"You done bought a horse!" said Bobby. "And Johnny, he's got a mount
to make him a rep--if they don't spill him." He broke into rollicking
song:
_They picked me up and carried me in;
They rubbed me down with a rolling pin.
"Oh, that's the way we all begin,
You're doing well," says Brown;
"To-morrow morn, if you don't die,
I'll give you another horse to try."
"Oh, can't you let me walk?" says I----_
Here he cocked an impish eye at Dines, observed that gentleman's
mournful face, and broke the song short.
"What's the matter with you now, Dinesy? You can ride 'em, of course.
No trouble after you first take the edge off."
"It isn't that," said Dines sorrowfully. "I--I--you ain't a bit to
blame, but--"
He stopped, embarrassed.
"What's the matter, you old fool? Spill it!"
Johnny sighed and drew in a long breath.
"I hate to name it, Bob--I do so. Hiram Yoast and Foamy White, the
blamed old fools, they orter told you! They'll be all broke up about
this." He looked Bob square in the eye and plunged on desperately.
"Them bears, Bobby--Hiram and Foamy had been makin' pets of 'em.
Feedin' them beef bones and such ever since last spring--had 'em
plumb gentle."
"Hell and damnation!"
Johnny's eyes were candid and compassionate. "Anybody would have done
just the same, Bobby. Don't you feel too bad about it. Rotten durned
shame, though. Them bears was a bushel o' fun. Jack and Jill, the two
biggest ones, they was a leetle mite standoffish and inclined to play
it safe. But the Prodigal Son, that's the least one--growed a heap
since last spring with plenty to eat that way--why, the Prodigal he'd
never met up with any man but Foamy and Hi, so he wasn't a mite leery.
Regular clown, that bear. Stand up right in front of the door, and
catch biscuit and truck the boys threw to him--loll out his little red
tongue and grin like a house afire. He was right comical. How he did
love molasses!"
"How come them fools didn't tell me?" demanded the crestfallen hunter,
almost in tears.
"Pretty tough luck," said Hales commiseratingly. "I killed a pet deer
once. I know just how you feel."
"I don't know who's to break it to Hiram and Foamy," said Johnny,
grieving. "It's goin' to hurt 'em, bad! They set a heap of store by
them bears--'special the Prodigal--poor little fellow! I feel right
bad myself, and I was only here two nights. Make it all the worse for
them, being all on account of their cussed carelessness. I can't see
how you're a bit to blame. Only I do think you might have noticed your
night horse didn't make any fuss. Usual, horses are scared stiff of
bears. But they'd got plumb used to these."
"Didn't keep up no horse that night," said Bob miserably.
"Look here!" said Hales. "What's the use of letting them other fellows
know anything about it? Mr. Dines and me, we won't tell. This young
man can send his bearskins over east, Tularosa or somewhere, and keep
his lip buttoned up. No one need be ever the wiser. Bears change their
range whenever they get good and ready. Nobody need know but what they
just took a notion to light out."
"Say, that's the right idea!" said Johnny, brightening. "That'll save
a heap of trouble. Boys are liable to think the round-up scared 'em
out--as might happen, easy. That ain't all either. That plan will not
only save Hi and Foamy a heap o' grief, but it won't be no bad thing
for Bob Gifford. I'll tell you honest, Bob--the Bar Cross will near
devil the life out of you if this thing ever gets out."
"That's good dope, kid," said Hales kindly. "No use cryin' over spilt
milk."
"Let's drop it then. I'll get rid of the bear hides."
"That's right. Talkin' about it only makes you feel bad. Forget it.
Here, I'll give you something else to think about. You two seem to be
all right."
Hales drew rein, with a long appraising look at the younger man. It
seemed to satisfy him; he rode a little to one side, facing a wooded
sugar-loaf hill in the middle of the rough gap leading east to
Rosebud. He waved his hand. A crackling of brush made instant answer;
high above them a horseman came from cover and picked his way down the
steep hill.
"Friend of mine," explained Hales, returning. "He is sort of watering
at night, just now. No hanging matter--but he wouldn't have showed up
unless I waved him the O. K. And he is sure one hungry man. It's for
him I bought the horse."
Johnny reflected a little. This was no new or startling procedure.
