How Law and Order Came to Aramie

BIG John Oakes, called Big because bigness was a quality of his nature—and the lack of it, of his physique—was asleep, grotesquely doubled up on the antique couch of his living room, a vast depression in the center of which made any graceful disposition of one’s person on it impossible.

- James Thurber

He awoke when the outside door opened, with a swift, instinctive reach toward his hip; but his revolver was in the gun belt flung across the back of a chair at his side. The sheriff grinned as Slim Mason playfully covered him with his own six-shooter and drawled, “I reckon the drop’s on you, Sheriff.” He added, “Didn’t know you was partial to the festive siesty.”

“Been chasing all over Arizony for that pirate, Grady,” explained the sheriff. “And the seas on the desert sure plays tarnation with a man. My pasear didn’t ree-sult in the apprehension of Mr. Grady, I might remark... But what is the occasion for this unexpected and dee-lightful visit?”

The smile left Mason’s face. A look of concern shadowed it.

“Bud Tevis. He’s shootin’ up the Cameo again.” Mason’s drawl was gone. The sheriff was in the midst of an expansive yawn, arms outstretched. His lips closed and whitened tightly.

“Bud Tevis!” His tone was hard. “Again, eh?” Oakes stood up and reached for his gun belt. There was a pause as he slowly buckled it on, adjusting it with unnecessary care in an abstracted way.

“Hasn’t got nobody?”

“No. Rode up to the Cameo a-shootin’ carefree like, and I reckoned I’d saunter down this way and let you know, John.

“Sure seems like Bud is hankerin’ for you to take his irons away from him agin,” Mason added after a while. The sheriff was silent. Two lines at the corners of his mouth deepened.

“Tevis has just been sobered about long enough to get real riled over that,” he commented grimly. Mason pulled the brim of his sombrero thru his fingers reflectively.