AT THE SIGN OF RYAN'S HAND
At the time of Curly's visit I was breaking in a bunch of fool ponies,
and along in August sold them to the Lawson Cattle Company. Their Flying
W. Outfit was forming up just then for the fall round-up, so by way of
swift delivery I took my ponies down by rail to Lordsburgh. Their camp
was beside the stock-yard, and the little old cow town was surely alive
with their cowboys, stamping new boots around to get them used, shooting
off their guns to show how good they felt, filling up with chocolate
creams and pickles to while the time between meals, sampling the whisky,
the games, and the druggist's sure-thing medicines, or racing ponies for
trial along the street.
Now I reckon that the sight and smell of a horse comes more natural to
me than anything else on earth, while the very dust from a horse race
gets into my blood, and I can't come near the course without my head
getting rattled. But from the first whiff of that town I caught the
scent of something going wrong, for most of the stock-yard was full of
cattle branded with a cross, and the Holy Cross _vaqueros_ were loading
them into a train. Moreover, by many a sign I gathered fact on fact,
that this delivery of Balshannon's cattle was out of the way of
business, not a shipment of beef to the market, but a sale of
breeding-stock, which meant nothing short of ruin. I strayed through
that town feeling sick, refusing to drink with the punchers, or talk cow
with the cattlemen, or take any interest in life. At the post office I
met up with Jim, face to face, and he tried to pass by short-sighted.
"Boy," said I, as I grabbed him, "why for air you shamed?"
"Leave me go," he snarled.
"For why, son?"
"'Cause I'm shamed."
"Of yo'self?"
"Shamed of my father. Our breeding-stock is gone to pay his gambling
debts."
"All of it?"
"What's left is offal. Now you leave me go!"
"Whar to?"
"To follow Balshannon's trail--drink, gambling, shame, death, and a good
riddance."
"You'll come with me first," says I, "for an oyster stew and some bear
sign. I ain't ate since sun-up."
He came with me for a stew and the doughnuts, which made him feel some
better in his heart, and after that I close-herded him until the cattle
were shipped, through the evening, through the night, and on to
daybreak. Then I rounded up his greaser cowboys from various gambling
joints, and pointed him and them for Holy Cross.
"Boy," says I at parting, "you've been at work on the range for long
months now, and yo' mother is surely sick for the sight of yo' fool
face. Go home."
"You old Chalkeye fraud," says he, with a grin as wide as the sunrise,
"you're getting rid of me because you want to have a howling time on
your lonesome, with all that money you got for your rotten ponies."
It was surely fine sight to see my Jim hit the trail, the silver fixings
of his saddle and cowboy harness bright as stars, his teeth aflash, his
eyes a-shining, as he stooped down to give me cheek at parting, and lit
out with his tail up for home. His riders saluted me as their old chief
in passing, calling, "Buenas dias señor, adios!" Yes, they were good
boys, with all their dark skin and their habit of missing the wash-time;
light-built riders, with big, soft eyes always watchful, grave manners,
gentle voices, gay laughter, and their beautiful Spanish talk like low
thunder rolling. They were brave as lions, they were true as steel, and
foolish only in the head, I reckon. So they passed by me one by one,
saluting with a lift of the cigarette, a glance of the eye, dressed
gorgeous in dull gold leather, bright gold straw sombreros,
rainbow-coloured serapes, spur and gun aflash, reins taut, and horses
dancing, and were gone in a cloud of dust and glitter away across the
desert. I was never to see them again.
It made me feel quite a piece wistful to think of Holy Cross down yonder
beyond the rim of the far grass, for that house had been more than home
to me, and that range was my pasture where I had grazed for twelve good
years. I could just judge, too, how Jim was wanting for home swift,
while the segundo, good old Juan Terrazas, would pray the young lord to
spare the little horses. "'Tis sixty leagues, and these our horses are
but children, señor."
"Confound the horses!" says Jim, "let's burn the trail for home. Roll
your trail, Pedro! _Vamenos!_"
"But the child horses, my lord, grass-fed only, in the hot desert."
"Roll your tail and roll it high,
We'll all be angels by-and-by!"
And Jim would lope along with a glad heart, singing the round-up songs--
"Little black bull came down the hillside,
Down the hillside, down the hillside,
Little black bull came down the hillside,
Long time ago."
Then he would go on some more happy when he thought of the big tune to
"Roll, Powder, Roll!"
As I heard afterwards, the outfit was rounding the shoulder of the hill
about five miles out when, on the ridge beyond, Mr. Jim's bright eye
took note of something alive.
"A vulture only, my lord," says the segundo, "eating a dead horse."
"A quart of kittens!" says my lord, some scornful. "Call that a
vulture?" and off he sailed, clattering down a slope of loose rocks.
