FIRE
Tombstone was waiting on the steps of the porch. "D'you have any
luck?" he asked.
"Pretty good luck," grinned the boy. "We argued the thing out, and
only half of 'em decided to quit, the three I.W.Ws., and three more.
The other six will stay."
"Even if half of 'em quits, we'll be short-handed an' prob'ly lose a
lot of hay," Tombstone glanced into the boy's face, and his brow
puckered. "Say, boss, what's the matter? Yer shirt's all tore. You
look like you be'n in a fight."
"Things did get a little lively down there for a few minutes, but
they're quiet, now."
Tombstone's reply was interrupted by the sound of hoofs, and the next
moment Tex and his six cowboys swept down the creek and drew up
sharply in the open space before the house.
"Hello, boss," called the new foreman, as he slipped to the ground.
"Well, we finished up the job. Shoved five hundred head of steers
onto the reservation, an' picked up four head of missin' saddle
horses." His glance rested for a moment upon the face of Tombstone,
and he grinned: "What's eatin' you? You're plumb doleful lookin'.
Got a burr in under yer suspenders?"
"Huh, they's plenty trouble 'round here. Part of the hay crew's
quit, an' the boss had a fight down to the bunk house, an' things
looks mighty bad."
"A fight, did you say?" Tex stepped closer to Connie. "How about
it, boss? It ain't over, is it?"
The boy laughed, "Yes, it's all over. You're just a few minutes too
late to get in on it." Connie spent the next ten minutes in
explaining the situation, concluding with the information that he was
going to pay off the insurgents and get them off the ranch.
Tex looked grave. "I.W.Ws., eh?"
Connie nodded: "Yes. Know anything about 'em?"
"I know enough to know that when they can't get holt of dynamite they
use fire. There must be a lot of haystacks in the fields by now.
They belong where Harmon an' his gang is. Ain't they done enough so
we can haul 'em to town an' turn 'em over to the sheriff?"
The boy shook his head: "No--but--" his voice trailed into silence,
and for some moments he stood apparently lost in thought:
"We started a setting just inside the fence up where our road joins
the main trail. We must have half a stack there already."
"I wasn't thinkin' about no half a stack," replied Tex. "How about
the settin's that's already finished--the ones that's got anywheres
from a hundred to four hundred ton apiece in 'em?"
"And I was thinking of that half a stack," replied the boy gravely.
"These I.W.Ws. are pilgrims. They wouldn't go far off the main trail
in the dark."
Followed, then, a colloquy, at the end of which Tex and his riders
turned and rode away into the night, and Connie and Tombstone
proceeded to the bunk house.
"Holy Smoke!" exclaimed Tombstone, as he stepped into the interior.
"They ain't a hull chair left! I'll say things was lively! Charge
'em up with the chairs, boss. It's their fault they was broke."
Connie laughed: "I'll contribute the chairs to the good of the
cause." He surveyed the six battered individuals who had been herded
into one end of the bunk house. "Step over here, one at a time and
get your money. You've worked a half a month." One by one the three
I.W.Ws. slouched forward and accepted his wages' while the six loyal
hands stood guard, each with the leg of a broken chair held
conspicuously in his hand. The three others who had thrown in with
them followed, only the last man making any comment. "I don't want
to quit," he whined. "I'm satisfied to keep on workin'. I'm like
him," he indicated the big man with the pipe. "This job suits me,
an' I want to stay. These here fellers talked me into strikin' fer
more wages, but I'm gittin' enough the way it is."
"You're a little too late deciding," answered Connie, coldly. "You
should have made up your mind when the fight started, like these
other men did. Here's your money." The boy handed the man his wages
and turned to the others. "You fellows are going to pull out of here
in about ten minutes," he ordered. "Tombstone will hitch a team to
the wagon and haul you out to the trail."
"The trail!" roared the big I.W.W. "You hauled us out from town an'
you'll haul us back where you got us! We know our rights. You'll
haul us clean to town, or we'll have the law on you!"
"You're a fine bunch to appeal to the law," sneered the boy. "But go
ahead. Your bluff is called, because once outside my gate you're
going to be afoot. We're short handed here because you've made us
short handed, and I haven't got a man, nor a team to spare for a trip
to town. It's only sixty or seventy miles, and the walk will do you
good. If you get tired just camp along the road and wait for the
stage. It will be along sometime to-morrow."
"If you don't haul us, you've got to sleep us, an feed us till the
stage comes, an' then pay our fare in."
"Oh, do I?" Connie smiled, "Well, just add that to your claim for
damages when you bring that law suit."
A few minutes later Tombstone pulled up at the door with a loud
"Whoa!" and Connie turned to the big man with the pipe. "Load 'em
into the wagon," he ordered. "And you boys better go along to see
that they don't start anything. Dump 'em off at the gate and hustle
back. We've done a pretty good evening's work since supper, and I'll
have the cook rustle an extra lunch."
Except for the little light of the stars, the night was dark, and
very still. Beside the trail, just outside the gate of the Round
Seven ranch, six disconsolate figures stood glowering into the night.
