An Act of Kindness
Death Valley Scotty
My favorite story I’ve heard about Death Valley Scotty is one he told to at a Women’s Club Luncheon in San Bernardino.
He hadn’t prepared anything to say, but that never stopped Scotty. Besides, he wanted the free lunch. After the lunch he was introduced to the audience of prim and proper ladies. The hostess, hearing of how Scotty’s stories could get a bit wild, decided to guide him to appropriate speaking material by asking;
“Of course being out in the wild and untamed desert, you’ve certainly had the opportunity to do works of courageousness and kindness. What is the greatest act of kindness you’ve ever preformed for anyone in need out there?”
Scotty stalled for a moment, and seemed at a loss. He got over it right away though and continued as follows:
“I prefer a mule to a horse for riding in the desert. The mules are stronger and smarter and do a bit better without water. For whatever reason though, I can’t recall right now, I was riding my horse that day. It was getting mighty hot and I decided to head up a canyon and see if there was some shade where I could rest the horse and eat some lunch.
Away up the canyon I could see one set of wheel tracks from a wagon. There was only one set of tracks, which meant whoever rode in hadn’t rode out yet. Sure enough a couple miles up there was a carriage with a couple of folks sitting in the shade underneath.
There they was, an old guy and his old wife sitting there in the shade crying away. They were so happy to see me and asked if I had some water. I got off my horse and gave my canteen. They gulped away as they were quite thirsty. I told them not to take it too fast as that was all the water I had and it was a long way to the next waterhole. They was crying they were so happy.
They told me they had come up this pretty canyon the day before for a picnic. They spred out a cloth on the ground and decided to let their horse off to wander and take a break while they had their lunch. The horse wandered off and they couldn’t find him. Then they both started crying and crying not knowing what to do. They’d stayed there all through the night and run out of water to drink and food to eat, and figured they were done for.
I had plenty of food with me and decided to share a nice lunch with them. They stopped their crying for a bit as they felt better after they ate. After we finished I cleaned up and got back on my horse. I wanted to get out of there as I had a long way to go before it got dark. They looked up at me leaving and started crying again.
“Are you going to leave us here to die?”
And they started crying and crying harder and harder when they realized I was.
Well they kept crying and crying, and I was starting to feel quite bad about their situation. They would most likely suffer a slow and horrible death. So I took my rifle out of it’s scabbard and shot ‘em–and that’s the kindest thing I could of done for them folks.
Every one of the ladies at the luncheon just sat there with their mouths agape.
“Why would you have told us a terrible story like that Scotty?”, the hostess asked after a long and awkward pause.
“Well, there’s just too much free education available for you to have asked such an ignorant question.”