"That bird is a man-bird flapping at us for help. Segundo, you've no
more range of sight than a boiled owl."
The segundo came grumbling along behind, and they curved off across the
level. "That man has lost his horse," says Jim; "thirsty, I guess, and
signalling for help. Go back, Terrazas, and tell the men to wait."
"Si, señor," and Terrazas rolled back to the trail.
As Jim got nearer he saw that the man on the hill had signalled nothing,
but his coat tails were a-flutter in the wind. Now he came all flapping
from rock to rock down the hillside. "Hello!" Jim shouted.
The stranger squatted down on a rock to wait for him, and sat wiping his
face on a red handkerchief. He was dressed all in black, a sky-scout of
sorts, but dusty and making signs as though he couldn't shout for
thirst. Jim took his half-gallon canteen, ranged up, and dismounted.
"Curious," he was thinking; "lips not swollen, tongue not black, this
man ain't thirsty much!"
"My deah young friend," says the preacher between drinks, "you're the
means under Heaven of my deliverance"--gulp--"from a shocking end."
"Scared you'd have to go to heaven?" asked Jim.
"I was afraid"--gulp--"that I must give up my labours in this vale
of"--gulp--"for which I was found unworthy."
"Is that so?"
"Seh, I have walked far, and am much exhausted."
Jim looked at the preacher's pants, and saw that a streak of the cloth
from knee to ankle was dusty none--the same being the mark of the
stirrup leathers. He could not have walked a hundred yards from his
horse.
"Stranger," says Jim, "your horse is just on the other side of this
hill."
"Yes, indeed--but it never lets me get any nearer, and I've chased it
for miles!"
"I'll catch your horse." Jim swung to his seat, spurred off, circled the
hilltop, and found the preacher's horse, rein to the ground, unable to
trot without being tripped at once, dead easy to catch at one jump. This
parson man was a liar, anyway.
Then something caught Jim's eye, a sort of winking star on a hill-crest
far to the east. He watched that star winking steady to right and left.
The thing was a heliograph making talk, as it supposed, to the
preacher, and Jim watched harder than ever.
He couldn't read the signs, so wondering most plentiful, he spurred up
to find out if anything more could be seen from the crest of the hill.
Yes, there lay the railroad, and the town of Lordsburgh, plain as a map.
This preacher had been sly, and heaps untruthful, so Jim rode back
leading his horse, but kept the sights he had seen for his own
consumption.
"I suah thank y'u, seh," says the preacher. "Alas! that I should be so
po' a horseman. My sacred calling has given me no chances of learning to
ride like you-all."
Jim watched him swing to the saddle as only a stockman can. You may
dress a puncher in his last coffin, but no disguise short of that will
spoil his riding.
"Mebbe," says the preacher, "you can favour me with a few hints on the
art of settin' a--whoa! hawss! And if you please, we will go more
gradual 'cause the motion is pitching my po' kidneys up through my neck.
Whoa! Yow!"
Jim broke away at a trot, sitting side-saddle to enjoy the preacher, who
jolted beside him like a sack of dogs.
"Stranger," says he, "the trail is where my men are waiting yonder. To
the left it goes to Lordsburgh, to the right it runs straight to
Bryant's and on to Holy Cross. Good morning, sir," and he left on the
dead run.
"My deah young friend," the preacher wailed at him. "Whoa! Whoa, now!
I've got mislaid! I place myself in yo' hands."
Jim reined.
"Well, where do you want to go?"
"I want to find a wild, a sinful young man by the name of du Chesnay.
He's the Honourable James du Chesnay. Perhaps you know him?"
"Partly. Well, what's your business with him?"
"I suffer," says the preacher, "from clergyman's sore throat--ahic!
Permit me, seh, to ride with you while I explain my business."
"As you please." They had gained the trail, and Jim swung into it with
the preacher, calling back to his riders to keep within range astern.
"Besides," says the preacher, coughing behind his hand, "I am somewhat
timid--there are so many robbers that I yearn for yo' company for
protection."
Jim yelled back to his men in Spanish, "Boys, just watch this
stranger--he's no good. Keep your guns handy, and if he tries to act
crooked, shoot prompt!"
"Thank you, seh!" says the preacher.
"And now, your business, quick!"
"It appears," the preacher groaned, "that some wicked men have been
behaving deceitfully in the purchase of a flock of cows from this young
gentleman."
"Eh?"
"Yes, they paid for his flock with a draft made in favour of Lord
Balshannon, on the National Bank at Grave City. What a dreadful name for
a city!--suggestive of----"
"Rats! Go on, man!"
"This draft on the bank from Jabez Y. Stone, who bought yo' cattle, seh,
you forwarded from Lordsburgh yesterday. It will be presented to-day by
Lord Balshannon at the bank in Grave City."