During the ride to the gate no one had spoken. In the mind of each
had risen a wild thought of seizing the team and wagon and driving it
on to town, but one glance into the faces of the guards showed their
evident willingness to use the chair legs they still held in their
hands, and the thought died a-borning.
To the northward, the black mass of the Bear Paws cut a jagged line
across the star-studded sky. A light puff of air from the south
rustled the leaves of the cottonwoods and fanned the faces of the
men, and to their ears was borne the muffled creak and rattle of the
wagon returning slowly down the creek to the ranch. The big leader
of the I.W.Ws. scowled as his eyes sought the trail that vanished
into the endless dark. Then, suddenly they fixed upon a rounded
black shape that reared high close beside the trail. It was an
unfinished stack of hay, the one they had been working on that day.
With a venomous imprecation the man pointed to the hay stack: "We'll
make him wisht he'd of hauled us to town!" he growled. "They's forty
ton of hay in that stack if they's a pound. We'll learn the young
pup to set men afoot sixty mile from nowheres!"
The others divined his intention. The narrow-shouldered man whom
Connie had choked into submission offered a protest: "What's forty
ton of hay?" he sneered. "Why not make a job of it while we're about
it? Might's well git hung fer a sheep as a lamb, as the sayin' goes.
What's the matter with slippin' around to them south fields where the
hayin's all finished? They's settin's of hay down there, four stacks
to the settin', an' a hundred ton to the stack. We kin pair off, two
an' two, an' burn three of them settin's to onct--that'll be twelve
hundred ton gone fluie!'
"That's the idee!" seconded the third I.W.W. "Might's well do a good
job while we're about it."
"Yes," sneered the big man, "An' where'd you go when you done it?
They ain't none of us knows the country well enough to ever git out
of them fences in the dark."
"The bad lands is south an' east," countered the narrow-shouldered
man. "We could hit fer the bad lands."
"Yes, an' then what?" taunted the big man. "A-foot in the bad lands
with nothin' to eat, an' nothin' to drink! If we didn't curl up an'
die in two days' time, we'd be crawlin' out of there on our bellies
a-beggin' 'em to come an' hang us to put us out of our misery. An'
believe me, if we git caught it's a tight necktie an' a cottonwood
limb fer us! No sir! I ain't agoin' to git fer off this trail!
They can't see this here stack from the ranch, nohow, an' we'll have
all night to git away in. They won't know it's burnt till mornin',
an' by that time we'll be a long ways off. It ain't like as if the
cowboys was home. They can't foller us, cause they ain't none of
them hay hands kin ride a horse no more'n what we kin. An' besides
they got so much hay down that they can't afford to stop hayin' to
chase us. Even if they did, we could see 'em fore they seen us, an'
hide till they got past. 'Course, I wisht this here was a big
settin', like them below, but losin' forty ton, with hay figgered
around twenty dollars a ton will make it cost him dear fer not
haulin' us to town. Come on!"
The big man started for the fence, the two I.W.Ws. followed at his
heels, but the other three men held back. With a hand on the barbed
wire, the big man glanced over his shoulder, then he turned and
strode wrathfully back to the trail: "What's ailin' youse?" he asked,
truculently, "Youse is in on this here party, same as us! Come on.
We're all in the same boat."
"We don't aim to burn no hay," replied one of the men, looking the
leader squarely in the eye.
"Oh, you don't, eh?" sneered the big man. "An' what do you aim to
do? Didn't you say you was goin' to join up with the I.W.Ws. the
first chanct you got? What do you expect to do--lay around an' let
someone else do the work, an' you git the benefits of it? That don't
go with us."
"An' burnin' up a man's property don't go with us, neither," retorted
the man, "I ain't no criminal."
"Oh, you ain't no criminal!" sneered the other, "An' yet you want to
belong to the I.W.W.! Well, we ain't got no Sunday School section in
the organization. We go after a thing to git it. If we can't git it
one way, we git it another. An' we don't care how we do it. The
only way fer labor to force its demands on capital is to terrorize
capital into grantin' the demands." The man rattled the sentence off
glibly, as a school boy speaks his "piece." It was a sentence he had
memorized. "An' the way to terrorize capital is to destroy
property," he continued, "An' that's what the I.W.W. is for."
"I'm glad I found out before I joined up," replied the other, "I
thought it was just a--a sort of union that took in unskilled labor."
"That's jest exactly what we be! A union--only instead of foolin'
around arbitratin' we believe in usin' force. Strike at capital's
dollars an' you bring it wallerin' to its knees. We're a union, all
right--but our idees is more radical than other unions."
"An' a blame sight too radical fer me!" exclaimed the man, "You go
your way, an' we'll go ourn."
"But, youse already throw'd in with us! Didn't you fight on our side
in the bunk house?"
"Fair fightin', with the odds about even's one thing, an' hay-burnin'
in the night is somethin' else. An' besides, I didn't know what kind
of an outfit you was. You got us kicked out of a good job with your
talkin', but you can't talk us into burnin' no haystack!"
The big I.W.W. turned to the two, who stood at the man's side. "How
about youse?" he asked, glaring into their faces.
