it was going to make him limp. He wondered if the boys would notice
anything queer about his walk. If they did, there was the conventional
excuse that his horse had fallen down with him--Happy Jack hoped that
it would be convincing. He took up the box again and looked at the
shining emptiness of it. It had been half full--not enough, by a long
way--and maybe some one would wonder what had become of it. Darn a
bunch that always had to know everything, anyway!
Happy Jack, warned at last by that unnamed instinct which tells of a
presence unseen, turned around and looked up apprehensively. The Happy
Family, sitting in a row upon their heels on the bank, looked down at
him gravely and appreciatively.
"There's a can uh wagon dope, up at camp," Cal Emmett informed him
sympathetically.
"Aw--" Happy Jack began, and choked upon his humiliation.
"I used to know a piece uh poetry about a fellow like Happy," Weary
remarked sweetly. "It said
_'He raised his veil, the maid turned slowly round_
_Looked at him, shrieked, and fell upon the ground.'_
Only, in this case," Weary smiled blandly down upon him, "Happy didn't
have no veil."
"Aw, gwan!" adjured Happy Jack helplessly, and reached for his
clothes, while the Happy Family chorused a demand for explanations.
* * * * *
A TAMER OF WILD ONES.
When the days grow crisp at each end and languorous in the middle;
when a haze ripples the skyline like a waving ribbon of faded blue;
when the winds and the grasses stop and listen for the first on-rush
of winter, then it is that the rangeland takes on a certain
intoxicating unreality, and range-wild blood leaps with desire to do
something--anything, so it is different and irresponsible and not
measured by precedent or prudence.
In days like that one grows venturesome and ignores difficulties and
limitations with a fine disregard for probable consequences, a mental
snapping of fingers. On a day like that, the Happy Family, riding
together out of Dry Lake with the latest news in mind and speech,
urged Andy Green, tamer of wild ones, to enter the rough-riding
contest exploited as one of the features of the Northern Montana Fair,
to be held at Great Falls in two weeks. Pink could not enter, because
a horse had fallen with him and hurt his leg, so that he was picking
the gentlest in his string for daily riding. Weary would not, because
he had promised his Little Schoolma'am to take care of himself and not
take any useless risks; even the temptation of a two-hundred-dollar
purse could not persuade him that a rough-riding contest is perfectly
safe and without the ban. But Andy, impelled by the leaping blood of
him and urged by the loyal Family, consented and said he'd try it a
whirl, anyway.
They had only ridden four or five miles when the decision was reached,
and they straightway turned back and raced into Dry Lake again, so
that Andy might write the letter that clinched matters. Then, whooping
with the sheer exhilaration of living, and the exultation of being
able to ride and whoop unhindered, they galloped back to camp and let
the news spread as it would. In a week all Chouteau County knew that
Andy Green would ride for the purse, and nearly all Chouteau County
backed him with all the money it could command; certainly, all of it
that knew Andy Green and had seen him ride, made haste to find someone
who did not know him and whose faith in another contestant was strong,
and to bet all the money it could lay hands upon.
For Andy was one of those mild-mannered men whose genius runs to
riding horses which object violently to being ridden; one of those
lucky fellows who never seems to get his neck broken, however much he
may jeopardize it; and, moreover, he was that rare genius, who can
make a "pretty" ride where other broncho-fighters resemble nothing so
much as a scarecrow in a cyclone. Andy not only could ride--he could
ride gracefully. And the reason for that, not many knew: Andy, in the
years before he wandered to the range, had danced, in spangled tights,
upon the broad rump of a big gray horse which galloped around a
saw-dust ring with the regularity of movement that suggested a
machine, while a sober-clothed man in the center cracked a whip and
yelped commands. Andy had jumped through blazing hoops and over
sagging bunting while he rode--and he was just a trifle ashamed of the
fact. Also--though it does not particularly matter--he had, later in
the performance, gone hurtling around the big tent dressed in the garb
of an ancient Roman and driving four deep-chested bays abreast. As has
been explained, he never boasted of his circus experience; though his
days in spangled tights probably had much to do with the inimitable
grace of him in the saddle. The Happy Family felt to a man that Andy
would win the purse and add honor to the Flying U in the winning. They
were enthusiastic over the prospect and willing to bet all they had on
the outcome.
