only visible means of support, yet
Luther waxed fat and shiny and larded the earth when he walked abroad.
Neither had Red Hoss an indulgent and generous patron such as Judge
Priest's Jeff--Jeff Poindexter--boasted in the person of his master.
Neither was he gifted in the manipulation of the freckled bones as the
late Smooth Crumbaugh had been; nor yet possessed he the skill of shadow
boxing as that semiprofessional pugilist, Con Lake, possessed it. Con
could lick any shadow that ever lived, and the punching bag that could
stand up before his onslaughts was not manufactured yet; wherefore he
figured in exhibition bouts and boxing benefits, and between these lived
soft and easy. He enjoyed no such sinecure as fell to the lot of Uncle
Zack Matthews, who waited on the white gentlemen's poker game at the
Richland House, thereby harvesting many tips and whose otherwise nimble
mind became a perfect blank twice a year when he was summoned before the
grand jury.

Red Hoss did, indeed, have a sister, but the relations between them were
strained since the day when Red Hoss' funeral obsequies had been
inopportunely interrupted by the sudden advent among the mourners of the
supposedly deceased, returning drippingly from the river which
presumably had engulfed him. His unexpected and embarrassing
reappearance had practically spoiled the service for his chief relative.
She never had forgiven Red Hoss for his failure to stay dead, and he
long since had ceased to look for free pone bread and poke chops in that
quarter.

So when he had need to eat, or when his wardrobe required replenishing,
he worked at odd jobs; but not oftener. Ordinarily speaking, his heart
was not in it at all. But at the time when this narrative begins his
heart was in it. One speaks figuratively here in order likewise to speak
literally. A romantic enterprise carried on by Red Hoss Shackleford
through a period of months promised now a delectable climax. As between
him and one Melissa Grider an engagement to join themselves together in
the bonds of matrimony had been arranged.

Before he fell under Melissa's spell Red Hoss had been regarded as one
of the confirmed bachelors of the Plunkett's Hill younger set. He had
never noticeably favored marriage and giving in marriage--especially
giving himself in marriage. It may have been--indeed the forked tongue
of gossip so had it--that the fervor of Red Hoss' courting, when once he
did turn suitor, had been influenced