A HOLE IN THE HERD.
The herd of cattle which Ted and the broncho boys were herding in No
Man's Land he had branded Circle S, named after Stella.
There were more than two thousand head of them, which Ted was feeding on
the rich range grasses of the Southwest to drive to the Moon Valley
Ranch to winter, for it was well known to cowmen that a Southern or
Southwestern beef animal will do better for a winter on the Northern
range.
After Stella's disappearance Ted and the boys searched every nook and
cranny of the town of Snyder, but were unable to get the slightest trace
of her. Dividing into bands, they scoured the country roundabout, being
assisted by the cow-punchers and the ranchers in the neighborhood.
But Stella had disappeared as if the earth had opened and swallowed her.
With all his ingenuity, backed by the strong desire he had to find her,
Ted was making no headway, and he hardly slept or ate during the long
days and nights, but was in the saddle almost continuously.
Naturally, he suspected Shan Rhue of knowing something about Stella's
absence, if, indeed, he was not actually responsible for it.
But he could not fasten anything on the man whom he had come to regard
as his greatest enemy, and whom he knew hated him. Whenever he sought
Shan Rhue, he was always to be found at his haunts.
Tired of the inaction, Ted met Shan Rhue on the street one day, and
resolved to have it out with him.
"Shan Rhue, I want to speak with you," said Ted, stopping him.
"Well, what is it you want?" asked Shan Rhue.
"I want you to tell me where Stella is," said Ted.
Shan Rhue stared at him in apparent amazement.
"How should I know where she is?" asked Shan Rhue, with a wicked
twinkling in his eye.
"I don't know," answered Ted; "but I think you do know."
"So I supposed, from the way in which you have had me followed. I
suppose you miss her a good deal."
"Her aunt, Mrs. Graham, is distraught with grief and anxiety. Surely you
have no fight on her, or on Miss Fosdick, either, that you should keep
them apart."
"No. I have no fight with a woman. But why should I know where the young
lady is?"
"There are several reasons why you should have had her taken away. But I
think the principal reason is that you think you can get square with me
by doing so."
"There might be something in that. Mind me, I am not confessing that I
took her away, or that I know who did take her away, or where she is.
You have seen me in town every day since the little trouble we had over
that old thief Norris, haven't you?"
"Yes, but that tells me nothing. It might not be necessary for you to
leave this town to have her hidden somewhere."
"But you and your friends searched the town from one end to the other,
and you did not find her."
"True, but for all that I am satisfied that you know where she is.
Suppose we call it off, and that you tell me where she is."
"If I knew, I would not tell you," said Shan Rhue, his voice intense
with hatred.
"What do you mean? Are you such a coward that you will punish a woman
for your spite against a man? I did not think that of you. I believe
Stella Fosdick was carried off by you, of your men, acting under your
instructions."
Shan Rhue's only reply was a sneering laugh.
"If I discover that what I say is true," said Ted, in a low voice so
full of purpose that it was in itself a warning, "you will be the
sorriest man in all this country. I will make you suffer by it even as
you have caused suffering to others."
"So you have suffered, eh? That is good! Now I am a little better
satisfied. But my debt to you is not yet paid. There are other things in
store for you."
"What do you mean, you dog? By Heaven, I know now that you did cause her
abduction, and I shall find her. You cannot keep me away from the place
in which you have hidden her. I shall find her if she is at the end of
the earth. When I do find her, if anything has harmed her, you, Shan
Rhue, gambler, thief, and murderer, shall pay for it, and pay heavier
than for any amusement you have had in all your miserable lying,
thieving career."
As the epithets addressed to Shan Rhue left Ted's lips, the bully sprang
back, and made a motion to draw his six-shooter.
But before he had his hand on his hip his eyes were looking into the
bore of Ted's forty-four. Instead of drawing a gun, therefore, he pulled
out his handkerchief and wiped his dry lips.
Shan Rhue feared Ted Strong.
"Remember," said Ted, before turning away, "I know that you have
spirited Stella Fosdick away. But I shall find her, and when I am sure
of it you better leave the country before I reach the place where you
are, for as sure as I am standing here I will make my previous
experience with you so tame that you will be glad to crawl in the dust
on your face to be forgiven."
"Ha, ha!" laughed Shan Rhue. "So it hurts as bad as that, eh? Good!"
He went away laughing, and it was all Ted could do to control himself,
and keep from leaping upon him and punching him. Instead, he jumped into
his saddle and rode Sultan like the wind out to the cow camp.
For several days he had paid no attention to the herd, leaving it under
the general direction of Bud, while he stayed in town trying to hear
some news of Stella, or was riding all over the country with one or
another of the boys, searching for her.
As he rode into camp with disappointment and dejection written on his
face, he was met by Mrs. Graham, who had grown pale and wan with
anxiety.
"Any news of her?" she asked Ted.
"None, but I haven't given up hope by any means. Don't worry so, Mrs.
Graham. I think I am on the track at last, and that we shall soon have
her with us again."
But Mrs. Graham only walked away with the tears coursing down her
cheeks. The herd was grazing to the west of the camp, and Ted rode out
to it, and to where Bud was sitting quietly in his saddle watching it.
There was an air of dejection about Bud, also. Indeed, every fellow in
the outfit was secretly worrying and grieving for Stella.
"Say, Ted," said Bud, as Ted rode up, "I think thar's somethin' wrong
with ther dogies."
Cow-punchers call the small Southwestern cattle "dogies."
"What do you mean?" asked Ted. "I was looking them over this morning.
Rode through the bunch. They seemed to be all right then."