* * * * *
The Happy Family, together with the aliens who swelled the crew to
round-up size, was foregathered at the largest Flying U corral,
watching a bunch of newly bought horses circle, with much snorting and
kicking up of dust, inside the fence. It was the interval between
beef-and calf-roundups, and the witchery of Indian Summer held the
range-land in thrall.
Andy, sizing up the bunch and the brands, lighted upon a rangy blue
roan that he knew--or thought he knew, and the eyes of him brightened
with desire. If he could get that roan in his string, he told himself,
he could go to sleep in the saddle on night-guard; for an easier horse
to ride he never had straddled. It was like sitting in grandma's pet
rocking chair when that roan loosened his muscles for a long, tireless
gallop over the prairie sod, and as a stayer Andy had never seen his
equal. It was not his turn to choose, however, and he held his breath
lest the rope of another should settle over the slatey-black ears
ahead of him.
Cal Emmett roped a plump little black and led him out, grinning
satisfaction; from the white saddle-marks back of the withers he knew
him for a "broke" horse, and he certainly was pretty to look at. Andy
gave him but a fleeting glance.
Happy Jack spread his loop and climbed down from the fence, almost at
Andy's elbow. It was his turn to choose. "I betche that there blue
roan over there is a good one," he remarked. "I'm going to tackle
him."
Andy took his cigarette from between his lips. "Yuh better hobble your
stirrups, then," he discouraged artfully. "I know that roan a heap
better than you do."
"Aw, gwan!" Happy, nevertheless, hesitated. "He's got a kind eye in
his head; yuh can always go by a horse's eye."
"Can yuh?" Andy smiled indifferently. "Go after him, then. And say,
Happy: if yuh ride that blue roan for five successive minutes, I'll
give yuh fifty dollars. I knew that hoss down on the Musselshell; he's
got a record that'd reach from here to Dry Lake and back." It was a
bluff, pure and simple, born of his covetousness, but it had the
desired effect--or nearly so.
Happy fumbled his rope and eyed the roan. "Aw, I betche you're just
lying," he hazarded; but, like many another, when he did strike the
truth he failed to recognize it. "I betche--"
"All right, rope him out and climb on, if yuh don't believe me." The
tone of Andy was tinged with injury. "There's fifty dollars--yes, by
gracious, I'll give yuh a _hundred_ dollars if yuh ride him for five
minutes straight."
A conversation of that character, carried on near the top of two
full-lunged voices, never fails in the range land to bring an audience
of every male human within hearing. All other conversations and
interests were immediately suspended, and a dozen men trotted up to
see what it was all about. Andy remained roosting upon the top rail,
his rope coiled loosely and dangling from one arm while he smoked
imperturbably.
"Oh, Happy was going to rope out a sure-enough bad one for his night
hoss, and out uh the goodness uh my heart, I put him wise to what he
was going up against," he explained carelessly.
"He acts like he has some thoughts uh doubting my word, so I just
offered him a hundred dollars to ride him--that blue roan, over there
next that crooked post. GET_ a reserved seat right in front of the
grand stand where all the big acts take_ PLACE;" he sung out suddenly,
in the regulation circus tone. "GET-a-seat-right-in-front-where-Happy-Jack-
the-WILD-Man-rides-the-BUCKING-BRONCHO--Go on, Happy. Don't keep the
audience waiting. Aren't yuh going to earn that hundred dollars?"
Happy Jack turned half a shade redder than was natural. "Aw, gwan. I
never said I was going to do no broncho-busting ack. But I betche yuh
never seen that roan before he was unloaded in Dry Lake."
"What'll yuh bet I don't know that hoss from a yearling colt?" Andy
challenged, and Happy Jack walked away without replying, and cast his
loop sullenly over the first horse he came to--which was _not_ the
roan.
Chip, coming up to hear the last of it, turned and looked long at the
horse in question; a mild-mannered horse, standing by a crooked corral
post and flicking his ears at the flies. "Do you know that roan?" he
asked Andy, in the tone which brings truthful answer. Andy had one
good point: he never lied except in an irresponsible mood of pure
deviltry. For instance, he never had lied seriously, to an employer.
"Sure, I know that hoss," he answered truthfully.
"Did you ever ride him?"
"No," Andy admitted, still truthfully. "I never rode him but once
myself, but I worked right with a Lazy 6 rep that had him in his
string, down at the U up-and-down, two years ago. I know the hoss, all
right; but I did lie when I told Happy I knowed him from a colt. I
spread it on a little bit thick, there." He smiled engagingly down at
Chip.
