Cole scowled ferociously, but his voice was almost apologetic when he addressed his former range companion.
“Brant,” he said, “I reckon you hate my guts, and maybe you got reason to, but I don’t want you hatin’ ’em for something I didn’t do. I just want to tell you, I didn’t have a damn thing to do with that dynamite bomb business. I talked against it.”
“Not surprised to hear that you did, Cole,” Brant replied. “No matter what you’ve done or haven’t done, I can’t see you pulling a sidewinder trick like that. As I said up in Dodge, when they accused you of shooting a jigger in the back, you just aren’t made that way.”
With a nod he rode on, leaving Dawson staring after him, a peculiar expression in his eyes. Dawson had been riding west toward the Flying V wire. Abruptly he turned his horse and rode due south, purposefully.
Shortly after the water diverting episode, Brant received some disquieting information anent the doings of Senor Kane. He learned that Kane was a frequent visitor at the Bar O ranch house. Finally one afternoon, the two young men arrived at the ranch house at the same time.
Kane and Brant were cordial to one another. Verna Loring was cordial to both. But just the same the situation was somewhat strained. For the first time in his life, Austin Brant learned what it meant to be ill at ease in another man’s presence, and somewhat uncertain of himself. There was no denying Norman Kane’s charm. His physical perfection was the least of it. He had an urbane manner, a gift for casual conversation. Every word and gesture bespoke his vivid personality. Brant was forced to admire him, his utter self-confidence, his equaly utter lack of self-consciousness. The highlight of the occasion came when Kane seated himself at the piano, ran his slender fingers powerfully across the keys, flung back his handsome head and sang, in a pure, sweet tenor, a hauntingly beautiful ballad of the range—
When the moon shines down on the chaparral
And the stars come out, one by one,
While wan and gray are the pinons tall
That stood so green ’neath the sun—
There’s a dream that comes from the yesteryears,
As I ride down the trail, all alone,
Of one I see through a mist of tears,
A dream of you, my own! my own!
Moon and stars together,
Each shall do their part
To bring to life again the dream
That dwells within my heart!
Sad was the parting,
Long the trail and lone,
That brings me back again to you,
To you, my own! My own!
As the last golden echoes died to silence, Norman Kane turned, smiled his thin, fleeting smile, and stood up with lithe grace.
“Well, so long, folks,” he said. “Got to be goin’. Want to make it to Tascosa by dark.”
With a nod to Brant and another smile, he strode out. Norman Kane understood to the full of the value of making an effectual departure.
Brant and Verna Loring walked out onto the porch and watched him ride away.
“Verna,” Brant said suddenly, “what do you think of that feller, anyhow?”
“Austin, I don’t know,” the girl replied frankly. “He draws me strangely, and at the same time repels me. There is something about him I can’t understand. Perhaps it is his eyes that are responsible. In front, they are all light and warmth, but in the back it seems that granite walls rise up to hide something that—perhaps it is not good to look upon. At times I feel as if I could go to the ends of the earth with him, but at the same time I know I would always be—afraid!”
Brant said nothing, but stared across the rangeland with unseeing eyes. Verna laid a slim little hand on his arm.
“Austin,” she said softly, “no woman would ever be afraid with you—anywhere!’
Before Brant could reply, she had slipped back into the house. He hesitated a moment, half turned, then strode abruptly to his horse.
Chapter Ten
The early fall roundup, in preparation for the final drives north before winter would close the trails, got under way. The cowmen of the section joined together to plan the work and choose a round-up boss. By an almost unanimous vote, this important chore was assigned to Austin Brant. As one oldtimer said, “He’s a young feller, but he’s got the savvy a lot of the older hands ain’t never seemed to tie onto.”
