Chip sat down on a neighboring case and regarded the dapper little figure. Such words, coming from those girlishly rosy lips, had an odd effect of unreality. But Pink plainly was in earnest. His eyes were pleading and wistful.
“You’re it!” said Chip. “You can go right to work. Seems you’re the man I’ve been looking for, only I didn’t recognize yuh on sight. We’ve got a heap of work ahead, and only five decent men in the outfit. It’s the Flying U. Those five have worked years for the outfit.”
“I sure savvy that bunch,” Pink declared sweetly. “I’ve heard of the Happy Family before. Ain’t you one of them?”
Chip Bennett grinned. “I was,” he admitted, a shade of regret in his voice. “But last spring I got married, and settled down. I’m one of the firm now, so I had to reform. The rest are a pretty salty bunch, but you’ll get on all right, seein’ you’re not the pilgrim you look. Got an outfit?”
“Sure. Bought one, brand new, in the Falls. It’s over at the hotel now, with a haughty, buckskin-colored suitcase.” Pink pulled the silver belt-buckle of his russet belt straight and patted his pink and blue tie.
“Well, if you’re ready, I’ll get the horses and we’ll drift. By the way, how shall I write you on the book?”
Pink stooped and with his handkerchief carefully wiped the Dry Lake dust from his shiny shoes.
“Yuh won’t crawfish on me, if I tell yuh?” he inquired anxiously, standing up.
“Of course not.” Chip looked his surprise.
“Well, it ain’t my fault, but my lawful, legal name is Percival Cadwallader Perkins.”
“Wha-at?”
“Percival Cad-wall-ader Perkins. Shall I get yuh something to take with it?”
Chip, with his pencil poised in air, stared again. “It’s sure a heavy load to carry,” he observed solemnly “How do you spell that second shift?”
Pink told him. “Ain’t it fierce?” he wanted to know. “My mother must have sure been light-minded when I was born, but there are two grandfathers who wanted a kid named after ’em. Them two names sure make a combination. You know what Cadwallader means, in the dictionary?”
“Lord, no!” said Chip, putting away his book.
“Battle-arranger,” Pink told him sadly. “Now, wouldn’t that jostle yuh? It’s true, too. It has sure arranged a lot of battles for me. When I went to school, I had to lick about six kids a day. At last, seein’ the name was mine and I couldn’t chuck it, I throwed in with an expugilist and learned how to fight proper. Since then things come easier. I ain’t afraid now to wear my name on my hatband.”
“I wouldn’t,” said Chip dryly. “Hike over and get your haughty new war bag. We’ve got to be in camp by dinner time.”
A MILE OUT Pink looked down at his festal garments and smiled. “I expect I’ll be pickings for your Happy Family when they see me in these war togs,” he remarked.
Chip Bennett studied him meditatively. “I was just wondering,” he said slowly, “if the Happy Family wouldn’t be pickings for you.”
Pink dimpled and said nothing.
The Happy Family were at dinner when Chip and Pink dismounted by the bed tent and went over to where the men were sitting. The Happy Family received them with decorous silence. Chip got plate, knife, fork, and spoon and started for the stove.
“Help yourself to the tools, then come over and fill up,” he invited Pink over his shoulder. “You’ll soon get used to things here.”
The Happy Family looked guardedly at one another. This wasn’t a chance visitor, then. He was going to work!
Weary Davidson, sitting cross-legged in the shade of a wagon wheel, looked at Pink, fumbling shyly among the knives and forks, and whistled absently: “Oh, tell me, pretty maiden, are there any more at home like you?”
Pink glanced at him quickly and retreated inside the tent. Every man of them knew the stranger had caught Weary’s meaning. They smiled discreetly at their plates.
After dinner—during which Cal Emmett tested the tenderness of the newcomer with tales of his life as a desperado—Pink asked Chip if he should change his clothes and get ready to go to work.
Chip told him it wouldn’t be a bad idea, and Pink, carrying his haughty suitcase and another bulky bundle, disappeared into the bed tent.
“By golly!” spoke up Slim.
