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Rowdy of the Cross L
by B. M. Bower (B.M. Sinclair)
September, 1999 [Etext #1907]
The Project Gutenberg Etext Rowdy of the Cross L, by B. M. Bower
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ROWDY OF THE "CROSS L."
by
B. M. BOWER
CONTENTS
- Lost in a Blizzard
- Miss Conroy Refuses Shelter
- Rowdy Hires a New Boss
- Pink as "Chappyrone"
- At Home at Cross L
- A Shot From the Dark
- Rowdy in a Tough Place
- Pink in a Threatening Mood
- Moving the Herd
- Harry Conroy at Home
- Rowdy Promoted
- "You Can Tell Jessie"
- Rowdy Finds Happiness
CHAPTER 1
Lost in a Blizzard.
"Rowdy" Vaughan--he had been christened Rowland by his mother, and
rechristened Rowdy by his cowboy friends, who are prone to treat with much
irreverence the names bestowed by mothers--was not happy. He stood in the
stirrups and shook off the thick layer of snow which clung, damp and
close-packed, to his coat. The dull yellow folds were full of it; his gray
hat, pulled low over his purple ears, was heaped with it. He reached up a
gloved hand and scraped away as much as he could, wrapped the long-skirted,
"sour-dough" coat around his numbed legs, then settled into the saddle with
a shiver of distaste at the plight he was in, and wished himself back at the
Horseshoe Bar.
Dixie, standing knee-deep in a drift, shook himself much after the manner of
his master; perhaps he, also, wished himself back at the Horseshoe Bar. He
turned his head to look back, blinking at the snow which beat insistently in
his eyes; he could not hold them open long enough to see anything, however,
so he twitched his ears pettishly and gave over the attempt.
"It's up to you, old boy," Rowdy told him resignedly. "I'm plumb lost; I
never was in this damn country before, anyhow--and I sure wish I wasn't here
now. If you've any idea where we're at, I'm dead willing to have you pilot
the layout. Never mind Chub; locating his feed when it's stuck under his
nose is his limit."
Chub lifted an ear dispiritedly when his name was spoken; but, as was
usually the case, he heard no good of himself, and dropped his head again.
No one took heed of him; no one ever did. His part was to carry Vaughan's
bed, and to follow unquestionably where Vaughan and Dixie might lead. He was
cold and tired and hungry, but his faith in his master was strong; the
responsibility of finding shelter before the dark came down rested not with
him.
Vaughan pressed his chilled knees against Dixie's ribs, but the hand upon
the reins was carefully non-committal; so that Dixie, having no suggestion
of his master's wish, ventured to indulge his own. He turned tail squarely
to the storm and went straight ahead. Vaughan put his hands deep into his
pockets, snuggled farther down into the sheepskin collar of his coat, and
rode passive, enduring.
They brought up against a wire fence, and Vaughan, rousing from his apathy,
tried to peer through the white, shifting wall of the storm. "You're a swell
guide--not," he remarked to the horse. "Now you, you hike down this fence
till you locate a gate or a corner, or any darned thing; and I don't give a
cuss if the snow does get in your eyes. It's your own fault."
Dixie, sneezing the snow from his nostrils, turned obediently; Chub, his
feet dragging wearily in the snow, trailed patiently behind. Half an hour of
this, and it seemed as if it would go on forever.
Through the swirl Vaughan could see the posts standing forlornly in the
snow, with sixteen feet of blizzard between; at no time could he distinguish
more than two or three at once, and there were long minutes when the wall
stood, blank and shifting, just beyond the first post.
Then Dixie lifted his head and gazed questioningly before him, his ears
pointed forward--sentient, strained--and whinnied shrill challenge. He
hurried his steps, dragging Chub out of the beginnings of a dream. Vaughan
straightened and took his hands from his pockets.
Out beyond the dim, wavering outline of the farthest post came answer to the
challenge. A mysterious, vague shape grew impalpably upon the strained
vision; a horse sneezed, then nickered eagerly. Vaughan drew up and waited.
"Hello!" he called cheerfully. "Pleasant day, this. Out for your health?"
The shape hesitated, as though taken aback by the greeting, and there was no
answer. Vaughan, puzzled, rode closer.
"Say, don't talk so fast!" he yelled. "I can't follow yuh."
"Who--who is it?" The voice sounded perturbed; and it was, moreover, the
voice of a woman.
Vaughan pulled up short and swore into his collar. Women are not, as a rule,
to be met out on the blank prairie in a blizzard. His voice, when he spoke
again, was not ironical, as it had been; it was placating.
"I beg your pardon," he said. "I thought it was a man. I'm looking for the
Cross L; you don't happen to know where it is, do yuh?"
"No--I don't," she declared dismally. "I don't know where any place is. I'm
teaching school in this neighborhood--or in some other. I was going to spend
Sunday with a friend, but this storm came up, and I'm--lost."
"Same here," said Rowdy pleasantly, as though being lost was a matter for
congratulation.
"Oh! I was in hopes--"
"So was I, so we're even there. We'll have to pool our chances, I guess. Any
gate down that way--or haven't you followed the fence?"
"I followed it for miles and miles--it seemed. It must be some big field of
the Cross L; but they have so very many big fields!"
"And you couldn't give a rough guess at how far it is to the Cross
L?"--insinuatingly.
He could vaguely see her shake of head. "Ordinarily it should be about six
miles beyond Rodway's, where I board. But I haven't the haziest idea of
where Rodway's place is, you see; so that won't help you much. I'm all at
sea in this snow." Her voice was rueful.
"Well, if you came up the fence, there's no use going back that way; and
there's sure nothing made by going away from it.--that's the way I came. Why
not go on the way you're headed?"
"We might as well, I suppose," she assented; and Rowdy turned and rode by
her side, grateful for the plurality of the pronoun which tacitly included
him in her wanderings, and meditating many things. For one, he wondered if
she were as nice a girl as her voice sounded. He could not see much of her
face, because it was muffled in a white silk scarf. Only her eyes showed,
and they were dark and bright.
When he awoke to the fact that the wind, grown colder, beat upon her
cruelly, he dropped behind a pace and took the windy side, that he might
shield her with his body. But if she observed the action she gave no sign;
her face was turned from him and the wind, and she rode without speaking.
After long plodding, the line of posts turned unexpectedly a right angle,
and Vaughan took a long, relieved breath.
"We'll have the wind on our backs now," he remarked. "I guess we may as well
keep on and see where this fence goes to."
His tone was too elaborately cheerful to be very cheering.He was wondering
if the girl was dressed warmly. It had been so warm and sunny before the
blizzard struck, but now the wind searched out the thin places in one's
clothing and ran lead in one's bones, where should be simply marrow. He
fancied that her voice, when she spoke, gave evidence of actual
suffering--and the heart of Rowdy Vaughan was ever soft toward a woman.
"If you're cold," he began, "I'll open up my bed and get out a blanket." He
held Dixie in tentatively.
"Oh, don't trouble to do that," she protested; but there was that in her
voice which hardened his impulse into fixed resolution.
"I ought to have thought of it before," he lamented, and swung down stiffly
into the snow.
Her eyes followed his movement with a very evident interest while he
unbuckled the pack Chub had carried since sunrise and drew out a blanket.
"Stand in your stirrup," he commanded briskly "and I'll wrap you up. It's a
Navajo, and the wind will have a time trying to find a thin spot."
"You're thoughtful." She snuggled into it thankfully. "I was cold."
Vaughan tucked it around her with more care than haste. He was pretty
uncomfortable himself, and for that reason he was the more anxious that the
girl should be warm. It came to him that she was a cute little schoolma'am,
all right; he was glad she belonged close around the Cross L. He also wished
he knew her name--and so he set about finding it out, with much guile.
"How's that?" he wanted to know, when he had made sure that her feet--such
tiny feet--were well covered. He thought it lucky that she did not ride
astride, after the manner of the latter-day young woman, because then he
could not have covered her so completely. "Hold on! That windy side's going
to make trouble." He unbuckled the strap he wore to hold his own coat snug
about him, and put it around the girl's slim waist, feeling idiotically
happy and guilty the while. "It don't come within a mile of you," he
complained; "but it'll help some."
Sheltered in the thick folds of the Navajo, she laughed, and the sound of it
sent the blood galloping through Rowdy Vaughan's body so that he was almost
warm. He went and scraped the snow out of his saddle, and swung up, feeling
that, after all, there are worse things in the world than being lost and
hungry in a blizzard, with a sweet-voiced, bright-eyed little schoolma'am
who can laugh like that.
"I don't want to have you think I may be a bold, bad robber-man," he said,
when they got going again. "My name's Rowdy Vaughan--for which I beg your
pardon. Mother named me Rowland, never knowing I'd get out here and have her
nice, pretty name mutilated that way. I won't say that my behavior never
suggested the change, though. I'm from the Horseshoe Bar, over the line, and
if I have my way, I'll be a Cross L man before another day." Then he waited
expectantly.
"For fear you may think I'm a--a robber-woman," she answered him
solemnly--he felt sure her eyes twinkled, if only he could have seen them--
"I'm Jessie Conroy. And if you're from over the line, maybe you know my
brother Harry. He was over there a year or two."
Rowdy hunched his shoulders--presumably at the wind. Harry Conroy's sister,
was she? And he swore. "I may have met him," he parried, in a tone you'd
never notice as being painstakingly careless. "I think I did, come to think
of it."
Miss Conroy seemed displeased, and presently the cause was forthcoming. "If
you'd ever met him," she said, "you'd hardly forget him." (Rowdy mentally
agreed profanely.) "He's the best rider in the whole country--and the
handsomest. He--he's splendid! And he's the only brother I've got. It's a
pity you never got acquainted with him."
"Yes," lied Rowdy, and thought a good deal in a very short time. Harry
Conroy's sister! Well, she wasn't to blame for that, of course; nor for
thinking her brother a white man. "I remember I did see him ride once," he
observed. "He was a whirlwind, all right--and he sure was handsome, too."
Miss Conroy turned her face toward him and smiled her pleasure, and Rowdy
hovered between heaven and--another place. He was glad she smiled, and he
was afraid of what that subject might discover for his straightforward
tongue in the way of pitfalls. It would not be nice to let her know what he
really thought of her brother.
"This looks to me like a lane," he said diplomatically. "We must be getting
somewhere; don't you recognize any landmarks?"
Miss Conroy leaned forward and peered through the clouds of snow dust.
Already the night was creeping down upon the land, stealthily turning the
blank white of the blizzard into as blank a gray--which was as near darkness
as it could get, because of the snow which fell and fell, and yet seemed
never to find an abiding-place, but danced and swirled giddily in the wind
as the cold froze it dry. There would be no more damp, clinging masses that
night; it was sifting down like flour from a giant sieve; and
of the supply there seemed no end.
"I don't know of any lanes around here," she began dubiously, "unless
it's--"
Vaughan looked sharply at her muffled figure and wondered why she broke off
so suddenly. She was staring hard at the few, faint traces of landmarks;
and, bundled in the red-and-yellow Navajo blanket, with her bright, dark
eyes, she might easily have passed for a slim young squaw.
Out ahead, a dog began barking vaguely, and Rowdy turned eagerly to the
sound. Dixie, scenting human habitation, stepped out more briskly through
the snow, and even Chub lifted an ear briefly to show he heard.
"It may not be any one you know," Vaughan remarked, and his voice showed his
longing; "but it'll be shelter and a warm fire--and supper. Can you
appreciate such blessings, Miss Conroy? I can. I've been in the saddle since
sunrise; and I was so sure I'd strike the Cross L by dinner-time that I
didn't bring a bite to eat. It was a sheep-camp where I stopped, and the
grub didn't look good to me, anyway--I've called myself bad names all the
afternoon for being more dainty than sensible. But it's all right now, I
guess."
CHAPTER 2
Miss Conroy Refuses Shelter.
