第58章

I said to myself; 'and of all your crimes against sense it does look like this idea of celebrating the Fourth should receive the award of demerit.Your business is busted up, your thousand dollars is gone into the kitty of this corrupt country on that last bluff you made, you've got just fifteen Chili dollars left, worth forty-six cents each at bedtime last night and steadily going down.To-day you'll blow in your last cent hurrahing for that flag, and to-morrow you'll be living on bananas from the stalk and screwing your drinks out of your friends.What's the flag done for you? While you were under it you worked for what you got.You wore your finger nails down skinning suckers, and salting mines, and driving bears and alligators off your town lot additions.How much does patriotism count for on deposit with the little man with the green eye-shade in the savings-bank adds up your book? Suppose you were to get pinched over here in this irreligious country for some little crime or other, and appealed to your country for protection--what would it do for you? Turn your appeal over to a committee of one railroad man, an army officer, a member of each labour union, and a coloured man to investigate whether any of your ancestors were ever related to a cousin of Mark Hanna, and then file the papers in the Smithsonian Institution until after the next election.That's the kind of a sidetrack the Stars and Stripes would switch you onto.'

"You can see that I was feeling like an indigo plant; but after I washed my face in some cool water, and got out my navys and ammunition, and started up to the Saloon of the Immaculate Saints where we were to meet, I felt better.And when I saw those other American boys come swaggering into the trysting place--cool, easy, conspicuous fellows, ready to risk any kind of a one-card draw, or to fight grizzlies, fire, or extradition, I began to feel glad I was one of 'em.So, I says to myself again: 'Billy, you've got fifteen dollars and a country left this morning--blow in the dollars and blow up the town as an American gentleman should on Independence Day.'

"It is my recollection that we began the day along conventional lines.

The six of us--for Sterrett was along--made progress among the cantinas, divesting the bars as we went of all strong drink bearing American labels.We kept informing the atmosphere as to the glory and preeminence of the United States and its ability to subdue, outjump, and eradicate the other nations of the earth.And, as the findings of American labels grew more plentiful, we became more contaminated with patriotism.Maximilian Jones hopes that our late foe, Mr.Sterrett, will not take offense at our enthusiasm.He sets down his bottle and shakes Sterrett's hand.'As white man to white man,' says he, 'denude our uproar of the slightest taint of personality.Excuse us for Bunker Hill, Patrick Henry, and Waldorf Astor, and such grievances as might lie between us as nations.'

"'Fellow hoodlums,' says Sterrett, 'on behalf of the Queen I ask you to cheese it.It is an honour to be a guest at disturbing the peace under the American flag.Let us chant the passionate strains of "Yankee Doodle" while the senor behind the bar mitigates the occasion with another round of cochineal and aqua fortis.'

"Old Man Billfinger, being charged with a kind of rhetoric, makes speeches every time we stop.We explained to such citizens as we happened to step on that we were celebrating the dawn of our own private brand of liberty, and to please enter such inhumanities as we might commit on the list of unavoidable casualties.

"About eleven o'clock our bulletins read: 'A considerable rise in temperature, accompanied by thirst and other alarming symptoms.' We hooked arms and stretched our line across the narrow streets, all of us armed with Winchesters and navys for purposes of noise and without malice.We stopped on a street corner and fired a dozen or so rounds, and began a serial assortment of United States whoops and yells, probably the first ever heard in that town.

"When we made that noise things began to liven up.We heard a pattering up a side street, and here came General Mary Esperanza Dingo on a white horse with a couple of hundred brown boys following him in red undershirts and bare feet, dragging guns ten feet long.Jones and me had forgot all about General Mary and his promise to help us celebrate.We fired another salute and gave another yell, while the General shook hands with us and waved his sword.

"'Oh, General,' shouts Jones, 'this is great.This will be a real pleasure to the eagle.Get down and have a drink.'

"'Drink?' says the general.'No.There is no time to drink./Vive la Libertad/!'

"'Don't forget /E Pluribus Unum/!' says Henry Barnes.

"'/Viva/ it good and strong,' says I.'Likewise, /viva/ George Washington.God save the Union, and,' I says, bowing to Sterrett, 'don't discard the Queen.'

"'Thanks,' says Sterrett.'The next round's mine.All in to the bar.

Army, too.'

"But we were deprived of Sterrett's treat by a lot of gunshots several square sway, which General Dingo seemed to think he ought to look after.He spurred his old white plug up that way, and the soldiers scuttled along after him.

"'Mary is a real tropical bird,' says Jones.'He's turned out the infantry to help us to honour to the Fourth.We'll get that cannon he spoke of after a while and fire some window-breakers with it.But just now I want some of that barbecued beef.Let us on to the plaza.'

"There we found the meat gloriously done, and Jerry waiting, anxious.

We sat around on the grass, and got hunks of it on our tin plates.