the night, he slipped through the guard on night-herd and lay down
among the others. He complimented himself on his craftiness, but never
dreamed that this was a trail herd, bound for some other country three
hundred miles beyond his native Texas. The company was congenial; it
numbered thirty-five hundred two-year-old steers like himself, and
strangely no one ever noticed him until long after they had crossed the
Frio. Then a swing man one day called his foreman’s attention to a
stray, line-backed, bar-circle-bar steer in the herd. The foreman only
gave him a passing glance, saying, “Let him alone; we may get a jug of
whiskey for him if some trail cutter don’t claim him before we cross
Red River.”
Now Red River was the northern boundary of his native State, and though
he was unconscious of his destination, he was delighted with his new
life and its constant change of scene. He also rejoiced that every hour
carried him farther and farther from the Nueces valley, where he had
suffered so much physical pain and humiliation. So for several months
he traveled northward with the herd. He swam rivers and grazed in
contentment across flowery prairies, mesas and broken country. Yet it
mattered nothing to him where he was going, for his every need was
satisfied. These men with the herd were friendly to him, for they
anticipated his wants by choosing the best grazing, so arranging
matters that he reached water daily, and selecting a dry bed ground for
him at night. And when strange copper-colored men with feathers in
their hair rode along beside the herd he felt no fear.
The provincial ideas of his youth underwent a complete change within
the first month of trail life. When he swam Red River with the leaders
of the herd, he not only bade farewell to his native soil, but burned
all bridges behind him. To the line-back steer, existence on the Nueces
had been very simple. But now his views were broadening. Was not he a
unit of millions of his kind, all forging forward like brigades of a
king’s army to possess themselves of some unconquered country? These
men with whom he was associated were the vikings of the Plain. The Red
Man was conquered, and, daily, the skulls of the buffalo, his
predecessors, stared vacantly into his face.
By the middle of summer they reached their destination, for the cattle
were contracted to a cowman in the Cherokee Strip, Indian Territory.
The day of delivery had arrived. The herd was driven into a pasture
where they met another outfit of horsemen similar to their own. The
cattle were strung out and counted. The men agreed on the numbers. But
watchful eyes scanned every brand as they passed in review, and the men
in the receiving outfit called the attention of their employer to the
fact that there were several strays in the herd not in the road brand.
One of these strays was a line-back, bar-circle-bar, two-year-old
steer. There were also others; when fifteen of them had been cut out
and the buyer asked the trail foreman if he was willing to include them
in the bill of sale, the latter smilingly replied: “Not on your life,
Captain. You can’t keep them out of a herd. Down in my country we call
strays like them _poker steers_.”
And so there were turned loose in the Coldwater Pool, one of the large
pastures in the Strip, fifteen strays. That night, in a dug-out on that
range, the home outfit of cowboys played poker until nearly morning.
There were seven men in the camp entitled to share in this flotsam on
their range, the extra steer falling to the foreman. Mentally they had
a list of the brands, and before the game opened the strays were
divided among the participants. An animal was represented by ten beans.
At the beginning the boys played cautiously, counting every card at its
true worth in a hazard of chance. But as the game wore on and the more
fortunate ones saw their chips increase, the weaker ones were gradually
forced out. At midnight but five players remained in the game. By three
in the morning the foreman lost his last bean, and ordered the men into
their blankets, saying they must be in their saddles by dawn, riding
the fences, scattering and locating the new cattle. As the men
yawningly arose to obey, Dick Larkin defiantly said to the winners,
“I’ve just got ten beans left, and I’ll cut high card with any man to
see who takes mine or I take one of his poker steers.”
“My father was killed in the battle of the Wilderness,” replied Tex,
“and I’m as game a breed as you are. I’ll match your beans and pit you
my bar-circle-bar steer.”
“My sire was born in Ireland and is living yet,” retorted Bold Richard.
“Cut the cards, young fellow.”
“The proposition is yours—cut first yourself.”
The other players languidly returned to the table. Larkin cut a five
spot of clubs and was in the act of tearing it in two, when Tex turned
the tray of spades. Thus, on the turn of a low card, the line-back
steer passed into the questionable possession of Dick Larkin. The
Cherokee Strip wrought magic in a Texas steer. One or two winters in
its rigorous climate transformed the gaunt long-horn into a marketable
beef. The line-back steer met the rigors of the first winter and by
June was as glossy as a gentleman’s silk tile. But at that spring
round-up there was a special inspector from Texas, and no sooner did
his eye fall upon the bar-circle-bar steer than he opened his book and
showed the brand and his authority to claim him. When Dick Larkin asked
to see his credentials, the inspector not only produced them, but gave
the owner’s name and the county in which the brand was a matter of
record. There was no going back on that, and the Texas man took the
line-back steer. But the round-up stayed all night in the Pool pasture,
and Larkin made it his business to get on second guard in night-herding
the cut. He had previously assisted in bedding down the cattle for the
night, and made it a point to see that the poker three-year-old lay
down on the outer edge of the bed ground. The next morning the
line-back steer was on his chosen range in the south end of the
pasture. How he escaped was never known; there are ways and ways in a
cow country.
