HIDDEN WATER
The trail to Hidden Water leads up the Salagua, alternately climbing
the hard mesa and losing itself in the shifting sand of the river
bottom until, a mile or two below the mouth of the box canyon, it
swings in to the edge of the water. But the Salagua is no purling
brook, dignified by a bigger name; it is not even a succession of mill
ponds like the dammed-up streams of the East: in its own name the
Salagua is a _Rio_, broad and swift, with a current that clutches
treacherously at a horse's legs and roars over the brink of stony
reefs in a long, fretful line of rapids. At the head of a broad mill
race, where the yellow flood waters boiled sullenly before they took
their plunge, Creede pulled up and surveyed the river doubtfully.
"Swim?" he inquired, and when Hardy nodded he shrugged his shoulders
and turned his horse into the water. "Keep your head upstream, then,"
he said, "we'll try it a whirl, anyhow."
Head to tail the two horses plodded heavily across the ford, feeling
their way among the submerged bowlders, while twenty feet below them
the irresistible onrush of the current slipped smoothly over the rim,
sending up a roar like the thunder of breakers. As they struggled up
the opposite bank after a final slump into a narrow ditch Creede
looked back and laughed merrily at his bedraggled companion.
"How's that for high?" he inquired, slapping his wet legs. "I tell
you, the old Salagua is a hell-roarer when she gits started. I
wouldn't cross there this afternoon for a hundred dollars. She's away
up since we took the wagon over last night, but about to-morrow you'll
hear her talk--snow's meltin' on the mountains. I wish to God she'd
_stay_ up!" he added fervently, as he poured the water out of his
boots.
"Why?" asked Hardy innocently. "Won't it interfere with your bringing
in supplies?"
"Sure thing," said Creede, and then he laughed maliciously. "But when
you've been up here a while," he observed, "you'll savvy a lot of
things that look kinder curious. If the old river would git up on its
hind legs and walk, forty feet high, and stay there f'r a month, we
cowmen would simply laugh ourselves to death. We don't give a dam' for
supplies as long as it keeps the sheep out.
"Begin to see light, eh?" he queried, as he pushed on up the river.
"Well, that's the only thing in God's world that wasn't made to order
for these sheepmen; the old Salagua cuts right square across the
country east and west without consultin' nobody, not even Jim Swope,
and the sheep move north and south.
"How'd you like to have the job of crossing a hundred thousand
_borregos_ and half of 'em with lambs, when the _rio_ was on a bender?
I've seen some of these sheepmen wadin' around up to their chins for
two weeks, tryin' to float twenty-five hundred head across the
river--and there wasn't turkey buzzards enough in the country when
they got through.
"Last year they had the sand bars up around Hidden Water lined with
carcasses two deep where they'd jest naturally crowded 'em into the
river and let 'em sink or swim. Them Chihuahua Mexicans, you savvy.
After they'd wore out their shoes and froze their marrow-bones wadin'
they got tired and shoved 'em in, regardless. Well, if this warm
weather holds we'll be able to git our _roder_ good and started before
the sheep come in. That's one reason why I never was able to do much
with these sheepmen," he added. "They hit me right square in the
middle of the round-up, Spring and Fall, when I'm too busy gatherin'
cattle to pay much attention to 'em. I did plan a little surprise
party last year--but that was somethin' special. But now you're on the
job, Rufe," he continued reassuringly, "I'm goin' to leave all sheep
and sheepmen strictly alone--you can bank on that. Bein' as we are
goin' to try the expeeriment I want to see it done right. I never made
a cent fightin' 'em, that's a cinch, and if you can appeal to their
better natures, w'y, go to it! I'd help you if I could, but bein' as I
can't I'll git out of the road and give you a chanst.
"Now I'll tell you how it'll be," he continued, turning in his saddle
and hooking one leg over the horn, "the boys'll come in for the
_roder_ to-morrow or next day; we begin to gather on the first, and it
takes us about a month. Well, we look for the sheep to come in on us
at about the same time--first of April--and we ain't been fooled yet.
