IT ain’t simply because I owe yuh my hide that I’d like to have yuh on my payroll,” said Jube Cameron persuasively. “I might’s well admit my aim is partly selfish. I know whut yuh can do, Reb; yores is the kind of stock savvy a man needs.”
They were on the C 8; Santee had ridden over to see how the rancher was getting on. Jube lost no time in coming to the subject uppermost in his mind. It irked the flaxen-haired one no little, for while there was something about the prospect of a job with Cameron that appealed to him strongly, he was unable to make up his mind to accept.
“I can’t offer yuh nothin’ better than punchin’ right now,” Cameron went on; “but I am free to sav my foreman’s sort of took up with the idee of a spread of his own. That’ll leave me shorthanded, an’ I’m thinkin’ about a man who’ll step into his boots without stumblin’. I figure yuh can do it, Reb; anyway, yuh got first bid when the time comes.” He ended with the air of a man who has laid his cards on the table.
This was a strong inducement for any man. Reb’s eyes crinkled with pleased gratitude; nevertheless, he still remained dubious.
“Cameron, Billy Farragoh never said he had a talk with yuh about me,” he said frankly; “but I know he did, an’ I know what about.” He shook his head decidedly. “Yuh both got it all wrong. I ain’t got a thing to complain of, right now. I shore thank yuh for thinkin’ of me, but—”
“Hold on!” Jube exclaimed, his expression inquiring. “What’s this yo’re sayin’, now?” Reb said it again at more length. Cameron gave a negative shake. “Unhuh,” he denied forcefully. “Billy come to me jest before he went to Lander,” he lied smoothly, “an’ told me he knew jest the man to replace my foreman, if I could git him. It was you, Reb; Billy said so, an’ that’s all he did say.” He went on to elaborate his innocence of any planning to do more than acquire the services of a man he wanted, knowing this was the line that would get him the farthest with Santee.
It did alter Reb’s mind materially. After all, there were a good many reasons why he would like to work for Jube Cameron. He affected to listen with deferential regret, while he thought it over again.
“I got a letter from Ronda yesterday,” Jube changed the subject craftily, reading Reb’s mood. “She says Billy’s studyin’ in Judge Hamer’s office right hard. She does git to see him occasional, though.... But she’ll be comin’ home in a few weeks, now—her an’ the Mrs.”
It was an even stronger argument with Reb, unconsciously as it had been put. To work on the same ranch where Ronda lived, to see her daily.... To prove to her what he could do—and prove to himself that what had happened to Dan Morgan’s money, down at Moab, had been an accident.... It certainly had its attraction.
Reb thought of Doc Lantry then, and of something else. The return of Ronda in the spring would coincide with that of the Wild Bunch, expecting the redemption of his promises to them. He couldn’t throw those boys down altogether, not with what Lantry had on him. But a new thought came—perhaps the responsibilities of a job with Cameron’s brand would excuse him from taking part in their activities for a time.
It didn’t take him long, after this, to arrive at his decision.
“I’ll go yuh on that job, Cameron,” he said abruptly, grinning to cover his reflections.
“Fine. I was hopin’ yuh would, Reb. Yuh can drag yore war-bag over here jest as soon as yuh want.”
Jube took it calmly, with no sign of his relief at the success of his endeavors. It was a way he had, of carrying even a small conspiracy through to a finish. Billy Farragoh had drawn no flattering picture of Doc Lantry in his talk. Any man, the boy declared, was fortunate to escape from Doc’s employ, on general principles. Well, Jube owed that much to Santee. Nevertheless, Billy’s very vagueness about Doc had left him more than a little curious.
“What kind o’ man is Lantry, Reb?” he could not help asking, as they walked back toward the house from the corrals. “I mean, how is he to work for—He’s so damn shy o’ being neighborly,” he added apologetically.
Instantly on his guard, Reb affected casualness. “Why, Doc’s got some rough edges,” he admitted. “I reckon he’s had a hard time of it. Makes him difficult to deal with—Billy prob’ly found that out. But we get along.”
“Been a hoss-dealer long, has he?” Cameron persisted. “Where’d he come from, anyways?”
In these questions and others the rancher evinced a desire to learn something of Lantry’s background that warned Reb like a red flag. He built up a circumstantial past for Doc, spotted with appropriate blanks; for he knew better than to seem to have Doc’s history too well at his command. A few artistic touches tended to make the man appear innocuous, a dyspeptic recluse.
Still Cameron hung on conversationally, as Reb settled into his saddle for the ride back to Ghost Creek. Why didn’t Lantry see a doctor? Maybe it was something that could be cured. “No need to say that if doctorin’ would make him more like you, it’d be worth tryin’,” Jube smiled.
