ONCE or twice each spring of late years the trappers would come down out of the mountains with the Indians to sell their pelts.
Horn’s Post had seen the day when thousands of them came to barter. But the glory of the trapper had faded long ago. Perhaps a score of white men, and a hundred red men, comprised the motley crew which visited Don Carlos’ Rancho that Saturday in early June. The trappers were a greasy, bearded, rollicking lot; and the Indians a hungry, silent crowd with the prospect of the reservation in their sombre eyes. The beaver were almost gone from the mountain streams.
Britt was one who sympathized with the red man. He sensed the romance of Carson’s day, when the eastern demand for beaver hats made the fur hunters rich. Indians never depleted any natural resource. But the white trappers were the advance guard of that greedy army of adventurers who must strip the streams and hills.
Across the half mile wide trail from Horn’s Post, a large flat adobe structure, cracked and crumbling of wall, was the Indian encampment. Ponies and dogs, squaws in their beaded and fringed buckskin, braves lolling on their colored blankets, a few tepees of painted hides, packs and pelts and fires—all these gave the old Texas Ranger a sad inkling of the past. Below the village in the wide bend of the creek the gray groups of prairie-schooners, the droves of oxen and horses, the movement of burly teamsters, somehow harmonized with Britt’s conception of the past glamour of the trappers’ era. The day of the caravan, too, was passing. In a few more years, when the steel rails reached Santa Fe, the great white rolling ship of the plains would be gone.
On Britt’s way to the trading-post he encountered an army sergeant who hailed him as an acquaintance. Britt remembered the ruddy Irish visage, but could not place the man. They chatted. The sergeant belonged to Gen. Mackenzie’s Fourth U. S. Cavalry bound for Fort Union and other points in southeastern New Mexico and Texas. They were making trails, and expected some hard Indian campaigns in the near future.
“Did you travel west along the Old Trail?” queried Britt, ever eager to add to his information of the day.
“Yes, from Fort Lyon,” replied the sergeant.
“How aboot movement of cattle?”
“Shure more than last summer. Las Animas reminds ye of Dodge.”
“Wal, you come up fer supper an’ tell us all aboot it.”
Before Britt got much farther on his way he was accosted by a young man whose apparel proclaimed him not long in the West, and whose dissipated face told the common story of many a tenderfoot.
“Are you Captain Britt, foreman for the Ripple ranch?”
“Yes, I’m Britt. What can I do fer you?”
“My name’s Taylor—Lee Taylor. I’m from the south. Miss Ripple will remember me. She knew my sister. I used to call at their school.”
“Ah-huh. Come in from Santa Fe?” asked Britt, casually, studying the young man. Long used to reading faces, he reacted unfavorably to this one.
“Yes. Up from El Paso.”
“Hawse-back, caravan or stage?”
“Came in the stage.”
“Had kinda a rough time, eh? What you want of me? A job ridin’?”
“No. I’d like to borrow some money. Don’t want to call on Miss Ripple in these rags. I’ll get money from home eventually.”
“Wal, I’ll ask Miss Holly aboot you. An’ if she knows you, why shore, I’ll help you oot…. Come in heah an’ meet the ootfit.”
Britt led Taylor into Horn’s saloon. At first glance he thought all his cowboys were there lined up at the rude bar. Brazos met him, surprised at his entrance and curious as to his companion.
“My Gawd, boss, air yu lost?”
“Say, Brazos, cain’t I take a drink myself once? … Heah, meet Lee Taylor, from the South. Says he knows Miss Holly…. Taylor, this is Brazos Keene.”
Britt conveyed a good deal more with a look than by words. He had no compunctions in turning the stranger over to Brazos. If Taylor was all right, which he certainly did not look, Brazos would grasp it quickly. Britt was getting tired of strangers imposing upon Holly’s generous hospitality. Lascelles was still up at the ranch-house, to Holly’s annoyance and Britt’s helpless rage.
“Wal, dog-gone! Another old beau of our Lady’s,” drawled the devilish Brazos. “Come on, Mister Taylor, meet the ootfit…. Cap, will yu have one on me?”
“Don’t care if I do. An’ I’ll set them up once, anyway.”
“Gosh, fellars, the world’s shore comin’ to an end. Heah’s the boss, an’ he’s thirsty.”
“He looks guilty to me,” declared Skylark, with a keen grin.
“Boys, meet Lee Taylor, from the south,” announced Britt, glad to relinquish the stranger to the tender mercy of his cowboys. And he lined up with them, amused at Skylark’s perspicuity. In truth he had more than one sense of guilt. Frayne had always had the power to excite him, thrill him, upset him; and that colloquy in the bunk-house weighed hauntingly on Britt’s conscience. His feeling had gotten the better of his judgment, which seldom happened, and never except pertaining to Holly. He needed a bracer. On Frayne’s account he was glad to have had the talk. It gave more light on this fascinating complex outlaw. But it might have been a hasty and inexcusable exposure of his own conjectures. His love and concern for Holly often led him to impulsive speech. On the other hand, when he cudgeled himself with reproach, he had, to uphold him, certain acts and words of Holly’s. If he could have been cold and calculating they might have betrayed more. As it was, he feared Holly liked this indifferent Renn Frayne far more than was good for her happiness. In view of Frayne’s attitude, which Britt felt bound to admit was honorable and fine, a wild and hopeless infatuation on Holly’s part would be deplorable.
Britt partook of a good stiff drink, and then he had another. They stimulated him to the extent of eradicating the oppression of vague trouble that had weighed upon him.
