The trail boss shook his fist after the departing puncher and swore
softly. He hated to lose a man at this time and he had been a little
reckless in threatening to "fire" him; but in a gun-fighting outfit
there was no room for a hothead. "Cimarron" was boss of the outfit that
was driving a large herd of cattle to California, a feat that had been
accomplished before, but that no man cared to attempt the second time.
Had his soul been enriched by the gift of prophecy he would have turned
back. As it was he returned to the work ahead of him. "Aw, let him
go," he growled. "He 's wuss off 'n I am, an' he 'll find it out quick.
I never did see nobody what got crazy mad so quick as him."
"Bill" Cassidy, not yet of age, but a man in stature and strength, rode
north because it promised him civilization quicker than any other way
except the back trail, and he was tired of the coast range. He had
forgotten the trail-boss during the last three days of his solitary
journeying and the fact that he was in the center of an uninhabited
country nearly as large as a good-sized state gave him no concern; he
was equipped for two weeks, and fortified by youth's confidence.
All day long he rode, around mesas and through draws, detouring to avoid
canyons and bearing steadily northward with a certainty that was a
heritage. Gradually the great bulk of mesas swung off to the west, and
to the east the range grew steadily more level as it swept toward the
peaceful river lying in the distant valley like a carelessly flung rope
of silver. The forest vegetation, so luxuriant along the rivers and
draws a day or two before, was now rarely seen, while chaparrals and
stunted mesquite became more common.
He was more than twenty-five hundred feet above the ocean, on a great
plateau broken by mesas that stretched away for miles in a vast sea of
grass. There was just enough tang in the dry April air to make riding a
pleasure and he did not mind the dryness of the season. Twice that day
he detoured to ride around prairie-dog towns and the sight of buffalo
skeletons lying in groups was not rare. Alert and contemptuous gray
wolves gave him a passing glance, but the coyotes, slinking a little
farther off, watched him with more interest. Occasionally he had a shot
at antelope and once was successful.
Warned by the gathering dusk he was casting about for the most favorable
spot for his blanket and fire when a horseman swung into sight out of a
draw and reined in quickly. Bill's hand fell carelessly to his side
while he regarded the stranger, who spoke first, and with a restrained
welcoming gladness in his voice. "Howd'y, Stranger! You plumb
surprised me."
Bill's examination told him that the other was stocky, compactly built,
with a pleasing face and a "good eye." His age was about thirty and the
surface indications were very favorable. "Some surprised myself," he
replied. "Ridin' my way?"
"Far's th' house," smiled the other. "Better join us. Couple of
buffalo hunters dropped in awhile back."
"They 'll go a long way before they 'll find buffalo," Bill responded,
suspiciously. Glancing around he readily picked out the rectangular
blot in the valley, though it was no easy feat. "Huntin' or ranchin'?"
he inquired in tones devoid of curiosity.
"Ranchin'," smiled the other. "Hefty proposition, up here, I reckon.
Th' wolves 'll walk in under yore nose. But I ain't seen no Injuns."
"You will," was the calm reply. "You 'll see a couple, first; an' then
th' whole cussed tribe. _They_ ain't got no buffalo no more, neither."
Buck glanced at him sharply and thought of the hunters, but he nodded.
"Yes. But if that couple don't go back?" he asked, referring to the
Indians.
"Then you 'll save a little time."
"Well, let 'em come. I 'm here to stay, one way or th' other. But,
anyhow, I ain't got no border ruffians like they have over in th'
Panhandle. They 're worse 'n Injuns."
"Yes," agreed Bill. "Th' war ain't ended yet for some of them fellers.
Ex-guerrillas, lots of 'em."
When they reached the house the buffalo hunters were arguing about their
next day's ride and the elder, looking up, appealed to Bill. "Howd'y,
Stranger. Ain't come 'cross no buffaler signs, hev ye?"
Bill smiled. "Bones an' old chips. But th' gray wolves was headin'
southwest."
"What 'd I tell you?" triumphantly exclaimed the younger hunter.
"Well, they ain't much dif'rence, is they?" growled his companion.
Bill missed nothing the hunters said or did and during the silent meal
had a good chance to study their faces. When the pipes were going and
the supper wreck cleaned away, Buck leaned against the wall and looked
across the room at the latest arrival. "Don't want a job, do you?" he
asked.
Bill shook his head slowly, wondering why the hunters had frowned at a
job being offered on another man's ranch. "I 'm headed north. But I
'll give you a hand for a week if you need me," he offered.