The storm lifted suddenly, as storms have a way of doing, and a low, squat
ranch-house stood dimly revealed against the bleak expanse of wind-tortured
prairie. Rowdy gave an exultant little whoop and made for the gate, leaned
and swung it open and rode through, dragging Chub after him by main
strength, as usual. When he turned to close the gate after Miss Conroy he
found her standing still in the lane.
"Come on in," he called, with a trace of impatience born of his weariness
and hunger.
"Thank you, no." Miss Conroy's voice was as crisply cold as the wind which
fluttered the Navajo blanket around her face. "I much prefer the blizzard."
For a moment Rowdy found nothing to say; he just stared. Miss Conroy shifted
uneasily in the saddle.
"This is old Bill Brown's place," she explained reluctantly. "He--I'd rather
freeze than go in!"
"Well, I guess that won't be hard to do," he retorted curtly, "if you stay
out much longer."
The dog was growing hysterical over their presence, and Bill Brown himself
came out to see what it was all about. He could see two dim figures at the
gate.
"Hello!" he shouted. "Why don't yuh come on in? What yuh standing there
chewing the rag for?"
Vaughan hesitated, his eyes upon Miss Conroy.
"Go in," she commanded imperiously, quite as if he were a refractory pupil.
"You're tired out, and hungry. I'm neither. Besides, I know where I am now.
I can find my way without any trouble. Go in, I tell you!"
But Rowdy stayed where he was, with the gate creaking to and fro between
them. Dixie circled till his back was to the wind. "I hope you don't think
you're going to mill around out here alone," Rowdy said tartly.
"I can manage very well. I'm not lost now, I tell you. Rodway's is only
three miles from here, and I know the direction."
Bill Brown waded out to them, wondering what weighty discussion was keeping
them there in the cold. Vaughan he passed by with the cursory glance of a
disinterested stranger, and went on to where Miss Conroy waited stubbornly
in the lane.
"Oh, it's you!" he said grimly. "Well, come in and thaw out; I hope yuh
didn't think yuh wouldn't be welcome yuh knew better. You got lost, I
reckon. Come on--"
Miss Conroy struck Badger sharply across the flank and disappeared into the
night. "When I ask shelter of you," she flung back, "you'll know it."
Rowdy started after, and met Bill Brown squarely in the gate. Bill eyed him
sharply. "Say, young fellow, how'd you come by that packhorse?" he demanded,
as Chub brushed past him.
"None of your damn' business," snapped Rowdy, and drove the spurs into
Dixie's ribs. But Chub was a handicap at any time; now, when he was tired,
there was no getting anything like speed out of him; he clung to his
shuffling trot, which was really no better than a walk. After five minutes
spent alternately in spurring Dixie and yanking at Chub's lead-rope, Rowdy
grew frightened and took to shouting. While they were in the lane Miss
Conroy must perforce ride straight ahead, but the lane would not last
always. As though with malicious intent, the snow swooped down again and the
world became an unreal, nightmare world, wherein was nothing save
shifting, blinding snowfloury and wind and bitter, numbing cold.
Rowdy stood in his stirrups, cupped his chilled fingers around his numbed
lips, and sent a longdrawn "Who-ee!" shrilling weirdly into the night.
It seemed to him, after long listening, that from the right came faint
reply, and he turned and rode recklessly, swearing at Chub for his slowness.
He called again, and the answer, though faint, was unmistakable. He settled
heavily into the saddle--too weak, from sheer relief, to call again. He had
not known till then just how frightened he had been, and he was somewhat
disconcerted at the discovery. In a minute the reaction passed and he
shouted a loud hello.
"Hello?" came the voice of Miss Conroy, tantalizingly calm, and as superior
as the greeting of Central. "Were you looking for me, Mr. Vaughan?"
She was close to him--so close that she had not needed to raise her voice
perceptibly. Rowdy rode up alongside, remembering uncomfortably his
prolonged shouting.
"I sure was," he admitted. And then: "You rode off with my blanket on." He
was very proud of his matter-of-fact tone.
"Oh!" Miss Conroy was almost deceived, and a bit disappointed. "I'll give it
to you now, and you can go back--if you know the way."
"No hurry," said Rowdy politely. "I'll go on and see if you can find a place
that looks good to you. You seem pretty particular."
Miss Conroy may have blushed, in the shelter of the blanket. "I suppose it
did look strange to you," she confessed, but defiantly. "Bill Brown is an
enemy to--Harry. He--because he lost a horse or two out of a field, one
time, he--he actually accused Harry of taking them! He lied, of course, and
nobody believed him; nobody could believe a thing like that about Harry. It
was perfectly absurd. But he did his best to hurt Harry's name, and I would
rather freeze than ask shelter of him. Wouldn't you--in my place, I mean?"
"I always stand up for my friends," evaded Rowdy. "And if I had a brother--"
"Of course you'd be loyal," approved Miss Conroy warmly. "But I didn't want
you to come on; it isn't your quarrel. And I know the way now. You needn't
have come any farther "
"You forgot the blanket," Rowdy reminded wickedly. "I think a lot of that
Navajo."
"You insisted upon my taking it," she retorted, and took refuge in silence.
For a long hour they plodded blindly. Rowdy beat his hands often about his
body to start the blood, and meditated yearnigly upon hot coffee and the
things he liked best to eat. Also, a good long pull at a flask wouldn't be
had, either, he thought. And he hoped this little schoolma'am knew where she
was going--truth to tell, he doubted it.
After a while, it seemed that Miss Conroy doubted it also. She took to
leaning forward and straining her eyes to see through the gray wall before.
"There should be a gate here," she said dubiously, at last.
"It seems to me," Rowdy ventured mildly, "if there were a gate, it would
have some kind of a fence hitched to it; wouldn't it?"
Miss Conroy was in no mood for facetiousness, and refused to answer his
question. "I surely can't have made a mistake," she observed uneasily.
"It would be a wonder if you didn't, such a night as this," he consoled. "I
wouldn't bank on traveling straight myself, even if I knew the
country--which I don't. And I've been in more blizzards than I'm years old."
"Rodway's place can't be far away," she said, brightening. "It may be
farther to the east; shall we try that way--if you know which is east?"
"Sure, we'll try. It's all we can do. My packhorse is about all in, from the
way he hangs back; if we don't strike something pretty soon I'll have to
turn him loose."
"Oh, don't do that," she begged. "It would be too cruel. We're sure to reach
Rodway's very soon."
More plodding through drifts high and drifts low; more leaning from saddles
to search anxiously for trace of something besides snow and wind and biting
cold. Then, far to the right, a yellow eye glowed briefly when the storm
paused to take breath. Miss Conroy gave a glad little cry and turned Badger
sharply.
"Did you see? It was the light from a window. We were going the wrong way.
I'm sure that is Rodway's."
Rowdy thanked the Lord and followed her. They came up against a fence, found
a gate, and passed through. While they hurried toward it, the light winked
welcome; as they drew near, some one stirred the fire and sent sparks and
rose-hued smoke rushing up into the smother of snow. Rowdy watched them
wistfully, and wondered if there would be supper, and strong, hot coffee. He
lifted Miss Conroy out of the saddle, carried her two long strides, and
deposited her upon the door-step; rapped imperatively, and when a voice
replied, lifted the latch and pushed her in before him.
For a minute they stood blinking, just within the door. The change from
numbing cold and darkness to the light of the overheated room was
stupefying.
Then Miss Conroy went over and held her little, gloved hands to the heat of
the stove, but she did not take the chair which some one pushed toward her.
She stood, the blanket shrouding her face and her slim young figure, and
looked about her curiously. It was not Rodway's house, after all. She
thought she knew what place it was--the shack where Rodway's hay-balers
bached.
From the first, Rowdy did not like the look of things--though for himself it
did not matter; he was used to such scenes. It was the presence of the girl
which made him uncomfortable. He unbuttoned his coat that the warmth might
reach his chilled body, and frowned.
Four men sat around a small, dirty table; evidently the arrivals had
interrupted an exciting game of seven-up. A glance told Rowdy, even if his
nose had not, that the four round, ribbed bottles had not been nearly
emptied without effect.
"Have one on the house," the man nearest him cried, and shoved a bottle
toward him.
Involuntarily Rowdy reached for it. Now that he was inside, he realized all
at once how weary he was, and cold and hungry. Each abused muscle and nerve
seemed to have a distinct grievance against him. His fingers closed around
the bottle before he remembered and dropped it. He looked up, hoping Miss
Conroy had not observed the action; met her wide, questioning eyes, and the
blood flew guiltily to his cheeks.
"Thanks, boys--not any for me," he said, and apologized to Miss Conroy with
his eyes.
The man rose and confronted him unsteadily. "Dat's a hell off a way! You too
proud for drink weeth us? You drink, now! By Gar, I make you drink!"
Rowdy's eyelids drooped, which was a bad sign for those who knew him.
"You're forgetting there's a lady present," he reminded warningly.
The man turned a brief, contemptuous glance toward the stove. "You got the
damn' queer way to talk. I don't call no squaw no lady. You drink queeck,
now!"
"Aw, shut up, Frenchy," the man at his elbow abjured him. "He don't have to
drink if he don't want to."
"You keep the face close," the other retorted majestically; and cursed loud
and long and incoherently.
Rowdy drew back his arm, with a fist that meant trouble for somebody; but
there were others before him who pinned the importunate host to the table,
where he squirmed unavailingly.
Rowdy buttoned up his coat the while he eyed the group disgustedly. "I guess
we'll drift," he remarked. "You don't look good to me, and that's no dream."
"Aw, stay and warm up," the fourth man expostulated. "Yuh don't need t' mind
Le Febre; he's drunk.'
But Rowdy opened the door decisively, and Miss Conroy, her cheeks like two
storm-buffeted poppies, followed him out with dignity--albeit trailing a
yard of red-and-yellow Navajo blanket behind her. Rowdy lifted her into the
saddle, tucked her feet carefully under the blanket, and said never a word.
"Mr. Vaughan," she began hesitatingly, "this is too bad; you need not have
left. I--I wasn't afraid."
"I know you weren't," conceded Rowdy. "But it was a hard formation--for a
woman. Are there any more places on this flat marked Unavailable?"
Miss Conroy replied misanthropically that if there were they would be sure
to find them.
They took up their weary wanderings again, while the yellow eye of the
window winked after them. They missed Rodway's by a scant hundred yards, and
didn't know it, because the side of the house next them had no lighted
windows. They traveled in a wide, half circle, and thought that they were
leaving a straight trail behind them. More than once Rowdy was urged by his
aching arm to drop the lead-rope and leave Chub to shift by himself, but
habit was strong and his heart was soft. Then he felt an odd twitching at
the lead-rope, as if Chub were minded to rebel against their leadership.
Rowdy yanked him into remembrance of his duty, and wondered. Bill Brown's
question came insistently to mind; he wondered the more.
Two minutes and the lead-rope was sawing against the small of his back
again. Rowdy turned Dixie's head, and spoke for the first time in an hour.
"My packhorse seems to have an idea about where he wants to go," he said. "I
guess we might as well follow him as anybody; he ain't often taken with a
rush of brains to the head. And we can't be any worse lost than we are now,
can we?"
Miss Conroy said no dispiritedly, and they swung about and followed Chub's
leadership apathetically. It took Chub just five minutes to demonstrate that
he knew what he was about. When he stopped, it was with his nose against a
corral gate; not content with that, he whinnied, and a new, exultant note
was in the sound. A deep-voiced dog bayed loudly, and a shrill yelp cut in
and clamored for recognition.
Miss Conroy gasped. "It's Lion and Skeesicks. We're at Rodway's, Mr.
Vaughan."
Rowdy, for the second time, thanked the Lord. But when he was stripping the
pack off Chub's back, ten minutes later, he was thinking many things he
would not have cared to say aloud. It might be all right, but it sure was
strange, he told himself, that Chub belonged here at Rodway's when Harry
Conroy claimed that he was an Oregon horse. Rowdy had thought his account
against Harry Conroy long enough, but it looked now as though another item
must be added to the list. He went in and ate his supper thoughtfully, and
when he got into bed he did not fall asleep within two minutes, as he might
be expected to do. His last conscious thought was not of stolen horses,
however. It was: "And she's Harry Conroy's sister! Now, what do you think of
that? But all the same, she's sure a nice little schoolma'am."
