you'll have to count me, same as you count Jim and Sorry. Won't you
please feel that I'm one more in the game, dad, and not just another
responsibility? I'll herd cattle, or do whatever there is to do. And
I'll keep my mouth shut, too. I can't stay here, day after day, doing
nothing but sweep and dust two rooms and fry potatoes and bacon for you
at night. Dad, I'll go _crazy_ if you don't let me into your life!
"Dad, if you knew the stunts I've done in the last three years! It was
make-believe West, but I learned things just the same." She kissed him
on the unshaven cheek nearest her,--and thought of the kisses she had
breathed upon the cheeks of story fathers with due care for the make-up
on her lips. Just because this was real, she kissed him again with the
frank vigor of a child.
"Dad," she said wheedlingly, "I think you might scare up something that
I can really ride. Yellowjacket is safe, but--but you have real _live_
horses on the ranch, haven't you? You must _not_ go judging me by the
palms and the bay windows of the Casa Grande. That's where I've slept,
the last few years when I wasn't off on location--but it's just as
sensible to think I don't know anything else, as it would be for me to
think you can't do anything but skim milk and fry bacon and make
sour-dough bread, just because I've seen you do it!"
Brit laughed and patted her awkwardly on the back. "If you was a boy,
I'd set you up as a lawyer," he said with an attempt at playfulness. "I
kinda thought you could ride. I seen how you piled onto old Yellowjacket
and the way you held your reins. It runs in the blood, I guess. I'll see
what I can do in the way of a horse. Ole Yellowjacket used to be a real
rim-rider, but he's gitting old; gitting old--same as me."
"You're not! You're just letting yourself _feel_ old. And am I one of
the outfit, dad?"
"I guess so--only there ain't going to be any of this hell-whoopin'
stuff, Raine. You can't travel these trails at a long lope with yore
hair flyin' out behind and--and all that damn foolishness. I've saw 'em
in the movin' pitchers----"
Lorraine blushed, and was thankful that her dad had not watched her work
in that serial. For that matter, she hoped that Lone Morgan would never
stray into a movie where any of her pictures were being shown.
"I'm serious, dad. I don't want to make a show of myself. But if you'll
feel that I can be a help instead of a handicap, that's what I want. And
if it comes to fighting----"
Brit pushed her from him impatiently. "There yuh go--fight--fight--and I
told yuh there ain't any fighting going on. Nothing more'n a fight to
hang on and make a living. That means straight, hard work and mindin'
your own business. If you want to help at that----"
"I do," said Raine quietly, getting to her feet. Her legacy of
stubbornness set her lips firmly together. "That's exactly what I mean.
Good night, dad."
Brit answered her noncommittally, apparently sunk already in his own
musings. But his lips drew in to suppress a smile when he saw, from the
corner of his eyes, that Lorraine was winding the alarm on the cheap
kitchen clock, and that she set the hand carefully and took the clock
with her to bed.
CHAPTER NINE
THE EVIL EYE OF THE SAWTOOTH
Oppression is a growth that flourishes best in the soil of opportunity.
It seldom springs into full power at once. The Sawtooth Cattle Company
had begun much as its neighbors had begun: with a tract of land, cattle,
and the ambition for prospering. Senator Warfield had then been plain
Bill Warfield, manager of the outfit, who rode with his men and saw how
his herds increased,--saw too how they might increase faster under
certain conditions. At the outset he was not, perhaps, more unscrupulous
than some of his neighbors. True, if a homesteader left his claim for a
longer time than the law allowed him, Bill Warfield would choose one of
his own men to file a contest on that claim. The man's wages would be
paid. Witnesses were never lacking to swear to the improvements he had
made, and after the patent had been granted the homesteader (for the
contestant always won, in that country) the Sawtooth, would pay him for
the land. Frequently a Sawtooth man would file upon land before any
other man had claimed it. Sometimes a Sawtooth man would purchase a
relinquishment from some poor devil of a claim-holder who seemed always
to have bad luck, and so became discouraged and ready to sell. An
intelligent man like Bill Warfield could acquire much land in this
manner, give him time enough.
In much the same manner his herds increased. He bought out small
ranchers who were crowded to the selling point in one way or another.