As Britt shook off the happy Brazos and turned to go out he met Ride-’Em Jackson, the negro of the outfit, with Bluegrass and Trinidad, two more of his cowboys.
“Boss, we is sho lookin’ fer yo,” declared Jackson.
The red-headed Trinidad, and the sharp eagle-eyed Bluegrass, hailed Britt with glad hands, and both gabbled at once.
“You needn’t squawk at me,” said Britt, producing his roll of bills. “Come over heah.”
“Boss, doan gimme all dat,” objected Jackson, his black face and rolling eyes ludicrously expressive. “Dis hyar Goge Washington Jeffersun Jackson sho nebber could keep it mo dan ten minnits.”
“Good, Ride-’Em. You got sense in yore woolly haid,” declared Britt. “Jest ride in?”
“Dis hyar minnit. An’ I’se got news.”
“Bad news?”
“Yes, suh. I reckon—orful bad fer Missy Holly.”
“Hawses?”
“Yas, suh.”
“Wal, report to me at the bunk-house in half an hour.”
Britt went out through the trading-post, lingering to watch the unaccustomed scene. Perhaps the most interesting place on the frontier was a trading-post during a big day. Dance-halls, gambling-halls and saloons had more of raw drama and wildness of the period, but the trader’s emporium had the life, the vividness, the atmosphere and business of the West. Here Mexican pesos and American silver dollars jingled on the counters, and rolls of gold coins went into the greasy buckskin of the trappers. Lean, half-naked, befeathered and painted savages sat and lounged around the great barn of a room, waiting to market their packs of hides. A dozen or more rugged white trappers held the floors, haranguing like auctioneers. Horn Brothers were close buyers. They knew these trappers dared not ship consignments of pelts east. And the trappers, earnest, desperate, knowing their day was past, argued with bulging jaws for a living wage. Fat squaws and comely maidens, with their coal-black shining hair hanging down their backs, fingered the dry-goods and gazed longingly at the colored candy. Counters were piled high with merchandise; rows of shelves sagged under the weight of countless cans; the odor of tobacco vied with that of dried pelts. A swarm of flies buzzed in the warm air.
Of late a habit of procrastination had grown upon Britt. He was conscious of it, believed that in a measure it was deliberate. He hated to think—to get down to facts and figures. If he had been alone, with only that bunch of fire-eating cowboys, if he had not the responsibility of Holly’s future on his hands, he could have revelled in the near prospect of the cattle crisis.
Repairing to the bunk-house he jotted down his payments to the men, and then figured carefully details of the two cattle drives he would advise Holly to sanction right after her party. The rise in price of beef was unprecedented, and it had two sides, one of them cardinally serious.
Presently Renn Frayne sauntered in leisurely, thoughtful of brow and smouldering of eye.
“Howdy, cowboy. Whar you been?” asked Britt, closing his account book.
“Didn’t you see me trailing you around?” was the laconic answer.
“Nope, I never did.”
“Cap, you are a worried man.”
“Hellyes.”
“I don’t blame you. It’s Miss Ripple, of course. An old Texas Ranger like you wouldn’t wink an eyelash about cattle or rustlers, or a tough outfit.”
“Shore. It’s Holly—bless her heart! I’m the only Dad she’s got…. What’d you see down at the post?”
“Getting lively. By tonight it’ll be going strong. Reminds me of Dodge and Hays City. But tame.”
“So you know Hays, eh? Ever run up against Wild Bill?”
“I saw Bill shoot five cowboys in a row, across the street, and he never got a scratch. But they were drunk and had buck-fever beside.”
“I used to trail-drive up oot of Texas. Them was the days. Dodge ’peared the wust town to me…. Wal, everythin’ is haidin’ west. We’ll think we’re back in Kansas pronto. Jackson has some bad news fer me. It jest keeps on comin’.”
“Britt, was it a good plan to draw all your riders in off the range?”
“No. Miss Holly’s orders.”
“It’ll cost her plenty.”
“I’m not so shore, Frayne. Everybody inside of a hundred miles will be heah. It’s an open invite, you know. Old Kurnel Ripple’s idee.”
Ride-’Em Jackson came trudging in to interrupt them. Walking did not appear to be his best method of locomotion. His shiny black face was wet with sweat.
“Hyar I is, boss.”
“Set down, Jackson, an’ get it off yore chest.”
“Yas suh,” he returned, with hesitation, rolling his eyes at Frayne. “Howdy, Marsh Frayne. How yo is?”
“Shoot, Jack. I’m able to help Cap bear up under your bad news.”
“Boss, dem hosses was gone.”
Britt cursed under his breath, though he had expected no less. It was not the loss of a score and more of good stock so much as verification of the closing in of a net about Don Carlos’ Rancho. Since the Heaver raid all of the Ripple thoroughbreds had been driven into the pastures and corrals. This bunch of many remaining out on the range had been left in Cedar Draw, an out-of-the-way place.
“We tracked ’em tree days, an’ den we gibe up,” went on the negro.
“Hawse-thieves, of course?”
“Yas suh. Dey sho nebber runned off by demselves. De tiefs rode shod hosses. Blue an’ Trinidad disagreed wif me aboot how many dey was. I made oot fo shod hosses, an’ one of dem was a little hoss carryin’ a heavy man.”
“Which way did they go, Jackson?”
“To de souf. We tracked ’em till we could see Seven Rivers. Den we reckoned we’d better mosey back.”