CHAPTER 3
Rowdy Hires a New Boss.
Next morning, after breakfast, Mr. Rodway followed Vaughan out to the
stable, and repeated Bill Brown's question.
"I'd like to know where yuh got this horse," he began, with an apologetic
sort of determination in his tone. "He happens to belong to me. He was run
off with a bunch three years ago, and this is the first trace anybody has
ever got of 'em. I see the brand's been worked. It was a Roman four--that's
my brand; now it looks like a map of Texas; but I'd swear to the
horse--raised him from a colt."
Rowdy had expected something of the sort, and he knew quite well what he was
going to do; he had settled that the night before, with the memory of Miss
Conroy's eyes fresh in his mind.
"I got him in a deal across the line," he said. "I was told he came from
east Oregon. But last night, when he piloted us straight to your corral
gate, I guessed he'd been here before. He's yours, all right, if you say
so."
"Uh course he ain't worth such a pile uh money, apologized Rodway, "but the
kids thought a heap of him. I'd rather locate some of the horses that was
with him--or the man yuh got him of. They was some mighty good horses run
out uh this country then, but they was all out on the range, so we didn't
miss 'em in time to do any good. Do yu know who took 'em across the line?"
"No," said Rowdy deliberately. "The man I got Chub from went north, and I
heard he got killed. I don't know of any other in the deal."
Rodway grunted, and Vaughan began vigorously brushing Dixie's roughened
coat. "If you don't mind," he said, after a minute, "I'd like to borrow Chub
to pack my bed over to the Cross L. I can bring him back again."
"Why, sure!" assented Rodway eagerly. "I hate to take him from yuh, but the
kids--"
"Oh, that's all right," interrupted Rowdy cheerfully. "It's all in the game,
and I should 'a' looked up his pedigree, for I knew--. Anyway, was worth the
price of him to have him along last night. We'd have milled around till
daylight, I guess, only for him."
"That's what," agreed Rodway. "Jessie's horse is one she brought from home
lately, and he ain't located yet; I dunno as he'd 'a' piloted her home.
Billy--that's what the kids named him--was born and raised here, yuh see.
I'll bet he's glad to get back--and the kids'll be plumb wild."
Rowdy did not answer; there seemed nothing in particular to say, and he was
wondering if he would see Miss Conroy before he left. She had not eaten
breakfast with the others; from their manner, he judged that no one expected
her to. He was not well informed upon the subject of schoolma'ams, but he
had a hazy impression that late rising was a distinguishing
characteristic--and he did not know how late. He saddled leisurely, and
packed his bed for the last time upon Chub. The red-and-yellow Navajo
blanket he folded tenderly, with an unconscious smile for the service it had
done, and laid it in its accustomed place in the bed. Then, having no
plausible excuse for going back to the house, he mounted and rode away into
the brilliant white world, watching wistfully the house from the tail of his
eye.
She might have got up in time to see him off, he thought discontentedly; but
he supposed one cowpuncher more or less made little difference to her.
Anyway, he didn't know as he had any license to moon around her. She
probably had a fellow; she might even be engaged, for all he knew. And--she
was Harry Conroy's sister; and from his experience with the breed, good
looks didn't count for anything. Harry was good-looking, and he was a snake,
if ever there was one. He had never expected to lie for him--but he
had done it, all right --and because Harry's sister happened to have nice
eyes and a pretty little foot!--
He had half a mind to go back and tell Rodway all he knew about those
horses; it was only a matter of time, anyway, till Harry Conroy overshot the
mark and got what was coming to him. He sure didn't owe Harry anything, that
he had need to shield him like he had done. Still, Rodway would wonder why
he hadn't told it at first; and that little girl believed in Harry, and said
he was "splendid!" Humph! He wondered if she really meant that. If she
did--
He squared his back to the house--and the memory of Miss Conroy's eyes--and
plodded across the field to the gate. Now the sun was shining, and there was
no possibility of getting lost. The way to the Cross L lay straight and
plain before him.
Rowdy rode leisurely up over the crest of a ridge beyond which lay the home
ranch of the Cross L. Whether it was henceforth to be his home he had yet to
discover--though there was reason for hoping that it would be. Even so
venturesome a man as Rowdy Vaughan would scarce ride a long hundred miles
through unpeopled prairie, in the tricky month of March, without some reason
for expecting a welcome at the end of his journey. In this case, a previous
acquaintance with "Wooden Shoes" Mielke, foreman of the Cross L, was Rowdy's
trump-card. Wooden Shoes, whenever chance had brought them together in the
last two or three years, was ever urging Rowdy to come over and unroll his
soogans in the Cross L bed-tent, and promising the best string in the outfit
to ride--besides other things alluring to a cow-puncher. So that, when his
relations with the Horseshoe Bar became strained, Rowdy remembered his
friend of the Cross L and the promises, and had drifted south.
Just now he hoped that Wooden Shoes would be home to greet him, and his eyes
searched wishfully the huddle of low-eaved cabins and the assortment of
sheds and corrals for the bulky form of the foreman. But no one seemed to be
about--except a bigbodied, bandy-legged individual, who appeared to be
playfully chasing a big, bright bay stallion inside the large enclosure
where stood the cabins.
Rowdy watched them impersonally; a glance proved that the man was not Wooden
Shoes, and so he was not particularly interested in him or his doings. It
did occur to him, however, that if the fellow wanted to catch that brute, he
ought to have sense enough to get a horse. No one but a plumb idiot would
mill around in that snow afoot. He jogged down the slope at a shuffling
trot, grinning tolerantly at the pantomime below.
He of the bandy-legs stopped, evidently out of breath; the stallion stopped
also, snorting defiance. Rowdy heard him plainly, even at that distance. The
horse arched his neck and watched the man warily, ready to be off at the
first symptom of hostilities--and Rowdy observed that a short rope hung from
his halter, swaying as he moved.
Bandy-legs seemed to have an idea; he turned and scuttled to the nearest
cabin, returning with what seemed a basin of oats, for he shook it
enticingly and edged cautiously toward the horse. Rowdy could imagine him
coaxing, with hypocritically endearing names, such as "Good old boy!" and
"Steady now, Billy"--or whatever the horse's name might be. Rowdy chuckled
to himself, and hoped the horse saw through the subterfuge.
Perhaps the horse chuckled also; at any rate, he stood quite still, equally
prepared to bounce away on the instant or to don the mask of docility.
Bandy-legs drew nearer and nearer, shaking the basin briskly, like an old
woman sifting meal. The horse waited, his nostrils quivering hungrily at the
smell of the oats, and with an occasional low nicker.
Bandy-legs went on tiptoes--or as nearly as he could in the snow--the basin
at arm's length before. The dainty, flaring nostrils sniffed tentatively,
dipped into the basin, and snuffed the oats about luxuriously--till he felt
a stealthy hand seize the dangling rope. At the touch he snorted protest,
and was off and away, upsetting Bandy-legs and the basin ignominiously into
a high-piled drift.
Bandy-legs sat up, scraped the snow out of his collar and his ears, and
swore. It was then that Rowdy appeared like an angel of deliverance.
"Want that horse caught?" he yelled cheerfully.
Bandy-legs lifted up his voice and bellowed things I should not like to
repeat verbatim. But Rowdy gathered that the man emphatically did want that
so-and-so-and-then-some horse caught, and that it couldn't be done a blessed
minute too soon. Whereat Rowdy smiled anew, with his face discreetly turned
away from Bandy-legs, and took down his rope and widened the loop. Also, he
turned Chub loose.
The stallion evidently sensed what new danger threatened his stolen freedom,
and circled the yard with high, springy strides. Rowdy circled after, saw
his chance, swirled the loop twice over his head, and hazarded a long throw.
Rowdy knew it for pure good luck that it landed right, but to this day
Bandy-legs looks upon him as a Wonder with a rope--and Bandy-legs would
insist upon the capital.
"Where shall I take him?" Rowdy asked, coming up with his captive, and with
nothing but his eyes to show how he was laughing inwardly.
Bandy-legs crawled from the drift, still scraping snow from inside his
collar, and gave many directions about going through a certain gate into
such-and-such a corral; from there into a stable; and by seeming devious
ways into a minutely described stall.
"All right," said Rowdy, cutting short the last needless details. "I guess I
can find the trail;" and started off, leading the stallion. Bandy-legs
followed, and Chub, observing the departure of Dixie, ambled faithfully in
the rear.
"Much obliged," conceded Bandy-legs, when the stallion was safely housed and
tied securely. "Where yuh headed for, young man?"
"Right here," Rowdy told him calmly, loosening Dixie's cinch. "I'm the
long-lost top hand that the Cross L's been watching the sky-line for, lo!
these many moons, a-yearning for the privilege of handing me forty plunks
about twice as fast as I've got 'em coming. Where's the boss?"
"Er--I'm him," confessed Bandy-legs meekly, and circled the two dubiously.
"I guess you've heard uh Eagle Creek Smith--I'm him. The Cross L belongs to
me."
Rowdy let out an explosive, and showed a row of nice teeth. "Well, I ain't
hard to please," he added. "I won't kick on that, I guess. I like your looks
tolerable well, and I'm willing to take yuh on for a boss. If yuh do your
part, I bet we'll get along fine." His tone was banteringly patronizing
"Anyway, I'll try yuh for a spell. You can put my name down as Rowdy
Vaughan, lately canned from the Horseshoe Bar."
"What for?" ventured Bandy-legs--rather, Eagle Creek--still circling Rowdy
dubiously.
"What for was I canned?" repeated Rowdy easily. "Being a modest youth, I
hate t' tell yuh. But the old man's son and me, we disagreed, and one of his
eyes swelled some; so did mine, a little." He stood head and shoulders above
Eagle Creek, and he smiled down upon him engagingly. Eagle Creek capitulated
before the smile.
"Well, I ain't got any sons--that I know of," he grinned. "So I guess yuh
can consider yourself a Cross L man till further notice."
"Why, sure!" The teeth gleamed again briefly. "That's what I've been telling
you right along. Where's old Wooden Shoes? He's responsible for me being
here."
"Gone to Chinook. He'll be back in a day or two." Eagle Creek shifted his
feet awkwardly. "Say"--he glanced uneasily behind him--"yuh don't want t'
let it get around that yuh sort of-- hired me--see?"
"Of course not," Rowdy assured him. "I was only joshing. If you don't want
me, just tell me to hit the sod."
"You stay right where you're at!" commanded Eagle Creek with returned
confidence in himself and his authority. Of a truth, this self-assured,
straight-limbed young man had rather dazed him. "Take your bed and war-bag
up to the bunk-house and make yourself t' home till the boys get back,
and--say, where'd yuh git that pack-horse?"
The laugh went out of Rowdy's tawny eyes. The question hit a spot that was
becoming sore. "I borrowed him this morning from Mr. Rodway," he said
evenly. "I'm to take him back to-day. I stopped there last night."
"Oh!" Eagle Creek coughed apologetically, and said no word, while Rowdy led
Chub back to the cabin which he had pointed out as the bunk-house; he stood
by while Rowdy loosened the pack and dragged it inside.
"I guess you can get located here," he said. "I ain't workin' more'n three
or four men just now, but there's quite a few uh the boys stopping here; the
Cross L's a regular hang-out for cow-punchers. You're a little early for the
season, but I'll see that yuh have something t' do--just t' keep yuh out uh
devilment."
Rowdy's brows unbent; it would seem that Eagle Creek was capable of
"joshing" also. "It's up t' you, old-timer," he retorted. "I'm strong and
willing, and don't shy at anything but pitchforks."
Eagle Creek grinned. "This ain't no blamed cowhospital," he gave as a
parting shot. "All the hay that's shoveled on this ranch needn't hurt
nobody's feelings." With that he shut the door, and left Rowdy to acquaint
himself with his new home.