They'll begin to stack up on the other side any time now, and as soon
as the water goes down they'll come across with a rush. And if they're
feelin' good-natured they'll spread out over The Rolls and drift
north, but if they're feelin' bad they'll sneak up onto Bronco Mesa
and scatter the cattle forty ways for Sunday, and bust up my _roder_
and raise hell generally. We had a little trouble over that last
year," he added parenthetically.
"Well, I'll turn over the house and the grub and the whole business to
you this year and camp out with the boys under the mesquite--and then
you can entertain them sheepmen and jolly 'em up no end. They won't
have a dam' thing--horse feed, grub, tobacco, matches, nothin'! Never
do have anythin'. I'd rather have a bunch of Apaches camped next to
me--but if you want to be good to 'em there's your chanst. Meanwhile,
I'm only a cow-punch pullin' off a round-up, and your name is
Mr.--you're the superintendent of the Dos S. Your job is to protect
the upper range, and I begin to think you can do it."
There was a tone of half-hearted enthusiasm about this talk which
marked it for a prepared "spiel," laboriously devised to speed the new
superintendent upon his way; but, not being schooled in social deceit,
Creede failed utterly in making it convincing.
"That's good," said Hardy, "but tell me--what has been your custom in
the past? Haven't you been in the habit of feeding them when they came
in?"
"Feed 'em?" cried Creede, flaring up suddenly. "Did I feed 'em? Well,
I should guess yes--I never turned one away hungry in my life. W'y,
hell, man," he exclaimed, his anger growing on him, "I slep' in the
same blanket with 'em--until I become lousy," he added grimly.
"What!" exclaimed Hardy, aghast. "You don't mean to say--"
"No," interrupted Creede ironically, "I don't mean to say anythin'--not
from now on. But while we're on the subject and to avoid any future
misunderstandin' I might just as well tell you right now that I
can't see nothin' good in a sheepman--_nothin'!_ I'm like my cat Tom
when he sees a rattlesnake, my hair bushes up clean over my ears and
I see hell, damnation, and sudden death!"
He rose up, frowning, on his mighty horse and gazed at Hardy with eyes
that burned deep with passion. "If every sheep and sheepman in Arizona
should drop dead at this minute," he said, "it would simply give me a
laughin' sensation. God damn 'em!" he added passionately, and it
sounded like a prayer.
Half an hour later as they passed through the gloomy silence of the
box canyon, picking their way over rocks and bowlders and driftwood
cast forty feet above the river level in some terrific glut of waters,
he began to talk again, evenly and quietly, pointing out indifferent
things along the trail, and when at last they mounted the hill and
looked down upon Hidden Water his anger was forgotten.
"Well," he remarked, throwing out a hand, "there's home--how do you
like it?"
Hardy paused and looked it over critically--a broad V-shaped valley
half a mile in length, beginning at the mouth of a great dry wash and
spreading out through trees and hummocks down to the river. A broken
row of cottonwoods and sycamores stretched along the farther side,
following the broad, twisting bed of the sand wash where the last
flood had ripped its way to the Salagua; and on the opposite side,
close up against the base of the cliff, a flash of white walls and the
shadow of a _ramada_ showed where man had built his puny dwelling high
in order to escape its fury. At their feet lay the ranch pasture, a
broad elbow of the valley rich with grass and mesquite trees and
fenced in with barbed wire that ran from cliff to cliff. Beyond the
eastern wall the ground was rough and broken, cut up by innumerable
gulches and waterways, and above its ridges there rose the forbidding
crags of a black butte whose shoulders ran down to and confined the
silvery river. Across the river and to the south the land was even
rougher, rising in sheer precipices, above the crests of which towered
a mighty needle of rock, standing out against the sky like a cathedral
spire, yet of a greater dignity and magnificence--purple with the
regal robes of distance.