“Ha! I rather snicker you reckoned correct,” retorted Britt, sarcastically. “Frayne, do you know the Seven River country down on the Pecos?”
“No. Only by hearsay.”
“Wal, thet’s Chisum country. The old reprobate. Boss cattleman of the West! An’ boss cattlethief, too! He laughs an’ owns up to it. Frayne, I reckon Chisum has his Long Rail brand on a hundred thousand haid of stock.”
“No!” ejaculated Frayne, incredulously.
“Des thick as bees, Marsh Frayne,” corroborated the negro. “I rode for Chisum an’ I knows.”
“Wal, Jackson, I hope thet’s all.”
“Yas, suh. But it ain’t, suh. I sho ain’t tole yo nuthin’ yet…. Fust camp we made comin’ back Chisum’s top ootfit rid down on us. We sho was scared, boss. But dey wuz friendly. A plumb dozen riders, boss, an’ Chisum’s top riders. I knowed ’em. I’d rid with dem. Russ Slaughter was haid of dat ootfit. Only ornery Slaughter in all dat Texas familee…. Wal, Russ tole ’em dey had quit Chisum. Dey wuz goin’ in de cattle game demselves. Russ says, ‘Jack, what yo want to ride fer thirty dollars a month when yo can git a hundred?’—An’ I asks Russ how. An’ he says dere’s half a million hed of cattle in de country an’ no law. Railroad market payin’ forty dollars a hed, an’ government buyers givin’ ten an’ no questions ast…. Russ talked till he was red in de face. We sho didn’t want to tro in wid dem an’ we was sort of flabustered.”
“Jack, thet was a fix. How’d you get oot of it?”
“Wal, suh, I says to Russ—‘Yo knows I’se turned ober a new leaf, an’ I’ll be dawg-goned if I’ll quit. Missy Ripple has been good to me an’ I sho gonna stick.’ … Blue an’ Trinidad talked like one man. Dawg-gone they did! An’ they says, ‘I’se not gibben up providin’ a husband fer Missy Ripple.’ … Russ looked ugly an’ talked ugly, which I ain’t gonna squeal to yo-all. ’Cept he said, ‘Say, if all yo heah boot the little lady is so, dere’s a chance fer any hombre to grab dat million.’”
“Ride-’Em, what did Blue an’ Trin say to that?” quietly asked Frayne.
“Marsh Frayne, you know Blue. Thet Kaintucky boy got kinda pale, but he kept mum. Russ hed been hittin’ de bottle an’ anyway, he wuzn’t acquainted wif Blue. I was scared ’cause it looked like Blue might bore him. But Trinidad he got redder’n a beet an’ busted oot, ‘The —— —— —— hell yo say? Shore yo come ober to Don Carlos’ Rancho, an’ try dat game yoself, Russ Slaughter.’ … An’ Russ laughed kinda mean. ‘Why not?’ he says. ‘If niggahs, Injuns, ootlaws, all hev a show with Holly Ripple then sho a white cowman can buck his luck. We’ll come to de party an’ look yo all over.’ … Den dey rode off an’ Blue hed a hell of a time keepin’ Trin fum trowin’ his rifle on Slaughter. An’ we rustled home. Dat’s all, boss.”
“Jackson, keep yore mouth shut aboot this,” replied Britt, authoritatively. “Hurry back to Bluegrass an’ Trinidad an’ tell them my orders air they’re not to tell the ootfit.”
“Yes suh. I’se rustlin’, suh,” replied the little negro, and bolted out of the door.
“Frayne, what you think of thet?” queried Britt, meeting the outlaw’s piercing gray eyes.
“It never rains but it pours.”
“Slaughter’s ootfit will come, shore as Gawd made little apples. They’ll use Holly’s party as a blind to look over the lay of our cattle. I don’t know what could be wuss than their quittin’ Chisum. I remember Maxwell tellin’ Kurnel Ripple why he was sellin’ oot. He knew.”
“Britt, didn’t you get the significance of that nigger’s report?” asked Frayne, cuttingly.
“Hellyes!” retorted Britt, heatedly. “Thet aboot Holly…. I’ve heahed it before. But Frayne, these hard-nut range-riders have vile minds an’ vile mouths. If only Holly would get married! Thet’d stop all this crazy courtin’ an’ gossipin’…. Slaughter will come an’ he’ll have the gall to make up to Holly. Thet needn’t bother us. She can take care of herself. But if Blue or Trin get drunk they’re liable to squeal what Russ said aboot Holly. If Brazos heahs it!—He’ll draw on Russ at fust sight.”
“Why Brazos?” queried Frayne, with cold detachment. “Why not Blue? Or someone else?”
Britt gave Frayne a sharp glance and threw up his hands. He paced the floor for a few minutes, while Frayne leaned in the doorway gazing out.
“Frayne, gimme yore angle on this idee,” spoke up the foreman, presently. “After Holly’s party I’d like to drive all our cattle this side of Cottonwood Creek, an’ hold them fer a while heah in sight of the ranch. Then cut oot as big a bunch as would be safe to drive to Las Animas. An’ do the same in the fall.”
“I’d advise that very thing. Only we can’t drive all the Ripple stock along the Cottonwood. But if we bunched the cattle closer and put out a night-guard we would cut down rustling. And I’d say the more Miss Ripple sells now the less she’ll lose.”
“My sentiments. I’ll advise thet strongly…. Now, Renn, I’m lookin’ to you fer help. Our problem is to hold these cowboys. Can we do it? What effect will Russ Slaughter’s quittin’ Chisum have on them?”