CHAPTER 4
Pink as "Chappyrone."
Rowdy was sprawled ungracefully upon somebody's bunk--he neither knew nor
cared whose--and he was snoring unmelodiously, and not dreaming a thing; for
when a cow-puncher has nothing in particular to do, he sleeps to atone for
the weary hours when he must be very wide-awake. An avalanche descended upon
his unwarned middle, and checked the rhythmic ebb and flow of sound. He
squawked and came to life clawing viciously.
"I'd like t' know where the devil yuh come from," a voice remarked
plaintively in a soft treble.
Rowdy opened his eyes with a snap. "Pink! by all that's good and bad! Get up
off my diaphragm, you little fiend."
Pink absent-mindedly kneaded Rowdy's stomach with his knuckles, and
immediately found himself in a far corner. He came back, dimpling
mischievously. He looked much more an angel than a fiend, for all his Angora
chaps and flame-colored scarf.
"Your bed and war-bag's on my bunk; you're on Smoky's; and Dixie's makin'
himself to home in the corral. By all them signs and tokens, I give a
reckless guess you're here t' stay a while. That right?" He prodded again at
Rowdy's ribs.
"It sure is, Pink. And if I'd known you was holding out here, I'd 'a' come
sooner, maybe. You sure look good to me, you darned little cuss!" Rowdy sat
up and took a lightning inventory of the four or five other fellows lounging
about. He must have slept pretty sound, he thought, not to hear them come
in.
Pink read the look, and bethought him of the necessary introductions. "This
is my side-kicker over the line that--you've heard about till you're plumb
weary, boys," he announced musically. "His name is Rowdy
Vaughan--bronco-peeler, crap fiend, and all-round bad man. He ain't a safe
companion, and yuh want t' sleep with your six-guns cuddled under your right
ear, and never, on no account, show him your backs. He's a real wolf, he is,
and the only reason I live t' tell the tale is because he respects
m' size. Boys, I'm afraid for yuh--but I wish yuh well."
"Pink, you need killing, and I'm tempted to live up to my rep," grinned
Rowdy indulgently. "Read me the pedigree of your friends."
"Oh, they ain't no worse--when yuh git used to 'em. That long-legged jasper
with the far-away look in his eyes is the Silent One--if he takes a notion
t' you, he'll maybe tell yuh the name his mother calls him. He may have seen
better days; but here's hoping he won't see no worse! He once was a
tenderfoot; but he's convalescing."
The Silent One nodded carelessly, but with a quick, measuring glance that
Rowdy liked.
"This unshaved savage is Smoky. He's harmless, if yuh don't mention
socialism in his presence; and if yuh do, he'll
down-with-the-trust-and-long-live-the-sons-uh-toil, all hours uh the night,
and keep folks awake. Then him and the fellow that started him off 'll
likely get chapped good and plenty. Over there's Jim Ellis and Bob Nevin;
they've both turned a cow or two, and I've seen worse specimens running
around loose--plenty of 'em. That man hidin' behind the grin--you can see
him if yuh look close--is Sunny Sam. Yuh needn't take no notice of him,
unless you're a mind to. He won't care--he's dead gentle.
"Say," he broke off, "how'd you happen t' stray onto this range, anyhow? Yuh
used t' belong t the Horseshoe Bar so solid the assessor always t' yuh down
on the personal-property list."
"They won't pay taxes on me no more, son." Rowdy's eyes dwelt fondly upon
Pink's cupid-bow mouth and dimples. He had never dreamed of finding Pink
here; though, when he came to think of it there was no reason why he
shouldn't.
Pink was not like any one else. He was slight and girlish to look at. But
you mustn't trust appearances; for Pink was all muscle strung on steel wire,
according to the belief of those who tried to handle him. He had little
white hands, and feet that looked quite comfortable in a number four boot,
and his hair was a tawny gold and curled in distracting, damp rings on his
forehead. His eyes were blue and long-lashed and beautiful, and they looked
at the world with baby innocence--whereas a more sophisticated
little devil never jangled spurs at his heels. He was everything but
insipid, and men liked him--unless he chose to dislike them, when they
thought of him with grating teeth. To find him bullying the Cross L boys
brought a warmth to Rowdy's heart.
Pink made a cigarette, and then offered Rowdy his tobacco-sack, and asked
questions about the Cypress Hills country. How was this girl?--and was that
one married yet?--and did the other still grieve for him? As a matter of
fact, he had yet to see the girl who could quicken his pulse a single beat,
and for that reason it sometimes pleased him to affect susceptibility beyond
that of other men.
It was after dinner when he and Rowdy went humming down to the stables,
gossiping like a couple of old women over a back fence.
"I see you've got Conroy's Chub yet," Pink observed carelessly.
"Oh, for Heaven's sake let up on that cayuse!" Rowdy cried petulantly. "I
wish I'd never got sight of the little buzzard-head; I've had him crammed
down my throat the last day or two till it's getting plumb monotonous. Pink,
that cayuse never saw Oregon. He was raised right on this flat, and he
belongs to old Rodway. I've got to lead him back there and turn him over
to-day."
Pink took three puffs at his cigarette, and lifted his long lashes to
Rowdy's gloom-filled face. "Stole?" he asked briefly.
"Stole," Rowdy repeated disgustedly. "So was the whole blame' bunch, as near
as I can make out."
"We might 'a' knowed it. We might 'a' guessed Harry Conroy wouldn't have a
straight title to anything if he could make it crooked. I bet he never
finished paying back that money yuh lent him--out uh the kindness uh your
heart. Did he?" Pink leaned against the corral fence and kicked meditatively
at a snow-covered rock.
"He did not, m' son. Chub's all I ever got out uh the deal--and I haven't
even got him. I borrowed him from Rodway to pack my bed over--borrowed the
blame' little runty cayuse that cost me sixty-four hard-earned dollars;
that's what Harry borrowed of me. And every blame' gazabo on the flat wanted
to know what I was doing with him!"
"I can tell yuh where t' find Conroy, Rowdy. He's working for an outfit down
on the river. I'd sure fix him for this! Yuh got plenty of evidence; you can
send him up like a charm. It was different when he cut your latigo strap in
that rough-riding contest; yuh couldn't prove it on him. But this--why, man,
it's a cinch!"
"I haven't lost Harry Conroy, so I ain't looking for him just now," growled
Rowdy. "So long as he keeps out uh reach, I won't ask no more of him.
And, Pink, I wish you'd keep this quiet--about him having Chub. I told
Rodway I couldn't put him next to the fellow that brought that bunch across
the line. I told him the fellow went north and got killed. He did go
north--fifty miles or so; and he'd ought to been killed, if he wasn't. Let
it go that way, Pink."
Pink looked like a cherub-faced child when he has been told there's no Santa
Claus. "Sure, if yuh say so," he stammered dubiously. He eyed Rowdy
reproachfully, and then looked away to the horizon. He kicked the rock out
of place, and then poked it painstakingly back with his toe--and from the
look of him, he did not know there was a rock there at all.
"How'd yuh happen to run across Rodway?" he asked guilelessly.
"I stopped there last night. I got to milling around in that storm, and ran
across the schoolma'am that boards at Rodway's, She was plumb lost, too, so
we dubbed around together for a while, and finally got inside Rodway's
field. Then Chub come alive and piloted us to the house. This morning Rodway
claimed him--says the brand has been worked from a Roman four. Oh, it's all
straight goods," he added hastily. "Old Eagle Creek here knew him, too."
But Pink was not thinking of Chub. He hunched his chap-belt higher and spat
viciously into the snow. "I knowed it," he declared, with melancholy
triumph. "It's school-ma'amitis that's gave yuh softening uh the vitals, and
not no Christian charity play. How comes it you're took that way, all
unbeknown t' your friends? Yuh never used t' bother about no female girls.
It's a cinch you're wise that she's Harry's sister; and I admit she's a
swell looker. But so's he; and I should think, Rowdy, you'd had about enough
uh that brand uh snake."
"There's nothing so snaky about her that I could see," defended Rowdy. He
did not particularly relish having his own mental argument against Miss
Conroy thrown back at him from another. "She seemed to be all right; and if
you'd seen how plucky she was in that blizzard--"
"Well, I never heard anybody stand up and call Harry white-livered, when yuh
come t' that," Pink cut in tartly. "Anyway, you're a blame fool. If she was
a little white-winged angel, yuh wouldn't stand no kind uh show; and I tell
yuh why. She's got a little tin god that she says prayers to regular.
That's Harry. And wouldn't he be the fine brother-in-law? He could borrow
all your wages off'n yuh, and when yuh went t' make a pretty ride, he'd up
and cut your latigo, and give yuh a fall. And he could work stolen horses
off onto yuh--and yuh wouldn't give a damn, 'cause Jessie wears a number two
shoe--"
"You must have done some rimrock riding after her yourself!" jeered Rowdy.
"And has got shiny brown eyes, just like Harry's--"
"They're not!" laughed Rowdy, half-angrily. "If you say that again, Pink,
I'll stick your head in a snow-bank. Her eyes are all right. They sure look
good to me."
"You've sure got 'em," mourned Pink. "Yuh need t' be close-herded by your
friends, and that's no dream. You wait till toward evening before yuh take
that horse back. I'm going along t' chappyrone yuh, Rowdy. Yuh ain't safe
running loose any more."
Rowdy cursed him companionably and told him to go along, if he wanted to,
and to look out he didn't throw up his own hands; and Pink grumbled and
swore and did go along. But when they got there, Miss Conroy greeted him
like a very good friend; which sent Rowdy sulky, and kept him so all the
evening. It seemed to him that Pink was playing a double game, and when they
started home he told him so.
But Pink turned in his saddle and smiled so that his dimples showed plainly
in the moonlight. "Chappyrones that set in a corner and look wise are the
rankest kind uh fakes," he explained. "When she was talking to me, she was
letting you alone--see?"
Rowdy accepted the explanation silently, and stored it away in his memory.
After that, by riding craftily, and by threats, and by much vituperation, he
managed to reach Rodway's unchapperoned at least three times out of
five--which was doing remarkably well, when one considers Pink.
CHAPTER 5
At Home at Cross L.
In two days Rowdy was quite at home with the Cross L. In a month he found
himself transplanted from the smoke-laden air of the bunk-house, and set off
from the world in a line camp, with nothing to do but patrol the boggy banks
of Milk River, where it was still unfenced and unclaimed by small farmers.
The only mitigation of his exile, so far as he could see, lay in
the fact that he had Pink and the Silent One for companions.
It developed that when he would speak to the Silent One, he must say Jim, or
wait long for a reply. Also, the Silent One was not always silent, and he
was quick to observe the weak points in those around him, and keen at
repartee. When it pleased him so to do, he could handle the English language
in a way that was perfectly amazing--and not always intelligible to the
unschooled. At such times Pink frankly made no attempt to understand him;
Rowdy, having been hustled through grammar school and two-thirds through
high school before he ran away from a brand new stepmother, rather enjoyed
the outbreaks and Pink's consequent disgust.
Not one of them loved particularly the line camp, and Rowdy least of all,
since it put an extra ten miles between Miss Conroy and himself. Rowdy had
got to that point where his mind dwelt much upon matters domestic, and he
made many secret calculations on the cost of housekeeping for two. More than
that, he put himself upon a rigid allowance for pocket-money--an allowance
barely sufficient to keep him in tobacco and papers. All this without
consulting Miss Conroy's wishes--which only goes to show that Rowdy Vaughan
was a born optimist.
The Silent One complained that he could not keep supplied with
reading-matter, and Pink bewailed the monotony of inaction. For, beyond
watching the river to keep the cattle from miring in the mud lately released
from frost grip, there was nothing to do.
According to the calendar, spring was well upon them, and the prairies would
soon be flaunting new dresses of green. The calendar, however, had neglected
to record the rainless heat of the summer gone before, or the searing winds
that burned the grass brown as it grew, or the winter which forgot its part
and permitted prairie-dogs to chip-chip-chip above ground in January, when
they should be sleeping decently in their cellar homes.