"That's Weaver's Needle," volunteered Creede, following his
companion's eyes. "Every lost mine for a hundred miles around here is
located by sightin' at that peak. The feller it's named after was
picked up by the Apaches while he was out lookin' for the Lost
Dutchman and there's been a Jonah on the hidden-treasure business ever
since, judgin' by the results.
"D'ye see that big butte straight ahead? That's Black Butte. She's so
rough that even the mountain sheep git sore-footed, so they say--we
have to go up there on foot and drive our cattle down with rocks. Old
Bill Johnson's place is over the other side of that far butte; he's
got a fine rich valley over there--the sheep haven't got in on him
yet. You remember that old feller that was drunk down at Bender--well,
that's Bill. Calls his place Hell's Hip Pocket; you wait till you try
to git in there some day and you'll know why."
He paused and turned to the north.
"Might as well give you the lay of the land," he said. "I'll be too
busy to talk for the next month. There's the Four Peaks, northeast of
us, and our cows run clean to the rocks. They's more different brands
in that forty miles than you saw in the whole Cherrycow country, I bet
ye. I've got five myself on a couple hundred head that the old man
left me--and everybody else the same way. You see, when the sheep come
in down on the desert and around Moreno's we kept pushin' what was
left of our cattle east and east until we struck the Peaks--and here
we are, in a corner. The old judge has got nigh onto two thousand
head, but they's about twenty of us poor devils livin' up here in the
rocks that has got enough irons and ear marks to fill a brand book,
and not a thousand head among us.
"Well, I started out to show you the country, didn't I? You see that
bluff back of the house down there? That runs from here clean to the
Four Peaks without a break, and then it swings west in a kind of an ox
bow and makes that long ridge up there to the north that we called the
Juate. All that high country between our house here and the
Peaks--everythin' east of that long bluff--is Bronco Mesa. That's the
upper range the judge asked me to point out to you. Everythin' west of
Bronco Mesa is The Rolls--all them rollin' hills out there--and they's
feed enough out there to keep all the sheep in the country, twice
over--but no water. Now what makes us cowmen hot is, after we've give
'em that country and welcome, the sheepmen're all the time tryin' to
sneak in on our upper range. Our cows can't hardly make a livin'
walkin' ten or fifteen miles out on The Rolls every day, and then back
again to water; but them dam' sheep can go a week without drinkin',
and as much as a month in the winter-time.
"Why can't they give us a chanst, then? We _give_ 'em all the good
level land and simply ask 'em as a favor to please keep off of the
bench up there and leave our cows what little cactus and browse they
is. But no--seems like as soon as you give one of them Chihuahua
Mexicans a gun he wants to git a fight out of somebody, and so they
come crowdin' in across our dead line, just to see if they can't git
some of us goin'."
Once more his eyes were burning, his breath came hard, and his voice
became high and sustained. "Well, I give one of 'em all he wanted," he
said, "and more. I took his dam' pistol away and beat him over the
head with it--and I _moved_ him, too. He was Jasper Swope's pet, and I
reckon he had his orders, but I noticed the rest went round."
He stopped abruptly and sat silent, twisting his horse's mane
uneasily. Then he looked up, smiling curiously.
"If you hadn't come up this year I would've killed some of them
fellers," he said quietly. "I'm gittin' as crazy as old Bill
Johnson--and he hears voices. But now lookee here, Rufe, you don't
want to believe a word I say about this trouble. Don't you pay any
attention to me; I'm bughouse, and I know it. Jest don't mention sheep
to me and I'll be as happy as an Injun on a mescal jag. Come on, I'll
run you to the house!"
Throwing his weight forward he jumped his big horse down the rocky
trail and went thundering across the flat, whooping and laughing and
swinging under mesquite trees as if his whole heart was in the race.
Catching the contagion Hardy's sorrel dashed madly after him, and the
moment they struck the open he went by like a shot, over-running the
goal and dancing around the low adobe house like a circus horse.
