Cattle-Ranch to College

by John Kendrick Bangs

  CHAPTER XIX.

  AN AWAKENING.

  It was a terrible shock to the boy, and for a few moments he seemeddazed as if by a physical blow. He had come into camp weary of body butlight and gay of heart, full of triumph, sure of a half-chaffing word ofcommendation from his friend and comrade. But that friend had met ahorrible death. John's heart sank like lead, and for the time the lightwent out of the sky for him. There was no joy, no sunshine, nofuture--Jerry was dead!

  "Where is he?" John asked of the man who brought him the sad news.

  "In camp," was the answer.

  John was in haste to go to his friend, yet he dreaded it with all hissoul. He forgot his triumph, his pride in his horse, his weariness, inthe one thought that filled his mind--"Jerry is dead!"

  "So Jerry, great, strong, experienced Jerry, on his big bay went down,and I, neither strong nor wise, am safe and well," John soliloquized.

  In a minute or two they entered camp, and John's first question was"Where?"

  The cook nodded toward a bed outspread in the shade of a wagon.

  Mr. Baker, the ranchman, was there, and as John reached the place hepulled back the canvas covering. The boy never forgot the sight that methis view. Jerry it was, certainly, but almost unrecognizable.

  John sat down by him, overcome by his first great grief. Death he hadseen many times, horrible deaths some of them, but none had come soclose as this. Cook, perceiving his plight, brought him a cup ofsteaming hot coffee, well knowing that it would put heart into him.

  "Mr. Baker," said John at length, "he's got to be buried some placewhere the coyotes can't get at him."

  "But it's sixty miles to the ranch," objected the ranchman.

  "That's nothing. Let me have a team and a wagon and I'll get him there."

  After some demur, which John finally overcame, Mr. Baker allowed him totake a big wagon and a four-horse team.

  The body was laid in reverently, the horses harnessed and hitched up.Just as John was about to take up the reins Mr. Baker came forward. "Iguess I'll go with you, Worth," he said. "Round-up's most finished and Ican do more good at home."

  He climbed into the seat of the big covered wagon as he spoke; and aftertying Lightning alongside the wheel horse, John took up the lines. Thepunchers stood round, hats off, their weather-beaten faces grave andfull of concern. All of them realized that this might have been _their_fate. Their rough hearts, accustomed as they were to all the chances ofthe dangerous life, were full of grief for the loss of their companion,"who was and is not."

  "So long!" they said--a farewell to living and dead.

  The whip cracked, the leaders jumped, and in a few minutes the white topof the wagon sank out of sight behind a rise. The sixty-mile funeraljourney had begun.

  For some time employer and employee sat silent side by side. John'shands were busy with the four fresh horses he was guiding, and his mindwith the real sorrow that filled it. He had never known Mr. Baker well;that familiar relation, unknown in the East, between employer andemployed was prevented by John's absence on the range, but the boy wasgrateful for the kindness Mr. Baker had shown him.

  "How long have you known Jerry, Worth?" the ranchman asked at length,touched by the boy's grief, and his interest aroused.

  "Since I've worked for you only," was the answer. "Some people you nevertake to and some you know and like right off; Jerry was that kind. Healways stood by me in quarrels, and many's the time he's stood a doublewatch 'cause he knew I was tired and he didn't want to wake me up. Yes,he stood by me through thick and thin."

  "He was a good hand, too," interpolated Mr. Baker.

  "He'd have divided his last dollar with me," continued John, more tohimself than to his hearer. "I'd have done the same with him."

  All this time they were travelling at full speed. The four horses yankedthe heavy wagon along steadily over gullies and ridges, through valleys,and over hilltops.

  A couple of hours passed in this way, during which John slowed thehorses down over the rocky places and urged them forward where it wassmooth.

  "What are you going to do with your money, Worth?" said Mr. Baker,hoping to dispel some of the sadness that hung over the boy. "You've notspent much this year, have you?"

  "'Bout three hundred dollars, I guess. Jerry and I thought of startingin with a little bunch of cows on our own hook, but----" The glance thatJohn gave over his shoulder into the wagon finished the sentence.