“No,” Reb sparred; “Lantry’s set in his way, Cameron. It’s ingrained in him—he wouldn’t listen to no sawbones, nor to me neither. He’d rather rock along as he’s doin’.”
“Mebbe if me, or somebody else, was to turn up over there an’ drop a word to kind of set him thinkin’—” Jube offered queryingly.
Reb shunted him away from that in a hurry. He didn’t want any of the Basin men taking an exaggerated interest in Doc Lantry, on whatever count; and it went without saying that Doc didn’t either.
“Doc’s crabby on the subject,” he said, frowning down the rancher’s suggestion. “It’s only askin’ fer grief to talk it to him.”
“Reckon that’s so,” Jube nodded comprehendingly. “It’s still purty good medicine to leave a man to his own concerns.... Wal, then I’ll be expectin’ yuh, soon as yuh git straightened out over there, Reb.”
So the subject of Lantry was passed off lightly; but as he rode away, Reb experienced a revival of the apprehensions which Cameron’s earlier cunning had allayed. Had there been talk of Lantry between the rancher and Billy Farragoh? Certainly Jube had been doing some thinking about Doc, at any rate. All these seemingly idle questions—Reb couldn’t get away from the feeling of a deeper purpose behind them.
“Mebbe somethin’s come out about them hosses Doc was sellin’,” he mused uneasily. “It can’t be much; but it wouldn’t take much to grow into a sneakin’ suspicion.... An’ Cameron wantin’ to get me away in a hurry. Why don’t he wait till his foreman quits?” But after all, it might be his own awakened vigilance that made this look ambiguous.
“Dang it all!” he burst out, grinning at his fears; “this is what Doc’s damned shady life leads to. The wild, free way of livin’! I’ll be spooky as a bronc if it goes on much longer.”
Seen in this light, the matter receded to its proper proportions. But later, when he mentioned to Lantry casually that he had taken a job with Cameron and Doc objected, Reb’s thinking came back in a flash to help him.
“Dammit all, Santee!” Doc exploded. “Yuh can be depended on to jam things up! The Kid an’ the others’ll be comin’ along soon—yuh won’t have time to hold down no job!” He ran on with quick acerbity.
“Are yuh done?” Reb inquired, when he stopped for breath. “Well, then, look here: Do yuh think the money means anything to me? No! So when I do somethin’ like this—”
“I s’pose yo’re tellin’ me this job is another clever way of divertin’ suspicion!” Lantry cut him off disgustedly.
“What yuh don’t know don’t hurt yuh—right away,” retorted Reb sententiously. “But Doc, what I know bothers me.” There was shrewdness in his humorous eyes as he gave an accurate account of Jube Cameron’s inquisitive questions.
Doc was inclined to be indignant. “Where does he git off, with his nose in my business?” he barked.
Reb laughed at him. “Yuh mean where’ll you get off,” he corrected. “No, Doc; you’ll never get done coverin’ up. No use tryin’. Now, my idea is that somethin’s come out about them hosses we drove up here. An’ if yuh want to know, I’m takin’ a job with Cameron to try an’ find out what’s known, an’ who knows it.”
Lantry thought this plausible. He had lost some of his assurance now. “What’ll I tell the Logans, though?” he queried, when they had talked it over.
“Why—tell ’em jest that. It won’t be for long, may-be. If the Kid ain’t satisfied, I’ll ride over some night myself.”
Doc was displeased with his leaving, but there was nothing he could say to any point. He wanted to stay on at Ghost Creek, for he had seen its advantages. Reb’s move might help him to do so. Masterfully at ease, Reb stuffed his war-bag, and the next morning rode off to work for Cameron.
Spring drew on apace now. The dirty snow was melting off the levels, the Wind River feeders began to swell, the ice to pile up. It was a season of swift rises in temperature. The C 8 cattle were being held on the high slopes, where last season’s cured grass lay bared, but taking his place with the boys, Reb found no sinecure awaiting him. Steers had to be tailed up through the thaws, kept out of the dangerous draws; weaklings needed looking after, which generally meant moving them down to the ranch by wagon, where they could be regularly tended.
One day Cameron rode out with Reb to see how his stock was shaping up for the coming beef cut. The air was balmy. The snow had almost disappeared. New grass was peeping up through what was left of it.
“Yuh ought to get a cut of a hundred an’ fifty,” Reb said, as they rode along. “It ain’t much, but I wouldn’t dig into my two-year-olds if I was you.” He jerked a thumb toward the white-faces grazing the slope below them. “They’ll be mighty hefty, time the grass gets strong. There’s ’nother bunch over the hump, here.”