"And he's a bad one, is he?" Chip queried Over his shoulder, just as
he was about to walk away.
"Well," Andy prevaricated--still clinging to the letter, if not to the
spirit of truth. "He ain't a hoss I'd like to see Happy Jack go up
against. I ain't saying, though, that he can't be _rode_. I don't say
that about _any_ hoss."
"Is he any worse than Glory, when Glory is feeling peevish?" Weary
asked, when Chip was gone and while the men still lingered. Andy,
glancing to make sure that Chip was out of hearing, threw away his
cigarette and yielded to temptation. "Glory?" he snorted with a fine
contempt. "Why, Glory's--a--_lamb_ beside that blue roan! Why, that
hoss throwed Buckskin Jimmy clean out of a corral--Did yuh ever see
Buckskin Jimmy ride? Well, say, yuh missed a pretty sight, then;
Jimmy's a sure-enough rider. About the only animal he ever failed to
connect with for keeps, is that same cow-backed hoss yuh see over
there. Happy says he's got a kind eye in his head--" Andy stopped and
laughed till they all laughed with him. "By gracious, Happy ought to
step up _on_ him, once, and see how _kind_ he is!" He laughed again
until Happy, across the corral saddling the horse he had chosen,
muttered profanely at the derision he knew was pointed at himself.
"Why, I've seen that hoss--" Andy Green, once fairly started in the
fascinating path of romance, invented details for the pure joy of
creation. If he had written some of the tales he told, and had sold
the writing for many dollars, he would have been famous. Since he did
not write them for profit, but told them for fun, instead, he earned
merely the reputation of being a great liar. A significant mark of his
genius lay in the fact that his inventions never failed to convince;
not till afterward did his audience doubt.
That is why the blue roan was not chosen in any of the strings, but
was left always circling in the corral after a loop had settled. That
is why the Flying U boys looked at him askance as they passed him by.
That is why, when a certain Mr. Coleman, sent by the board of
directors to rake northern Montana for bad horses, looked with favor
upon the blue roan when he came to the Flying U ranch and heard the
tale of his exploits as interpreted--I should say created--by Andy
Green.
"We've got to have him," he declared enthusiastically. "If he's as bad
as all that, he'll be the star performer at the contest, and make that
two-hundred-dollar plum a hard one to pick. Some of these gay boys
have entered with the erroneous idea that that same plum is hanging
loose, and all they've got to do is lean up against the tree and it'll
drop in their mouths. We've got to have that roan. I'll pay you a good
price for him, Whitmore, if you won't let him go any other way. We've
got a reporter up there that can do him up brown in a special article,
and people will come in bunches to see a horse with that kind of a
pedigree. Is it Green, here, that knows the horse and what he'll do?
You're sure of him, are you, Green?"
Andy took time to roll a cigarette. He had not expected any such
development as this, and he needed to think of the best way out. All
he had wanted or intended was to discourage the others from claiming
the blue roan; he wanted him in his own string. Afterwards, when they
had pestered him about the roan's record, he admitted to himself that
he had, maybe, overshot the mark and told it a bit too scarey, and too
convincingly. Under the spell of fancy he had done more than make the
roan unpopular as a roundup horse; he had made him a celebrity in the
way of outlaw horses. And they wanted him in the rough-riding contest!
Andy, perhaps, had never before been placed in just such a position.
"Are you sure of what the horse will do?" Mr. Coleman repeated, seeing
that Andy was taking a long time to reply.
Andy licked his cigarette, twisted an end and leaned backward while he
felt in his pocket for a match. From the look of his face you never
could have told how very uncomfortable he felt "Naw," he drawled. "I
ain't never sure of what _any_ hoss will do. I've had too much
dealings with 'em for any uh that brand uh foolishness." He lighted
the cigarette as if that were the only matter in which he took any
real interest, though he was thinking fast.
Mr. Coleman looked nonplussed. "But I thought--you said--"
"What I said," Andy retorted evenly, "hit the blue roan two years ago;
maybe he's reformed since then; I dunno. Nobody's rode him, here." He
could not resist a sidelong glance at Happy Jack. "There was some talk
of it, but it never come to a head."
"Yuh offered me a hundred dollars--" Happy Jack began accusingly.