"By Joe," exclaimed Creede as he came up, "that _caballo_ of yours can
run some. I'm goin' to make a little easy money off of Bill Lightfoot
when he comes in. He's been blowin' about that gray of his for two
years now and I'll match you ag'inst him for a yearlin'. And don't you
forgit, boy, we're going after that black stallion up on Bronco Mesa
just as soon as the _roder_ is over."
His face was all aglow with friendliness and enthusiasm now, but as
they started toward the house, after turning their horses into the
corral, he suddenly stopped short in the trail.
"Gee," he said, "I wonder what's keepin' Tom? Here Tom! Heere Tom!
Pussy, pussy, pussy!" He listened, and called again. "I hope the
coyotes ain't caught him while I was gone," he said at length. "They
treed him a few times last year, but he just stayed up there and
yelled until I came--spoiled his voice callin' so long, but you bet he
can purr, all right."
He listened once more, long and anxiously, then his face lit up
suddenly.
"Hear that?" he asked, motioning toward the bluff, and while Hardy was
straining his ears a stunted black cat with a crook in his tail came
into view, racing in wildly from the great pile of fallen bowlders
that lay at the base of the cliff, and yowling in a hoarse, despairing
voice, like a condemned kitten in a sack.
"Hello, Tommy, Tommy, Tommy!" cried Creede, and as the cat stopped
abruptly, blinking warily at Hardy, he strode forward and gathered it
gently into his arms. "Well, you poor little devil," he exclaimed,
stroking its rough coat tenderly, "you're all chawed up again! Did
them dam' coyotes try to git you while I was gone?" And with many
profane words of endearment he hugged it against his breast,
unashamed.
"There's the gamiest cat in Arizona," he said, bringing him over to
Hardy with conscious pride. "Whoa, kitten, he won't hurt you. Dogged
if he won't tackle a rattlesnake, and kill 'im, too. I used to be
afraid to git out of bed at night without puttin' on my boots, but if
any old rattler crawls under my cot now it's good-bye, Mr. Snake.
Tommy is right there with the goods--and he ain't been bit yet,
neither. He killed three side-winders last Summer--didn't you, Tom,
Old Socks?--and if any sheep-herder's dog comes snoopin' around the
back door he'll mount him in a minute. If a man was as brave as he is,
now, he'd--well, that's the trouble--he wouldn't last very long in
this country. I used to wonder sometimes which'd go first--me or Tom.
The sheepmen was after me, and their dogs was after Tom. But I'm
afraid poor Tommy is elected; this is a dam' bad country for cats."
He set him down with a glance of admiring solicitude, such as a
Spartan mother might have bestowed upon her fighting offspring, and
kicked open the unlocked door.
The Dos S ranch house was a long, low structure of adobe bricks,
divided in the middle by the open passageway which the Mexicans always
affect to encourage any vagrant breeze. On one side of the _corredor_
was a single large room, half storehouse, half bunk room, with a
litter of pack saddles, rawhide kyacks and leather in one corner, a
heap of baled hay, grain, and provisions in the other, and the rest
strewn with the general wreckage of a camp--cooking utensils, Dutch
ovens, canvas pack covers, worn-out saddles, and ropes. On the other
side the rooms were more pretentious, one of them even having a board
floor. First came the large living-room with a stone chimney and a
raised hearth before the fireplace; whereon, each on its separate
pile of ashes, reposed two Dutch ovens, a bean kettle, and a
frying-pan, with a sawed-off shovel in the corner for scooping up
coals. Opening into the living-room were two bedrooms, which, upon
exploration, turned out to be marvellously fitted up, with high-headed
beds, bureaus and whatnots, besides a solid oak desk.
To these explorations of Hardy's Creede paid but slight attention, he
being engaged in cooking a hurried meal and watching Tommy, who had a
bad habit of leaping up on the table and stealing; but as Hardy paused
by the desk in the front bedroom he looked up from mixing his bread
and said:
"That's your room, Rufe, so you can clean it up and move in. I
generally sleep outdoors myself--and I ain't got nothin', nohow. Jest
put them guns and traps into the other room, so I can find 'em. Aw, go
ahead, you'll need that desk to keep your papers in. You've got to
write all the letters and keep the accounts, anyhow. It always did
make my back ache to lean over that old desk, and I'm glad to git
shent of it.