This highly important matter attended to, the roundup strategy and tactics were handed over to Brant. His word was law and he had the final say-so in all matters. The owners of the cows were as much under his orders as any cowhand or wrangler. There was only one man to whom even the all-powerful round-up boss was chary of getting too uppity with—the cook. That truculent and habitually bad-tempered individual was monarch of all he surveyed and, within limits, did pretty much as he pleased. If it is true that an army travels on its stomach, what is to be said of an outfit of hungry cowboys with some eigh teen hours a day of gruelling toil on their hands? Cooks were in a class by themselves, and they knew it.
Brant’s first chore was to choose trusted lieutenants who would be in charge of groups of hands that were to scour the range thoroughly in search of wandering cows, singly or in large groups. Brant “told off” his subordinates—gave them their orders—and the serious work of the roundup began.
The troops of cowboys rode out over the range and presently scattered until the hands were separated by distances that varied according to the type of range they were working. Coulees, canyons and brakes were combined for holed-up beefs and fugitive cows with late calves. The cattle were gathered up by ones and twos and small groups and driven to designated holding spots. At the holding spot, after the critters were held in close herd, the work of cutting out began. Various brands were segregated by driving the individual critters past a tally man who called and recorded the brands. The cow a calf was following was carefully noted and the calf branded the same as the mother.
With the greatest care, the beef cattle were cut and segregated according to brands. Those not wanted, the culls and cut-backs, were also separated to later be allowed to drift back onto the range, as were the calves and the cows not needed for shipment.
“I don’t want any mavericks ambling around when this roundup is finished,” Brant cautioned his men.
Several straymen representing distant spreads not included in the roundup, were present to drive home cows that had wandered far from their range. Each outfit gathered its beef cut together in readiness for the drive to market.
Dust and sweat and sun! The stench of burned hair and scorched flesh. Shouting and cursing. The whiz of ropes, the sizzle of the branding iron. The thud of horses’ irons and the dull rumble of thousands of unshod hoofs. Sourdough biscuits, steaks fried in deep fat, numberless cups of steaming coffee. Then laughter and song and skylarking. The croon of the night-hawks, the rumbling of full-fed, contented cattle. The jingle of bridle irons and the popping of saddle leather in the velvety dark! Dreamless sleep beneath the stars! Round-up days!
The March of the Longhorns—the wildest, gayest, most carefree and most joyous phase of life the nation ever knew or ever will know. The March of the Longhorns! that exerted an influence hard to overestimate on the country over which it passed. It colored the tradition and the literature of a nation and hastened the spread of empire over a wild and untrodden land. For less than a score of years the vast panorama was painted on the dust clouds staining the sky and dimming the stars of the West, before it faded under the erasing hand of changing conditions. The cowboy was the plumed knight of the cactus and the mesquite, his armor denim and leather, his lance a whizzing length of three-eighths manila, his escutcheon the stamping of a glowing iron on hair and flesh, his sword a flaming sixgun wielded with unbelievable dexterity. He rode a crusade against the dumb, imponderable forces of nature, and, unlike the Crusaders of old, he rode triumphant, hat tilted, lips a-quirk, into the oblivion of a new era.
Norman Kane was an amused onlooker at the beginning of the roundu
p, but long before the first beef herd was driven to its home range, his own cows were rolling northward.
“Something to be said for wire,” Brant observed to John Webb. “Does away with combing the whole range and cutting out.”
Webb rumbled in his throat, but nevertheless looked thoughtful.
Under a hazy autumn sun the Running W shipping herd started on the long trek to Dodge City. Dust a-foggin’, cowboys shouting, horses mettlesome and frisky, with bellowing and blatting and clashing horns the cows took the trail. The Canadian was crossed, and the tawny Red. Austin Brant rode with the herd, but when they reached the Cimarron he did not cross with the others. Instead with half a dozen chosen companions, he rode east, fording the river many miles farther on. After negotiating the crossing, they rode on east, veering somewhat to the north. Until, following the directions supplied Brant by old Nate Loring, they reached a small settlement called Cary. A few miles east of Cary, according to Loring, was the spread owned by Tom Sutton, the man who imported Hereford bulls to cross with his longhorn cows.