They would find themselves fenced off from water, the Sawtooth having
acquired the water rights to creek or spring. Or they would be hemmed in
with fenced fields and would find it next to impossible to make use of
the law which gave them the right to "condemn" a road through. They
would not be openly assailed,--Bill Warfield was an intelligent man. A
dozen brands were recorded in the name of the Sawtooth Cattle Company,
and if a small rancher found his calf crop shorter than it should be, he
might think as he pleased, but he would have no tangible proof that his
calves wore a Sawtooth brand.
Inevitably it became necessary now and then to stop a mouth that was
ready to speak unwelcome truths. But if a Sawtooth man were known to
have committed violence, the Sawtooth itself was the first to put the
sheriff on his trail. If the man successfully dodged the sheriff and
made his way to parts unknown, the Sawtooth could shrug its shoulders
and wash its hands of him.
Then whispers were heard that the Sawtooth had on its pay roll men who
were paid to kill and to leave no trace. So many heedless ones crossed
the Sawtooth's path to riches! Fred Thurman had been one; a "bull-headed
cuss" who had the temerity to fight back when the Sawtooth calmly laid
claim to the first water rights to Granite Creek, having bought it, they
said, with the placer claim of an old miner who had prospected along the
headwaters of Granite at the base of Bear Top.
By that time the Sawtooth had grown to a power no poor man could hope to
defeat. Bill Warfield was Senator Warfield, and Senator Warfield was a
power in the political world that immediately surrounded him. Since his
neighboring ranchmen had not been able to prevent his steady climbing to
the position he now held, they had small hope of pulling him down. Brit
was right. They did well to hang on and continue living in that
country.
An open killing, one that would attract the attention of the outside
world, might be avenged. The man who committed the crime might be
punished,--if public opinion were sufficiently massed against him. In
that case Senator Warfield would cry loudest for justice. But it would
take a stronger man than the country held to raise the question of Fred
Thurman's death and take even the first steps toward proving it a
murder.
"It ain't that they can _do_ anything, Mr. Warfield," the man from
Whisper said guardedly, urging his horse close to the machine that stood
in the trail from Echo. It was broad day--a sun-scorched day to
boot--and Senator Warfield perspired behind the wheel of his car. "It's
the talk they may get started."
"What have they said? The girl was at the ranch for several days. She
didn't talk there, or Hawkins would have told me."
"She was sick. I saw her the other day at the Quirt, and she more'n half
recognized me. Hell! How'd _I_ know she was in there among them rocks?
Everybody that was apt to be riding through was accounted for, and I
knew there wasn't any one coming horseback or with a rig. My hearing's
pretty good."
Warfield moved the spark lever up and down on the wheel while he
thought. "Well," he said carefully at last, "if you're falling down in
your work, what are you whining about it to me for? What do you want?"
Al moistened his lips with his tongue. "I want to know how far I can go.
It's been hands off the Quirt, up to now. And the Quirt's beginning to
think it can get away with most anything. They've throwed a fence across
the pass through from Sugar Spring to Whisper. That sends us away around
by Three Creek. You can't trail stock across Granite Ridge, nor them
lava ledges. If it's going to be hands off, I want to know it. There's
other places I'd rather live in, if the Quirt's going to raise talk
about Fred Thurman."
Senator Warfield pulled at his collar and tie as if they choked him.
"The Quirt has made no trouble," he said. "Of course, if they begin
throwing fences across our stock trails and peddling gossip, that is
another story. I expect you to protect our interests, of course. And I
have never made a practice of dictating to you. In this case"--he sent a
sharp glance at Al--"it seems to me your interests are involved more
than ours. As to Fred Thurman, I don't know anything about it. I was not
here when he died, and I have never seen this girl of Brit's who seems
to worry you. She doesn't interest me, one way or the other."
"She seems to interest Bob a whole lot," Al said maliciously. "He rode
over to see her yesterday. She wasn't home, though."
Senator Warfield seemed unmoved by this bit of news, wherefore Al
returned to the main issue.
"Do I get a free hand, or don't I?" he insisted. "They can't be let
peddle talk--not if I stay around here."
Senator Warfield considered the matter.
