Tennessee's Partner Page #2

"Tennessee's Partner" is a short story by Bret Harte, set in the American West during the Gold Rush era. It revolves around the complex friendship between a gold miner named Tennessee and his unnamed partner. The story explores themes of loyalty, betrayal, and morality as it delves into the tensions arising from Tennessee's impulsive nature and his partner's steadiness. When a crisis occurs involving a woman and an act of jealousy, the dynamics of their partnership are tested, leading to a poignant climax that highlights both the ruggedness and the humanity of frontier life. Harte's narrative is characterized by rich descriptions and sharp dialogue, encapsulating the spirit of the Old West while examining deeper moral questions.

• Short story

								

a grim pleasure in the responsibility he had created. "I don't take any
hand in this yer game," had been his invariable but good-humored reply
to all questions. The Judge--who was also his captor--for a moment
vaguely regretted that he had not shot him "on sight" that morning,
but presently dismissed this human weakness as unworthy of the judicial
mind. Nevertheless, when there was a tap at the door, and it was said
that Tennessee's Partner was there on behalf of the prisoner, he was
admitted at once without question. Perhaps the younger members of the
jury, to whom the proceedings were becoming irksomely thoughtful, hailed
him as a relief.

For he was not, certainly, an imposing figure. Short and stout, with a
square face sunburned into a preternatural redness, clad in a loose duck
"jumper" and trousers streaked and splashed with red soil, his aspect
under any circumstances would have been quaint, and was now even
ridiculous. As he stooped to deposit at his feet a heavy carpetbag he
was carrying, it became obvious, from partially developed legends and
inscriptions, that the material with which his trousers had been patched
had been originally intended for a less ambitious covering. Yet he
advanced with great gravity, and after having shaken the hand of each
person in the room with labored cordiality, he wiped his serious,
perplexed face on a red bandanna handkerchief, a shade lighter than his
complexion, laid his powerful hand upon the table to steady himself, and
thus addressed the Judge:

"I was passin' by," he began, by way of apology, "and I thought I'd
just step in and see how things was gittin' on with Tennessee thar--my
pardner. It's a hot night. I disremember any sich weather before on the
Bar."

He paused a moment, but nobody volunteering any other meteorological
recollection, he again had recourse to his pocket handkerchief, and for
some moments mopped his face diligently.

"Have you anything to say in behalf of the prisoner?" said the Judge,
finally.

"Thet's it," said Tennessee's Partner, in a tone of relief. "I come yar
as Tennessee's pardner--knowing him nigh on four year, off and on, wet
and dry, in luck and out o' luck. His ways ain't allers my ways, but
thar ain't any p'ints in that young man, thar ain't any liveliness
as he's been up to, as I don't know. And you sez to me, sez
you--confidential-like, and between man and man--sez you, 'Do you know
anything in his behalf?' and I sez to you, sez I--confidential-like, as
between man and man--'What should a man know of his pardner?'"

"Is this all you have to say?" asked the Judge impatiently, feeling,
perhaps, that a dangerous sympathy of humor was beginning to humanize
the Court.

"Thet's so," continued Tennessee's Partner. "It ain't for me to say
anything agin' him. And now, what's the case? Here's Tennessee wants
money, wants it bad, and doesn't like to ask it of his old pardner.
Well, what does Tennessee do? He lays for a stranger, and he fetches
that stranger. And you lays for HIM, and you fetches HIM; and the
honors is easy. And I put it to you, bein' a far-minded man, and to you,
gentlemen, all, as far-minded men, ef this isn't so."

"Prisoner," said the Judge, interrupting, "have you any questions to ask
this man?"

"No! no!" continued Tennessee's Partner, hastily. "I play this yer hand
alone. To come down to the bedrock, it's just this: Tennessee, thar, has
played it pretty rough and expensive-like on a stranger, and on this yer
camp. And now, what's the fair thing? Some would say more; some
would say less. Here's seventeen hundred dollars in coarse gold and a
watch--it's about all my pile--and call it square!" And before a hand
could be raised to prevent him, he had emptied the contents of the
carpetbag upon the table.

For a moment his life was in jeopardy. One or two men sprang to their
feet, several hands groped for hidden weapons, and a suggestion to
"throw him from the window" was only overridden by a gesture from the
Judge. Tennessee laughed. And apparently oblivious of the excitement,
Tennessee's Partner improved the opportunity to mop his face again with
his handkerchief.

When order was restored, and the man was made to understand, by the use
of forcible figures and rhetoric, that Tennessee's offense could not be
condoned by money, his face took a more serious and sanguinary hue,
and those who were nearest to him noticed that his rough hand trembled
slightly on the table. He hesitated a moment as he slowly returned the
gold to the carpetbag, as if he had not yet entirely caught the elevated
sense of justice which swayed the tribunal, and was perplexed with the
belief that he had not offered enough. Then he turned to the Judge, and
saying, "This yer is a lone hand, played alone, and without my pardner,"
he bowed to the jury and was about to withdraw when the Judge called him
back. "If you have anything to say to Tennessee, you had better say it
now." For the first time that evening the eyes of the prisoner and his
strange advocate met. Tennessee smiled, showed his white teeth, and,
saying, "Euchred, old man!" held out his hand. Tennessee's Partner took
it in his own, and saying, "I just dropped in as I was passin' to see
how things was gettin' on," let the hand passively fall, and adding that
it was a warm night, again mopped his face with his handkerchief, and
without another word withdrew.

The two men never again met each other alive. For the unparalleled
insult of a bribe offered to Judge Lynch--who, whether bigoted, weak,
or narrow, was at least incorruptible--firmly fixed in the mind of that
mythical personage any wavering determination of Tennessee's fate; and
at the break of day he was marched, closely guarded, to meet it at the
top of Marley's Hill.

How he met it, how cool he was, how he refused to say anything, how
perfect were the arrangements of the committee, were all duly reported,
with the addition of a warning moral and example to all future
evildoers, in the RED DOG CLARION, by its editor, who was present, and
to whose vigorous English I cheerfully refer the reader. But the beauty
of that midsummer morning, the blessed amity of earth and air and sky,
the awakened life of the free woods and hills, the joyous renewal and
promise of Nature, and above all, the infinite Serenity that thrilled
through each, was not reported, as not being a part of the social
lesson. And yet, when the weak and foolish deed was done, and a life,
with its possibilities and responsibilities, had passed out of the
misshapen thing that dangled between earth and sky, the birds sang, the
flowers bloomed, the sun shone, as cheerily as before; and possibly the
RED DOG CLARION was right.

Tennessee's Partner was not in the group that surrounded the ominous
tree. But as they turned to disperse attention was drawn to the singular
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