“Where did you pluck that modest flower, Chip?” Jack Bates wanted to know.
Chip sifted some tobacco into a paper. “I picked it in town,” he told them. “I hired it to punch cows, and its name is—wait a minute.” He put away the tobacco sack, got out his book, and turned the leaves. “Its name is Percival Cadwallader Perkins.”
“Oh, mamma! Percival Cadwolloper Perkins!” Weary looked stunned. “Yuh want to double the guard tonight, Chip. That name’ll sure stampede the bunch.”
“He’s sure a sweet young thing—mama’s precious lamb broke out of the home corral!” said Jack Bates. “I’ll bet yuh a tall, yellow-haired mamma with flowing widow’s weeds’ll be out here hunting him up inside a week. We got to be gentle with Cadwolloper.”
The reappearance of Pink cut short the discussion. He still wore his Panama, and the dainty pink-and-white striped silk shirt, the gray trousers, and russet-leather belt with silver buckle. But around his neck, nestling under his rounded chin, was a gorgeous rose-pink silk handkerchief, of the hue that he always wore, and that had given him the nickname of “Pink.”
His white hands were hidden in a pair of wonderful silk-embroidered buckskin gauntlets. His gray trousers were tucked into number-four tan riding boots, with silk-stitched tops. A shiny new pair of silver-mounted spurs jingled from his heels.
He smiled trustfully at Chip Bennett, got out papers and tobacco, and rolled a cigarette.
“If there’s anything I hate,” Cal remarked irrelevantly to the crowd, “it’s to see a girl smoke!”
Pink looked up and opened his lips to speak, then thought better of it. The cavvy came jingling up, and Pink turned to watch. To him the thudding hoofs were sweet music for which he had hungered long.
“Weary, you and Cal better relieve the boys on herd,” Chip Bennett called. “I’ll get you a horse, P-Perkins”—he had almost said “Pink”—“and you can go along with Cal.”
“Yes, sir,” said Pink, with a docility that would have amazed any who knew him well. He followed Chip out to the corral, where Cal and Weary were already inside with their ropes, among the circling mass.
Chip led out a little cow-pony that could almost day-herd without a rider of any sort, and Pink bridled him before the covertly watching crew. He did not do it as quickly as he might have done, for he deliberately fumbled the buckle and pinned one ear of the pony down flat with the head-stall.
Happy Jack, who had been standing herd disconsolately with two aliens, stared open-mouthed at Pink’s approach and rode hastily to camp, fair bursting with questions and comments.
The herd, twelve hundred range-fattened steers, grazed quietly on a hillside a half mile from camp. Pink ran a quick, appraising eye over the bunch, estimating correctly the number and noting their splendid condition.
“Never saw so many cattle in one bunch before, did yuh?” queried Cal, misinterpreting the glance.
Pink shook his head. “Does one man own all those cows?” he wanted to know.
“Yeah—and then some. This is just a few that we’re shipping to get ’em out of the way of the real herds.”
“How many are there?” asked Pink.
Cal turned his back upon his conscience and winked at Weary. “Oh, only nine thousand, seven hundred and twenty-one,” he liked boldly. “Last bunch we gathered was fifty-one thousand, six hundred and twenty-nine and a half. Er—the half,” he explained hastily in answer to Pink’s look of unbelief, “was a calf that we let in by mistake. I caught it and took it back to its mother.”
“I should think,” Pink ventured hesitatingly, “it would be hard to find its mother. I don’t see how you could tell.”
“Wel
l,” said Cal gravely, sliding sidewise in the saddle, “it’s this way. A calf is always like its mother, hair for hair. This calf had white hind feet, one white ear, and the deuce of diamonds on its left side. All I had to do was ride the range till I found the cow that matched.”
“Oh!” Pink looked convinced.
Weary, smiling to himself, rode off to take his station at the other side of the herd. Even the Happy Family must place duty before pleasure, and Cal started down along the nearest edge of the bunch. Pink showed inclination to follow.
“You stay where you’re at, sonny,” Cal told him over his shoulder.
