In every frontier settlement there are men who have come there to escape
restraint. Cutter was one of the `fast set' of Black Hawk business men.
He was an inveterate gambler, though a poor loser. When we saw a light
burning in his office late at night, we knew that a game of poker was going
on. Cutter boasted that he never drank anything stronger than sherry, and
he said he got his start in life by saving the money that other young men
spent for cigars. He was full of moral maxims for boys. When he came to
our house on business, he quoted `Poor Richard's Almanack' to me, and told
me he was delighted to find a town boy who could milk a cow. He was
particularly affable to grandmother, and whenever they met he would begin
at once to talk about `the good old times' and simple living. I detested
his pink, bald head, and his yellow whiskers, always soft and glistening.
It was said he brushed them every night, as a woman does her hair. His
white teeth looked factory-made. His skin was red and rough, as if from
perpetual sunburn; he often went away to hot springs to take mud baths. He
was notoriously dissolute with women. Two Swedish girls who had lived in
his house were the worse for the experience. One of them he had taken to
Omaha and established in the business for which he had fitted her.
Pages:
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214