Besides being the most lonesome spot in a thinly settled country, with
a desert on each side, and with Engle, thirty miles, for next
neighbor, the horse camp had other advantages. It was situated in the
Panhandle of Socorro County; a long, thin strip of rough mountain, two
townships wide and five long, with Sierra County west, Dona Ana to the
south, Lincoln and Otero on the east; a convenient juxtaposition in
certain contingencies. Many gentlemen came uncommunicative to the
horse camp and departed unquestioned. In such case the tradition of
hospitality required the host to ride afield against the parting time;
so being enabled to say truly that he knew not the direction of his
guest's departure. Word was passed on; the Panhandle became well and
widely known; we all know what the lame dog did to the doctor.
But Johnny rubbed his nose. This thing had been done with needless
ostentation; and Johnny did not like Mr. Hales' face. It was a furtive
face; the angles of the eyes did not quite match, so that the eyes
seemed to keep watch of each other; moreover, they were squinched
little eyes, and set too close to the nose; the nose was too thin and
was pinched to a covert sneer, aided therein by a sullen mouth under
heavy mustaches. Altogether Mr. Hales did not look like a man
overgiven to trustfulness. Johnny did not see any reason why Mr.
Hales' friend should not have ridden in later and with more reticence;
so he set himself to watch for such reason.
"My friend, Mr. Smith," announced Hales, as Mr. Smith joined them. Mr.
Smith, like the others, wore belt and six-shooter; also, a rifle was
strapped under his knee. He was a short and heavy-set man, singularly
carefree of appearance, and he now inquired with great earnestness:
"Anybody mention grub?"
"Sure," said Bobby. "Let's drift! Only a mile or so."
_We all went to the ranch next day;
Brown augured me most all the way;
He said cowpunching was only play,
There was no work at all.
"All you have to do is ride,
It's just like drifting with the tide----"
Lord have mercy, how he lied!
He had a most horrible gall!_
The walling hills were higher now. The canyon fell away swiftly to
downward plunge, gravel between cut banks. Just above the horse camp
it made a sharp double-S curve. Riding across a short cut of shoulder,
Bob, in the lead, held up a hand to check the others. He rode up on a
little platform to the right, from which, as pedestal, rose a great
hill of red sandstone, square-topped and incredibly steep. Bobby waved
his hat; a man on foot appeared on the crest of the red hill and
zigzagged down the steeps. He wore a steeple-crowned hat and he
carried a long rifle in the crook of his arm.
Johnny's eyes widened. He exchanged a glance with Hales; and he
observed that Smith and Hales did not look at each other. Yet they
had--so Johnny thought--one brief glance coming to them, under the
circumstances.
Hales pitched his voice low.
"You was lying about them bears, of course?"
"Got to keep boys in their place," said Johnny in the same guarded
undertone. "If them bears had really been pets do you suppose I'd ever
have opened my head about it?"
"It went down easy." Hales grinned his admiration. "You taken one
chance though--about his night horse."
"Not being scared, you mean? Well, he hasn't mentioned any horse
having a fit. And I reckoned maybe he hadn't kept up any night horse.
Really nothing much for him to do. Except cooking."
"He does seem to have a right smart of company," agreed Hales.
Bob returned with the last comer--a gaunt, brown man with a gift for
silence.
"My friend, Mr. Jones," Bob explained gravely. "He stakes his horse
on that hilltop. Bully grass there. And quiet. He likes quiet. He
doesn't care for strangers a-tall--not unless I stand good for 'em."
The camp--a single room, some fourteen feet by eighteen, flat roofed,
made of stone with a soapstone fireplace--was built in a fenced yard
on a little low red flat, looped about by the canyon, pleasant with
shady cedars, overhung by a red and mighty mountain at the back, faced
by a mightier mountain of white limestone. The spring gushed out at
the contact of red and white.
The bunch of saddle horses was shut up in the water pen. Preparation
for dinner went forward merrily, not without favorable comment from
Mr. Smith for Bob's three bearskins, a proud carpet on the floor. Mr.
Jones had seen them before; Hales and Johnny kept honorable silence on
that theme. Hales and Mr. Smith set a good example by removing belt
and gun; an example followed by Bob, but by neither Johnny nor Mr.
Jones. The latter gentleman indeed had leaned his rifle in the corner
beyond the table. But while the discussion of bearskins was most
animated, Johnny caught Mr. Jones' eye, and arched a brow. Johnny
next took occasion to roll his own eye slowly at the unconscious
backs of Mr. Hales and Mr. Smith--and then transferred his gaze, very
pointedly, to the long rifle in the corner. Shortly after, Mr. Jones
rose and took a seat behind the table, with the long rifle at his
right hand.