“What must I do?” Pink straightened his Panama.
Cal’s voice came back to him faintly: “Just don’t bother the cattle.”
“Good advice, that,” Pink commented amusedly. He prepared for a lazy afternoon and enjoyed every minute.
On the way back to camp at supper time, Pink looked as if he had something on his mind. Cal and Weary exchanged glances.
“I’d like to ask,” Pink began timidly, “how you fed that calf—before you found his mother. Didn’t he get pretty hungry?”
“Why, I carried a bottle of milk along,” Cal lied fluently. “When the bottle went empty I’d catch a cow and milk her. All range cows’ll gentle right down, if yuh know the right way to approach ’em. That’s a secret that we don’t tell just everybody.”
That settled it, of course. Pink dismounted stiffly and walked painfully to the cook tent. Ten months out of saddle told even upon Pink, and made for extreme discomfort.
When he had eaten hungrily, responding to the ironical sociability of his fellow with a brevity which only his soft voice saved from brusqueness, he unrolled his new bed and lay down with not a thought for the part he was playing. He heard with indifference Weary’s remark outside, that “Cadwolloper’s about all in. Day-herding’s too strenuous for him.” The last that came to him, someone was chanting: “Mamma had a precious lamb, his cheeks were red and rosy; And when he rode the festive bronc, he tumbled on his nosey… .”
There was more, but Pink had gone to sleep and so missed it.
At sundown he awoke and saddled the night horse Chip Bennett had caught for him, then went to bed again. When shaken gently for middle guard, he dressed sleepily, donned a pair of white angora chaps, and stumbled out into the moonlight.
Guided and coached by Cal, he took his station and began that monotonous round which had been a part of life he loved best. Though stiff and sore from unaccustomed riding, Pink felt content to be where he was, watching the quiet land and the slumbering herd, with the moon swimming through the drifting gray clouds above. Twice in a complete round, he met Cal going in the opposite direction. At the second round Cal stopped him.
“How yuh coming?” he queried cheerfully.
“All right, thank you,” said Pink.
“Yuh want to watch out for a lop-horned critter over on the other side,” Cal went on, in confidential tones. “He keeps trying to sneak out of the bunch. Don’t let him get away. If he goes, take after him and fog him back.”
“He won’t get away from me, if I can help it,” Pink promised, and Cal rode on, with Pink smiling maliciously after him.
As Pink neared the opposite side, a dim shape angled slowly out before him, moving aimlessly away from the sleeping herd. Pink followed. Farther they moved, and faster. Into a little hollow went the critter and circled. Pink took down his rope, let loose a good ten feet of it, and spurred unexpectedly close.
Whack! The rope landed with precision on the bowed shoulders of Cal. “Yuh will try to fool me, will yuh?” Whack! “I guess I can point out a critter that won’t stray out uh the bunch again for a spell!” Whack!
Cal straightened in the saddle, gasping astonishment, pulled up with a jerk, and got off in an unlovely mood.
“Here’s where yuh get yourn, yuh little mama’s lamb!” Cal cried angrily. “Climb down and get your ears cuffed proper, yuh pink little smart aleck! Thump me with a rope, will yuh?”
Pink got down. Immediately they mixed. Presently Cal stretched the long length of him in the grass, with Pink sitting comfortably upon his middle. Cal looked up at the dizzying swim of the moon, saw new and uncharted stars, and nearer, dimly revealed in the half-light, the self-satisfied, cherubic face of Pink.
Cal tried to rise and discovered a surprising state of affairs. He could scarcely move. The more he tried the more painful became Pink’s hold on him. He blinked and puzzled over the mystery.
“Of all the bone-headed, feeble-minded sons-uh-guns,” announced Pink melodiously, “you sure take the sour-dough biscuit. You’re plumb tame. A lady could handle yuh. You cuff my ears proper? That’s a laugh.”
Cal, battered as to features and bewildered as to mind, blinked again and grinned feebly.