Jube nodded, his gaze turning as he took in the spread of Shoshone Meadows, dotted with his cattle. “Yore estimate of the cut agrees with Pat’s,” he said. Pat was his foreman. “It removes any doubts I might’ve had about yore ability, Reb.”
They talked on, until Reb broke off to discourage two young steers inclined toward belligerence. “Don’t pay to have ’em fight off no beef,” he commented, riding back to join his employer after his swift maneuvers.
Jube smiled quizzically. “Yuh was born to raise cows, Reb,” he responded.
It was true. Reb loved the work. He became absorbed in it. It came over him with a surge that he could ask nothing better of life than to go on like this. The money in his pockets meant nothing when he had good horseflesh under him and the wide sky overhead—steers to think about. The Sundance Kid was due back any day now. For a moment Reb hoped to make the break with his bunch permanent. Cameron would need him through the round-up. Logan and the others would become impatient with waiting, drift away.... The picture had its bright aspects.
It was late that afternoon, and Reb was riding alone down Rock Creek—Cameron had returned to the ranch long since—when he saw a solitary rider racking forward. He stared at the other, caught by something in the man’s posture, and then grunted. His eyes hardened as the two drew together, but his grin was easy.
“Takin’ a chance, ain’t yuh, Logan?” he queried.
The Sundance Kid pulled up. “Howdy, Reb. I knowed it was you.... How’s tricks?” He was his old, cool, impudent self.
“Well, I’m doin’ some scoutin’ on Lantry’s account. Workin’ for Cameron.”
The Kid’s lips parted, drew upward. “Doc told me,” he admitted. “But o’ course you’ll drop that now.”
“No. Not yet,” Reb returned. He told the other why, though he was sure Lantry had explained this also. “Doc don’t scarcely take enough pains for his own good,” he concluded. “Somebody’s got to, if we go on usin’ Ghost Creek. I’m doin’ it.”
The Kid didn’t quiz, didn’t press him. Not openly, at least. He evidenly had heard about the Castle Gate job. And he showed a respect for Reb’s judgment that had not been in him last year.
“Have to keep up a front with the C 8,” he agreed, “till yuh git what yore after, anyway. But yuh can fix it up to git some job that’ll let yuh off now an’ again without anyone knowin’.” His tone implied that there was no question of this.
“Well, I dunno.” Reb had been taut and guarded since the Sundance Kid’s appearance had jarred him. Outwardly he was as free as ever. “Grass’ll be gettin’ strong right soon now. Reckon I can’t find much excuse for shirkin’ the busy season.”
“You do what yuh can,” Logan urged, when they had smoked and thrashed it out, to Reb’s advantage as far as he could see. The Kid unhooked his knee from his saddle-horn. “We’re all primed to go into yore scheme, Santee. I’ll look yuh up again in a day or two.”
“You’ll find me in the thick of Cameron’s boys, an’ damn busy, too, if I know anythin’ about it,” Reb thought to himself, as the Kid rode off in the direction of Ghost Creek. He knew the crisis in his affairs had come. Before, he felt, he had been driven by circumstance. The Castle Gate robbery had been a product of fate. But if he went into anything further of the kind, he would have no such excuse; there would be no answer save his own weakness. And he was not weak. He had always gloried in his strength.
He rode back to the C 8 determined to give the outlaws a wide berth for a few days, until chance or wisdom pointed out his proper course of action. There was no inkling then that fate was to strike again, with the sharpness of lightning, within a few hours.
Jube Cameron called him into his office from the supper table.
“Reb,” he said without preamble, “I’m goin’ to put yuh out at the Upper Shoshone camp fer a few weeks.”
Reb nodded, thinking it fell in precisely with his own plans. “Who do yuh want up there with me?” he asked.
“You’ll be alone, Reb,” the rancher answered slowly; “an’ I’ll tell yuh why. I wouldn’t even put a man there to keep the cows out of the Rock Creek bog, if it was only that; but there’s a handy corral there, an’ I need some extra broncs broke fer the round-up. You’ll have yore time to yoreself, wrangle the hosses, an’ keep an eye on the bog, without any trouble at all,” he went on pleasantly, with no idea of what he was doing to Reb. “I’ll send the boys up with the cavvy tomorrer—an’ the wagon with yore grub, too.”
Reb’s agreement with this arrangement was a masterpiece of outward control. Inwardly he groaned. “The Sundance Kid’ll find me wide open now, with no way to turn,” he thought bleakly.