Apart from the brief storm which Rowdy had brought with him, there had been
no snow worth considering. Always the chill winds shaved the barren land
from the north, or veered unexpectedly, and blew dry warmth from the
southwest; but never the snow for which the land yearned. Wind, and bright
sunlight, and more wind, and hypocritical, drifting clouds, and more sun;
lean cattle walking, walking, up-hill and down coulee, nose to the dry
ground, snipping the stray tufts where should be a woolly carpet of sweet,
ripened grasses, eating wildrose bushes level with the sod, and wishing
there was only an abundance even of them; drifting uneasily from hilltop to
farther hilltop, hunger-driven and gaunt, where should be sleek content.
When they sought to continue their quest beyond the river, and the weaker
bogged at its muddy edge, Rowdy and Pink and the Silent One would ride out,
and with their ropes drag them back ignominiously to solid ground and the
very doubtful joy of living.
May Day found the grass-land brown and lifeless, with a chill wind blowing
over it. The cattle wandered as before except that knock-kneed little calves
trailed beside their lean mothers and clamored for full stomachs.
The Cross L cattle bore the brunt of the range famine, because Eagle Creek
Smith was a stockman of the old school. His cattle must live on the open
range, because they always had done so. Other men bought or leased large
tracts of grass-land, and fenced them for just such an emergency, but not
he. It is true that he had two or three large fields, as Miss Conroy had
told Rowdy, but it was his boast that all the hay he raised was eaten by his
saddlehorses, and that all the fields he owned were used solely for horse
pastures. The open range was the place for cattle and no Cross L critter
ever fed inside a wire fence.
Through the dry summer before, when other men read the ominous signs and
hurriedly leased pasture-land and cut down their herds to what the fields
would feed, Eagle Creek went calmly on as he had done always. He shipped
what beef was fit --and that, of a truth, was not much!--and settled down
for the winter, trusting to winter snows and spring rains to refill the
long-dry lakes and waterholes, and coat the levels anew with grass.
But the winter snows had failed to appear, and with the spring came no rain.
"April showers" became a hideously ironical joke at nature's expense. Always
the wind blew, and sometimes great flocks of clouds would drift
superciliously up from the far sky-line, play with men's hopes, and sail
disdainfully on to some more favored land.
It is all very well for a man to cling stubbornly to precedent, but if he
clings long enough, there comes a time when to cling becomes akin to crime.
Eagle Creek Smith still stubbornly held that rangecattle should be kept to
the range. He waited until May was fast merging to June, watching, from
sheer habit, for the spring transformation of brown prairies into green.
When it did not come, and only the coulee sides and bottoms showed green
among the brown, he accepted ruefully the unusual conditions which nature
had thrust upon him, and started "Wooden Shoes" out with the wagons on the
horse round-up, which is a preliminary to the roundup proper, as every one
knows.
CHAPTER 6
A Shot From the Dark.
"I call that a bad job well done," Pink remarked, after a long silence, as
he gave over trying to catch a fish in the muddy Milk River.
"What?" Rowdy, still prone to day-dreams of matters domestic, came back
reluctantly to reality, and inspected his bait.
"Oh, come alive! I mean the horse round-up. How we're going to keep that
bunch uh skeletons under us all summer is a guessing contest for fair.
Wooden Shoes has got t' give me about forty, instead of a dozen, if he wants
me t' hit 'er up on circle the way I'm used to. I bet their back-bones'll
wear clean up through our saddles."
"Oh, I guess not," said Rowdy calmly. "They ain't so thin--and they'll pick
up flesh. There's some mighty good ones in the bunch, too. I hope Wooden
Shoes don't forget to give me the first pick. There's one I got my eye
on--that blue roan. Anyway, I guess you can wiggle along with less than
forty."
Pink shook his head thoughtfully and sighed. Pink loved good mounts, and the
outlook did not please him. The round-up had camped, for the last time, on
the river within easy riding distance of Camas. The next day's drive would
bring them to the home ranch, where Eagle Creek was fuming over the
lateness of the season, the condition of the range, and the June rains,
which had thus far failed even to moisten decently the grass-roots.
"Let's ride over to Camas; all the other fellows have gone," Pink proposed
listlessly, drawing in his line.
Rowdy as listlessly consented. Camas as a town was neither interesting nor
important; but when one has spent three long weeks communing with nature in
her sulkiest and most unamiable mood, even a town without a railroad to its
name may serve to relieve the monotony of living.
The sun was piling gorgeous masses of purple and crimson clouds high about
him, cuddling his fat cheeks against their soft folds till, a Midas, he
turned them to gold at the touch. Those farther away gloomed jealously at
the favoritism of their lord, and huddled closer together--the purple for
rage, perhaps; and the crimson for shame!
Pink's face was tinged daintily with the glow. and even Rowdy's lean, brown
features were for the moment glorified. They rode knee to knee silently,
thinking each his own thoughts the while they watched the sunset with eyes
grown familiar with its barbaric splendor, but never indifferent.
Soon the west held none but the deeper tints, and the shadows climbed, with
the stealthy tread of trailing Indians, from the valley, chasing the
after-glow to the very hilltops, where it stood a moment at bay and then
surrendered meekly to the dusk. A meadow-lark near-by cut the silence into
haunting ripples of melody, stopped affrighted at their coming, and flew off
into the dull glow of the west; his little body showed black against a
crimson cloud. Out across the river a lone coyote yapped sharply, then
trailed off into the weird plaint of his kind.
"Brother-in-law's in town to-day; Bob Nevin saw him," Pink remarked, when
the coyote ceased wailing and held his peace.
"Who?" Rowdy only half-heard.
"Bob Nevin," repeated Pink naively.
"Don't get funny. Who did Bob see?"
"Brother-in-law. Yours, not mine. Jessie's tin god. If he's there yet, I bid
for an invite to the 'swatfest.' Or maybe"--a horrible possibility forced
itself upon Pink--"maybe you'll kill the fattest maverick and fall on his
neck--"
"The maverick's?" Rowdy's brows were rather pinched together, but his tone
told nothing.
"Naw; Harry Conroy's a fellow's liable to do most any fool thing when he's
got schoolma'amitis."
"That so?"
Pink snorted. The possibility had grown to black certainty in his mind. He
became suddenly furious.
"Lord! I hope some kind friend'll lead me out an' knock me in the head, if
ever I get locoed over any darned girl!"
"Same here," agreed Rowdy, unmoved.
"Then your days are sure numbered in words uh one syllable, old-timer,"
snapped Pink.
Rowdy leaned and patted him caressingly upon the shoulder--a form of irony
which Pink detested. "Don't get excited, sonny," he soothed. "Did you fetch
your gun?"
"I sure did!" Pink drew a long breath of relief. "Yuh needn't think I'm
going t' take chances on being no human colander. I've packed a gun for
Harry Conroy ever since that rough-riding contest uh yourn. Yuh mind the way
I took him under the ear with a rock? He's been makin' war-talk behind m'
back ever since. Did I bring m' gun! Well, I guess yes!" He dimpled
distractingly.
"All the same, it'll suit me not to run up against him," said Rowdy quite
frankly. He knew Pink would understand. Then he lifted his coat
suggestively, to show the weapon concealed beneath, and smiled.
"Different here. Yuh did have sense enough t' be ready--and if yuh see him,
and don't forget he's got a sister with a number two foot, damned if I don't
fix yuh both a-plenty!" He settled his hat more firmly over his curls, and
eyed Rowdy anxiously from under his lashes.
Rowdy caught the action and the look from the tail of his eye, and grinned
at his horse's ears. Pink in warlike mood always made him think of a
four-year-old child playing pirate with the difference that Pink was always
in deadly earnest and would fight like a fiend.
For more reasons than one he hoped they would not meet Harry Conroy. Jessie
was still in ignorance of his real attitude toward her brother, and Rowdy
wanted nothing more than to keep her so. The trouble was that he was quite
certain to forget everything but his grievances, if ever he came face to
face with Harry. Also, Pink would always fight quicker for his friends than
for himself, and he felt very tender toward Pink. So he hoped fervently
that Harry Conroy had already ridden back whence he came, and there would be
no unpleasantness.
Four or five Cross L horses stood meekly before the Come Again Saloon, so
Rowdy and Pink added theirs to the gathering and went in. The Silent One
looked up from his place at a round table in a far corner, and beckoned.
"We need another hand here," he said, when they went over to him. "These
gentlemen are worried because they might be taken into high society some
day, and they would be placed in a very embarrassing position through their
ignorance of bridge-whist. I have very magnanimously consented to teach them
the rudiments."
Bob Nevin looked up, and then lowered an eyelid cautiously. "He's a liar. He
offered to learn us how to play it; we bet him the drinks he didn't savvy
the game himself. Set down, Pink, and I'll have you for my pretty pardner."
The Silent One shuffled the cards thoughtfully. "To make it seem like
bona-fide bridge," he began, "we should have everybody playing."
"Aw, the common, ordinary brand is good enough," protested Bob. "I ain't in
on any trimmings."
The Silent One smiled ever so slightly. "We should have prizes--or favors.
Is there a store in town where one could buy something suitable?"
"They got codfish up here; I smelt it," suggested Jim Ellis. Him the Silent
One ignored.
"What do you say, boys, to a real, high society whist-party? I'll invite the
crowd, and be the hostess. And I'll serve punch--"
"Come on, fellows, and have one with me," called a strange voice near the
door.
"Meeting's adjourned," cried Jim Ellis, and got up to accept the invitation
and range along the bar with the rest. He had not been particularly
interested in bridge-whist anyway.
The others remained seated, and the bartender called across to know what
they would have. Pink cut the cards very carefully, and did not look up.
Rowdy thrust both hands in his pockets and turned his square shoulder to the
bar. He did not need to look--he knew that voice, with its shoddy
heartiness.
Men began to observe his attitude, and looked at one another. When one is
asked to drink with another, he must comply or decline graciously, if he
would not give a direct insult.
Harry Conroy took three long steps and laid a hand on Rowdy's shoulder--a
hand which Rowdy shook off as though it burned. "Say, stranger, are you too
high-toned t' drink with a common cowpuncher?" he demanded sharply.
Rowdy half-turned toward him. "No, sir. But I'll be mighty thirsty before I
drink with you." His voice was even, but it cut.
The room stilled on the instant; it was as if every man of them had turned
to lay figures. Harry Conroy had winced at sight of Rowdy's face--men saw
that, and some of them wondered. Pink leaned back in his chair, every nerve
tightened for the next move, and waited. It was Harry--handsome, sneering, a
certain swaggering defiance in his pose --who first spoke.
"Oh, it's you, is it? I haven't saw yuh for some time. How's
bronco-fighting? Gone up against any more contests?" He laughed
mockingly--with mouth and eyes maddeningly like Jessie's in teasing mood.
Rowdy could have killed him for the resemblance alone. His lids drooped
sleepily over eyes that glittered. Harry saw the sign, read it for danger;
but he laughed again.
"Yuh ought to have seen this bronco-peeler pull leather, boys," he jeered
recklessly "I like to 'a' died. He got piled up the slickest I ever saw; and
there was some feeble-minded Canucks had money up on him, too: He won't
drink with me, 'cause I got off with the purse. He's got a grouch--and I
don't know as I blame him; he did get let down pretty hard, for a fact."
"Maybe he did pull leather--but he didn't cut none, like you did, you damn'
skunk!" It was Pink--Pink, with big, long-lashed eyes purple with rage, and
with a dead-white streak around his mouth, and a gun in his hand.
Harry wheeled toward him, and if a new light of fear crept into his eyes,
his lips belied it in a sneer. "Two of a kind!" he laughed. "So that's the
story yuh brought over here, is it? Hell of a lot uh good it'll do yuh!"
Something in Pink's face warned Rowdy. Harry's face turned watchfully from
one to the other. Evidently he considered Pink the more uncertain of the
two; and he was quite justified in so thinking. Pink was only waiting for a
cue before using his gun; and when Pink once began, there was no telling
where or when he would leave off.
