characters this tall, raw-boned man--who could, and did, “pull his gun” like a streak of lightning--added to the population of the local cemetery with a score of six.

Among the new-comers to Three Corners during the rehabilitation of that town was a Hebrew named Moses Goldman. This man, a good-looking fellow of some twenty-eight years, hailed from New York. He opened a shop, and, with the business ability of his race, soon succeeded in making it the principal draper’s establishment of the place. Before long, however, reports began to circulate that the handsome young Hebrew was not quite so respectful in demeanour towards his lady customers as he should have been, and, although highly popular with a certain element, the major portion of Three Corners’ female population gave Goldman’s shop a wide berth.

One Monday morning Jim Cutler, who had been up all night looking after the “game” in his establishment, was just leaving the place when a young woman, whom he recognised as the schoolmistress, ran up to him and said: “Oh, Mr. Cutler, would you mind walking as far as the school-house with me?”

Cutler, somewhat astonished, did so, and was gratefully thanked for his trouble. After leaving her he walked slowly back to his rooms, wondering why he of all men should have been chosen to escort the pretty “school ma’am.”

Some days afterwards Cutler, who passed the school on his way to and from the Gem Saloon (his place), saw the mistress deliberately cross the street just before reaching Goldman’s shop, and continue on her way on the other side. He also saw Goldman come to the door and try to attract the girl’s attention. When he reached Goldman, the latter; twirling his moustache, remarked, laughingly, “Shy girl, that, eh?” Cutler looked at the Hebrew for a moment, and then answered quietly, as he moved away, “She ain’t your kind.”

Three weeks after this little episode there was a ball at the City Hotel, and, naturally, almost the entire youth and beauty of Three Corners “turned out.” The City Hotel was just opposite Cutler’s saloon, and at about one o’clock the gambler was sitting in a chair outside his place, listening to the music, when the schoolmistress and her mother left the hotel on their way home. A moment later a man also quitted the building and followed them. Presently he stopped the two ladies and attempted to converse with them. The younger of the women apparently expostulated with him, and then the two went on, leaving him standing at the corner. Cutler recognised the solitary figure as that of Goldman, the draper, and drew his own conclusions. Next morning Cutler made it his business to leave the Gem Saloon just as the schoolmistress was passing, and strode up to her.

“Miss Thurloe,” he said, “you were stopped last night on your way home. Can I be of any assistance to you? I know you have only your mother to protect you.”

The girl gave him a grateful look, and explained that Goldman had repeatedly forced his attentions on her. She had done her best to send him about his business, but he continually annoyed her, even going so far as to enter the school-house, interrupting lessons and making himself generally obnoxious.

Cutler smiled grimly during the girl’s hesitating recital, saw her safely to her destination, and then went home for a sleep. At three o’clock that afternoon he walked leisurely towards the school-house, stopped at the fence just by the rear door, and chatted with the boys, it being the recess hour. Suddenly, approaching from the opposite direction, he beheld Goldman, who walked straight into the school-house without having seen the gambler. The latter waited for a few moments, then he also entered the building. Reaching the schoolroom, at the end of a short hall, he found the door locked, and promptly threw himself against it with all his strength. The door gave way with a crash and Cutler leapt in, to see the schoolmistress struggling in the arms of Goldman. She was fighting like a tigress, but the Jew’s hand, held tightly over her mouth, prevented her crying out. Directly Goldman beheld the saloon-keeper he released his prisoner, who sank back panting upon a chair, and glared savagely at the new-comer. Cutler, ignoring him entirely, walked slowly toward the agitated schoolmistress and stood still, waiting for her to speak.

Goldman, however, was the first to do so. “Oh, no wonder I’ve no chance,” he burst out, viciously; “Cutler’s as lucky in love as he usually is at cards.”