"And yuh never made no move to earn it, that I know of. By gracious,
yuh all seem to think I ought to _mind_-read that hoss! I ain't seen
him for two years. Maybe so, he's a real wolf yet; maybe so, he's a
sheep." He threw out both his hands to point the end of the
argument--so far as he was concerned--stuck them deep into his
trousers' pockets and walked away before he could be betrayed into
deeper deceit. It did seem to him rather hard that, merely because he
had wanted the roan badly enough to--er--exercise a little diplomacy
in order to get him, they should keep harping on the subject like
that. And to have Coleman making medicine to get the roan into that
contest was, to say the least, sickening. Andy's private belief was
that a twelve-year-old girl could go round up the milk-cows on that
horse. He had never known him to make a crooked move, and he had
ridden beside him all one summer and had seen him in all places and
under all possible conditions. He was a dandy cow-horse, and dead
gentle; all this talk made him tired. Andy had forgotten that he
himself had started the talk.
Coleman went often to the corral when the horses were in, and looked
at the blue roan. Later he rode on to other ranches where he had heard
were bad horses, and left the roan for further consideration. When he
was gone, Andy breathed freer and put his mind to the coming contest
and the things he meant to do with the purse and with the other
contestants.
"That Diamond G twister is going t' ride," Happy Jack announced, one
day when he came from town. "Some uh the boys was in town and they
said so. He can ride, too. I betche Andy don't have no picnic gitting
the purse away from _that_ feller. And Coleman's got that sorrel
outlaw uh the HS. I betche Andy'll have to pull leather on that one."
This was, of course, treason pure and simple; but Happy Jack's
prophecies were never taken seriously.
Andy simply grinned at him. "Put your money on the Diamond G twister,"
he advised calmly. "I know him--he's a good rider, too. His name's
Billy Roberts. Uh course, I aim to beat him to it, but Happy never
does like to have a sure-thing. He wants something to hang his jaw
down over. Put your money on Billy and watch it fade away, Happy."
"Aw, gwan. I betche that there sorrel--"
"I rode that there sorrel once, and combed his forelock with both
spurs alternate," Andy lied boldly. "He's pickings. Take him back and
bring me a real hoss."
Happy Jack wavered. "Well, I betche yuh don't pull down that money,"
he predicted vaguely. "I betche yuh git throwed, or something. It
don't do to be too blame sure uh nothing."
Whereat Andy laughed derisively and went away whistling. "I wish I was
as sure uh living till I was a thousand years old, and able to ride
nine months out of every year of 'em," he called back to Happy. Then
he took up the tune where he had left off.
For the days were still crisp at both ends and languorous in the
middle, and wind and grasses hushed and listened for the coming of
winter. And because of these things, and his youth and his health, the
heart of Andy Green was light in his chest and trouble stood afar off
with its face turned from him.
It was but three days to the opening of the fair when Coleman,
returning that way from his search for bad horses, clattered, with his
gleanings and three or four men to help drive them, down the grade to
the Flying U. And in the Flying U coulee, just across the creek from
the corrals, still rested the roundup tents for a space. For the
shipping was over early and work was not urgent, and Chip and the Old
Man, in their enthusiasm for the rough-riding contest and the entry of
their own man, had decided to take the wagons and crew entire to Great
Falls and camp throughout the four days of the fair. The boys all
wanted to go, anyway, as did everybody else, so that nothing could be
done till it was over. It was a novel idea, and it tickled the humor
of the Happy Family.
The "rough string," as the bad horses were called, was corralled, and
the men made merry with the roundup crew. Diamond G men they were,
loudly proclaiming their faith in Billy Roberts, and offering bets
already against Andy, who listened undisturbed and had very little to
say. The Happy Family had faith in him, and that was enough. If
everybody, he told them, believed that he would win, where would be
the fun of riding and showing them?
It was after their early supper that Coleman came down to camp at the
heels of Chip and the Old Man. Straightway he sought out Andy like a
man who has something on his mind; though Andy did not in the least
know what it was, he recognized the indefinable symptoms and braced
himself mentally, half suspecting that it was something about that
blue roan again. He was getting a little bit tired of the blue
roan--enough so that, though he had chosen him for his string, he had
not yet put saddle to his back, but waited until the roundup started
out once more, when he would ride him in his turn.
It was the blue roan, without doubt. Coleman came to a stop directly
in front of Andy, and as directly came to the point.