“You may pay the penalty of hiring the riff-raff of the ranges. They’re most bad, these cowboys, and some of them as bad as Slaughter. I’d say in the ordinary run of things your outfit would break under this deal. Then, of course, you’d suffer an enormous loss, perhaps ruin. It has happened before.”
“I savvy thet. We must make this oot of the ordinary.”
“There’s a chance Miss Ripple might reach those boys so all hell couldn’t change them. You know cowboys. Tell her to double their wages and give them freedom. Put them on their honor. I know that’s funny, Britt. But do it. If they can be made to see that she relies on each and every one of them to beat these rustlers and save her rancho—why, it’s as good as done.”
Britt cracked his hands together with the sound like a pistol-shot.
“Renn, thet night at the supper, will you have a talk ready fer the boys?” flashed Britt.
The outlaw waved the proposition aside.
“Unbeknown to Holly, I mean,” went on Britt, eagerly. “She’s preparing a talk. Of course she’ll call on me, an’ perhaps Brazos, though if he knowed it, he’d die of fright. But you can, Renn, an’ I’m appealin’ to you. Surprise Holly an’ the whole ootfit. I declare I’d never get done thankin’ you.”
“Old Timer, you are back to the wall,” said Frayne, with his rare smile. “I’ll do it, Britt. I’ll take the hide off these cowboys.”
Sunday was a lonesome day for the foreman, who likened himself to an old hen that had lost most of her brood of chickens.
Frayne, Tex and Mex Southard, Santone, Ride-’Em Jackson and Cherry were around when Jose called them for meals. But the rest of the outfit had succumbed either to liquor or games of chance, or according to Santone, to both these failings of cowboys. Britt did not have opportunity to consult Holly about his plan to drive a big herd of cattle to the railroad. Holly was engrossed with the details of her coming party and dance, especially with the speech she intended to make to the cowboys. She was going over her books, and her father’s papers and correspondence.
Britt kept track of the boys through Santone and Jackson, and by patrolling the beat between the bunk-house and the corrals and the crowded Mexican street with its concentration around Horn’s place. Nothing of any moment had occurred in the way of brawls. The cowboys were jolly and prodigal of their two months’ wages.
On Monday the east-bound caravan pulled out with its wagons about half loaded. The departure of sixty-odd teamsters thinned the ranks of the crowd. But before that day had advanced far the vanguard of visitors to Don Carlos’ Rancho began to arrive. By Tuesday, which was the date for the great fiesta, the ranch-house was full of guests from all over the surrounding country. San Marcos, Cimarron, Raton and Lincoln were represented to the extent of practical desertion of these frontier towns. Sewall McCoy rode in at the head of his contingent of cowboys. Various groups of hard-faced, intent-eyed men arrived to keep to themselves.
About noon on Tuesday Britt thought it high time to inaugurate the proposed treatment of cowboys under the influence of liquor. It developed that Frayne and Cherokee would not want for help. Skylark, who had marvelously sobered up on Monday, and Talman, Stinger and Jim all wanted to be in on the ducking of the inebriates. Cherry and Santone hitched up and drove a big wagon into the village, where Frayne and Britt were ready to receive them. Bluegrass and Trinidad were carried out and dumped into the wagon. Rebel and Handsome Caines were located, and hilariously took the proceeding as a ride in their honor; Flinty and Tennessee had to be tied hand and foot, a procedure which brought a frightful chorus of profanity. The triumphant cowboys in charge drove toward the bunk-house, followed by a crowd of whites, Indians and Mexicans.
Brazos Keene and his faithful Laigs had been dead to the world for many hours. They were rudely awakened and hauled out of their bunks.
“Wot you hombres up to?” Brazos bawled, furiously. They promptly roped him and carried him out like a lassoed bull.
“Boss, wot ya gonna do?”
“Brazos, you forget the party tonight.”
“No I didn’t neither,” he protested. “Me and Laigs come home early last night.”
“Wal, you’re too shaky to suit this vigilante ootfit…. Pile him in, boys.”
“——— ——— ———!” roared Brazos, “I’ll kill somebody fer this.”
Laigs Mason was more complaisant.
“Wasser masser?” he asked, stupidly, leering around at his captors. “Wash Brazos raisin’—hell aboot?”
“Laigs, come oot. We’re takin’ you on a little hay-wagon ride.”
“Dawg-gone!” babbled Laigs, staggering between Britt and Frayne. “Shore nice of—you fellars…. Brazos, no cowboys ever hed sich frens.”
“Haw! Haw!” yelled Brazos, fiendishly. “Laigs Mason, you’ll wake up pronto…. All yore fault. Didn’t I want to come home?—Jest one more little drink!”
“Rustle Cherry,” ordered Britt, climbing up on the seat beside the driver. “Down over thet stony flat to the creek…. Drive like hell…. Frayne, you boys keep ’em in the wagon.”
Cherokee drove the wagon at a gallop over ground covered with loose boulders. If cowboys hated anything it was to be jolted. They were bumped and tossed about. When one of them tried to jump or fall out he was promptly thrown back by Frayne and his allies. That ride down to the creek was hard enough even for the sober cowboys who could hold on. Cherry drove down upon a gravel bar to the edge of a green clear pool about three feet deep.
“Brazos first,” yelled Britt.
They dragged the flaxen-haired cowboy out of the wagon and threw him in. Brazos went under, and then bounded up with incredible speed.