Buck smiled. "Much obliged, friend; but it 'll leave me worse off than
before. My other puncher 'll be back in a few weeks with th' supplies,
but I need four men all year 'round. I got a thousand head to brand
yet."
The elder hunter looked up. "Drive 'em back to cow-country an' sell
'em, or locate there," he suggested.
Buck's glance was as sharp as his reply, for he could n't believe that
the hunter had so soon forgotten what he had been told regarding the
ownership of the cattle. "I don't own 'em. This range is bought an'
paid for. I won't lay down."
"I done forgot they ain't yourn," hastily replied the hunter, smiling to
himself. Stolen cattle cannot go back.
"If they was I 'd stay," crisply retorted Buck. "I ain't quittin'
nothin' I starts."
"How many 'll you have nex' spring?" grinned the younger hunter. He was
surprised by the sharpness of the response. "More 'n I 've got now, in
spite of h--!"
Bill nodded approval. He felt a sudden, warm liking for this rugged man
who would not quit in the face of such handicaps. He liked game men,
better if they were square, and he believed this foreman was as square
as he was game. "By th' Lord!" he ejaculated. "For a plugged peso I 'd
stay with you!"
Buck smiled warmly. "Would good money do? But don't you stay if you
oughtn't, son."
When the light was out Bill lay awake for a long time, his mind busy
with his evening's observations, and they pleased him so little that he
did not close his eyes until assured by the breathing of the hunters
that they were asleep. His Colt, which should have been hanging in its
holster on the wall where he had left it, lay unsheathed close to his
thigh and he awakened frequently during the night so keyed was he for
the slightest sound. Up first in the morning, he replaced the gun in
its scabbard before the others opened their eyes, and it was not until
the hunters had ridden out of sight into the southwest that he entirely
relaxed his vigilance. Saying good-by to the two cowmen was not without
regrets, but he shook hands heartily with them and swung decisively
northward.
He had been riding perhaps two hours, thinking about the little ranch
and the hunters, when he stopped suddenly on the very brink of a sheer
drop of two hundred feet. In his abstraction he had ridden up the
sloping southern face of the mesa without noticing it. "Bet there ain't
another like this for a hundred miles," he laughed, and then ceased
abruptly and started with unbelieving eyes at the mouth of a draw not
far away. A trotting line of gray wolves was emerging from it and
swinging toward the south-west ten abreast. He had never heard of such
a thing before and watched them in amazement. "Well, I'm--!" he
exclaimed, and his Colt flashed rapidly at the pack. Two or three
dropped, but the trotting line only swerved a little without pause or a
change of pace and soon was lost in another draw. "Why, they 're single
hunters," he muttered. "Huh! I won't never tell this. I can't hardly
believe it myself. How 'bout you, Ring-Bone?" he asked the horse.
Turning, he rode around a rugged pinnacle of rock and stopped again,
gazing steadily along the back trail. Far away in a valley two black
dots were crawling over a patch of sand and he knew them to be horsemen.
His face slowly reddened with anger at the espionage, for he had not
thought the cowmen could doubt his good will and honesty. Then suddenly
he swore and spurred forward to cover those miles as speedily as
possible. "Come on, ol' Hammer-Head!" he cried. "We're goin' back!"
The hunters had finally decided they would ride into the southwest and
had ridden off in that direction. But they had detoured and swung north
to see him pass and be sure he was not in their way. Now, satisfied
upon that point, they were going back to that herd of cattle, easily
turned from skinning buffalo to cattle, and on a large scale. To do
this they would have to kill two men and then, waiting for the absent
puncher to return with the wagon, kill him and load down the vehicle
with skins. "Like h--l they will!" he gritted. "Three or none, you
piruts. Come on, White-Eye! Don't sleep all th' time; an' don't light
often'r once every ten yards, you saddle-galled, barrel-bellied runt!"
Into hollows, out again; shooting down steep-banked draws and avoiding
cacti and chaparral with cat-like agility, the much-described little
pony butted the wind in front and left a low-lying cloud of dust
swirling behind as it whirred at top speed with choppy, tied-in stride
in a winding circle for the humble sod hut on Snake Creek. The rider
growled at the evident speed of the two men ahead, for he had not gained
upon them despite his efforts. "If I 'm too late to stop it, I 'll
clean th' slate, anyhow," he snapped. "Even if I has to ambush! Will
you run?" he demanded, and the wild-eyed little bundle of whalebone and
steel found a little more speed in its flashing legs.
The rider now began to accept what cover he could find and when he
neared the hut left the shelter of the last, low hill for that afforded
by a draw leading to within a hundred yards of the dugout's rear wall.