"Well, Mr. Bob," said Hales when dinner was over, "here's your thirty
dollars. You give Smith a bill of sale and get your pardner to witness
it. Me, I'm telling you good-by. I'm due to lead Smith's discard pony
about forty mile north to-night, and set him loose about daylight--up
near the White Oaks stage road. Thank'ee kindly. Good-by, all!"
"Wait a minute, Toad," said Smith briskly. "I'll catch up my new
cayuse and side you a little ways. Stake him out in good grass, some
quiet place--like my pardner here." He grinned at Mr. Jones, who
smiled, attentive. "I'll hang my saddle in a tree and hoof it back
about dark. Safe enough here--all good fellows. And I sure like that
bear meat. To say nothing of being full up of myself for society."
"We'll do the dishes," said Johnny. "Bob, you rope me up the gentlest
of my hyenas and we'll slip down to Puddingstone presently."
"Well, good luck to you, Mr. Dines," said Hales at the door.
"So long."
"That horse you've got staked out, Mr. Jones," said Johnny, when the
others were catching horses, "how about him? I've got a private horse
out in the water pen. Shall we swap? Saddles too? You're a little the
biggest, but you can let out my stirrups a notch, and I can take up a
notch in yours, up on that pinnacle when I go for my new horse and
come back--about dark. That way, you might ride down the canyon with
Bob. I think maybe--if it was important--Bob might not find the horses
he wants, and might lay out to-night. And you might tell him you was
coming back to camp. But you can always change your mind, you know.
'All you have to do is ride.'"
"This is right clever of you, young man," said Jones slowly.
"It sure is. Your saddle any good?"
"Better'n yours. Enough better to make up for the difference in
hosses, unless yours is a jo-darter. My hoss is tired."
"He'll have all fall to rest up. We'd better trade hats, too. Somebody
might be watchin' from the hills."
"Them fellows?" Jones motioned toward the water pen with the plate he
was drying.
"Scouts, I guess. Decoy ducks. More men close, I judge. Acted like it.
You ought to know."
"It ain't noways customary to send two men after me," said Jones.
Johnny nodded. "You don't know about Smithy yet. Let me wise you up."
He outlined the trustfulness of Smithy. "So he was all labeled up for
an outlaw, like a sandwich man. Putting one over on Bobby--him being a
boy. Bobby fell for it. And me, just a big kid myself, what show did I
have with two big grown men smooth as all that? So they fooled me,
too. Smithy said 'Toad' once--notice? Toad Hales. I've heard of Toad
Hales. Socorro way. Big mitt man, once. Skunk--but no fighting fool.
Out for the dollar."
"He sees some several. You're takin' right smart of a chance, young
fellow."
"I guess I've got a right to swap horses if I want to. Hark! They're
ridin' up the canyon."
"Well, suh, I'm right obliged to you, and that's a fact."
"I'm not doing this for you exactly. I'm protectin' the Bar Cross. And
that's funny, too," said Johnny. "I've just barely signed up with the
outfit, and right off things begin to take place in great lumps and
gobs. More action in two days than I've seen before in two years.
Here's how I look at it: If anyone sees fit to ride up on you and
gather you on the square I've got nothing to say. But I hold no candle
to treachery. You're here under trust. I owe it to the Bar Cross--and
to you--that you leave here no worse off than you came. I don't know
what you've done. If it's mean enough, I may owe it to Johnny Dines
to go after you myself later on. But you go safe from here first.
That's my job."
"And I'll bet you'd sure come a-snuffin'. I judge you're a right white
man, suh! But it's not so mean as all that, this time. Not even a case
of 'alive or dead.' Just 'for arrest and conviction.' So I guess
you'll be reasonably safe on the hillside. No money in killing you, or
me, or whoever brings my hoss off of that hill. And they'll be
counting on gathering you in easy--asleep here, likely."
"That's the way I figured it--that last."
"But how'll you square yourself with the sheriff?"
"I'll contrive to make strap and buckle meet some way. Man dear, I've
got to!"
"Well, then--I owe you a day in harvest. Good-by, suh. Jones, he pulls
his freight."
* * * * *
Johnny brought his new horse and saddle down from the red hill,
unmolested. He cut out what horses he wanted to keep in the branding
pen; turned the others loose, his new acquisition with them; and
started supper. Mr. Smith joined him at dark; but the horse hunters
did not get back. Supper followed, then seven-up and conversation.
Johnny fretted over the non-return of Gifford.
"He talked as if he knew right where to lay his hand on them horses,"
he complained. "Wish I had gone myself. Now in the morning I'll have
to be out of here at daylight. That bunch I got in the pen, I got to
take them out to grass, and wait till Bob comes--if the blame little
fool sleeps out to-night."