"I think the same as him," answered one. "I'm skeert," added the man
who had told Connie he didn't want to quit. "I'm skeert to help burn
the hay, an' I'm skeert not to."
The big man laughed, nastily: "You better be more skeert not to," he
said, "We'll all git the blame of it, anyhow. But, if you throw in
with us, they'll be four agin two, an' if we git caught we kin lay it
on them two pardners of yourn. If we split three an' three, we all
git it."
"I don't want to burn no hay,'" whimpered the man, "But, I'm skeert."
"Suit yerself," replied the big man, indifferently, and turned to
join his two companions who waited beside the fence.
"I'll go! Wait! I'll go long! If us four all sticks together, we
kin lay it on them two." He joined the three who were already
crawling through the wire fence.
"Light her at both ends, an' in the middle," ordered the big man, as
he made for the farther end of the stack. The two men in the road
waited, undecided which way to turn. "What'll we do?" asked one.
"I ain't agoin' to run," said the other, "I ain't got nothin' to run
fer. Let them that does the burnin' do the runnin'."
"But, s'pose they see the fire, an' come up an' ketch us?'
"It won't look so bad if we don't run, as if we do--" a bright tongue
of flame shot upwards at a corner of the stack, and another from an
opposite corner. By the light of the flames the two men saw two of
the I.W.Ws. straighten up, and step back from the fire. The next
instant at the outer rim of the fire light, they caught a blur of
swiftly moving forms. A cry of terror reached their ears.
The flames were bright now, and by their light, they saw a rope shoot
out, and one of the I.W.Ws. was jerked clear off his feet, and fell
violently to the ground. A form ran toward them shrieking in fright
and they recognized the "skeert" man. He, too, was jerked to the
ground before he had run twenty feet. A shower of sparks shot
upward, as one of the flame spots dimmed. A form rushed toward them
stopping at the fence. "Come on, boys! Help fight fire!" The
speaker was Connie Morgan and instantly the two men were at his side.
It was but the work of a moment to crawl through the fence. As they
ran toward the stack they pulled off their coats, and a moment later
were working furiously beside men in high-heeled boots and chaps,
beating down the flames with their coats while others tore at the
stacks with pitch forks. In a few moments the fire was subdued, and
the last spark beaten out. Two lanterns were lighted, and by their
light, the men grouped themselves about the four forms that lay on
the ground tightly bound with lariat ropes.
"Come on," said one of the two men who had refused to help fire the
stack. "There ain't nothin' more fer us to do here. We'll be goin'."
"Don't let them two git away!" roared the big I.W.W. "They was into
it, same as us. They was the lookouts!"
Connie Morgan laughed: "Hold on, boys!" he called, "How about going
back on the job?"
The men turned and faced him. "We was in the fight in the bunk
house, all right," answered the one. "An' you told him," he
indicated the "skeert" man, who was whimpering and moaning upon the
ground, "that it was too late to go back to work. That he'd ort to
made up his mind before the fight."
"Well," answered Connie, "I've had time to change my mind since. You
see, we figured about what would happen up here when we turned these
I.W.Ws. loose, and we sort of got ready for it. The boys got in off
the range tonight, and they rode out here and surrounded the stack
while I was paying you off. Then I followed along behind the wagon
to see the fun, and instead of going back with the wagon, I slipped
in behind that hay cock over there, and so I couldn't help hearing
what you fellows were talking about. I guess you know the I.W.Ws.
now as well as I do. Back there in the bunk house you thought they
were right. I like to see a man willing to fight for what he really
believes to be right. I need men like that. As long as I'm running
the Round Seven, you two have got a job--that is if you want to come
back."
"I'll say I do!" exclaimed the man, quickly. "It's the best blamed
outfit I ever worked fer--an' as fer as wages goes, you kin pay me
whatever you want."
"How about you?" asked Connie, turning to the other.
"I think the same as him," answered the man.
Connie gave a loud whistle, and presently the sound of creaking and
the rattle of wheels announced the approach of the wagon. Tightly
bound, the three I.W.Ws. were loaded in, and as the boys were about
to load the man who had joined them at the last moment, Connie
stepped forward and threw the rope off him. The man rose trembling
to his feet and stood looking fearfully from one to another. No one
paid him the slightest attention, and the boy turned to the others:
"Come on, boys! Let's be getting back. I expect the cook has got
that grub ready by this time."
The cowboys mounted their horses, and the others climbed into the
wagon.
"How about me?" piped the man who had been released from his bonds.
"Ain't you goin' to take me along?'
"Not you," answered the boy, "Ive got no use for your kind, whatever.
Why, you're not even worth arresting!"
The cowboys started their horses, and the wagon followed the cowboys,
and as it threaded its way through the cottonwoods that bordered the
trail down the creek, a wailing cry was born to the ears of the
riders: "I'm skeert all alone in the dark! I'm skeert!" and then the
sound was drowned in the rush of water about the wheels as the wagon
crossed at the ford. And as they emerged on the other side another
sound was borne to their ears. It was the long cry of the cook:
"Come on an' eat it or I'll throw it a-w-a-y!"