“Aggh!” he bellowed. And the shock was so great that upon plunging back he went under again. Floundering and rolling he got up to wade out, like a drenched shivering dog, and as sober as he had ever been in his life.
“Come mon, Laigs. Take yore medicine,” he shouted, bouncing around on the bar.
When they rolled Laigs out upon the gravel he sat up with his solemn blinking eyes beginning to show some intelligence.
“Wash thish, boys?”
“Grab hold and swing,” called Frayne. Britt and Santone and Skylark also laid hold of the cowboy, one to each arm and leg, and they swung him, once, twice, three times, then let go. Laigs was small and light. He went far, and fell with a tremendous splash. And when he came up like a spouting porpoise his breathless yell was echoed by the ruthless captors. That water must have been as cold as ice-water. Laigs made terrific haste to plunge out. When he got ashore he was sober, and madder than a wet hen.
“I’m g-gonna cut out s-somebody’s gizzard,” he shivered. He presented such a ridiculous figure that the cowboys yelled in glee.
“Take those guns,” called Frayne, as they dragged out the limp Bluegrass.
“Frayne, how’s Blue goin’ to take this?” queried Britt, dubiously. “He’s from Kentucky, you know!”
“He’ll take it wet,” declared Frayne, with grim humor. “In with him, boys.”
Bluegrass went in like a sack of lead and sank likewise. As he did not immediately burst up with a great splash Britt yelled frantically for Brazos and Laigs to drag him out.
“S-say, I—I wouldn’t wade in thet water even fer you, boss,” declared the Texan, laboriously climbing into the wagon.
“Laigs! Pull Blue oot! Rustle!”
Whereupon the obliging Mason plunged in and rescued Bluegrass, pulling him out on the bar, where he presented alarming symptoms of unconsciousness.
“He’s all right,” declared Frayne. “I’ll look after him. He’s coming to now. Throw the rest of them in!”
Splash! Splash! Splash! went the remaining cowboys in succession; and with their bawls of shocked sensibilities and the infernal glee of Skylark and his helpers, they made the welkin ring.
Britt forgot to keep track of Brazos and Laigs. But in a moment more they made their presence known. Brazos lashed the horses and drove them at break-neck speed off the bar and up the slow slope.
“Wait fer us, boss,” yelled Brazos, from the wagon-seat. “We’re gonna come back with another load.”
“Stop!” replied Britt, in stentorian tones.
“Go to hell, Cappy, you an’ your baptizers,” shouted Laigs, gleefully. “We’ll be back.”
“Wal, Brazos turned the tables on us. We’ll have to walk,” declared Britt.
“I’ll bet he’ll come,” said Frayne. “We’ll have to wait till Blue recovers.”
“Aw, Brazos will be heah pronto. Didn’t you see thet devil in his eye? He’s shore up to suthin’.”
It developed that Bluegrass must have opened his mouth under water and had almost strangled. Frayne rolled him on his face, pounded and pumped his body, until signs of life returned. His pale features took on a shade of red, and he opened his eyes to stare at the faces bent over him.
“There, you’re all right now, Blue,” spoke up Britt, with relief. “Air you sober?”
“I reckon…. Who thought I needed a bath?”
“We all did. Brazos an’ Laigs got theirs fust. Look at Trin, an’ the rest of yore pards.”
But Blue did not laugh. He sat up shivering. “Whose idee was this?”
“Mine,” rejoined Britt, fearing the reaction of this hot-blooded Kentuckian.
“He’s a liar, Blue,” spoke up Frayne, with a laugh. “It was my idee. I’ve seen it worked before…. You forgot we were all to be sober for Miss Ripple’s fiesta tonight. I was afraid some of you boys wouldn’t be. So we ducked you.”
“Frayne, I’m holdin’ you responsible.”
“Sure. But don’t be a damn fool, Blue,” returned the outlaw, easily. “Take a joke when it’s on you.”
“Joke hell! I’m froze. I’m a bag of ice-bones. I’ll catch numonia an’ die.”
“All you need is a rub-down and a sleep. Then you’ll be fine.”
“I’m gonna call you out for this,” said Bluegrass, doggedly.
Britt silenced the cowboys who were about to remonstrate with Blue. He divined that Frayne was equal to the occasion.
“Blue, that’d be a poor return for the favor I’ve done you.”
“Favor!—Jest what favor, Mister?”
“Why, sobering you up. And saving your good name with Miss Ripple. If you get sore I’ll have to shoot your arm off—or worse if you get ugly. That would put Miss Ripple against me. I was only working for her, for your good, and for all of us.”
“I don’t care a damn,” yelled Blue, now red in the face. But he did care. “You gotta show me you can beat me to a gun.”
“Blue, we took yore guns off an’ you bet we’ll keep them,” interposed Britt. “Swaller yore medicine, boy.”
“Did you duck Brazos?”
“Wal, I should smile we did.”
“An’ how’d he take it?”
“Yelled murder. But he stole the wagon, an’ drove off, leavin’ us heah to shank it back.”
Bluegrass gazed from his partner Trinidad to the other shivering cowboys, and his face began to work.
“Dog-gone-it! Do I look like them?”
“Wuss. You lay in the mud. An’ you better let me wipe it off.”
“All right…. Frayne, I lay down. But I’ll play some orful trick on you, by thunder!”
“You’re welcome, Blue,” replied Frayne, heartily. “I knew you were a good fellow…. Boys, you all want to take this to heart. If we don’t pull together as an outfit, like brothers, like men with their backs to the wall, Miss Ripple will be robbed poor. And we’ll be disgraced in our own eyes forever.”