Brant located Sutton’s spread without difficulty. He found Sutton to be an affable man who was willing to sell his surplus bulls. But Sutton voiced a word of warning.
“You’ll never be able to run these critters back to the Panhandle, son,” he told Brant. “Their hoofs won’t stand it over the rough ground. They’ll be goin’ lame on you before you reach the Cimarron and you’ll end up by losin’ every one of ’em. I’m glad of a chance to sell—got more than I got any use for now—but I don’t want to take advantage of a feller, I tell you, you can’t make it.”
“I’ve got a notion,” Brant replied. “See you have a blacksmith shop here.”
“Uh-huh, a good one,” Sutton replied, wonderingly.
“And I reckon I won’t have any trouble buying all the shoes I want in Cary, eh?”
“No trouble at all,” agreed the mystified rancher.
Next day the Oklahoma spread owner watched something the like of which he had never seen before. Shaking his head and muttering, he watched Brant and his hands nail iron shoes to the hooves of the bulls Brant had purchased. The word got around, and before the chore was completed a number of residents from town, and hands from nearby spreads formed an interested and skeptical audience. There were derisive remarks, much shaking of heads, and considerable outright laughter.
But when Austin Brant reached the Panhandle, although the Oklahoma gents were not there to see it, the laugh was on the other side of the face. The shod bulls plodded stolidly across the rough ground, and not a single one suffered lameness. Taking his time and making the trip by easy stages, Brant brought the herd intact to the Running W range.
The feat kicked up considerable excitement. Men rode in from miles around to look over the prize animals and the iron that protected their tender hoofs.
“Son, you’ve started something,” said Colonel Charles Goodnight of the JA spread, a speculative gleam in his fine eyes. “I figger the time will come when putting shoes on valuable beef critters will be a common practice.”
Goodnight was a prophet not without honor in his own land, and this particular prognostication, along with others, proved to be sound.
Shortly after his return, Brant rode up to the Bar O. While Verna busied herself in the kitchen, Brant talked with old Nate in the living room.
“There’s a new gamblin’ hangout over in Tascosa,” Loring remarked in the course of the conversation. “I understand she’s a heller—up-to-date gamblin’ riggin’s, music, plate glass mirrors, gals, floods of likker. All first class. They’re doing a big business. Heard they figgered first to squat at Clarendon, down toward the mouth of the Palo Duro, but Col o nel Goodnight rode down and sort of persuaded the gamblin’ gents to move on. There was quite a bit of cussin’ and argifyin’, I heard, but Goodnight is considerable of a feller and has a way with him when he sets out to persuade folks to do somethin’. Anyhow, the gamblers packed up and moved to Tascosa where folks don’t ’pear to be so pertickler.”
“Who opened it?” Brant asked.
“Feller who told me about it didn’t know ’em,” Loring replied. “Said they were new jiggers in the section. From up in Oklahoma, he believed. Said they were salty appearin’ gents who know their business. Won’t stand for any rough stuff. He said the games ’peared to be straight enough.”
“Would be in the beginning, anyhow,” Brant returned. “Reckon I’ll have to drop in and look the place over the next time I’m in town. Figure to ride up in the next day or two.”
Brant did ride to Tascosa two days later. He located the new place without difficulty and entered. Inside the door he paused, staring with astonishment. At the far end of the bar stood three men. One was Norman Kane. The other two were Phil Doran and Pink Hansen.
Kane noticed Brant’s entrance, and walked over to the bar to join him in a drink.
“What you doing here, Kane?” Brant asked casually.
Norman Kane smiled his thin smile. “Got an interest in the diggin’s,” he replied.
“You have!”
“Uh-huh. I persuaded Doran and Hansen to come down to this section and open up. Put out the money for them to make the move on. They weren’t doin’ so well at the Crossin’ anymore. Down here the place is a prime money maker. Good investment.”
“If you don’t mind investing in such a business,” Brant conceded.
Kane’s eyes narrowed a trifle. “Business is business,” he returned composedly. “Where there’s money to be took, I say take it.”