"How do you know?"
"Unhappily, my sacred calling has left me quite unfamiliah with the
carnal affairs of this most wicked country."
"Well, what's wrong? The bank wired yesterday morning that they held
money to meet this draft. Stone showed me the telegram."
"Up to noon," said the preacher, "there was money in the bank; some
forty thousand dollars in the name of Jabez Y. Stone, ready to meet yo'
draft, and pay for the cattle."
"I know that!"
"At noon yesterday that money was withdrawn from the bank."
"Impossible!"
"Jabez Y. Stone had given a previous draft to another man for the money.
The other man got the plunder--the--ahic!--dross, I mean. Oh that we
poh mortals should so crave after the dross which perisheth!"
"Don't preach!"
"Oh, my young brother, the little word in season----"
"I wish it would choke you. Now who drew that money?"
"A carnal man--yo' fatheh's mortal enemy--Misteh Ryan."
"Ryan! Ryan!"
"Misteh George Ryan, yessir. To-day yo' father presents a worthless
paper at the bank in exchange for his breeding cattle. Oh, how grievous
a thing it is that deceitful men should so deceive themselves, preparing
for a sultry hereafter. Think of these poh dumb driven cattle, exchanged
for a bogus draft upon a miserable, miserable bank--how----"
"Luis!" Jim yelled, and his segundo, old Luis Terrazas, came a-flying.
"Luis, take the men home--I've got to go back to Lordsburgh."
"Stay!" The preacher lifted his hand, brushed back the hat from his
face, and stared into Jim's eyes. "Chalkeye Davies is yondeh at
Lordsburgh thar--you can trust him, eh? Send a letter to Chalkeye; ask
him to wire the sheriff at Albuquerque to hold that thar train of cattle
pending inquiries."
"I'm going back myself. You stand aside!"
"Seh, if you don't ride straight for Holy Cross, you ain't goin' to see
yo' mother alive--she's sinking rapid."
"How do you know what's happening at Holy Cross, at Grave City, and at
Lordsburgh, and all these places a hundred miles apart?"
"Have I said anything, boy, that you cayn't believe?"
"You lied when you said you were thirsty, when you claimed to have
walked, when you made out you couldn't catch your horse, and couldn't
ride--you lied, and you're a liar!"
The preacher reached for his hip, and a dozen revolvers covered him
instant.
"Seh," he said, quite gentle, "my handkerchief is in my hip-pocket;
observe me blow my nose at yo' remarks."
He trumpeted into his big red handkerchief.
"Why do you make this bluff," says Jim, "at being a preacher, when
you've been all your life in the saddle?"
"Yo' questions, seh, are personal for a stranger, and the character you
gave me to yo' greasers was some hasty, and the salute of guns you offer
makes me feel unworthy. As to your thanks for an honest warning to save
yo' lost cattle and haste to yo' dying mother----"
Jim flushed with shame.
"I beg your pardon, sir."
"And you accept my warning?"
"If you'll prove you forgive me by shaking hands, Mr.----"
"Misteh? Just call me friend--no more. And Jim, when you've been to Holy
Crawss, yo' natural feelings will call you swift to Grave City, where
you'll find your father in mortal danger, I feah."
"In mortal danger?"
"Unless," said the stranger, "a mere friend can save him."
Jim looked into this stranger's face, at the tanned hide, seamed and
furrowed with trouble, the strong hard lips, twisty with a sort of queer
smile, at the eyes, which seemed to be _haunted_.
"Sir," he said, "I'll do what you tell me."
So he took paper and pencil from his wallet, leaned over the horn of his
saddle, and made it desk enough for what he had to write.
"Will this do?" says he, passing his letter to the stranger.
"Yes, I reckon. Add, sonny, that Misteh Michael Ryan's private cyar is
due from the east to-morrow, with the Pacific Express. It's timed to
reach Grave City at 10:05 p.m. Chalkeye will be thar."
Jim wrote all that down, then looked up, fearful, surprised at this
preacher knowing so much, then glanced all round to see which man had
the best horse for his message.
"Onate!" he called.
"Si señor."
"Take this letter, Onate, to Mr. Chalkeye Davies in Lordsburgh. Then
you'll follow me home."
Onate uncovered, took the letter, and bowed his thanks. "Gracias señor,
adios!" and curved off swift for Lordsburgh.
Then Jim saw the preacher's eyes boring him through.
"You will shake hands?" he asked.
"With a glad hand," said Captain McCalmont. "Put her thar, boy! I hope
when we meet up again you'll remember me as a friend."
So the great robber swung his horse, and spurred up back to his hilltop,
while Jim and the _vaqueros_ burned the trail for home.