by Zane Grey
“What in the deuce has come off?” he muttered, and taking out his matches, he struck one. This colorful clean-smelling room could not be his. Yes, it was — because he heard Nels and Ren talking through the partition. Burning his fingers in his astonishment he struck another match to light the lamp. But where was his plain, cheap, stinking lamp? Here was a shining one of brass with a big white globe. Rugs on the floor, curtains at the two windows, a dresser with a fine mirror, pictures on the walls, a new three-quarter bright-blanketed bed where his bunk had been, a washstand with colored ware upon it, and towels the quality of which no cowboy before had ever felt, a comfortable Morris chair beside his table, and... but his roving gaze encountered a striking photograph in a silver frame upon his table. Majesty Stewart! With a groan he took the picture and fell into the chair, to stare down upon the lovely face, the speaking eyes, the bare neck of this girl who had bewitched him.
“Damn you! damn you!” he whispered, softly. It seemed a long while before he became aware of whispers and low laughs in Nels’ room.
“Hey, pard, air you daid?” came through the wall.
“No! But I wish I were,” shouted Lance.
“Why fer, you big stiff?... You oughta see my bunkhouse. My Gawd! — Pard, what’s thet fairy-guy we used to read about when we was kids? Aladdin! Thet’s the hombre. Wal, he’s been here. ... Nels told me the servants fetched all this truck down today, an’ Bonita fixed the rooms up. An’ a swell job she did!”
At that juncture Stewart stamped into Nels’ room. Lance hid the picture, and hurried out, and into the ranchman’s presence. “Here you are, Jack-of-all-trades,” said Stewart, gayly, and he opened a ledger on Nels’ table. “Balanced proper up to this page and date. And there’s a year and more of figures. Sidway, if you make sense of these I’ll be obliged.”
“I’ll hop to it, Boss.”
It was midnight when Lance straightened out those accounts. The last entry was of seven hundred and thirty steers sold at thirty-five dollars a head — payment not yet received. Among the bank statements, papers and correspondence were a batch relative to Madge Stewart’s income and expenses. Over a period of time a yearly income of sixty thousand dollars had diminished until at the present it had shrunk to a few thousands. The correspondence indicated that from time to time bonds and stocks had been transferred from Madeline Stewart’s account to that of her daughter.
“Gosh! I wonder if Stewart really meant me to see these,” pondered Lance. “All as plain as print! Mother and father sacrificing themselves to the extravagance of spoiled daughter! And she doesn’t know it! — Can you beat that?”
Lance’s troubled mind yielded to the exhaustion of a hard day and toilsome hours with figures, and he slept. Ren’s pounding on his door awakened him. After breakfast Stewart appeared and Lance brought him the ledger.
“All done, sir, and not so bad except for — for these,” said Lance. “Accounts, you know, of your daughter.”
“Sidway! Did I leave them in this book?” ejaculated Stewart, utterly discomfited.
“Evidently you did. Of course, I went over them. I’m sorry, sir.”
“If she ever found this out...”
“Stewart, she won’t from me,” interrupted Lance, hurriedly, hoping to relieve the rancher of embarrassment. “And — as for your own accounts, sir — they’re not so bad as you led me to believe. When you receive the money for that batch of cattle sold the other day, you can pay your debts and have around five thousand dollars left.”
“No! — Sidway, you’re — you’re.... it’d be too good to be true.”
“Maybe you did not figure out just what you’d receive for the cattle.”
“I didn’t at that.”
“Well, it comes to twenty-five thousand, five hundred and fifty dollars. Quite a lump sum, sir.”
“I must have made a big mistake on the wrong side.”
“You evidently did.”
“I was thinking most of Madeline,” replied Stewart, his dark eyes softening. “Sidway, I reckon Starr is right about you.”
“That knock-kneed windbag! Now what’d he say?”
“I don’t remember it all. One thing stuck, though. He called you a whiz.”
Lance felt that he had never received a compliment that had pleased him more. He went to work that day and drove Starr to distraction and dragged him home a cripple.
“Look at me, Nels,” whined Ren, wet with sweat, grimy and ragged.
“Hey, Sid, who’s this heah nigger you fetched in?” drawled Nels.
“It’s me, Nels. Me! — Worked to death by thet fiend. An’ what I hate most in all this world is diggin’ postholes!”