"Look here, Green," he began. "I'm shy on horses for that contest, and
Whitmore and Bennett say I can have that roan you've got in your
string. If he's as bad as you claim, I certainly must have him. But
you seem to have some doubts of what he'll do, and I'd like to see him
ridden once. Your shingle is out as a broncho-peeler. Will you ride
him this evening, so I can size him up for that contest?"
Andy glanced up under his eyebrows, and then sidelong at the crowd.
Every man within hearing was paying strict attention, and was eyeing
him expectantly; for broncho-fighting is a spectacle that never palls.
"Well, I can ride him, if yuh say so," Andy made cautious answer, "but
I won't gamble he's a bad hoss _now_--that is, bad enough to take to
the Falls. Yuh don't want to expect--"
"Oh, I don't expect anything--only I want to see him ridden once. Come
on, no time like the present. If he's bad, you'll have to ride him at
the fair, anyhow, and a little practice won't hurt you; and if he
isn't, I want to know it for sure."
"It's a go with me," Andy said indifferently, though he secretly felt
much relief. The roan would go off like a pet dog, and he could
pretend to be somewhat surprised, and declare that he had reformed.
Bad horses do reform, sometimes, as Andy and every other man in the
crowd knew. Then there would be no more foolish speculation about the
cayuse, and Andy could keep him in peace and have a mighty good
cow-pony, as he had schemed. He smoked a cigarette while Chip was
having the horses corralled, and then led the way willingly, with
twenty-five men following expectantly at his heels. Unlike Andy, they
fully expected an impromptu exhibition of fancy riding. Not all of
them had seen Andy atop a bad horse, and the Diamond G men, in
particular, were eager to witness a sample of his skill.
The blue roan submitted to the rope, and there was nothing spectacular
in the saddling. Andy kept his cigarette between his lips and smiled
to himself when he saw the saddle bunch hazed out through the gate and
the big corral left empty of every animal but the blue roan, as was
customary when a man tackled a horse with the record which he had
given the poor beast. Also, the sight of twenty-five men roosting
high, their boot-heels hooked under a corral rail to steady them,
their faces writ large with expectancy, amused him inwardly. He
pictured their disappointment when the roan trotted around the corral
once or twice at his bidding, and smiled again.
"If you can't top him, Green, we'll send for Billy Roberts. _He'll_
take off the rough edge and gentle him down for yuh," taunted a
Diamond G man.
"Don't get excited till the show starts," Andy advised, holding the
cigarette in his fingers while he emptied his lungs of smoke. Just to
make a pretence of caution, he shook the saddle tentatively by the
horn, and wished the roan would make a little show of resistance,
instead of standing there like an old cow, lacking only the cud, as he
complained to himself, to make the resemblance complete. The roan,
however, did lay back an ear when Andy, the cigarette again in his
lips, put his toe in the stirrup.
"Go after it, you weatherbeaten old saw-buck," he yelled, just to make
the play strong, before he was fairly in the saddle.
Then it was that the Happy Family, heart and soul and pocket all for
Andy Green and his wonderful skill in the saddle; with many dollars
backing their belief in him and with voices ever ready to sing his
praises; with the golden light of early sunset all about them and the
tang of coming night-frost in the air, received a shock that made them
turn white under their tan.
"Mama!" breathed Weary, in a horrified half-whisper.
And Slim, goggle-eyed beside him, blurted, "Well, by _golly_!" in a
voice that carried across the corral.
For Andy Green, tamer of wild ones (forsooth!) broncho-twister with a
fame that not the boundary of Chouteau County held, nor yet the
counties beyond; Andy Green, erstwhile "André de Gréno, champion
bare-back rider of the Western Hemisphere," who had jumped through
blazing hoops and over sagging bunting while he rode, turned
handsprings and done other public-drawing feats, was prosaically,
unequivocally "piled" at the fifth jump!
That he landed lightly on his feet, with the cigarette still between
his lips, the roosting twenty-five quite overlooked. They saw only the
first jump, where Andy, riding loose and unguardedly, went up on the
blue withers. The second, third and fourth jumps were not far enough
apart to be seen and judged separately; as well may one hope to decide
whether a whirling wheel had straight or crooked spokes. The fifth
jump, however, was a masterpiece of rapid-fire contortion, and it was
important because it left Andy on the ground, gazing, with an
extremely grieved expression, at the uninterrupted convolutions of the
"dandy little cow-hoss."