Skylark called from the bank: “Brazos’ drivin’ back, hellbent fer election.”
The cowboys, except Frayne and Blue, trooped behind Britt up the slope, all voicing anticipation. Sure enough there came the bouncing wagon behind galloping horses and leaving a cloud of dust.
“Wonder who thet son-of-a-gun has got?” demanded Britt, with vast curiosity.
“I’ll bet ten bucks I know.”
“Gee, look at thet wagon!”
“Boys, you can gamble Brazos would figger up suthin’ great.”
“Thet hombre always laughs last.”
To Britt’s amaze the horses did not fall and the wagon did not break to pieces. Brazos, whooping, his face like that of a red imp, drove down and slowing the team, brought them with a fine flourish to a halt on the wide bar. He leaped out. His audience was not slow in reaching the tail-end of that wagon. Britt saw Laigs Mason astride a man dressed in black. There was another man in the wagon. Brazos laid hold of his heels and hauled him out to drop him on the sand, like a sack of potatoes. This personage was Lee Taylor, whose visage attested to a debauch.
“Heah yu air,” sang out Brazos, and with a remarkable exhibition of strength he lifted Taylor aloft, above his head, and giving vent to an Indian yell, threw him into the pool. Whatever the Southerner’s condition on the moment of hitting the water, it was certain that when he lunged up in a great splash and floundered ashore he was not under the influence of anything but exceedingly cold water.
Blue of visage, shaking as one with the ague, drenched and dishevelled, Taylor fronted Britt.
“S-so this is h-h-how you let your ruffianly cowboys treat a gentleman?”
“Only fun, Taylor. An’ at thet you needed it,” replied Britt, dryly.
“Say, who’s a ruffian an’ who’s a gentleman?” queried Brazos, menacingly. The diabolical fun in him suffered a blight. Britt quietly pushed Taylor back to the rear.
“Let him up, Laigs,” shouted Brazos.
Britt wheeled in time to see the gambler, Malcolm Lascelles, arise clumsily from the floor of the wagon. His frock-coat and flowered vest were spoiled by contact with dust. His wide, flat-crowned sombrero was not in evidence. His handsome face was streaked with dirt and distorted by rage.
“Step oot, Mister Lascelles,” invited Brazos, sarcastically.
Lascelles jumped down, his action proving that his equilibrium was not perfect.
“Britt, what’s the meaning of this outrage?” he demanded.
“I don’t know, Lascelles. We treated Brazos an’ Mason to a duckin’. They stole the wagon an’ drove away. Why you’re heah I don’t savvy, but it wasn’t from order of mine.”
“Damnable outrage!” fumed Lascelles. “These drunken louts of yours ——”
“Take care, Lascelles,” interrupted Britt. “I warn you.”
“But this range is free. A man has a right to his liberty.”
“Shore. But there’s no law heah. An’ if a man doesn’t measure up to what the frontier expects, he’s liable to lose not only freedom, but life.”
“You’re one with your crew,” snarled Lascelles, malignantly. “I am Miss Ripple’s guest—an old friend—and you dare insult me.”
Brazos stepped up. “Boss, I reckon this is my deal,” he interposed, coolly.
“It shore is, Brazos. But you’re sober now. Use your haid.”
Laigs Mason edged his ludicrous little misshapen form in beside Brazos. His homely face expressed an untamed and unabatable fidelity to his partner.
“Don’t weaken, Brazos. This caird-sharp stinks of rum.”
“Shet up. Lemme do the talkin’ heah,” snapped Brazos, and then he fastened those piercing half slits of eyes on the gambler.
“Lascelles, my idee was to duck yu along with yore southern gent friend,” said Brazos. “Reckon I don’t often explain my actions toward any hombre who makes me sore. But I’m tellin’ yu. Miss Holly ast us to be sober today. Thet’s why Frayne an’ Britt hashed up this duckin’ idee. Wal, it is a plumb good one—an’ I’ll be ——— ——— if I’m gonna let her see yu at her party drunk ——”
“I’m not drunk,” protested Lascelles.
“Aw, you’re a liar. Yu been drunk fer a week. Right now as Laigs heah swears, yu stink of rum. An’ my idee was to give yu a cold bath. Gonna take yore medicine?”
“No, you heathen rowdy. Don’t you dare lay another hand on me.”
“Ah-huh…. Wal, my idee grows a little,” returned Brazos, with a cool insolence that Britt had learned to gauge. “I jest happened to remember how yu fleeced Laigs oot of half a month’s wages.”
“I did not. My game is square,” declared Lascelles, stoutly, though he paled slightly. No doubt he had been long enough on the frontier to find out what was meted out to crooked gamblers.
“How aboot it, Laigs?”
“Pard, I couldn’t swear I seen him, ’cause my eyes was pore,” admitted Mason, frankly. “But Sky seen him hold oot on me, an’ Ride-’Em seen him, too.”
“Boys, is thet so?”
“Yes, it’s so,” declared Skylark, curtly.
The little negro rolled his big eyes till the whites showed. He was reluctant. He remembered the southern attitude toward his race. But he was also loyal.
“Brazos, jest how slick Mistah Lascelles is I dunno. But I sho seen him pull tricks thet Laigs hisself can pull when he’s sober.”
“Lascelles, now what?”
“You’re a Texan. Can you believe a nigger against a white man?”