Dismounting, he ran lightly forward on foot, alert and with every sense
strained for a warning.
Reaching the wall he peered around the corner and stifled an
exclamation. Buck's puncher, a knife in his back, lay head down the
sloping path. Placing his ear to the wall he listened intently for some
moments and then suddenly caught sight of a shadow slowly creeping past
his toes. Quickly as he sprang aside he barely missed the flashing
knife and the bulk of the man behind it, whose hand, outflung to save
his balance, accidentally knocked the Colt from Bill's grasp and sent it
spinning twenty feet away.
Without a word they leaped together, fighting silently, both trying to
gain the gun in the hunter's holster and trying to keep the other from
it. Bill, forcing the fighting in hopes that his youth would stand a
hot pace better than the other's years, pushed his enemy back against
the low roof of the dugout; but as the hunter tripped over it and fell
backward, he pulled Bill with him. Fighting desperately they rolled
across the roof and dropped to the sloping earth at the doorway, so
tightly locked in each other's arms that the jar did not separate them.
The hunter, falling underneath, got the worst of the fall but kept on
fighting. Crashing into the door head first, they sent it swinging back
against the wall and followed it, bumping down the two steps still
locked together.
Bill possessed strength remarkable for his years and build and he was
hard as iron; but he had met a man who had the sinewy strength of the
plainsman, whose greater age was offset by greater weight and the youth
was constantly so close to defeat that a single false move would have
been fatal. But luck favored him, for as they surged around the room
they crashed into the heavy table and fell with it on top of them. The
hunter got its full weight and the gash in his forehead filled his eyes
with blood. By a desperate effort he pinned Bill's arm under his knee
and with his left hand secured a throat grip, but the under man wriggled
furiously and bridged so suddenly as to throw the hunter off him and
Bill's freed hand, crashing full into the other's stomach, flashed back
to release the weakened throat grip and jam the tensed fingers between
his teeth, holding them there with all the power of his jaws. The dazed
and gasping hunter, bending forward instinctively, felt his own throat
seized and was dragged underneath his furious opponent.
In his Berserker rage Bill had forgotten about the gun, his fury
sweeping everything from him but the primal desire to kill with his
hands, to rend and crush like an animal. He was brought to his senses
very sharply by the jarring, crashing roar of the six-shooter, the
powder blowing away part of his shirt and burning his side. Twisting
sideways he grasped the weapon with one hand, the wrist with the other
and bent the gun slowly back, forcing its muzzle farther and farther
from him. The hunter, at last managing to free his left hand from the
other's teeth, found it useless when he tried to release the younger
man's grip of the gun; and the Colt, roaring again, dropped from its
owner's hand as he relaxed.
The victor leaned against the wall, his breath coming in great, sobbing
gulps, his knees sagging and his head near bursting. He reeled across
the wrecked room, gulped down a drink of whisky from the bottle on the
shelf and, stumbling, groped his way to the outer air where he flung
himself down on the ground, dazed and dizzy. When he opened his eyes
the air seemed to be filled with flashes of fire and huge, black
fantastic blots that changed form with great swiftness and the hut
danced and shifted like a thing of life. Hot bands seemed to encircle
his throat and the throbbing in his temples was like blows of a hammer.
While he writhed and fought for breath a faint gunshot reached his ears
and found him apathetic. But the second, following closely upon the
first, seemed clearer and brought him to himself long enough to make him
arise and stumble to his horse, and claw his way into the saddle. The
animal, maddened by the steady thrust of the spurs, pitched viciously
and bolted; but the rider had learned his art in the sternest school in
the world, the "busting" corrals of the great Southwest, and he not only
stuck to the saddle, but guided the fighting animal through a barranca
almost choked with obstructions.
Stretched full length in a crevice near the top of a mesa lay the other
hunter, his rifle trained on a small bowlder several hundred yards down
and across the draw. His first shot had been an inexcusable blunder for
a marksman like himself and now he had a desperate man and a very
capable shot opposing him. If Buck could hold out until nightfall he
could slip away in the darkness and do some stalking on his own account.
For half an hour they had lain thus, neither daring to take sight. Buck
could not leave the shelter of the bowlder because the high ground
behind him offered no cover; but the hunter, tiring of the fruitless
wait, wriggled back into the crevice, arose and slipped away, intending
to crawl to the edge of the mesa further down and get in a shot from a
new angle before his enemy learned of the shift; and this shot would not
be a blunder. He had just lowered himself down a steep wall when the
noise of rolling pebbles caused him to look around, expecting to see his
friend. Bill was just turning the corner of the wall and their eyes met
at the same instant.