Brant did not pursue the conversation further, but as he looked over the tables and noticed the cold-eyed, steel-nerved card sharps doing the dealing and manipulating, he had a feeling that there would be considerable “taking” in the Post-hole, as the place was named.
Kane finished his drink, nodded to Brant and strolled back to the far end of the bar. Neither Doran nor Hansen approached the Running W foreman, which was not surprising under the circumstances of their last meeting. Brant was conscious of their eyes hard upon him when he left the Posthole.
Chapter Eleven
When John Webb returned from the North drive, Brant had a serious conversation with the Running W owner.
“We’re being robbed blind,” he told Webb. “We didn’t tally anything like the number of calves we should have at roundup, and we’re losing steers and beefs off the range every day. I’ve got men riding line all the time, but still it goes on. Somebody is almighty slick about it.”
“Them hellions from New Mexico!” growled Webb.
“Mebbe,” Brant admitted, “but I’m beginning to wonder. I posted men where they’d have a mighty good chance to intercept any cows run in that direction, and so far they haven’t seen a thing.”
“How about them darn nesters down to the south, the little hellions you run water to after Kane fenced ’em out?”
“I can’t say for sure,” Brant admitted, “but if it’s them, they’re sure covering up.”
“Trust ’em to do that,” grunted Webb, with the big owner’s habitual distrust of the little feller.
“Well, whoever is responsible, it’s getting worse,” Brant declared. “Never before have we lost so many cows as during the past few months.”
It was not strange that Webb should ascribe most of his troubles to the New Mexico faction. In the shadow of the flat-topped mountains roamed bands of the most notorious killers and outlaws the West ever knew. They were made up of such men as William H. Boney (Billy the Kid), Frank McNab, Doc Skurlock, Charley Bowdre, Fred Waite, Tom O’Folliard, and other desperadoes. From all the frontier states and territories, particularly from Texas, outlaws, stage robbers, cow thieves, paid killers and other owlhoots had gathered to take part in the carnival of crime highlighted by such sanguinary episodes as the Lincoln County War. The well stocked ranches of the Panhandle offered rich pickings for those gentlemen of easy conscience and quick trigger finger. What Webb believed was equally believed by honest ranches all over th
e section. Even such a reputable cattleman as John Chisum was looked upon with suspicion by the Texas owners, because he happened to originate in New Mexico.
This condition furnished opportunity for home-grown wideloopers. With the blame for any outrage almost automatically placed upon the New Mexico owlhoots, the shrewd rustler of the Pan-handle could get away with a lot and never be suspected. Many took advantage of this opportunity to fatten their herds with other men’s cattle.
Austin Brant knew this, and while he did not discount the probability that the New Mexico owl-hoots were doing the widelooping on the Running W, he did not overlook the possibility that the depredations might be credited to somebody closer to home.
Norman Kane was also having his troubles. Several times within a two weeks period his wire was cut and his cows drifted out onto the Running W range. His hands, with the assistance of the Running W riders, herded them together and drove them back home.
“Chances are some more will still be maverickin’ around,” Kane told Brant. “I reckon you’ll run onto ’em sooner or later.”
Which proved to be the case. Quite a few more Flying V cows were encountered by the Running W cowboys and delivered to their proper owner.
“And each time my wire was cut, I lost quite a few head,” Kane declared to John Webb. “Sure it’s the New Mexico bunch. Who else? If I can just line sights with the hellions some time!”
Brant was thoughtful as he and Webb rode back to the ranch house.
“Funny, isn’t it?” he remarked to the Boss. “They always cut Kane’s east fence. Looks like they’d cut it on the west side, if it is the New Mexico owlhoots doing the widelooping.”
“Can’t never tell what an owlhoot is liable to do,” Webb grunted. “And then again, mebbe it’s them damn nesters down to the south what are responsible. They would cut the wire over to the east.”
“The south wire would be even more convenient for them,” commented Brant.
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