At daybreak the round-up moved into the next pasture, the wagons, cut
and saddle horses following. The special inspector was kept so busy for
the next week that he never had time to look over the winter drift and
strays, which now numbered nearly two thousand cattle. When the work
ended the inspector missed the line-back steer. He said nothing,
however, but exercised caution enough to take what cattle he had
gathered up into Kansas for pasturage.
When the men who had gone that year on the round-up on the western
division returned, there was a man from Reece’s camp in the Strip, east
on Black Bear, who asked permission to leave about a dozen cattle in
the Pool. He was alone, and, saying he would bring another man with him
during the shipping season, he went his way. But when Reece’s men came
back after their winter drift during the beef-gathering season, Bold
Richard Larkin bantered the one who had left the cattle for a poker
game, pitting the line-back three-year-old against a white poker cow
then in the Pool pasture and belonging to the man from Black Bear. It
was a short but spirited game. At its end the bar-circle-bar steer went
home with Reece’s man. There was a protective code of honor among
rustlers, and Larkin gave the new owner the history of the steer. He
told him that the brand was of record in McMullen County, Texas, warned
him of special inspectors, and gave him other necessary information.
The men from the Coldwater Pool, who went on the eastern division of
the round-up next spring, came back and reported having seen a certain
line-back poker steer, but the bar-circle-bar had somehow changed,
until now it was known as the _pilot wheel_. And, so report came back,
in the three weeks’ work that spring, the line-back pilot-wheel steer
had changed owners no less than five times. Late that fall word came
down from Fant’s pasture up west on the Salt Fork to send a man or two
up there, as Coldwater Pool cattle had been seen on that range. Larkin
and another lad went up to a beef round-up, and almost the first steer
Bold Richard laid his eyes on was an under-bit, line-back, once a
bar-circle-bar but now a pilot-wheel beef. Larkin swore by all the
saints he would know that steer in Hades. Then Abner Taylor called Bold
Richard aside and told him that he had won the steer about a week
before from an Eagle Chief man, who had also won the beef from another
man east on Black Bear during the spring round-up. The explanation
satisfied Larkin, who recognized the existing code among rustlers.
The next spring the line-back steer was a five-year-old. Three winters
in that northern climate had put the finishing touches on him. He was a
beauty. But Abner Taylor knew he dared not ship him to a market, for
there he would have to run a regular gauntlet of inspectors. There was
another chance open, however. Fant, Taylor’s employer, had many Indian
contracts. One contract in particular required three thousand northern
wintered cattle for the Fort Peck Indian Reservation in northeast
Montana. Fant had wintered the cattle with which to fill this contract
on his Salt Fork range in the Cherokee Strip. When the cowman cast
about for a foreman on starting the herd for Fort Peck, the fact that
Abner Taylor was a Texan was sufficient recommendation with Fant. And
the line-back beef and several other poker steers went along.
The wintered herd of beeves were grazed across to Fort Peck in little
less than three months. On reaching the agency, the cattle were in fine
condition and ready to issue to the Indian wards of our Christian
nation. In the very first allotment from this herd the line-back beef
was cut off with thirty others. It was fitting that he should die in
his prime. As the thirty head were let out of the agency corral, a
great shouting arose among the braves who were to make the kill. A
murderous fire from a hundred repeaters was poured into the running
cattle. Several fell to their knees, then rose and struggled on. The
scene was worthy of savages. As the cattle scattered several Indians
singled out the line-back poker steer. One specially well-mounted brave
ran his pony along beside him and pumped the contents of his carbine
into the beef’s side. With the blood frothing from his nostrils, the
line-back turned and catching the horse with his horn disemboweled him.
The Indian had thrown himself on the side of his mount to avoid the
sudden thrust, and, as the pony fell, he was pinned under him. With
admirable tenacity of life the pilot-wheel steer staggered back and
made several efforts to gore the dying horse and helpless rider, but
with a dozen shots through his vitals, he sank down and expired. A
destiny, over which he had no seeming control, willed that he should
yield to the grim reaper nearly three thousand miles from his
birthplace on the sunny Nueces.
Abner Taylor, witnessing the incident, rode over to a companion and
inquired: “Did you notice my line-back poker steer play his last trump?
From the bottom of my heart I wish he had killed the Indian instead of
the pony.”