"'Nds up!" snapped the youth, his Colt glinting as it swung up. The
hunter, gripping the rifle firmly, looked into the angry eyes of the
other, and slowly obeyed. Bill, watching the rifle intently, forthwith
learned a lesson he never forgot: never to watch a gun, but the eyes of
the man who has it. The left hand of the hunter seemed to melt into
smoke, and Bill, firing at the same instant, blundered into a hit when
his surprise and carelessness should have cost him dearly. His bullet,
missing its intended mark by inches, struck the still moving Colt of the
other, knocking it into the air and numbing the hand that held it. A
searing pain in his shoulder told him of the closeness of the call and
set his lips into a thin, white line. The hunter, needing no words to
interpret the look in the youth's eyes, swiftly raised his hands,
holding the rifle high above his head, but neglected to take his finger
from the trigger.
Bill was not overlooking anything now and he noticed the crooked finger.
"Stick th' muzzle _up_, an' pull that trigger," he commanded, sharply.
"Now!" he grated. The report came crashing back from half a dozen
points as he nodded. "Drop it, an' turn 'round." As the other obeyed
he stepped cautiously forward, jammed his Colt into the hunter's back
and took possession of a skinning knife. A few moments later the
hunter, trussed securely by a forty-foot lariat, lay cursing at the foot
of the rock wall.
Bill, collecting the weapons, went off to cache them and then peered
over the mesa's edge to look into the draw. A leaden splotch appeared
on the rock almost under his nose and launched a crescendo scream into
the sky to whine into silence. He ducked and leaped back, grinning
foolishly as he realized Buck's error. Turning to approach the edge
from another point he felt his sombrero jerk at his head as another
bullet, screaming plaintively, followed the first. He dropped like a
shot, and commented caustically upon his paucity of brains as he gravely
examined the hole in his head gear. "Huh!" he grunted. "I had a fool's
luck three times in twenty minutes,--d--d if I 'm goin' to risk th' next
turn. _Three_ of 'em," he repeated. "I 'm a' Injun from now on. An'
that foreman shore can shoot!"
He wriggled to the edge and called out, careful not to let any of his
anatomy show above the sky-line. "Hey, Buck! I ain't no buffalo
hunter! This is Cassidy, who you wanted to punch for you. Savvy?" He
listened, and grinned at the eloquent silence. "You talk too rapid," he
laughed. Repeating his statements he listened again, with the same
success. "Now I wonder is he stalkin' _me_? Hey, _Buck_!" he shouted.
"Stick yore hands up an' foller 'em with yore face," said Buck's voice
from below. Bill raised his arms and slowly stood up. "Now what 'n
blazes do _you_ want?" demanded the foreman, belligerently.
"Nothin'. Just got them hunters, one of 'em alive. I reckoned mebby
you 'd sorta like to know it." He paused, cogitating. "Reckon we
better turn him loose when we gets back to th' hut," he suggested.
"I'll keep his guns," he added, grinning.
The foreman stuck his head out in sight. "Well, I'm d--d!" he exclaimed,
and sank weakly back against the bowlder. "Can you give me a hand?" he
muttered.
The words did not carry to the youth on the skyline, but he saw,
understood, and, slipping and bumping down the steep wall with more
speed than sense, dashed across the draw and up the other side. He
nodded sagely as he examined the wound and bound it carefully with the
sleeve of his own shirt. "'T ain't much--loss of blood, mostly. Yo 're
better off than Travis."
"Travis dead?" whispered Buck. "In th' back! Pore feller, pore feller;
didn't have no show. Tell me about it." At the end of the story he
nodded. "Yo 're all right, Cassidy; yo 're a white man. He 'd 'a'
stood a good chance of gettin' me, 'cept for you." A frown clouded his
face and he looked weakly about him as if for an answer to the question
that bothered him. "Now what am I goin' to do up here with all these
cows?" he muttered.
Bill rolled the wounded man a cigarette and lit it for him, after which
he fell to tossing pebbles at a rock further down the hill.
"I reckon it _will_ be sorta tough," he replied, slowly. "But I sorta
reckoned me an' you, an' that other feller, can make a big ranch out of
yore little one. Anyhow, I 'll bet we can have a mighty big time
tryin'. A mighty fine time. What you think?"
Buck smiled weakly and shoved out his hand with a visible effort. "We
can! Shake, Bill!" he said, contentedly.