Freddy the Cowboy (18 page)

Mr. Flint had herded the shoppers and Mr. Metacarpus and most of the salespeople into a corner at the point of his gun, and was making a systematic search. Freddy knew that he would certainly be caught. He thought: “If I only had time to put on one of those dresses and pretend to be a salesgirl! Maybe I could sell Mr. Flint a bottle of perfumery.” But there was no time for such thoughts. He had to do something. His gun, loaded with blanks, was worse than useless. Even his water pistol was empty. Yet a good squirt of water at the right moment might give him a chance to run. But there wasn't any water.

Then he saw the big bottle of perfume just above him on the counter. He took it down and uncorked it. It was a heavy, sweet perfume; a very little bit of it might have been all right, but a lot of it together was pretty sickening. Freddy sniffed, said: “Whew! Gosh!” and started to put it back. Then he changed his mind. He filled the water pistol full.

Mr. Flint was searching the floor, counter by counter. Mr. Metacarpus stood back wringing his hands and puffing unhappily through his moustache. Behind him, twenty or more women looked on fearfully as the rancher threw down racks of dresses, poked under shelves and counters, and called on Freddy to come out and fight like a man.

It was taking Mr. Flint some time. Freddy found some hairpins and hurriedly pinned up the long black hair into a knot on top of his head. He yanked off the rat-tail moustache and rouged his cheeks, and made an enormous Cupid's bow mouth for himself with lipstick, and even put on some eye shadow, making his little pig's eyes look much larger. He had to work in the dark back of the counter, and he used whichever lipstick and rouge came first to hand, but when he looked at himself in one of the little compact mirrors he almost fainted. “Oh, my gracious!” he said. “If Mr. Bean saw me now he'd throw me off the farm!” He didn't really look much like a salesgirl. But he certainly didn't look like a pig.

However, it was his only chance. He found a scarf under the counter and put it over his shoulders, covering up the cowboy shirt. And then, as Mr. Flint turned into Aisle F, he stood up behind the counter, and with an inviting smile on his big lipsticked mouth—and one of the women said afterwards that he looked like a cannibal chief inviting a missionary to step into the stewpot—he said: “Could I interest you in our newest French perfume, sir? The latest thing from Paris.” He pushed the bottle forward.

Mr. Flint checked and swung round to face the pig. And then he jumped back with a sort of yelp, for Freddy was certainly the most terrible looking salesgirl that had ever appeared behind a counter.

But Freddy pulled out the water pistol and leaned forward. “May I put just a dab on your pocket handkerchief, sir? I'm sure you'll find it refreshing.” And he squirted the entire contents of the pistol into the man's face.

He squirted the entire contents of the pistol into the man's face.

Mr. Flint yelped again—with pain this time, for the perfume had gone into his eyes. He dropped his pistols and sputtered and danced about, pawing at his face, which was streaming with perfumery. Freddy jumped the counter, snatched up the guns, and then waited, holding them on Flint, till the man had cleared his eyes so he could see.

“Turn your back to me, Flint,” he commanded. “Yes, it's me—Freddy. Stick up your hands and turn your back.” And when Mr. Flint had done so, he quickly refilled the water pistol and deliberately squirted it onto the rancher's clothing. Then he refilled it once more, tucked it into his holster, picked up the gun he had laid down, and made his captive walk over to the elevator.

The crowd of onlookers shrank back at the sight of the big Colt revolvers, and several of them grew quite faint—though Freddy thought it was as much at the smell of the perfume as any idea of danger. Of course he hadn't really got a good look at himself in a mirror, or he would have known better what had terrorized them. As he passed Mr. Metacarpus, he said: “You can charge that bottle of perfumery to me, Frederick Bean, Mr. Metacarpus. I guess you know me.”

Mr. Metacarpus bowed and puffed his moustache.

Freddy herded his prisoner down in the elevator and out between rows of gasping and sniffing shoppers, to the street. There, before he told Mr. Flint to get on his horse, he took his rope and tossed a loop over the man's shoulders, pulled it tight, and hitched the free end around his saddle horn. Flint's pony was faster than Cy; he had no intention of letting the rancher escape until he had finished with him.

About an hour later, just as the dudes were coming out from dinner, Freddy and Mr. Flint rode up to the ranch house. Freddy fired a shot in the air, and immediately they were surrounded. He kept one gun on the raging Flint, and with the other covered Jasper and Slim, who looked as if they might be going to attempt a rescue.

“You two boys,” he said—“don't start anything. I'm not going to hurt your boss—just going to make a little speech and let him go. And while I'm not much of a shot, these bullets make you kind of jump if they do hit you.

“Now, ladies and gentlemen,” he went on, “Mr. Flint, here, is awful mad at me, and he claimed he was going to shoot me on sight. I admit I was scared. I'm not any hero. Besides, I haven't got anything but a water pistol and a gun with blanks in it.”

“But you shot those cans the other night,” said one of the dudes.

“I didn't hit the cans,” Freddy said. “It was just a trick. I'll show you some time how it was done.”

“What's the matter with you, Jasper?” Mr. Flint called angrily. “You and Slim want to get fired? Are you going to stand there and let this fat monkey make a fool of me?”

“Looks like that was done before you rode up here, boss,” Jasper drawled. “Or maybe I ought to say it
smells
like it. You been to a beauty parlor or somethin'?”

“Yes, what
is
that awful smell?” said Mrs. Balloway. She stepped forward, sniffing. “Why I do believe—why, it's Mr. Flint!”