“Yu bet yore life—when I know the nigger. Jackson isn’t a liar. Cowboys don’t lie—when they’re in earnest.”
“You’re as low-down as they are,” retorted Lascelles, yielding to a passion that perhaps did not rightly interpret the cowboy’s coolness. “That’s the last straw, you take a nigger’s word to mine. I’ll shoot him. And I’ll recommend to Miss Ripple that she discharge you.”
“Fine. You’ll get a long way, ’specially with thet first bluff,” rang out Brazos. Then with incredible rapidity he launched a terrific blow upon Lascelles. Following a sharp, solid crack the gambler fell backward to measure his length in the pool. All save his head went under. In contrast to the others who had been immersed in that icy current, his motions were slow and deliberate. When he strode ashore, his right hand inside his coat, all the cowboys except Laigs sheered to either side of Brazos. Britt himself leaped instinctively out of line. All saw Lascelles’ white supple hand close round something which could only be a gun. Gamblers seldom packed a gun on their hips, but they always had one, or a derringer, up their sleeves, or inside the coat, concealed but easy to draw. And there stood Brazos and Laigs, unarmed.
“Look oot!” warned Britt, reaching for his weapon, which he had left on the table in the bunk-house. The moment was terrible. Out of a clear sky the thunderbolt!
“Lascelles, don’t draw!”
Even the maddened gambler stiffened at Frayne’s voice. Britt suddenly relaxed with a strong revulsion of feeling, and the sweat broke out all over his cold skin. And he knew what to expect before he turned. Frayne leaned back against the wagon with a gun levelled low.
“Let go…. Come out.”
Lascelles’ hand dropped limply from under his coat, and with a repulsive face, dirty gray and livid white, he stepped out of the water.
“Hawses comin’,” shouted Brazos.
In the soft sand of the bank a group of horsemen had drawn close without being heard by the tense spectators or participants in that drama.
“Russ Slaughter!” added Bluegrass, trenchantly.
Britt swept his gaze away from Frayne and Lascelles. At least ten or more riders were heading down under the cottonwoods, with a swarthy leader in front. Several more horsemen hung back on the bank with a string of pack-mules. Slaughter at the head of his followers walked his horse leisurely down on the bar, far enough to take in the situation. Then as Frayne stepped out from the wagon Slaughter halted so sharply that his companions’ horses collided with him. Like so many range-riders Slaughter had the visage of a beast of prey. It would have been impossible to determine his motive, but to be on the safe side Britt gauged him as an enemy. Frayne could be trusted to read this man the same way.
“’Scuse us fer ridin’ in on you,” drawled Slaughter. “We seen the wagon as we wus crossin’ above … Howdy, Blue…. Wal, there’s my ole nigger cowboy, Jackson…. An’ Trinidad too, wet as a drowned rat…. I take you, sir, to be Britt, foreman of the Ripple outfit.”
“Yes, I’m Britt, but you’ll excuse me fer the minnit.”
“Who are you, rider?” queried Frayne.
“I reckoned everybody had heerd of Russ Slaughter, an’ would shore know him on sight.”
“Never heard of you,” returned Frayne, curtly. “Would you mind shutting your jaw until I get through with this card-sharp?”
“Wal, it’s none of my bizness, but I don’t like your talk…. I reckon you’re this coal hand, Frayne, huh?”
“If you don’t like my talk—lump it,” deliberately rejoined Frayne, with the nerve of a man who had no fear.
“Yeah?” returned Slaughter, insolently. His oscillating red eyes had swiftly grasped the general absence of guns in that group, except in Frayne’s case.
“Lascelles, you’re played out here at Don Carlos’ Rancho,” said Frayne. “If your card-sharp tricks weren’t enough, your gall in taking advantage of the Ripple hospitality and using it to press your absurd suit upon Miss Holly, would be. Send for your pack and get out. That’s all.”
“An’ see heah, Lascelles,” added Brazos, passionately. “Yu seen I hadn’t a gun. Yu’d shot me but fer Frayne…. Wal, ——— ——— yore cheap soul, go fer thet gun next time we meet.”
“Lascelles, thet’s clear enough,” interposed Britt, forcefully, wanting to lend his authority to this expulsion. “I advise you to leave pronto.”
Lascelles flung his hands with a gesture of hopeless rage and impotent defeat. Then he started to stalk off, his back to Frayne, who still held that ominous gun forward.
“Hold on,” called Slaughter. Then he addressed Frayne and Britt. “If you’re through, I reckon you’ve no objection to my talkin’ to this Lascelles?”
“Wal, it’s a free country,” answered the foreman, not heartily.
“Who air you, stranger?” asked the Chisum cowman, fastening hard eyes upon Lascelles.
“My name’s Lascelles. I’m from Louisiana.”
“Gambler?”
“I play cards for pleasure.”
“This fellar Frayne called you a card-sharp.”
“He’s a-a-er … That’s not true. The cowboys lost and put up a job on me.”
“What’s thet talk about your imposin’ on Miss Ripple?” queried Slaughter, with a crackling laugh.
“More balderdash,” retorted Lascelles. “I’m a guest here. Everybody in the West knows of the Ripple brag. All welcome! Stay as long as you like! No man ever turned away from that Ripple door!—That would be enough. But I knew Holly Ripple in New Orleans…. We were sweethearts. Her father took her away. I got here finally to try to win her back. And these jealous ——”
“Stop the ——— ——— liar!” burst out Brazos, flaming of face.
“Wal, by ———, thet’s interestin’,” drawled Slaughter. “I’ve heard a sight aboot thet little lady. Sweet on you, Lascelles?”