"Oh, they're eatin' well, an' aire as likely a lot o' beef ez ever I
see," replied Bud.
"Well, what then?"
"Thar ain't so many o' them ez there wuz, er my eye hez gone back on
me."
"Any of them get away?"
"I figger it so."
"What have you found out?"
"Some one is liftin' our cattle. That's what I mean."
"Great Scott! What makes you think so?"
"Ted, ther herd has shrunk."
"You judge by the eye, I suppose."
"Yes. That is the only way I have o' judgin'. We hev never had a count
o' them since we drove them onto this range."
"How many do you think we are shy?"
"My eye tells me erbout five hundred."
"Great guns! How could five hundred head get away from us? And right
under our noses, too."
"Easy enough. You must remember that since Stella has been gone we've
paid no more attention to the herd than if we didn't own them."
"That's true. As for myself, I confess that I've given them no
attention. And I've kept you fellows so busy that we've left the cattle
to take care of themselves, almost."
"Well, it's time we woke up ter ther situation, er soon we won't hev no
more cattle than a rabbit."
"That's so. We'll run a count of them in the morning."
"It's shore got me puzzled. I can't think whar they could hev gone."
"Strayed, possibly."
"P'r'aps. Ever hear o' there bein' any rustlers in this part o' ther
country?"
"No, I never have. But there are some pretty bad citizens in this
section, who, if they never have rustled cattle, certainly are capable
of it."
"Alludin' to who?"
"Well, there's Shan Rhue and his gang, for instance."
"They're pretty bad actors, fer shore. But I ain't positive thet they're
ther kind what would rustle. They're jest plain town thieves an'
gamblers. They ain't cow-punchers. It gen'rally is fellers what has been
in ther cow business at some time er another what rustles stock."
"Oh, it doesn't take much of a man to steal cattle. A thieving gambler
could do it as well as another."
"But our brand and ear crop? They shore couldn't get away from them."
"They're not so hard, Bud. A good man could run our stock out of this
part of the country and alter the brand without any trouble."
"Shore, ther brand is not so hard to alter."
"Let's ride back to camp and look at the brand book, and see if any one
has a similar brand to ours, or one that they could alter without
trouble. But, remember, I'm not going to give myself any uneasiness in
the matter, and I think we will find the herd all there. I can't see how
so many cattle as you think could get away from us."
"I do."
"In what manner could they?"
"Well, yer see, thar ain't ary o' us fellers been ridin' herd at night
since Stella was taken away."
"Yes; go on."
"Ther fellers what hev been guardin' ther herd at night we picked up
around here when we drove ther herd up from ther South."
"True. They were all local cow-punchers. I realize that we have made a
mistake. One of us ought to have had charge of every night watch since
we have been on this range."
"Shore. It's a cinch they wouldn't attempt to run 'em off in ther
daytime."
"That's the idea. It would be as easy as shooting fish in a rain barrel
for a crooked night foreman to drift a few cattle away from the herd in
the dark, to be picked up by fellows waiting on the outside, and driven
into the hills until the brands and marks could be changed."
They were at the camp now, and Ted got out the brand book and turned its
leaves over in an attempt to find a brand similar to their own, the
Circle S, which was a circle with the letter S in the center.
In every Western State or Territory in which cattle-raising is a
business the law makes it imperative that every ranchman who uses the
open range shall select a brand for his cattle which is registered. This
brand is his own, and every head of cattle found with his brand on it
belongs to him.
On the open range the cattle get mixed more or less, and in the spring
there is a general round-up of the cattle, after the calves have been
born and are following their mothers.
The cow-punchers go into the vast herds and drive out the calves. Of
course, the mother follows the calf, lowing piteously for it.
When the cow is out with the calf, it can be plainly seen to whom she
belongs by the brand on her. Her owner, or his men or representatives,
promptly throw her and the calf into their own herd, and later put their
brand on the calf.
Calves which are motherless and are unbranded are known as mavericks,
and belong to whoever finds them. The cowman who finds a maverick
promptly puts his own brand on it and it belongs to him.
The safety of the system is in choosing a brand that cannot be easily
altered, and which will not be easily confounded with the brand of
another.
When the boys had chosen the brand Circle S for this herd in honor of
Stella, they had spoken of this, and Bud had remarked that it would be
easily altered by making an eight of the S, but they had found no Circle
8 in the brand book, and took the chance, especially as Stella now
insisted upon having no other brand for the herd than Circle S, her "own
brand," as she called it.
Ted and Bud could find no brand in the Texas or Oklahoma brand books at
all like theirs, and dismissed the matter from their minds.
The next morning early all hands turned out for a count of the herd. The
herd was split, and the broncho boys took turns at the count, as the
bunches of cattle were split and driven slowly past them on the point.
From the books, there should be two thousand three hundred cattle, or
thereabouts, in the herd. A few cattle more or less would not have been
surprising, for a great herd of cattle will, like a magnet, draw to it
all the individual strays in the country roundabout.
It was well in the afternoon before the count was finished, and the boys
rode into camp to count up and compare with the books. Ted totaled the
figures, while the boys hung eagerly over him to learn the result.
"Well, what d'yer make it?" asked Bud, as Ted, with an expression of
perplexity on his face, looked up from his work.
"The count is seventeen hundred and fifty," answered Ted slowly.
"Gee! And that's how many shy?"
"Five hundred and fifty. Bud, you have a good eye."
"Orter hev. I've been runnin' my eye over herds fer many a year. So,
we've been done out o' more'n five hundred head, eh? Well, Stella comes
fust, an' then ther man what thinks he kin rustle cattle from the
broncho boys had better take a runnin' jump outer this man's country."