While Harry stood uncertain, Rowdy's fist suddenly spatted against his cheek
with considerable force. He tumbled, a cursing heap, against the foot-rail
of the bar, scrambled up like a cat--a particularly vicious cat--and came at
Rowdy murderously. The Come Again would shortly have been filled with the
pungent haze of burned powder, only that the bartender was a man-of-action.
He hated brawls, and it did not matter to him how just might be the quarrel;
he slapped the gaping barrels of a sawed-off shotgun across the bar--and from
the look of it one might imagine many disagreeable things.
"Drop it! Cut it out!" he bellowed. "Yuh ain't going t' make no
slaughter-pen out uh this joint, I tell yuh. Put up them guns or else take
'em outside. If you fellers are hell-bent on smokin' each other up, they's
all kinds uh room outdoors. Git! Vamose! Hike!"
Conroy wheeled and walked, straight-backed and venomous, to the door. "Come
on out, if yuh ain't scared," he sneered. "It's two agin' one and then some,
by the look uh things. But I'll take yuh singly or in bunches. I'm ready for
the whole damn' Cross L bunch uh coyotes. Come on, you white-livered--!"
Rowdy rushed for him, with Pink and the Silent One at his heels. He had
forgotten that Harry Conroy ever had a sister of any sort whatsoever. All he
knew was that Harry had done him much wrong, of the sort which comes near to
being unforgivable, and that he had sneered insults that no man may
overlook. All he thought of was to get his hands on him.
Outside, the dusky stillness made all sounds seem out of place; the faint
starlight made all objects black and unfamiliar. Rowdy stopped, just off the
threshold, blinking at the darkness which held his enemy. It was strange
that he did not find him at his elbow, he thought--and a suspicion came to
him that Harry was lying in wait; it would be like him. He stepped out of
the yellow glare from a window and stood in more friendly shade. Behind him,
on the door-step, stood the other two, blinking as he had done.
A form which he did not recognize rushed up out of the darkness and
confronted the three belligerently. "You're a-disturbin' the peace," he
yelled. "We don't stand for nothing like that in Camas. You're my
prisoners--all uh yuh." The edict seemed to include even the bartender,
peering over the shoulder of Bob Nevin, who struggled with several others
for immediate passage through the doorway.
"I guess not, pardner," retorted Pink, facing him as defiantly as though the
marshal were not twice his size.
The marshal lunged for him; but the Silent One, reaching a long arm from the
door-step, rapped him smartly on the head with his gun. The marshal squawked
and went down in a formless heap.
"Come on, boys," said the Silent One coolly. "I think we'd better go. Your
friend seems to have vanished in thin air."
Rowdy, grumbling mightily over what looked unpleasantly like retreat, was
pushed toward his horse and mounted under protest. Likewise Pink, who was
for staying and cleaning up the whole town. But the Silent One was firm, and
there was that in his manner which compelled obedience.
Harry Conroy might have been an optical--and aural--illusion, for all the
trace there was of him. But when the three rode out into the little street,
a bullet pinged close to Rowdy's left ear, and the red bark of a revolver
spat viciously from a black shadow beside the Come Again.
Rowdy and the two turned and rode back, shooting blindly at the place, but
the shadow yawned silently before them and gave no sign. Then the Silent
One, observing that the marshal was getting upon a pair of very unsteady
legs, again assumed the leadership, and fairly forced Rowdy and Pink into
the homeward trail.
CHAPTER 7
Rowdy in a Tough Place.
Rowdy, with nice calculation, met Miss Conroy just as she had left the
school-house, and noted with much satisfaction that she was riding alone.
Miss Conroy, if she had been at all observant, must have seen the light of
some fixed purpose shining in his eyes; for Rowdy was resolved to make her a
partner in his dreams of matters domestic. And, of a truth, his easy
assurance was the thinnest of cloaks to hide his inner agitation.
"The round-up just got in yesterday afternoon," he told her, as he swung
into the trail beside her. "We're going to start out again to-morrow, so
this is about the only chance I'll have to see you for a while."
"I knew the round-up must be in," said Miss Conroy calmly. "I heard that you
were in Camas a night or two ago."
Inwardly, Rowdy dodged. "We camped close to Camas," he conceded guardedly.
"A lot of us fellows rode into town."
"Yes, so Harry told me," she said. "He came over to see me yesterday. He is
going to leave--has already, in fact. He has had a fine position offered him
by the Indian agent at Belknap. The agent used to be a friend of father's."
She looked at Rowdy sidelong, and then went straight at what was in the
minds of both.
"I'm sorry to hear, Mr. Vaughan, that you are on bad terms with Harry. What
was the trouble?" She turned her head and smiled at him--but the smile did
not bring his lips to answer; it was unpleasantly like the way Harry smiled
when he had some deviltry in mind.
Rowdy scented trouble and parried. "Men can't always get along agreeably
together."
"And you disagree with a man rather emphatically, I should judge. Harry said
you knocked him down." Politeness ruled her voice, but cheeks and eyes were
aflame.
"I did. And of course he told you how he took a shot at me from a dark
corner, outside." Rowdy's eyes, it would seem, had kindled from the fire in
hers.
"No, he didn't--but I--you struck him first."
"Hitting a man with your fist is one thing," said Rowdy with decision.
"Shooting at him from ambush is another."
"Harry shouldn't have done that," she admitted with dignity. "But why
wouldn't you take a drink with him? Not that I approve of drinking--I wish
Harry wouldn't do such things--but he said it was an insult the way you
refused."
"Jessie--"
"Miss Conroy, please."
"Jessie"--he repeated the name stubbornly--"I think we'd better drop that
subject. You don't understand the case; and, anyway, I didn't come here to
discuss Harry. Our trouble is long standing, and if I insulted him you ought
to know I had a reason. I never came whining to you about him, and it don't
speak well for him that he hot-footed over to you with his version. I
suppose he'd heard about me--er--going to see you, and wanted to queer me.
I hope you'll take my word for it, Jessie, that I've never harmed him; all
the trouble he's made for himself, one way and another.
"But what I came over for to-day concerns just you and me. I wanted to tell
you that--to ask you if you'll marry me. I might put it more artistic,
Jessie, but that's what I mean, and--I mean all the things I'd like to say
and can't." He stopped and smiled at her, wistfully whimsical. "I've been
three weeks getting my feelings into proper words, little girl, and coming
over here I had a speech thought out that sure done justice to my subject.
But all I can remember of it is just that--that I want you for always."
Miss Conroy looked away from him, but he could see a deeper tint of red in
her cheek. It seemed a long time before she said anything. Then: "But you've
forgotten about Harry. He's my brother, and he'd be--er--you wouldn't want
him related-- to you."
"Harry! Well, I pass him up. I've got a pretty long account against him; but
I'll cross it off. It won't be hard to do--for you. I've thought of all
that; and a man can forgive a whole lot in the brother of the woman he
loves." He leaned toward her and added honestly: "I can't promise you I'll
ever get to like him, Jessie; but I'll keep my hands off him, and I'll treat
him civil; and when you consider all he's done, that's quite a large-sized
contract."
Miss Conroy became much interested in the ears of her horse.
"The only thing to decide is whether you like me enough. If you do, we'll
sure be happy. Never mind Harry."
"You're very generous," she flared, "telling me to never mind Harry. And
Harry's my own brother, and the only near relative I've got. I know
he's--impulsive, and quick-tempered, perhaps. But he needs me all the more.
Do you think I'll turn against him, even for you?"
That "even" may have been a slip, but it heartened Rowdy immensely. "I don't
ask you to," he told her gently. "I only want you to not turn against me."
"I do wish you two would be sensible, and stop quarreling." She glanced at
him briefly.
"I'm willing to cut it out--I told you that. I can't answer for him,
though." Rowdy sighed, wishing Harry Conroy in Australia, or some place
equally remote.
Miss Conroy suddenly resolved to be strictly just; and when a young woman
sets about being deliberately just, the Lord pity him whom she judges!
"Before I answer you, I must know just what all this is about," she said
firmly. "I want to hear both sides; I'm sure Harry wouldn't do anything
mean. Do you think he would?"
Rowdy was dissentingly silent.
"Do you really, in your heart, believe that Harry would--knowingly--be
guilty of anything mean?" Her eyes plainly told the answer she wanted to
hear.
Rowdy looked into them, hesitated, and clung tenaciously to his
convictions. "Yes, I do; and I know Harry pretty well, Jessie." His face
showed how much he hated to say it.
"I'm afraid you are very prejudiced," she sighed. "But go on; tell me just
what you have against Harry. I'm sure it can all be explained away, only I
must hear what it is."
Rowdy regarded her, puzzled. How he was to comply he did not know. It would
be simply brutal to tell her. He would feel like a hangman. And she believed
so in Harry, she wouldn't listen; even if she did, he thought bitterly, she
would hate him for destroying her faith. A woman's justice--ah, me!
"Don't you see you're putting me in a mighty hard position, girlie?" he
protested. "You're a heap better off not to know. He's your brother. I wish
you'd take my word that I'll drop the whole thing right where it is. Harry's
had all the best of it, so far; let it stand that way."
Her eyes met his coldly. "Are you afraid to let me judge between you? What
did he do? Daren't you tell?"
Rowdy's lids drooped ominously. "If you call that a dare," he said grimly,
"I'll tell you, fast enough. I was a friend to him when he needed one mighty
bad. I helped him when he was dead broke and out uh work. I kept him going
all winter--and to show his gratitude, he gave me the doublecross, in more
ways than one. I won't go into details." He decided that he simply could not
tell her bluntly that Harry had worked off stolen horses on him, and worse.
"Oh--you won't go into details!" Scorn filled eyes and voice. "Are they so
trivial, then? You tell me what you did for Harry--playing Good Samaritan.
Harry, let me tell you, has property of his own; I can't see why he should
ever be in need of charity. You're like all the rest; you hint things
against him--but I believe it's just jealousy. You can't come out honestly
and tell me a single instance where he has harmed you, or done anything
worse than other high-spirited young men."
"It wouldn't do any good to tell you," he retorted. "You think he's just
lacking wings to be an angel. I hope to God you'll always be able to think
so! I'm sure I don't want to jar your faith."
"I must say your actions don't bear out your words. You've just been trying
to turn me against him."
"I haven't. I've been trying to convince you that I want you, anyway, and
Harry needn't come between us."
"In other words, you're willing to overlook my being Harry's sister. I
appreciate your generosity, I'm sure." She did not look, however, as if she
meant that.
"I didn't mean that."
"Then you won't overlook it? How very unfortunate! Because I can't help the
relationship."
"Would you, if you could?" he asked rashly.
"Certainly not!"
"I'm afraid we're getting off the trail," he amended tactfully. "I asked
you, a while back, if you'd marry me."
"And I said I must hear both sides of your trouble with Harry, before I
could answer."
"What's the use? You'd take his part, anyway."
"Not if I found he was guilty of all you--insinuate. I should be perfectly
just." She really believed that.
"Can't you tell me yes or no, anyway? Don't let him come between us."
"I can't help it. We'd never agree, or be happy. He'd keep on coming between
us, whether we meant him to or not," she said dispiritedly.
"That's a cinch," Rowdy muttered, thinking of Harry's trouble-breeding
talents.
"Then there's no more to be said. Until you and Harry settle your
difficulties amicably, or I am convinced that he's in the wrong, we'll just
be friends, Mr. Vaughan. Good afternoon." She rode into the Rodway yard,
feeling very just and virtuous, no doubt. But she left Rowdy with some
rather unpleasant thoughts, and with a sentiment toward her precious brother
which was not far from manslaughter.
CHAPTER 8
Pink in a Threatening Mood.
Eagle Creek Smith had at last reached the point where he must face new
conditions and change established customs. He could no longer ignore the
barrenness of the range, or close his eyes to the grim fact that his cattle
were facing starvation--and that in June, when they should be taking on
flesh.