“We finished that corral, didn’t we? Now we can have some peace when Manuel and Jose wrangle Miss Stewart’s horses.... Oh boy — tomorrow!”
“Me for the hills!” ejaculated Ren.
* * * * *
Lance was waiting for Starr the following night at sunset. Inside Nels was banging pans in unusual excitement.
“Pard, what’n hell’s wrong with you?” demanded Ren, staring.
“Behold a — a — devastated man!”
“Wal, whatever’n hell thet means you shore air it.... So you obeyed them orders?”
“Yes. They were Stewart’s.”
“An’ you had to ride in town with Majesty — all alone — and meet her friends — all them peaches we jest know air comin’ — an’ be a swell lady’s guy?”
“You said it!”
“My Gawd, how tough! Jest the rottenest break ever. Wait till I bed down my hawse an’ I’ll be ready to be deevasstated.”
After supper Ren got up to help Nels with the dishes and he said: “Okay now, pard. Shoot! I reckon I’m strong enough now.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Tell us aboot Majesty’s outfit.”
“Well, the boys are all nice clean-cut college chaps. You’ll like them, especially the big football player, Snake Elwell. He’s a regular fellow.”
“Aw, nix on the fellers. It’s the gurls Nels an’ me want to heah about.”
“Six of them, Ren. Six! And they might have been picked for a swell movie.... The gang arrived at ten-thirty. They stayed in town until three. Five awful hours! If I performed one job, there were a hundred. They probably were kidding me or Madge, for the whole bunch of crazy women went after me. Poor little me! While the boys hung around Madge. They ate and they drank. Can that crowd lap up the booze? I’m telling you. And they had to see everything and everybody in Bolton.”
“Swell. But thet ain’t tellin’ us how they stacked up.”
“Can’t you wait till you lamp them?”
“Nope. Me an’ Nels hev artistic feelin’s.”
“Well, here goes — the way I got it. Allie Leland first, evidently Madge’s best friend, a slim stylish girl with gray eyes, the peach of the bunch, I’d say, though not in looks. Next Maramee Joyce, brown beauty built like Jean Harlow, a knockout. Next a little southern girl, looks like sixteen but must be twenty-two. Dark, vivacious, with a smile that would drive any man nutty, and a sweet southern accent. Nels will fall for her. Then Pequita Nelson. Part Spanish, Ren. Creamy olive skin, great dreamy sloe-black eyes, willowy and graceful. Blue-blood, pard.... Then Selma Thorne, a blonde that, if you never saw Madge, would do the trick. And last Beulah Allen.... Whew! Ren, here’s a peach that’s a composite of honey, dynamite and autumn leaves of red and gold. Pretty! Why, she’s so pretty I couldn’t take my eyes off her. Red-headed, roguish-eyed, and a shape! What’s more she’s a devil clear down to her toes.”
“Pard!” gasped Ren, utterly fascinated. “What’n hell air we up agin? It was bad enough with only Majesty heah. We shore air a deevasstated outfit.”
“Ren, you should have heard the whoop those college tenderfeet let out when they saw Bonita.”
“Ahuh. Wal, I’ll be liable to shoot a laig off one of them,” growled Ren.
* * * * *
Work on the ranch for L
ance and Ren, except an occasional and brief overseeing of laborers brought out from town, practically ceased. Their jobs took on manifold aspects. They had to drive and to ride, especially the latter. The only girl guest who knew anything about horses was Dixie Conn. Madge’s horses were all too spirited for tenderfeet. Lance and Ren disagreed as to Madge’s own ability to handle several of her mounts.
“Say, Ren, you’re all wet,” protested Lance. “She was a swell horsewoman once. Nels vouched for that. But she has been to college for four years. She’s forgotten a lot. Besides she’s out of condition. She’s soft, if you get what I mean.”
“Cain’t you lay off yore grouch?” complained Ren. “Majesty is okay.”
“So far as looks are concerned, yes. She looks grand. And that’s all you see. Ren, you ought to be back at that garage.”
The expression of Starr’s face became so peculiar, and a giggle of Bu Allen sounded so gleeful that Lance turned toward the wide stable door. Madge had entered and she had heard him. Likewise had Rollie Stevens and Nate Salisbury, who were with her. The others appeared coming down the lane.