"The girl's got the only line on me," Al went on. "The inquest was as
clean as I ever saw. Everything all straight--and then, here she comes
up----"
"If you know how to stop a woman's mouth, Al, you can make a million a
month telling other men." Senator Warfield smiled at him. Then he leaned
across the front seat and added impressively, "Bear one thing in mind,
Al. The Sawtooth cannot permit itself to become involved in any scandal,
nor in any killing cases. We're just at the most crucial point with our
reclamation project, over here on the flat. The legislature is willing
to make an appropriation for the building of the canal, and in two or
three months at the latest we should begin selling agricultural tracts
to the public. The State will also throw open the land it had withdrawn
from settlement, pending the floating of this canal project. More than
ever the integrity of the Sawtooth Cattle Company must be preserved,
since it has come out openly as a backer of the irrigation company.
Nothing--_nothing_ must be permitted to stand in the way."
He removed his thin driving cap and wiped his perspiring forehead. "I'm
sorry this all happened--as it has turned out," he said, with real
regret in his tone. "But since it did happen, I must rely upon you
to--to--er----"
"I guess I understand," Al grinned sardonically. "I just wanted you to
know how things is building up. The Quirt's kinda overreached itself. I
didn't want you comin' back on me for trying to keep their feet outa the
trough. I want you to know things is pretty damn ticklish right now, and
it's going to take careful steppin'."
"Well, don't let your foot slip, Al," Senator Warfield warned him. "The
Sawtooth would hate to lose you; you're a good man."
"Oh, I get yuh," Al retorted. "My foot ain't going to slip---- If it
did, the Sawtooth would be the first to pile onto my back!" The last
sentence was not meant for the senator's ears. Al had backed his horse,
and Senator Warfield was stepping on the starter. But it would not have
mattered greatly if he had heard, for this was a point quite thoroughly
understood by them both.
The Warfield car went on, lurching over the inequalities of the narrow
road. Al shook his horse into a shambling trot, picking his way
carelessly through the scattered sage.
His horse traveled easily, now and then lifting a foot high to avoid
rock or exposed root, or swerving sharply around obstacles too high to
step over. Al very seldom traveled along the beaten trails, though there
was nothing to deter him now save an inherent tendency toward
secretiveness of his motives, destinations and whereabouts. If the
country was open, you would see Al Woodruff riding at some distance from
the trail--or you would not see him at all, if there were gullies in
which he could conceal himself. He was always "line-riding," or hunting
stray stock--horses, usually--or striking across to some line-camp of
the Sawtooth, on business which he was perfectly willing to state.
But you will long ago have guessed that he was the evil eye of the
Sawtooth Company. He took no orders save such general ones as Senator
Warfield had just given him. He gave none. Whatever he did he did alone,
and he took no man into his confidence. It is more than probable that
Senator Warfield would never have known to a certainty that Al was
responsible for Thurman's death, if Al had not been worried over the
Quirt's possible knowledge of the crime and anxious to know just how far
his power might go.
Ostensibly he was in charge of the camp at Whisper, a place far enough
off the beaten trails to free him from chance visitors. The Sawtooth
kept many such camps occupied by men whose duty it was to look after the
Sawtooth cattle that grazed near; to see that stock did not "bog down"
in the tricky sand of the adjacent water holes and die before help came,
and to fend off any encroachments of the smaller cattle owners,--though
these were growing fewer year by year, thanks to the weeding-out policy
of the Sawtooth and the cunning activities of such as Al Woodruff.
It may sound strange to say that the Sawtooth country had not had a real
"killing" for years, though accidental deaths had been rather frequent.
One man, for instance, had fallen over a ledge and broken his neck,
presumably while drunk. Another had bought a few sticks of dynamite to
open up a spring on his ranch, and at the inquest which followed the
jury had returned a verdict of "death caused by being blown up by the
accidental discharge of dynamite." A sheepman was struck by lightning,
according to the coroner, and his widow had been glad to sell ranch and
sheep very cheaply to the Sawtooth and return to her relatives in
Montana. The Sawtooth had shipped the sheep within a month and turned
the ranch into another line-camp.
You will see that Senator Warfield had every reason to be sincere when
he called Al Woodruff a good man; good for the Sawtooth interests, that
means. You will also see that Brit Hunter had reasons for believing that
the business of ranching in the Sawtooth country might be classed as
extra hazardous, and for saying that it took nerve just to hang on.
