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Updated: June 7, 2025
The sheriff hummed a tune as he cleaned his revolver. He was the law. Bill Watson, the sheriff of Ellisville, was a heavily built man, sandy-haired, red-mustached, and solid. His legs were bowed and his carriage awkward. He had thick, clumsy-looking fingers, whose appearance belied their deftness. Bill Watson had gone through the Quantrell raid in his time.
Upon the arm of this gentleman was a lady, also tall, thin, pale, with wide, dark eyes, which now opened with surprise that was more than half shock. Lastly, with head up and eyes also wide, like those of a stag which sees some new thing, there came a young woman, whose presence was such as had never yet been seen in the hotel at Ellisville.
At this moment Sam broke out with a loud exclamation. "Say!" he cried. "Yes, sir," said Buford. "I'll tell you what!" "Yes?" "Now, you listen to me. I'll tell you what! You see, this here place where we are now is just about a mile from the White Woman Sinks, and that is, as I was sayin', just about halfway between Ellisville and Plum Centre. Now, look here. This country's goin' to boom.
One by one, here and there, these new men selected their lands and made their first rude attempts at building for themselves the homes which they coveted and had come far to win. Ellisville lay at an eddy in the Plains, and gathered toll of the strange driftwood which was then afloat.
The transient population of Ellisville, the cattle sellers and cattle buyers and land seekers, outnumbered three to one the resident or permanent population, which catered to this floating trade, and which supplied its commercial or professional wants. The resident one third was the nucleus of the real Ellisville that was to be. The social compact was still in embryo. Life was very simple.
In the town of Ellisville the great heap of buffalo bones was gone from the side of the railroad track. There were many wagons now, but none brought in bones to pile up by the railway; for even the bones of the buffalo were now gone forever. Mother Daly looked out upon the Cottage corral one day, and saw it sound and strong. Again she looked, and the bars were gone.
The railroad company which founded Ellisville had within its board of directors a so-called "Land and Improvement Company," which latter company naturally had the first knowledge of the proposed locations of the different towns along the advancing line.
We've more than a thousand acres of land there, and plenty of cattle. Curly shall be foreman he's married the little waiter girl, and has come back to Ellisville; they live next door to Sam and Nora. Aunt Lucy shall be our cook. We shall have roses, and green grass, and flowers. And you and I you and I shall live and shall do that which has been sent to us to do. Mary Ellen dear Mary Ellen "
Tall as the older lady by her side, erect, supple, noble, evidently startled but not afraid, there was that about this girl which was new to Ellisville, which caused the eye of every man to fall upon her and the head of every woman to go up a degree the higher in scorn and disapprobation. This was a being of another world. There was some visitation here.
Sam, the stage driver, was crossing on his regular buckboard trip from Ellisville to Plum Centre, and was now nearly half-way on his journey. Obviously the courses of these two vehicles must intersect, and at the natural point of this intersection the driver of the faster pulled up and waited for the other.
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