When he finally did confess to himself that things couldn't go on like that,
others had been before him in leasing and buying land, until only the dry
benches were left to him and his hungry herds.
But Eagle Creek was a man of resource. When the round-up pulled in and
Wooden Shoes reported to him the general state of the cattle, and told of
the water-holes newly fenced and of creek bottoms gobbled by men more
farseeing than he, Eagle Creek took twenty-four hours to adjust himself to
the situation and to meet the crisis before him. His own land, as compared
to his twenty thousand cattle, was too pitifully inadequate for a second
thought.
He must look elsewhere for the correct answer to his problem.
When Rowdy rode apathetically up to the stable, Pink came out of the
bunk-house to meet him, big with news. "Oh, doctor! We're up against it
a-plenty now," he greeted, with his dimples at their deepest.
"Huh!" grunted Rowdy crossly. "What's hurting you, Pink?"
"Forecasting the future," Pink retorted. "Eagle Creek has come alive, and
has wised up sudden to the fact that this ain't going t' be any Noah's flood
brand uh summer, and that his cattle look like the tailings of a wash-board
factory. He's got busy--and we're sure going to. We're due t' hit the grit
out uh here in the first beams uh rosy morn, and do a record stunt at
gathering cattle."
"Well, we were going to, anyhow," Rowdy cut in.
"But that's only the prelude, old-timer. We've got t' take 'em across
country to the Belknap reservation. Eagle Creek went t' town and
telegraphed, and got the refusal of it for pasturage; he ain't so slow,
oncet he gets started. But if you've ever rode over them dried-up benches,
you savvy the merry party we'll be when we git there. I've saw jack-rabbits
packing their lunch along over there."
"Belknap"--Rowdy dropped his saddle spitefully to the ground--"is where our
friend Conroy has just gone to fill a splendid position."
Pink thoughtfully blew the ashes from his cigarette. "Harry Conroy would
fill one position fine. So one uh these days I'll offer it to him. I don't
know anybody that'd look nicer in a coffin than that jasper--and if he's
gone t' Belknap, that's likely the position he'll fill, all right."
Rowdy said nothing, but his very silence told Pink much.
"How'd yuh make out with Jessie?" Pink asked frankly, though he was not
supposed to know where Rowdy had been.
Rowdy knew from experience that it was useless trying to keep anything from
Pink that Pink wanted to know; besides, there was a certain comfort in
telling his troubles to so stanch a friend. "Harry got his work in there,
too," he said bitterly. "He beat me to her and queered me for good, by the
looks."
"Huh!" said Pink. "I wouldn't waste much time worrying over her, if she's
that easy turned."
"She's all right," defended Rowdy quickly. "I don't know as I blame her; she
takes the stand any sister would take. She wants to know all about the
trouble--hear both sides, she said, so she could judge which was to blame. I
guess she's got her heart set on being peacemaker. I know one thing:
she--likes me, all right."
"I don't see how he queered yuh any, then," puzzled Pink. "She sure couldn't
take his part after you'd told her all he done."
Rowdy turned on him savagely. "You little fool, do you think I told her?
Right there's the trouble. He told his story; and when she asked for mine, I
couldn't say anything. She's his sister."
"You--didn't--tell!" Pink leaned against the stable and stared. "Rowdy
Vaughan, there's times when even your friend can't disguise the fact that
yuh act plumb batty. Yuh let Harry do yuh dirt that any other man'd 'a'
killed him on bare suspicion uh doing; and yuh never told her when she asked
yuh to! How yuh lent him money, and let him steal some right out uh your
pocket--"
"I couldn't prove that," Rowdy objected.
"And yuh never told her about his cutting your latigo--"
"Oh, cut it out!" Rowdy glowered down at him. "I guess I don't need to be
reminded of all those things. But are they the things a man can tell a girl
about her brother? Pink, you're about as unfeeling a little devil as I ever
run across. Maybe you'd have told her; but I couldn't. So it's all off."
He turned away and stared unseeingly at the rim of hills that hid the place
where she lived. She seemed very far away from him just then--and very, very
desirable. He thought then that he had never before realized just how much
he cared.
"You can jest bet I'd 'a' told her!" gritted Pink, watching furtively
Rowdy's averted face. "She ain't goin' t' be bowed down by no load of
ignorance much longer, either. If she don't get Harry Conroy's pedigree
straight out, without the varnish, it'll be because I ain't next to all his
past."
But Rowdy, glooming among the debris of certain pet air-castles, neither
heard nor wanted to hear Pink's wrathful mutterings.As a matter of fact, it
was not till Pink clattered out of the yard on Mascot that he remembered
where he was. Even then it did not occur to him to wonder where Pink was
going.
CHAPTER 9
Moving the Herd.
Four thousand weary cattle crawled up the long ridge which divides Chin
Coulee from Quitter Creek. Pink, riding point, opposite the Silent One,
twisted round in his saddle and looked back at the slow-moving river of
horns and backs veiled in a gray dust-cloud. Down the line at intervals rode
the others, humped listlessly in their saddles, their hat brims pulled low
over tired eyes that smarted with dust and wind and burning heat.
Pink sighed, and wished lonesomely that it was Rowdy riding point with him,
instead of the Silent One, who grew even more silent as the day dragged
leadenly to mid-afternoon; Pink could endure anything better than being left
to his thoughts and to the complaining herd for company.
He took off his hat, pushed back his curls--dripping wet they were and
flattened unbecomingly in pasty, yellow rings on his forehead--and eyed with
disfavor a line-backed, dry cow, with one horn tipped rakishly toward her
speckled nose; she blinked silently at wind and heat, and forged steadily
ahead, up-hill and down coulee,always in the lead, always walking, walking,
like an automaton. Her energy, in the face of all the dry, dreary days,
rasped Pink's nerves unbearably. For nearly a week he had
ridden left point, and always that line-backed cow with the down-crumpled
horn walked and walked and walked, a length ahead of her most intrepid
followers.
He leaned from his saddle, picked up a rock from the barren, yellow
hillside, and threw it at the cow spitefully. The rock bounced off her lean
rump; she blinked and broke into a shuffling trot, her dragging hoofs
kicking up an extra amount of dust, which blew straight into Pink's face.
"Aw, cut it out!" he shouted petulantly. "You're sure the limit, without
doing any stunts at sprinting up-hill. Ain't yuh got any nerves, yuh blamed
old skate? Yuh act like it was milkin'-time, and yuh was headed straight for
the bars and a bran mash. Can't yuh realize the kind uh deal you're up
against? Here's cattle that's got you skinned for looks, old girl, and they
know it's coming blamed tough; and you just bat your eyes and peg along
like yuh enjoyed it. Bawl, or something, can't yuh? Drop back a foot and act
human!"
The Silent One looked across at him with a tired smile. "Let her go, Pink,
and pray for more like her," he called amusedly. "There'll be enough of them
dropping back presently."
Pink threw one leg over the horn and rode sidewise, made him a cigarette,
and tried to forget the cow--or, at least, to forgive her for not acting as
dog-tired as he felt.
They were on the very peak of the ridge now, and the hill sloped smoothly
down before them to the bluff which bounded Quitter Creek. Far down, a tiny
black speck in the coulee-bottom, they could see Wooden Shoes riding along
the creek-bank, scouting for water. From the way he rode, and from the fact
that camp was nowhere in sight, Pink guessed shrewdly that his quest was in
vain. He shrugged his shoulders at what that meant, and gave his attention
to the herd.
The marching line split at the brow of the bluff. The line-backed cow
lowered her head a bit and went unfaltering down the parched, gravel-coated
hill, followed by a few hundred of the freshest. Then the stream stopped
flowing, and Pink and the Silent One rode back up the bluff to where the
bulk of the footsore herd, their senses dulled by hunger and weariness and
choking thirst, sniffed at the gravel that promised agony to their bruised
feet, and balked at the ordeal. Others straggled up, bunched against the
rebels, and stood stolidly where they were.
Pink galloped on down the crawling line. "Forward, the Standard Oil
Brigade!" he yelled whimsically as he went.
The cowboys heard--and understood. They left their places and went forward
at a lope, and Pink rode back to the coulee edge, untying his slicker as he
went. The Silent One was already off his horse and shouting hoarsely as he
whacked with his slicker at the sulky mass. Pink rode in and did the same.
It was not the first time this thing had happened, and from a diversion it
was verging closely on the monotonous. Presently, even a rank tenderfoot
must have caught the significance of Pink's military expression. The
Standard Oil Brigade was at the front in force.
Cowboys, swinging five-gallon oil-cans, picked up from scattered sheep camps
and carried many a weary mile for just such an emergency, were charging the
bunch intrepidly. Others made shift with flat sirup-cans with pebbles
inside. A few, like Pink and the Silent One, flapped their slickers till
their arms ached. Anything, everything that would make a din and startle the
cattle out of their lethargy, was pressed into service.
But they might have been raised in a barnyard and fed cabbage leaves from
back door-steps, for all the excitement they showed. Cattle that three
months ago--or a month--would run, head and tail high in air, at sight of a
man on foot, backed away from a rattling, banging cube of gleaming tin,
turned and faced the thing dull-eyed and apathetic.
In time, however, they gave way dogedly before the onslaught. A few were
forced shrinkingly down the hill; others followed gingerly, until the line
lengthened and flowed, a sluggish, brown-red stream, into the coulee and
across to Quitter Creek.
Here the leaders were browsing greedily along the banks. They had emptied
the few holes that had still held a meager store of brackish water and so
the mutinous bulk of the herd snuffed at the trampled, muddy spots and
bellowed their disappointment.
Wooden Shoes rode up and surveyed the half maddened animals gloomily. "Push
'em on, boys," he said. "They's nothings for 'em here. I've sent the wagons
on to Red Willow; we'll try that next. Push 'em along all yuh can, while I
go on ahead and see."
With tin-cans, slickers, and much vituperation, they forced the herd up the
coulee side and strung them out again on trail. The line-backed cow walked
and walked in the lead before Pink's querulous gaze, and the others plodded
listlessly after. The gray dust-cloud formed anew over their slowmoving
backs, and the cowboys humped over in their saddles and rode and rode, with
the hot sun beating aslant in their dirt-grimed faces, and with the wind
blowing and blowing.
If this had been the first herd to make that dreary trip, things would not
have been quite so disheartening. But it was the third. Seven thousand lean
kine had passed that way before them, eating the scant grass growth and
drinking what water they could find among those barren, sun-baked coulees.
The Cross L boys, on this third trip, were become a jaded lot of
hollow-eyed men, whose nerves were rasped raw with long hours and longer
days in the saddle. Pink's cheeks no longer made his name appropriate, and
he was not the only one who grew fretful over small things. Rowdy had been
heard, more than once lately, to anathematize viciously the prairie-dogs for
standing on their tails and chipchip-chipping at them as they went by. And
though the Silent One did not swear, he carried rocks in his pockets,
and threw them with venomous precision at every "dog" that showed his
impertinent nose out of a burrow within range. For Pink, he vented his
spleen on the line-backed cow.
So they walked and walked and walked.
The cattle balked at another hill, and all the tincans and slickers in the
crowd could scarcely move them. The wind dropped with the sun, and the
clouds glowed gorgeously above them, getting scant notice, except that they
told eloquently of the coming night; and there were yet miles--long, rough,
heartbreaking miles--to put behind them before they could hope for the
things their tired bodies craved: supper and dreamless sleep.
When the last of the herd had sidled, under protest, down the long hill to
the flat, dusk was pushing the horizon closer upon them, mile by mile. When
they crawled sinuously out upon the welcome level, the hill loomed ghostly
and black behind them. A mile out, Wooden Shoes rode out of the gloom and
met the point. He turned and rode beside Pink.
"Yuh'll have t' swing 'em north," he greeted.
"Red Willow's dry as hell--all but in the Rockin' R field. No use askin' ole
Mullen to let us in there; we'll just go. I sent the wagons through the
fence, an' yuh'll find camp about a mile up from the mouth uh the big
coulee. You swing 'em round the end uh this bench, an' hit that big coulee
at the head. When you come t' the fence, tear it down. They's awful good
grass in that field!"