That is why Al rode oblivious to his surroundings, meditating no doubt
upon the best means of preserving the "integrity" of the Sawtooth and at
the same time soothing effectively the ticklishness of the situation of
which he had complained. It was his business to find the best means. It
was for just such work that the Sawtooth paid him--secretly, to be
sure--better wages than the foreman, Hawkins, received. Al was
conscientious and did his best to earn his wages; not because he
particularly loved killing and spying as a sport, but because the
Sawtooth had bought his loyalty for a price, and so long as he felt that
he was getting a square deal from them, he would turn his hand against
any man that stood in their way. He was a Sawtooth man, and he fought
the enemies of the Sawtooth as matter-of-factly as a soldier will fight
for his country. To his unimaginative mind there was sufficient
justification in that attitude. As for the ease with which he planned to
kill and cover his killing under the semblance of accident, he would
have said, if you could make him speak of it, that he was not squeamish.
They'd all have to die some day, anyway.
CHAPTER TEN
ANOTHER SAWTOOTH "ACCIDENT"
Frank Johnson rose from the breakfast table, shaved a splinter off the
edge of the water bench for a toothpick and sharpened it carefully while
he looked at Brit.
"You goin' after them posts, or shall I?" he inquired glumly, which, by
the way, was his normal tone. "Jim and Sorry oughta git the post holes
all dug to-day. One of us better take a look through that young stock in
the lower field, too, and see if there's any more sign uh blackleg.
Which you ruther do?"
Brit tilted his chair backward so that he could reach the coffeepot on
the stove hearth. "I'll haul down the posts," he decided carelessly.
"They're easy loaded, and I guess my back's as good as yourn."
"All you got to do is skid 'em down off'n the bank onto the wagon,"
Frank said. "I wisht you'd go on up where we cut them last ones and git
my sweater, Brit. I musta left it hanging on a bush right close to where
I was workin'."
Brit's grunt signified assent, and Frank went out. Jim and Sorry, the
two unpicturesque cowboys of whom Lorraine had complained to the cat had
already departed with pick and shovel to their unromantic task of
digging post holes. Each carried a most unattractive lunch tied in a
flour sack behind the cantle of his saddle. Lorraine had done her
conscientious best, but with lumpy, sour-dough bread, cold bacon and
currant jelly of that kind which is packed in wooden kegs, one can't do
much with a cold lunch. Lorraine wondered how much worse it would look
after it had been tied on the saddle for half a day; wondered too what
those two silent ones got out of life,--what they looked forward to,
what was their final goal. For that matter she frequently wondered what
there was in life for any of them, shut into that deadly monotony of
sagebrush and rocks interspersed with little, grassy meadows where the
cattle fed listlessly.
Even the sinister undercurrent of antagonism against the Quirt could not
whip her emotions feeling that she was doing anything more than live
the restricted, sordid little life of a poorly equipped ranch. She had
ridden once with Frank Johnson to look through a bunch of cattle, but it
had been nothing more than a hot, thirsty, dull ride, with a wind that
blew her hat off in spite of pins and tied veil, and with a companion
who spoke only when he was spoken to and then as briefly as possible.
Her father would not talk again as he had talked that night. She had
tried to make him tell her more about the Sawtooth and had gotten
nothing out of him. The man from Whisper, whom Brit had spoken of as Al,
had not returned. Nor had the promised saddle horse materialized. The
boys were too busy to run in any horses, her father had told her shortly
when she reminded him of his promise. When the fence was done, maybe he
could rustle her another horse,--and then he had added that he didn't
see what ailed Yellowjacket, for all the riding she was likely to do.
"Straight hard work and minding your own business," her father had said,
and it seemed to Lorraine after three or four days of it that he had
summed up the life of a cattleman's daughter in a masterly manner which
ought to be recorded among Famous Sayings like "War is hell" and "Don't
give up the ship."
On this particular morning Lorraine's spirits were at their lowest ebb.
If it were not for the new stepfather, she would return to the Casa
Grande, she told herself disgustedly. And if it were not for the belief
among all her acquaintances that she was queening it over the
cattle-king's vast domain, she would return and find work again in
motion pictures. But she could not bring herself to the point of facing
the curiosity and the petty gossip of the studios. She would be expected
to explain satisfactorily why she had left the real West for the mimic
West of Hollywood. She did not acknowledge to herself that she also
could not face the admission of failure to carry out what she had begun.