Some of the dudes began to giggle, but Freddy said: “Please! Let me finish. Well, Mr. Flint threatened me and I ran away and hid. I guess you know most of the story. I don't like Mr. Flint. I had to buy this pony from him because he would have beaten it to death if I hadn't. He tried to rob our bank, but my friends drove him off. There's a lot of other things, too, but I won't go into them. It came down to a straight fight between him and me—him with these two guns I'm holding on him, and me with a revolver loaded with blanks, and a water pistol. Well, he caught up with me today. And all I want to say is: I got the drop on him. I shot him with my water pistol before he could draw and shoot. And now, my friends, I'm going to shoot him again, just for good measure.” He tucked one gun in his belt, drew the water pistol, and squirted its contents over both Flint and his pony.

For a minute there was silence, as the rank sweet reek of the perfume filled the hot noon air. Then Jasper began to laugh. It was like touching off a pack of firecrackers; the laugh spread; there were at first a few isolated giggles and hoots, and then the whole crowd was roaring. They yelled and shouted, pounded one another on the backs, and gasped and got red in the face and still went on laughing until they had to lie down on the ground. Through it all Freddy and Mr. Flint sat on their horses without moving.

At last when the crowd was too weak to make any more noise, Freddy said: “O.K., Flint; you can get down.”

So Mr. Flint dismounted and started into the ranch house. But Jasper said: “Hey, keep out of the house. These folks don't want to have it all smelled up so they can't live in it.”

“You're fired,” said Mr. Flint.

“I fired myself ten minutes ago,” said the cowboy. “A boss that goes out with two six-guns and gets shot up with a water pistol ain't any boss I can work for. Even if he comes back smellin' sweeter'n a greenhouse full of posies.”

“Me too,” said Slim. “You shore are the sweetest smellin' buckaroo ever decorated this ranch. Folks ought to put you in a vase and set you on the piano.”

Flint glared at them a moment. “O.K.,” he said at last; “you're fired yourselves. But come over here a minute.”

So they went over close to him and held their noses while he whispered to them for a time. At first they looked doubtful, but then they began nodding their heads, and pretty soon Mr. Flint walked over to one of the buildings where he would be out of sight and out of smelling range of the dudes. And Slim went into the house.

Jasper spoke to the crowd. “Folks,” he said, “Cal's quit. We was his partners in the ranch, but he was the boss. But now he's quit and we're running the place. Slim's packin' his stuff for him, and when he rides out of here he won't come back.”

And that was the way it worked out. Mr. Flint had the sense to realize that if he stayed on, the dudes would giggle and laugh at him every time they saw him. He couldn't face their ridicule; he had not only made a fool of himself, he had made a perfumed fool of himself.

And indeed his troubles pursued him as he rode on west. For the perfume wouldn't come off, no matter how much he scrubbed, and sent his clothes to the dry cleaner's. Clerks in hotels where he engaged a room for the night sniffed disgustedly, and people in restaurants got up and moved away from him. There were even pieces in the local papers of towns he stopped in—all about the mysterious Perfumed Cowboy. But he never came back to the ranch.

Freddy rode back home, and that night there was a big party in the cow barn in his honor. There were refreshments, and speeches—one by Charles lasted an hour and a half—and there was dancing, and the singing of some of the cowboy songs Freddy had written. The Horrible Ten put on a splendid floor show, which a visiting spaniel, who had traveled a good deal, said was the equal of anything he had seen in New York.

Freddy made a speech, too. He tried to be modest, but it is hard to be modest when you are the hero of the occasion, and I guess he did pat himself on the back quite a lot. But one thing he said was pretty good. Mac, the wildcat, wanted to know why he hadn't just shot Mr. Flint and got it over quick.

Freddy said: “There are two ways of getting rid of people: one way is by shooting them; the other way is by making them look ridiculous. I didn't want to shoot Mr. Flint, even though he wanted to shoot me. But squirting that perfume over him made everybody laugh at him, and he couldn't stand that. That was the easiest way to get rid of him.”

Of course, like most reasons people have for the things they do, I think Freddy made it up afterwards. At the time he wasn't thinking of making people laugh at Flint; he just wanted to stop the man from shooting him. But there is a lot of truth in what he said, just the same.

The party was at its height, and Mrs. Wiggins and Bill, the goat, were trying to do an apache dance together—it wasn't very good, but it was funny all right—when one of the Horrible Ten announced that he thought he heard the Beans driving into the barnyard.

“Good land of mercy!” said Mrs. Wiggins. “It's after eleven! Get to bed, animals. Lights out!” In one minute the barn was dark and silent.

Mr. Bean unhitched Hank and shook some hay down into his manger, and he was following Mrs. Bean into the house when he saw Freddy crossing the barnyard. The pig had been the last to leave.

“Here, you!” he called, and Freddy came across to him. “Oh, it's you,” he said. “Well, I expect you've been looking for us before this. Didn't expect to stay so long. But Aunt Effie, she has buckwheat cakes every morning. And you know how it is when the cakes and the butter and the syrup don't come out even. You go on eatin' till they do. Well, they didn't come out even till this mornin'. So then we got in the buggy and came home.” He paused. “Don't know why I'm explainin' this to you,” he said. “Everything been quiet at home, here?”

“Very quiet,” said Freddy.

“No trouble? Nothing exciting happen?”

“No, sir; very peaceful time we all had.”

“Good!” said Mr. Bean, and he whacked Freddy on the back and went on to the house.

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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 1950 by Walter R. Brooks

ISBN: 978-1-4976-9224-4

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