The purple fire in Madge’s eyes was no new catastrophe for Lance. As a matter of fact, he had never seen it blaze for anyone or anything except him. Nevertheless this time, as always, it stimulated him to battle. Perhaps he labored under the delusion that he was right, but so long as he believed so he would not give in.
“Ren, saddle Dervish for me,” ordered Madge, quietly.
Lance stepped forward and laid an ungentle hand on the cowboy. “Miss Stewart, please forgive my interference. But you should not ride Dervish — just yet. You — he...”
“I heard you express your opinions to Ren,” she interrupted, in a tone that made Lance feel as if he were the scum of the earth. “You can save your breath.”
“That I won’t do so long as I am a cowboy on this ranch,” replied Lance, coolly, as he found himself. “I have a duty here — to your father — and through him to you.... Dervish is a bad actor. He has not been worked out. Besides he does not like you, Miss Stewart. It’s dangerous for you to mount him.”
“Majesty, listen to Sidway,” interposed Rollie, his fine face earnest. “That horse looks skittish to me.”
Dixie Conn backed up Stevens, and the other girls apparently fell in line. This, Lance knew, was only adding fuel to the fire. He believed that if they only had advised it, Madge would have been amenable. But Lance Sidway was waving a red flag in her face.
“Ren, do as you’re ordered,” said Madge.
“Miss Majesty, mebbe Lance is right about this.”
“I know I’m right,” Lance said, earnestly. “Nels agreed with me. He saw you on Bellefontaine the other day, and Bell isn’t half the horse this Dervish is. May I repeat what Nels said to me?”
“Why, yes, if it pleases you so much,” rejoined Madge.
“He told me to keep you off the wicked horses if I could.”
“Nels! The old traitor! He taught me to ride.”
“He said also that when you were sixteen there wasn’t your beat in this state.... Coming from Nels, Miss Stewart, that is the very highest compliment.”
“And you think sixteen is so far back in my past that I’ve forgotten how to ride?” queried Madge, with sarcasm. “Well, I’ll show you!”
“I didn’t say that. I think, though, you act like sixteen or under.... Will you force me to go to your father?”
“You wouldn’t dare!”
“Yes, I would.”
“Go ahead. It’ll be a relief to be rid of you. By the time you find Dad I’ll be far out on the range.”
“Miss Stewart, he will hold me responsible if you are thrown.”
“So that’s it? Thinking of your job! It’s not too sure, at that.”
Lance gave up, and went back to saddling Pinto. Starr, at Madge’s order, led the slender racy Dervish out of his stall. Lance heard the cowboy curse under his breath. He also heard Allie Leland, and some of the other girls, taking his part against Madge. And Lance’s ears burned with something besides resentment. All these guests of Madge’s had been fine to him, and Bu Allen more than friendly. Lance put Pequita Nelson up on Pinto, and hurried on to saddle Leatherstocking. The young men were having the fun of saddling their own horses. Lance liked this bunch of college boys better than he had anticipated.
At last all the girls were up except Madge and she was leading Dervish out into the open. Ren was with her. Lance hurried to get astride Umpqua. The others, except Allie Leland, rode out toward the range.
“Sidway, go with the others,” called Madge.
He waited to see her put a foot into Starr’s hand and go sailing upon Dervish. She was not in the least afraid of him. There was a red flush in her cheeks, a smoldering fire in her eyes. Lance had to admire her for more than the superb and lovely figure she made on the roan. Then Madge and the Leland girl passed him to join the others. Dervish acted all right, Lance thought, but Madge was holding him in. But could she hold him if he broke into a run or could she stay on if he wanted to pitch? Lance gambled that she would fail in the latter event, anyway. Starr joined him and they loped to catch up with the others.
“Ren, you four flusher, why didn’t you stand by me?” queried Lance, with irritation.
“By thunder, I should of,” he replied, contritely. “But Majesty always kids me along — makes me reckon I’m a helluva feller.”
“Yeah? Well, if you’d come strong, we might have avoided a risk.”
“She’ll ride thet nag.”
“Gosh, I hope so. She handles him great. But Ren, damnit! That’s a horse — a mean horse! And she can’t weigh more than a hundred and ten.”
