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By Root 3212 0

sure to anchor him permanently someday. Right now his other roots out West seemed lustier and stronger. He was bound to return to his ranch, and would, in time, inhabit many houses, including the grandest in the land; but sooner or later these roots would cause all others to wither, and he would come back more and more to Sagamore Hill. Here hung the hallowed portrait of his father, and various stuffed symbols of his own manhood—the buffalo, the bears, the many antelope heads. The place was loud with the happy squeals of his daughter, the conversation of his friends and relatives. This endearingly ugly house was Home. In it he would live out his sixty years (Roosevelt was already quite sure of that figure)41 and die.

But for the time being, he was twenty-six, and the Wild West was calling. Urging Bamie to continue her entertainments on his behalf, he caught the Chicago Limited out of New York on 22 August 1885.42

NEWSPAPERMEN WERE WAITING to interview Roosevelt at St. Paul and Bismarck as usual, but for some reason they seemed more interested in talking about the Marquis de Morès than about politics. Was it true that he and the Marquis had recently had “a slight tilt,” and that their relations were “somewhat strained”?43

The only “tilt” Roosevelt could think of—and it was trivial, in his opinion—was a business misunderstanding that had occurred during the spring. He had contracted to sell some cattle to the Northern Pacific Refrigerator Car Company at a price of six cents a pound, but on delivery de Morès had reduced the price to five and a half cents a pound, saying that the market in Chicago was down by that much. Roosevelt, in turn, had insisted that a contract was a contract, irrespective of price fluctuations afterward; but the Marquis remained obdurate. Roosevelt had philosophically taken his cattle back, and let it be known that he would not do business with the Marquis again.44

Now, months later, he sought to play down the incident. It was “not true,” he said, that the two cattle kings of the Badlands were “looking for each other with clubs.” The story of a “tilt” was exaggerated; but why all these questions? He found out soon enough. The Marquis de Morès had just been indicted for murder.45

Roosevelt reached Medora on 25 August, and paused only to announce a meeting of his Little Missouri Stockmen’s Association on 5 September before hurrying north to discuss the indictment with Sewall and Dow.46 He already knew the facts. This “murder” was nothing new—merely another skirmish in the legal war that had been waged against de Morès ever since the fatal ambush of 26 June 1883. Charges that the Marquis had killed Riley Luffsey had twice been examined by justices of the peace, and twice dismissed for lack of proof; yet now a grand jury in Mandan had decided there was enough evidence to warrant a trial.47

De Morès, who had also been vacationing in the East, arrived in Dakota close on Roosevelt’s heels, and gave himself up to the authorities. They told him that “a little matter of fifteen hundred dollars judiciously distributed” would cause the indictment to be withdrawn. “I have plenty of money for defense,” he replied haughtily, “but not a dollar for blackmail.” He was promptly placed in Bismarck jail.48

A SUBTLY TRANSFORMED ranch house greeted the returning proprietor of Elkhorn. There were unmistakable signs of feminine occupation: patches of bright color in the windows, delicate items of laundry hanging up to dry, a new air of neatness and tidiness. Inside, Roosevelt found Mrs. Sewall and Mrs. Dow, along with Kitty Sewall, “a forlorn little morsel” about the same age as Baby Lee. Dow had brought them all West three weeks before.49

Roosevelt was pleased to have more company under his roof. The ranch house was amply big enough for six—so big, indeed, that it needed domestic management. The women, in turn, were anxious to repay him for their free board and lodging. They swept and scrubbed and polished, mended his linen, and at regular intervals sorted out his possessions so he could find what he was looking