She had told her dad that she wanted to fight with him, even though
"fighting" in this case meant washing the coarse clothing of her father
and Frank, scrubbing the rough, warped boards of the cabin floor, and
frying ranch-cured bacon for every meal, and in making butter to sell,
and counting the eggs every night and being careful to use only the
cracked ones for cooking.
She hated every detail of this crude housekeeping, from the chipped
enamel dishpan to the broom that was all one-sided, and the pillow slips
which were nothing more nor less than sugar sacks. She hated it even
more than she had hated the Casa Grande and her mother's frowsy
mentality. But because she could see that she made life a little more
comfortable for her dad, because she felt that he needed her, she would
stay and assure herself over and over that she was staying merely
because she was too proud to go back to the old life and own the West a
failure.
She was sweeping the doorstep with the one-sided broom when Brit drove
out through the gate and up the trail which she knew led eventually to
Sugar Spring. The horses, sleek in their new hair and skittish with the
change from hay to new grass, danced over the rough ground so that the
running gear of the wagon, with its looped log-chain, which would later
do duty as a brake on the long grade down from timber line on the side
of Spirit Canyon, rattled and banged over the rocks with a clatter that
could be heard for half a mile. Lorraine looked after her father
enviously. If she were a boy she would be riding on that sack of hay
tied to the "hounds" for a seat. But, being a girl, it had never
occurred to Brit that she might like to go,--might even be useful to
him on the trip.
"I suppose if I told dad I could drive that team as well as he can, he'd
just look at me and think I was crazy," she thought resentfully and gave
the broom a spiteful fling toward a presumptuous hen that had approached
too closely. "If I'd asked him to let me go along he'd have made some
excuse--oh, I'm beginning to know dad! He thinks a woman's place is in
the house--preferably the kitchen. And here I've thought all my life
that cowgirls did nothing but ride around and warn people about stage
holdups and everything! I'd just like to know how a girl would ever have
a chance to know what was going on in the country, unless she heard the
men talking while she poured their coffee. Only this bunch don't talk at
all. They just gobble and go."
She went in then and shut the door with a slam. Up on the ridge Al
Woodruff lowered his small binocular and eased away from the spot where
he had been crouching behind a bush. Every one on the Quirt ranch was
accounted for. As well as if he had sat at their breakfast table Al knew
where each man's work would take him that day. As for the girl, she was
safe at the ranch for the day, probably. If she did take a ride later
on, it would probably be up the ridge between the Quirt and Thurman's
ranch, and sit for an hour or so just looking. That ride was beginning
to be a habit of hers, Al had observed, so that he considered her
accounted for also.
He made his way along the side hill to where his horse was tied to a
bush, mounted and rode away with his mind pretty much at ease. Much more
at ease than it would have been had he read what was in Lorraine's mind
when, she slammed that door.
Up above Sugar Spring was timber. By applying to the nearest Forest
Supervisor a certain amount could be had for ranch improvements upon
paying a small sum for the "stumpage." The Quirt had permission to cut
posts for their new fence which Al Woodruff had reported to his boss.
As he drove up the trail, which was in places barely passable for a
wagon, Brit was thinking of that fence. The Sawtooth would object to it,
he knew, since it cut off one of their stock trails and sent them around
through rougher country. Just what form their objection would take,
Brit did not know. Deep in his intrepid soul he hoped that the Sawtooth
would at last show its hand openly. He had liked Fred Thurman, and what
Lorraine had told him went much deeper than she knew. He wanted to bring
them into the open where he could fight with some show of winning.
"I'll git Bill Warfield yet--and git him right," was the gist of his
musings. "He's bound to show his head, give him time enough. Him and his
killers can't always keep under cover. Let 'em come at me about that
fence! It's on my land--the Quirt's got a right to fence every foot of
land that belongs to 'em."
All the way over the ridge and across the flat and up the steep, narrow
road along the edge of Spirit Canyon, Brit dwelt upon the probable moves
of the Sawtooth. They would wait, he thought, until the fence was
completed and they had made a trail around through the lava rocks. They
would not risk any move at present; they would wait and tacitly accept
the fence, or pretend to accept it, as a natural inconvenience. But Brit
did not deceive himself that they would remain passive. That it had been
"hands off the Quirt" he did not know, but attributed the Quirt's
immunity to careful habits and the fact that they had never come to the
point where their interests actually clashed with the Sawtooth.