"Pretty swell rooms, ain't they? Notice them lace curtains? The
kangaroo rats have chawed the ends a little, but I tell you, when
Susie and Sallie Winship was here this was the finest house for forty
miles. That used to be Sallie's room, where you are now. Many's the
time in the old days that I've rid up here to make eyes at Sallie, but
the old lady wouldn't stand for no sich foolishness. Old Winship
married her back in St. Louie and brought her out here to slave around
cookin' for _roder_ hands, and she wanted her daughters to live
different. Nope, she didn't want no bow-legged cow-punch for a
son-in-law, and I don't blame her none, because this ain't no place
for a woman; but Sal was a mighty fine girl, all the same."
He shook a little flour over his dough, brushed the cat off the table
absently, and began pinching biscuits into the sizzling fat of the
Dutch oven, which smoked over its bed of coals on the hearth. Then,
hooking the red-hot cover off the fire, he slapped it on and piled a
little row of coals along the upturned rim.
"Didn't you never hear about the Winship girls?" he asked, stroking
the cat with his floury hands. "No? Well, it was on account of them
that the judge took over this ranch. Old man Winship was one of these
old-time Indian-fightin', poker-playin' sports that come pretty nigh
havin' their own way about everythin'. He had a fine ranch up
here--the old Dos S used to brand a thousand calves and more, every
round-up; but when he got old he kinder speculated in mines and loaned
money, and got in the hole generally, and about the time the sheep
drifted in on him he hauled off and died. I pulled off a big _roder_
for 'em and they sold a lot of cattle tryin' to patch things up the
best they could, but jest as everythin' was lovely the drouth struck
'em all in a heap, and when the Widde' Winship got the estate settled
up she didn't have nothin' much left but cows and good will. She
couldn't sell the cows--you never can, right after these dry
spells--and as I said, she wouldn't let the girls marry any of us
cowmen to kinder be man for the outfit; so what does she do but run
the ranch herself!
"Yes, sir--Susie and Sallie, that was as nice and eddicated girls as
you ever see, they jest put on overalls and climbed their horses and
worked them cattle themselves. Course they had _roder_ hands to do the
dirty work in the corrals--brandin' and ear-markin' and the like--but
for ridin' the range and drivin' they was as good as the best. Well,
sir, you'd think every man in Arizona, when he heard what they was
doin', would do everythin' in his power to help 'em along, even to
runnin' a Dos S on an _orehanna_ once in a while instead of hoggin' it
himself; but they's fellers in this world, I'm convinced, that would
steal milk from a sick baby!"
The brawny foreman of the Dos S dropped the cat and threw out his
hands impressively, and once more the wild glow crept back into his
eyes.
"You remember that Jim Swope that I introduced you to down on the
desert? Well, he's a good sheepman, but he's on the grab for money
like a wolf. He's got it, too--that's the hell of it."
Creede sighed, and threw a scrap of bacon to Tommy.
"He keeps a big store down at Moroni," he continued, "and the widde',
not wantin' to shove her cows onto a fallin' market, runs up an
account with him--somethin' like a thousand dollars--givin' her note
for it, of course. It's about four years ago, now, that she happened
to be down in Moroni when court was in session, when she finds out by
accident that this same Jim Swope, seein' that cattle was about to go
up, is goin' to close her out. He'd 'a' done it, too, like fallin' off
a log, if the old judge hadn't happened to be in town lookin' up some
lawsuit. When he heard about it he was so durned mad he wrote out a
check for a thousand dollars and give it to her; and then, when she
told him all her troubles, he up and bought the whole ranch at her own
price--it wasn't much--and shipped her and the girls back to St.
Louie."
Creede brushed the dirt and flour off the table with a greasy rag and
dumped the biscuits out of the oven.
"Well," he said, "there's where I lost my last chanst to git a girl.
Come on and eat."