"All right," said Pink cheerfully. It was in open defiance of range
etiquette; but their need was desperate. The only thing about it Pink did
not like was the long detour they must make. He called the news across to
the Silent One, after Wooden Shoes had gone on down the line, and they swung
the point gradually to the left.
Before that drive was over, Pink had vowed many times to leave the range
forever and never to turn another cow--besides a good many other foolish
things which would be forgotten, once he had a good sleep. And Rowdy,
plodding half-way down the herd, had grown exceedingly pessimistic regarding
Jessie Conroy, and decided that there was no sense in thinking about her all
the time, the way he had been doing. Also, he told himself savagely that if
Harry ever crossed his trail again, there would be something doing. This
thing of letting a cur like that run roughshod over a man on account of a
girl that didn't care was plumb idiotic. And beside him the cattle walked
and walked and walked, a dim, moving mass in the quiet July night.
CHAPTER 10
Harry Conroy at Home.
It was late next morning when they got under way; for they had not reached
camp until long after midnight, and Wooden Shoes was determined the cattle
should have one good feed, and all the water they wanted, to requite them
for the hard drive of the day before.
Pink rode out with Rowdy to the herd--a heavylidded, gloomy Rowdy he was,
and not amiably inclined toward the small talk of the range. But Pink had
slept five whole hours and was almost his normal self; which means that
speech was not to be denied him.
"What yuh mourning over?" he bantered. "Mad 'cause the reservation's so
close?"
"Sure," assented Rowdy, with deep sarcasm.
"That's what I thought. Studying up the nicest way uh giving brother-in-law
the glad hand, ain't yuh?"
"He's no relation uh mine--and never will be," said Rowdy curtly. "And I'll
thank you, Pink, to drop that subject for good and all."
"Down she goes," assented Pink, quite unperturbed. "But the cards ain't all
turned yet, yuh want to remember, I wouldn't pass on no hand like you've
got. If I wanted a girl right bad, Rowdy, I'd wait till I got refused before
I'd quit."
"Seems to me you've changed your politics lately," Rowdy retorted. "A while
back you was cussing the whole business; and now you're worse than an old
maid aunt. Pink, you may not be wise to the fact, but you sure are an
inconsistent little devil."
"Are yuh going t' hunt Harry up and--"
"I thought I told you to drop that."
"Did yuh? All right, then--only I hope yuh didn't leave your gun packed away
in your bed," he insinuated.
"You can take a look to-night, if you want to."
Pink laughed in a particularly infectious way he had, and, before he quite
knew it, Rowdy was laughing, also. After that the world did not look quite
so forlorn as it had, nor the day's work so distasteful. So Pink, having
accomplished his purpose, was content to turn the subject.
"There's old Liney"--he pointed her out to Rowdy--"fresh as a meadow-lark. I
had a big grouch against her yesterday, just because she batted her eyes and
kept putting one foot ahead uh the other. I could 'a' killed her. But she's
all right, that old girl. The way she led out down that black coulee last
night wasn't slow! Say, she's an ambitious old party. I wish you was riding
point with me, Rowdy. The Silent One talks just about as much as
that old cow. He sure loves to live up to his rep."
"Oh, go on to work," Rowdy admonished. "You make me think of a magpie." All
the same, he looked after him with smiling lips, and eyes that forgot their
gloom. He even whistled while he helped round up the scattered herd, ready
for that last day's drive.
Every man in the outfit comforted himself with the thought that it was the
last day's drive. After long weeks of trailing lean herds over barren,
windbrushed hills, the last day meant much to them. Even the Silent One sang
something they had never heard before, about "If Only I Knew You Were True."
They crossed the Rocking R field, took down four panels of fence, passed
out, and carefully put them up again behind them. Before them stretched
level plain for two miles; beyond that a high, rocky ridge that promised
some trouble with the herd, and after that more plain and a couleee or two,
and then, on a far slope--the reservation.
The cattle were rested and fed, and walked out briskly; the ridge neared
perceptibly. Pink's shrill whistle carried far back down the line and
mingled pleasantly with voices calling to one another across the herd. Not a
man was humped listlessly in his saddle; instead, they rode with shoulders
back and hats at divers jaunty angles to keep the sun from shining in eyes
that faced the future cheerfully.
The herd steadily climbed the ridge, choosing the smoothest path and the
easiest slope. Pink assured the line-backed cow that she was a peach, and
told her to "go to it, old girl." The Silent One's pockets were quite empty
of rocks, and the prairiedogs chipped and flirted their funny little tails
unassailed. And Rowdy, from wondering what had made Pink change his attitude
so abruptly, began to plan industriously the next meeting with
Jessie Conroy, and to build a new castle that was higher and airier than any
he had ever before attempted--and perhaps had a more flimsy foundation; for
it rested precariously on Pink's idle remarks.
The point gained the top of the ridge, and Pink turned and swung his hat
jubilantly at the others. The reservation was in sight, though it lay
several miles distant. But in that clear air one could distinguish the line
fence--if one had the eye of faith and knew just where to look. Presently he
observed a familiar horseman climbing the ridge to meet them.
"Eagle Creek's coming," he shouted to the man behind. "Come alive, there,
and don't let 'em roam all over the map. Git some style on yuh!"
Those who heard laughed; no one ever dreamed of being offended at what Pink
said. Those who had not heard had the news passed on to them, in various
forms. Wooden Shoes, who had been loitering in the rear gossiping with the
men, rode on to meet Smith.
Eagle Creek urged his horse up the last steep place, right in the face of
the leaders, which halted and tried to turn back. Pink, swearing in a
whisper, began to force them forward.
"Let 'em alone," Eagle Creek bellowed harshly. "They ain't goin' no
farther."
"W-what?" Pink stopped short and eyed him critically. Eagle Creek could not
justly be called a teetotaler; but Pink had never known him to get worse
than a bit wobbly in his legs; his mind had never fogged perceptibly. Still,
something was wrong with him, that was certain. Pink glanced dubiously
across at the Silent One and saw him shrug his shoulders expressively.
Eagle Creek rode up and stopped within ten feet of the line-backed cow; she
seemed hurt at being held up in this manner, Pink thought.
"Yuh'll have t' turn this herd back," Eagle Creek announced bluntly.
"Where to?" Pink asked, too stunned to take in the meaning of it.
"T' hell, I guess. It's the only place I know of where everybody's
welcome." Eagle Creek's tone was not pleasant.
"We just came from there," Pink said simply, thinking of the horrors of that
drive.
"Where's Wooden Shoes?" snapped the old man; and the foreman's hat-crown
appeared at that instant over the ridge.
"Well, we're up against it," Eagle Creek greeted. "That damn' agent--or the
fellow he had workin' for him--reported his renting us pasture. Made the
report read about twice as many as we're puttin' on. He's got orders now t'
turn out every hoof but what b'longs there."
"My Lord!" Wooden Shoes gasped at the catastrophe which faced the Cross L.
"That's Harry Conroy's work," Pink cut in sharply' "He'd hurt the Cross L if
he could, t' spite me and Rowdy. He--"
"Don't matter--seein' it's done. Yuh might as well turn the herd loose right
here, an' let 'em go t' the devil. I don't know what else t' do with 'em."
"Anything gone wrong?" It was Rowdy, who had left his place and ridden
forward to see what was holding the herd back.
"Naw. We're fired off the reservation, is all. We got orders to take the
herd to hell. Eagle Creek's leased it. Mr. Satan is going to keep house here
in Montana; he says it's better for his trade," Pink informed him, in his
girlish treble.
Eagle Creek turned on him fiercely, then thought better of it and grinned.
"Them arrangements wouldn't make us any worse off'n what we are," he
commented. "Turn 'em loose, boys."
"Man, if yuh turn 'em loose here, the first storm that hits 'em, they all
die," Wooden Shoes interposed excitedly. "They ain't nothings for 'em. We
had t' turn 'em into the Rockin' R field last night, t' git water an' feed.
Red Willow's gone dry outside dat field. They ain't--nothings. They'll die!"
Eagle Creek looked at him dully. For the first time in his life he faced
utter ruin. "Damn 'em, let 'em die, then!" he said.
"That's what they'll sure do," Wooden Shoes reiterated stubbornly. "If they
don't git feed and water now, yuh needn't start no round-up next spring."
Pink's eyes went down over the close-huddled backs and the thicket of
polished horns, and his eyelids stung. Would all of them die, he wondered!
Four thousand! He hoped not. There must be some way out. Down the hill, he
knew the cowboys were making cigarettes while they waited and wondered
mightily what it was all about If they only knew, he thought, there would be
more than one rope ready for Harry Conroy.
"How about the Peck reservation? Couldn't you get them on there?" Rowdy
ventured.
"Not a hoof!" growled Eagle Creek, with his chin sunk against his chest.
"There's thirty thousand Valley County cattle on there now." He looked down
at the cattle, as Pink had done. "God! It's bad enough t' go broke," he
groaned; "but t' think uh them poor brutes dyin' off in bunches, for want uh
grass an' water! I've run that brand fer over thirty year."
CHAPTER 11
Rowdy Promoted.
Rowdy rode closer. "If you don't mind paying duty," he began tentatively, "I
can put you next to a range over the line, where I'll guarantee feed and
water the year round for every hoof you own."
Eagle Creek lifted his head and looked at him "Whereabouts?" he demanded
skeptically.
"Up in the Red Deer country. Pink knows the place. There's range a-plenty,
and creeks running through that never go dry; and the country isn't stocked
and fenced to death, like this is."
"And would we be ordered off soon as we got there?"
"Sure not--if you paid duty, which would only be about double what you were
going to pay for one year's pasture."
Eagle Creek breathed deeply, like a man who has narrowly escaped
suffocation. "Young man, I b'lieve you're a square dealer, and that yuh
savvy the cow business. I've thought it ever since yuh started t' work." His
keen old eyes twinkled at the memory of Rowdy's arrival, and Rowdy grinned.
"I take yuh at your word, and yuh can consider yourself in charge uh this
herd as it stands. Take it t' that cow heaven yuh tell about--and damn it,
yuh won't be none the worse for it!"
"We'll pass that up," said Rowdy quietly. "I'll take the herd through,
though; and I'd advise you to get the rest on the road as soon as they can
be gathered. It's a three-hundred-mile drive."
"All right. From now on it's up to you," Eagle Creek told him briskly. "Take
'em back t' the Rockin' R field, and I'll send the wagons back t' you. Old
Mullen'll likely make a roar--but that's most all gove'ment land he's got
fenced, so I guess I can calm him down. Will yuh go near the ranch?"
"I think so," said Rowdy. "It will be the shortest way."
"Well, I'll give yuh some blank checks, an' you can load up with grub and
anything else yuh need. I'll be over there by the time you are, and fix up
that duty business. Wooden Shoes'll have t' get another outfit together, and
get another bunch on the trail. One good thing--I got thirty days t' get off
what cattle is on there; and thirty days uh grass and water'll put 'em in
good shape for the trip. Wish this bunch was as well fixed."
"That's what," Rowdy assented. "But I think they'll make it, all right."
"I'll likely want yuh to stay up there and keep cases on 'em. Any
objections?"
"Sure not!" laughed Rowdy. "Only I'll want Pink and the Silent One to stay
with me."
"Keep what men yuh want. Anything else?"
"I don't think of anything," said Rowdy. "Only I'd like to have
a--talk--with Conroy." Creek eyed him sharply. "Yuh won't be apt t' meet
him. Old Bill Brown, up home, would like to see him, too. Bill's a
perseverin' old cuss, and wants to see Conroy so bad he's got the sheriff
out lookin' for him. It's about a bunch uh horses that was run off, three
years ago. Yuh brought one of 'em back into the country last spring, yuh
mind."
Rowdy and Pink looked at one another, but said nothing.
"Old Bill, he follered your back trail and found out some things he wanted
t' know. Conroy got wind of it, though, and he left the agency