Cutler flushed at the gibe, but he said not a word, waiting for the girl to speak. Presently, having in a measure recovered herself, she rose and approached the gambler. “Mr. Cutler,” she said, unsteadily, “this man has insulted me repeatedly. Just now he tried to kiss me by force, and I’m afraid I shall have to give up my position here and leave Three Corners.”

In a very gentle voice Cutler asked the girl to leave the room for a few minutes. After she had gone he turned toward Goldman, who stood looking at him defiantly, his arms folded across his chest.

“If you were a man,” he said, sternly, “I’d drop you where you stand, but I’m going to teach you a lesson that’ll do you a heap of good.” Then, with a sudden bound, he grasped Goldman by the throat, threw him across a desk, and, with a three-foot ruler, administered a thrashing such as might be given to a recalcitrant schoolboy, only with somewhat greater severity. The punishment over, Cutler picked the man up and, dragging him across the floor, threw him bodily out of the building. Now Goldman was himself a powerful man, but Cutler’s action had been so swift and decisive that the Hebrew had practically no chance to offer resistance. Once freed from the gambler’s hold, however, he turned and flew at his adversary with clenched fists, snarling furiously. Cutler stood quite still, and just as the Hebrew came within the proper distance his right fist shot out straight from the shoulder. It landed square on Goldman’s jaw, and he dropped like a log.

Several of the school-children, attracted by the noise, now crowded round, vastly excited. Cutler, having informed Miss Thurloe that he believed she would not be further annoyed, but that he would keep an eye on “that fool masher,” walked slowly toward the town, leaving the vanquished draper lying where he had fallen.

It has been necessary to explain all this in order that readers of THE WIDE WORLD MAGAZINE unfamiliar with the ways of the Far West may better understand what follows. I have said that the better element had in a manner of speaking driven the original settlers at Three Corners to new fields. These new-comers looked upon Cutler as an “undesirable.” His reputation as a “man-killer” did not appeal to the emigrants from the cultured Eastern States, who would gladly have seen him pack up and leave the town. Goldman was quite aware of this, so, directly he recovered himself, he asked for and obtained a warrant for Cutler’s arrest on a charge of assault. The gambler was arraigned before the local magistrate, where he steadfastly refused to give any reason for the chastisement he had inflicted upon Goldman. The latter immediately realized the advantage of Cutler’s chivalrous reluctance to drag a woman’s name into the affair, and so swore that the assault was entirely unprovoked and committed out of “pure devilry” on Cutler’s part. Cutler was fined fifty dollars and severely admonished by the Court. Everyone wondered why this acknowledged “bad man” did not promptly wreak vengeance on the Hebrew. The gambler, however, desiring to protect the name of the school-teacher, said not a word, but paid the fine and went about his business as though nothing had happened.

Some ten days passed, when, one moonlight evening, Cutler came driving down the road leading into Three Corners, behind a fast-trotting horse. Just as he reached the end of a long field of corn a report rang out and his horse dropped, riddled with shot. Cutler jumped from his buggy, whipped out his revolver, and made for the corn-field, from which the shot had evidently come. He made a thorough search, but the tall corn-stalks afforded a secure hiding-place to the would-be assassin--for Cutler had no doubt whatever that the shot had been meant for him. Reluctantly giving up his quest, he walked back to his saloon and sent several men to remove the dead horse and bring in his buggy. The next morning he again made his way to the corn-field, and there, just by the fence, he found five discarded cigarette ends of a very expensive Egyptian brand which he knew to be smoked by only one man in Three Corners--Goldman, the draper. Evidently the man had lain in wait for a long time. Cutler next climbed over the fence, and was about to return when he saw lying in the path a piece of cloth torn from a jacket, and on it a button. It looked as though the would-be murderer, in jumping the fence, had caught his coat on the barbed wire; at any rate, he had left a damning piece of evidence behind him. With the cigarette ends and the fragment of cloth in his pocket, Cutler walked leisurely up the road into the town and made direct for the shop of Moses Goldman.