“Fifteen, pard, and she’s strong. I’ll admit, though, I forgot she hadn’t been ridin’.”
“All right, let’s go. I’ll try to make Madge think I don’t care a damn if she breaks her neck.... Fact is, I — I don’t. But I’ll keep an eye on her.”
“Me too, pard. Ain’t they a swell lookin’ outfit? I wish Bonita was heah. Majesty said I could ask her. But I knowed I couldn’t see anyone else, then... hey!...”
Lance rode away from the loquacious cowboy and steadied down conscientiously to his job. Once out in the grass and the sage there was much less danger of accidents. The girls had listened to reason, if their hostess had not. And except Dixie Conn, they were all too scared of horses to try any stunts. Dixie and Madge forged ahead, and Lance kept a position that would enable him to overtake Dervish, if he bolted. But nothing happened across the sage flat to the pine knoll five miles away. Madge led them up to the top of that, then down, and over the rolling range land toward the foothills. Half an hour of lope and trot brought them to the slope.
“Majesty,” screamed Maramee Joyce. “For Pete’s sake — hold on! I’m dying!”
“I’ve got that — awful stitch in my — side,” cried Selma Thorne.
“We’ll rest,” replied Madge, merrily. “But how in the world will you girls ever make it up into the mountains?”
“But you’re — not going soon?”
“Ah! this is swell, Majesty!”
“Majesty, let’s leave these tenderfeet behind on that trip,” suggested Snake Ewell, good-naturedly.
“What? You big hunk of protoplasm!” exclaimed Bu Allen, her pretty face scarlet, her roguish eyes snapping, her red hair disheveled. “Why, astride that horse you look as much like Sidway as I do like a rodeo queen.”
At length when they were rested Madge gave the word: “Let’s go! And step on it!”
As they swept off with merry screams and shouts Lance, with an eye ever on Dervish, saw that he meant business. He balked. And when Madge laid on the spurs he began to pitch. Lance in a few jumps had Umpqua beside her, but as he reached for the roan’s head Madge cried: “Let him alone!”
“But he’ll pile you up.”
“He will not!”
As bucking horses went, Dervish would have been mean for any rider. But to Lance’s surprise
Madge stayed in the saddle. Bent double, red-eyed and infuriated, the roan bucked all over the flat, and failed to dislodge the girl. She had her spurs dug into him and sat her saddle as if a part of it.
“You’re riding him, cowgirl!” yelled Lance, carried away with her spirit and the spectacle she made.
Then Dervish, succeeding in getting the bit between his teeth, bolted away across the valley, in the opposite direction from the ranch. It took only a glance to see that the roan was a runaway horse and that he would eventually get the best of his rider. Lance spurred Umpqua after him. By now the others were a couple of miles distant toward the ranch, and they were not yet aware of Madge’s predicament. The roan was fast. Lance had to urge Umpqua into his top speed to gain at all. And he saw that it was going to be a race. Madge fought her mount with all her might. If she heard Lance yell to let the horse run she gave no sign. The girl had evidently been jolted by the bucking, and now she was spending the last of her strength. She would be thrown.
Then after a grueling run Lance drew close to the roan. Madge showed signs of distress. She was beginning to sway.
“Drop your bridle!” yelled Lance. “Grab the pommel! Hold on!”
She heard him and obeyed. That saved her from an immediate spill. Umpqua thundered closer and closer until his nose passed the roan’s flank. But again Madge was swaying. She was near a fall and the ground was rocky, and rough with hummocks. Desperately goading his horse, Lance gained inch by inch, until he stretched out a clutching hand. She had the sense to shake her feet loose from the stirrups. But that loss of stability broke her seat in the saddle. She was in the air when Lance caught her in a grip of steel and swung her up before him.
“Oh!” she screamed, wildly. “You’re tearing my flesh!”
Lance let her go, to slip her into the crook of his arm, and hold her across his saddle. Umpqua was excited, too, and hard to slow down.
“Whoa! Steady, old boy!” called Lance, over and over again. “We’ve got her.... There, Ump! — Easy now — easy!”
At length Lance halted the horse and then turned his attention to the girl. Her face lay high up on his left arm, near his shoulder, and it was white. The lipstick on her strained lips made a startling contrast.