  "Did you ever think of going to school?" asked the ranchman, intent onhis effort to divert the boy's thoughts.

  "No, I saw a dude feller one time that had been to school all hislife"--John spoke contemptuously--"and I'd rather punch cows all my daysthan be like him."

  "Why? He might have been a poor specimen. My son would have been alawyer if he had lived, and I would a great deal rather have him onethan a cow-puncher."

  John shook his head, unconvinced. A vision came to him of streets walledin on each side by buildings so that every thoroughfare was a canon andevery room a prison. The joy of wild freedom, fraught though it was withdanger and hard work, tingled in his veins.

  HERDS WERE POURING IN FROM EVERY DIRECTION. (_Page283._)]

  "You know if you stay on the range," continued Mr. Baker, "it's only aquestion of time when you'll be stiffened and broken down, or else, whatmay be better, you'll be caught as Jerry was. If you keep on punchingcows all your life nothing will be left behind showing that you've beenin the world but a pine plank set in the ground."

  For a time John's thoughts were as busy as his hands. A new idea hadbeen presented to him--his future. What would he do with it? He lovedthe wild, free life he was now leading, and up to this time he had neverthought of working for something higher and more lasting. Mr. Baker hadstirred a part of him that had long lain dormant--ambition. His plansheretofore had seldom carried him further than a few days or weeks, hissole care was to do his duty and keep his job; but now he had a newcare--his future.

  The horses jogged along steadily over the rough country, their drivergetting every bit of speed out of them that would allow them to last thejourney through. Most of the time Lightning went alongside the wheelhorse contentedly. With particular perversity, however, as the team waspassing through a narrow place, where there was barely enough room topass, Lightning began a spirited altercation with his side partner. Heshied off from him, pushed him, and bit at him till he in turnretaliated. For a time John had his hands full, but "Lite," in hisefforts to kick holes in the unoffending side of the wheel horse, gottangled in the harness, and so stopped the whole business. His masterextricated him with difficulty, and "Lite," instead of getting thepunishment he so richly deserved, was petted instead, whereupon hebecame very good indeed and rubbed his nose affectionately againstJohn's sleeve, as much as to say: "I'm sorry. I'll never do it again."

  "It seems to me," said Mr. Baker, after they had got started again,"that a fellow that could tame such a wicked brute as that horse was afew months ago could master anything, books or anything else."

  "Oh, I've read some books," said John eagerly, "and I thought I knewsomething till that dude feller told all about the things he knew. Butthat chap couldn't ride a sway-backed cow," and John smiled, sad as hewas, at the thought.

  "You struck a poor sample," the ranchman responded. "He saw you couldbeat him physically, so he tried to get even with you mentally."

  For a time they rode along in silence, the boy busy with his ownthoughts, which Mr. Baker was wise enough not to interrupt.

  At length Smith Creek, the half-way mark of their journey, was reached,and they stopped for water, rest, and food. The horses were unharnessedand allowed to feed a while. Thirty miles had been covered in less thanfive hours--thirty miles of diversified country, hill and plain, rockand mud. The road was not worthy of the name, it was merely a wheeltrack more or less distinct.

  John was restless, the short hour of relief allowed the faithful beastsseemed long to him, and he was more at ease when they were spinningalong the trail a
gain. He had been living on his nerve all the morningand the strain was beginning to tell.

  Soon Mr. Baker began to talk again. He was interested in the youngcompanion by his side, this boy so filled with determination, soenergetic and forceful and yet so abounding in loyalty and affection, ashis grief over Jerry's death and his fondness for his horse testified;this boy who read books and yet had such a whole-souled contempt ofaffected learning as evidenced by his ill-concealed disdain of theEastern "dude." "You've never been East," began the ranchman, "or toschool?"

  "No. I was born in Bismarck, North Dakota," was the answer. "It must bequeer," he added after a pause, and a smile lit up his tired face."There's lots of women there, they say, and the men get their hair cutevery month; the people have to always dress for dinner, the papernovels say, and everybody goes to school."