"Oh, he'll be in purty quick, likely."
"I don't know," said Johnny dejectedly. "I had to-morrow all figured
out like a timetable, and here it's all gummed up. Listen. What's that
in the yard--crunchin'? Varmints, likely. When I was here last we used
to throw out beef bones, and of nights we'd shoot through the doorway
at the noise. We got eight skunks and three coyotes and a fox and a
tub. Guess I'll try a shot now." He picked up his revolver and cocked
it.
"Hello, the house!" said a hurried voice outside.
"Why, it's a man!" said Johnny. He turned his gun upon Mr. Smith.
"One word and you're done," he whispered. His eye was convincing.
Smith petrified. Johnny raised his voice. "Hello, outside! You come
near getting shot for a skunk! If you want supper and shelter say
please and walk out loud like a man. I don't like your pussy-foot
ways."
"Come out of there--one at a time--hands up!" said the voice. "We've
got you surrounded. You can't get away!"
"On the contrary, we are behind thick walls, and you can get away if
you're right quick and immediate," said Johnny. "Inside of a minute
I'm going to empty a rifle out there on general principles. This is a
Bar Cross house. I am a Bar Cross man, where I belong, following
orders. Half a minute more!"
"You fool! This is the sheriff's posse!"
"I hear you say it."
"I am the sheriff of Socorro County," said another voice, "and I
summon you to surrender."
"I am a Bar Cross man in a Bar Cross house," repeated Johnny. "If
you're the sheriff, walk in that door on your hind legs, with your
hands up, and let us have a look at you."
"That's Johnny Dines talking!" said a third voice. "Hello, Dines! This
is me, Bill Fewell! Say, this is the sheriff and his posse all right!
Don't you get in wrong."
"One man may unbuckle his belt and back in at that door, hands up. If
you can show any papers for me, I surrender. While I give 'em the
quick look, the man that comes in is a hostage with my gun between his
shoulder blades. If he takes his hands down or anybody tries any funny
business, I'll make a sieve of him. Step lively!"
"Dines, you fool," bawled the sheriff, "I got nothing against you. But
I've got a warrant for that man in there with you, and I'm going to
have him."
"Oh!" A moment's silence. Then said Johnny, in an injured voice: "You
might ha' said so before. I've got him covered and I've taken his gun.
So now I've got one gun for him and one for the hostage. Send in one
man walking backward, hands up, warrant in his belt--and let him stop
right in the door! No mistakes. If the warrant is right you get your
man. Any reward?"
"He's a stiff-necked piece," said Fewell. "But he'll do just what he
says. Here, give me your warrant. He won't hurt me--if you fellows
hold steady. If you don't, you've murdered me, that's all. Hey, Dines!
You stubborn long-eared Missouri mule, I'm coming, as per
instructions--me, Bill Fewell. You be careful!"
He backed up and stood framed in the open door against the lamplight.
Johnny's hand flickered out and snatched the warrant.
"Why, sheriff, this seems to be all right. Only he gave me a different
name. But then, he naturally would. Why, this warrant is all
shipshape. Hope I get some of that reward. Here's your man, and here
are my guns." He appeared at the door and tossed his guns down. The
sheriff crowded by, and broke into a bellow of rage.
"You fool! You blundering idiot! This is one of my posse!"
"What?" Johnny's jaw dropped in pained surprise. "He's a liar, then.
He told me he was an outlaw. Don't blame me!"
"You hell-sent half-wit! Where's that other man--Jones?"
"Oh, him? He's down the canyon, sir. He went with Bob after horses. He
hasn't got back yet, sir."
"Dines, you scoundrel! Are you trying to make a fool out of me?"
"Oh, no, sir! Impossible. Not at all, sir. If you and your posse will
take cover, sir, I'll capture him for you when he comes back, just as
I did this one, sir. We are always glad to use the Bar Cross house as
a trap and the Bar Cross grub for bait. As you see, sir."
"Damn you, Dines, that man isn't coming back!"
Johnny considered this for a little. Then he looked up with innocent
eyes.
"Perhaps you are right, sir," he said thoughtfully.
* * * * *
Long since, the floods have washed out the Bar Cross horse camp, torn
away pens and flat and house, leaving from hill to hill a desolate
wash of gravel and boulders--so that no man may say where that poor
room stood. Yet youth housed there and hope, honor and courage and
loyalty; there are those who are glad it shall shelter no meaner
thing.