Me, I'm for the old days when law
and order meant what they said. A law was a law, and a order was
a order."
"But----" I began.
"I was going on," continued Bud, "while this coffee is boiling,
to describe to you a case of genuine law and order that I knew of
once in the times when cases was decided in the chambers of a
six-shooter instead of a supreme court.
"You've heard of old Ben Kirkman, the cattle king? His ranch run
from the Nueces to the Rio Grande. In them days, as you know,
there was cattle barons and cattle kings. The difference was
this: when a cattleman went to San Antone and bought beer for the
newspaper reporters and only give them the number of cattle he
actually owned, they wrote him up for a baron. When he bought 'em
champagne wine and added in the amount of cattle he had stole,
they called him a king.
"Luke Summers was one of his range bosses. And down to the king's
ranch comes one day a bunch of these Oriental people from New
York or Kansas City or thereabouts. Luke was detailed with a
squad to ride about with 'em, and see that the rattlesnakes got
fair warning when they was coming, and drive the deer out of
their way.
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