  Mr. Baker smiled at this description of the life and manners of theEast, and kept plying the boy with questions, put kindly, until he hadlearned pretty much all there was to know about him. It was long sinceJohn had had so much interest shown him, and it warmed his heart; it wasspecially grateful at this time, when he felt that he had lost a triedand true friend. The ranchman advised him to work out the year and savehis money, and at the end of that time doff his cowboy clothes andmanners, array himself in a "boiled shirt," enter some good-sized town,and go to school and church.

  John was rather dubious about this; "muscle work," as he called it, workrequiring a quick eye, a strong will, and the ability to endure, he knewhe could do, but about brain work and book learning he was not soconfident. The idea of wearing a "boiled shirt" made him smile.

  "Those stiff-bellied things the dudes wear," said he derisively. "Mewear one of those things!" and he laughed aloud at the thought.

  Nevertheless the serious idea took deep root, and while he did not makeany promises he had a half-formed resolve to follow the old ranchman'sadvice.

  All this time the horses jogged along more and more wearily, andrequiring more and more urging from the youngster on the driver's seat.The last ten miles seemed endless; it was all John could do to keep theteam going, and even tireless Lightning running alongside movedunsteadily with fatigue.

  They were glad enough when the ranch buildings appeared dimly in thefast-deepening gloom. The sixty-mile drive was ended at last. When thewagon entered the ranch yard John almost fell into the arms of one ofthe men who had come to find out the cause of this unusually latearrival. It was Mr. Baker who told what the wagon contained and thestory of Jerry's death.

  John dragged himself to a hastily improvised bed, and, dropping down onit, was asleep in a twinkling; the first rest for thirty-six longfatiguing hours.

  Late the next day he was awakened to attend Jerry's funeral. It was avery simple ceremony, but the evident sincerity of the mourners' griefmade it impressive. He was laid away on a grassy knoll where severalother good men and true had been buried by their comrades. A rude railfence enclosed the spot--the long resting place of men who had died inthe performance of their duty.

  For a time things went sadly at the ranch, for John (he did not rejointhe round-up) missed his cow-puncher friend, his good-natured grumbling,his ever-ready helping hand. But gradually the boy's faculty of makingfirm, loyal friends helped to fill the gap that Jerry's death had made,though no one could ever take his place.

  Mr. Baker's talk about school and a future took deep root, and as theboy turned the idea over in his mind it developed into a resolve to tryit anyway.

  Life had a new meaning now for John, and he found it absorbinglyinteresting. The work he had to do was a means to an end, and thecommonplace, every-day drudgery became simply a cog in the machinery,and therefore not only bearable but interesting.

  The boy's success as a breaker of horses kept him much of the time atthat work. Since he had broken Lightning all other horses seemed tame tohim in comparison. It was part of his work not only to break the horsesto the saddle but to care for them generally, brand the colts, and trainthem for cow-pony work, as well as to guard them by day and night. Onthese long day rides over the rolling prairie and bleak, fantasticallyshaped and colored "bad lands" he would take a piece of a book in hispocket, and when an opportunity occurred read it. He read many booksthis way, tearing out and taking a few pages in his pocket each day. Mr.Baker was fond of reading, and understood the value of education; he hadsome books, and the less valuable ones he gave to his protege; these andthe few John had been able to pick up from outfits he met and during theinfrequent visits to a town formed his text books.

  As he thought and read and studied he became more and more convincedthat cowboy life was not for him: to know more about the things he hadread a few scraps about, to gain a place in the world, to learnsomething and achieve something was now his firm resolve.

  The summer, fall, and early winter went by quickly for the boy. Eachseason had its own peculiar duties and dangers--the round-up andbranding, the driving of the steers to the railroad for the Easternmarket (a serious undertaking, involving as it might the loss ofvaluable cattle through injury and drowning when fording streams), thecutting of hay for the weaker cattle and horses, and occasional huntingtrips for fresh meat. And so the year wore round.

  On New Year's day John's time was up--the time which he had set to startout to seek his fortune. He had saved more than a year's earnings, sothe small capitalist saddled Lightning, bade his friends good-by, andset forth, not without some misgivings, on a new quest: to getknowledge, see the world, and, if it might be, grasp his share of itshonors.