“Yes, she was.”
“Jest what you mean by sweet?” went on Slaughter, his evil mind betrayed in tone and look.
Brazos’ harsh appeal to Frayne caused Lascelles to turn, and suddenly he read something in Frayne’s menace that the arrival of the Slaughter contingent had disrupted.
“No gentleman ever kisses and tells,” he responded.
“Haw! Haw! Haw! … But come out with it, Lascelles…. Hellno!—Keep yore mouth shet.”
Frayne had taken a forward stride, his gun going to a level with his eye. It quivered and froze.
“Another word about Holly Ripple and I’ll shoot out your teeth,” hissed Frayne.
“Lascelles, you’ll need your teeth,” interposed Slaughter, as cool as if disaster did not impend. “You can keep—all thet fer my private ear…. How’d you like to throw in with my outfit? We’re footloose. Got plenty of money an’ big deals on buyin’ an’ sellin’ cattle.”
“I’ll do it,” choked out Lascelles.
“You’re in. Come on. Send fer yore pack an’ camp with us tonight,” rejoined Slaughter, motioning his men back and wheeling his horse. He turned in his saddle.
“Britt, I’ll see you at the fandango,” he said, jeeringly.
The foreman was glad indeed that he did not have a gun on him.
“Frayne, we’ll meet again,” called Slaughter, from the slope.
The outlaw’s piercing gaze did not leave the retreating Lascelles until he passed out of sight with the horsemen under the trees. He might not have heard Russ Slaughter’s taunting last call.
Brazos’ first move, after being relieved from that restraint, was to boot the southerner in the rear. “Taylor, get oot. Go along with them. An’ Gawd help yu if yu run into me again!”
The frightened young man, ashen of face, and dripping water from his bedraggled garments, hurried up the slope to disappear in the direction of the village.
“Brazos! You’re plumb loco!” remonstrated Britt.
“Who’n hell ain’t?—Mad? I’m so ——— ——— mad I could bite nails. Look at Laigs, heah! He’s spittin’ fire, but he cain’t talk. Look at Frayne. White in the face, by Gawd! Look at yourself, boss. You’re green. All ’cause we got ketched with our pants off. No guns!—Cap, if yu ever rustle my gun again, fer any reason whatsoever, I’ll hate yore guts.”
“I’m sorry, Brazos. But cool down. Mebbe it’s better we weren’t packin’ our hardware. What do you say, Renn?”
“Britt, I haven’t swallowed so much in years,” replied the outlaw, breathing heavily. “I’d say—let’s never be caught unarmed again.”
“Boss, you’ll bust the outfit wide open,” claimed Mason. “Course we-all know it’s on account of Miss Holly. What you-all say, fellars?”
“You needn’t vote on it,” interrupted Britt, harshly. “My fault! Old Ranger thet I am—thet girl makes me wax in her hands. But boys, she’s no squeamish woman. She’s got guts. She’s jest afraid some of you cowboys will be shot.”
“Shore she is, bless her heart!” rang Brazos. “But we’re gonna get bored anyhow. An’ I want my guns an’ my chances.”
“Boys, after this you’re wakin’ an’ sleepin’ arsenals,” ordered Britt, grimly.
“Whoopee!” bawled Laigs Mason.
“All the same we’re gonna use our haids,” concluded Britt.
Brazos turned to Frayne and thrust out his long arm and quivering hand. His boyish face lost its tense cruelty and bitterness in a warm and beautiful smile.
“Shake, Renn.”
The outlaw made haste to comply, for once somewhat flustered.
“Yu saved my life. Thet gambler would have bored me. I seen murder in his eye.”
“Struck me that way,” rejoined Frayne, as Brazos wrung his hand. “Bad mess. I was afraid I’d have to shoot Lascelles. Slaughter’s an ugly, contrary cuss.”
“He didn’t quite savvy yu, Renn,” went on Brazos. “But I did, shore. An’ I was itchin’ to line up beside yu.”
Britt placed a clasping hand on the grip of the two men. “Thet should make you friends.”
“Pards, if Renn will have it,” replied Brazos, his strong, wild spirit visible in his blue eyes.
“Brazos, I would only be too glad. But—” Frayne’s piercing gray eyes, fine and glad yet doubtful, strove to read the cowboy’s mind.
“There ain’t no buts—leastways no more.”
“Frayne, take him up. Brazos is a true blue Texan,” interposed Britt, in earnest zeal. “Cement this proffered friendship. It’ll save the ootfit.”
“Frayne, I never had one damn thing against yu—but—but—” and here Brazos hesitated and grew as rosy as any girl.
“But! There you are, Brazos,” replied Frayne, hastily. “I know what it is, you darned locoed cowboy! I’ll take your word…. Don’t give yourself away in front of this bunch of hard eggs!”
“I shore will, Renn,” retorted Brazos recovering his cool ease. There was something winning about him then. “I never had a damn thing against yu—but—but this…. Fust off I was afeared Miss Holly l-liked you better’n me. An’ now I know it.”
“Brazos!—You sentimental jackass,” retorted Frayne, his anger vying with other and more powerful feelings. An unfamiliar ruddy tinge showed under his tan. “You are wrong…. But I appreciate what it cost you to come clean like this…. I’m with you for life, cowboy.”
“Laigs, yu pop-eyed geezer,” ejaculated Brazos, roughly, perhaps to hide more emotion, “shake hands with our new pard, Renn Frayne.”