“Yuh try an old gag that I wore out in Wyoming,” went on Pink, warming to the subject. “Loadin’ me with stuff that wouldn’t bring the heehaw from a sheepherder! Bah! You’re extinct. Say” —Pink’s fists kneaded Cal’s diaphragm—“are yuh all ba-a-d?”
“Oh, Lord! No. I’m dead gentle. Lemme up.”
“D’yuh think that critter will quit the bunch ag’in tonight?”
“He ain’t liable to,” Cal assured him. “Say, who are yuh, anyhow?”
“I’m Percival Cadwallader Perkins. Do you like that name?”
“Ouch! It—it’s bully!”
“You’re a liar,” said Pink, getting up. “Furthermore, yuh old chucklehead, yuh ought to know better than try to run a blazer on me. Your best girl happens to be my cousin.”
Cal scrambled slowly and painfully to his feet. “Then you’re Milk River Pink!” He sighed. “I might of guessed it.”
“I cannot tell a lie,” Pink said. “Only, plain Pink’ll do for me. Where do yuh suppose the bunch is by this time?”
They mounted and rode back together. Cal was deeply thoughtful.
“Say,” he said suddenly, just as they parted to ride their rounds, “the boys’ll be tickled plumb to death. We’ve been wishin’ you’d blow in here ever since the Cross L quit the country.”
Pink drew rein and looked back, resting one hand on the cantle. “Yuh needn’t break your neck spreading the glad tidings,” he warned. “Let ’em find out, the same as you done.”
“Sure,” agreed Cal, passing his fingers gingerly over his swollen face. “I ain’t no hog. I’m willin’ for ’em to have some sport with yuh, too.”
THE NEXT MORNING when Cal Emmett appeared at breakfast with a slight limp and several inches of cuticle missing from his features, the Happy Family learned that his horse had fallen down with him as he was turning a stray back into the herd.
Chip Bennett hid a smile behind his coffee cup.
It was Weary Davidson that afternoon on dayherd who indulged his mendacity for the benefit of Pink. His remarks were but paving-stones for a scheme hatched overnight by the Happy Family.
Weary began by looking doleful and emptying his lungs in sorrowful sighs. Pink rose obediently to the bait and asked if he felt bad, but Weary only sighed the more. Then, growing confidential, he told how he had dreamed a dream the night before. With picturesque language, he detailed the horror of it. He was guilty of murder, he confessed, and the crime weighed heavily on his conscience.
“Not only that,” he went on, “but I know that death is camping on my trail. That dream haunts me. I feel that my days are numbered in words of one syllable. That dream’ll come true. You see if it don’t!”
“I—I wouldn’t worry over just a bad dream, Mr. Weary,” comforted Pink.
“But that ain’t all. I woke up in a cold sweat, and went outside. And there in the clouds, perfect as life, I seen a posse of men gallopin’ up from the south. Down south,” he explained sadly, “sleeps my victim—a white-headed, innocent old man. That posse is sure headed for me, Mr. Perkins.”
Pink’s eyes widened. He looked like a child listening to a story of goblins. “If I can help you, Mr. W
eary, I will,” he promised with wide-eyed generosity.
“Will yuh be my friend? Will yuh let me lean on yuh in my dark hours?” Weary’s voice shook with emotion.
Pink said that he would, and he seemed very sympathetic and anxious for Weary’s safety.
When Pink went out that night to stand his shift, he found Weary at his side instead of Cal. Weary explained that Cal was feeling shaky on account of that fall he had got, and, as Weary couldn’t sleep anyway, he had offered to stand in Cal’s place. Pink scented mischief.
This night the moon shone brightly at intervals, with patches of silvery clouds racing before the wind and chasing black splotches of shadows over the sleeping land. For all that, the cattle lay quiet, and the monotony of circling the herd was often broken by Weary and Pink with little talks, as they turned and rode together.
“Mr. Perkins, fate’s a-crowding me close,” said Weary gloomily, when an hour had gone by. “I feel as if I had—What in … what was that?”
Voices raised in excited talk came faintly on the wind. With a glance toward the cattle, Weary turned his horse and, beckoning Pink to follow, rode out to the right.
“It’s the posse!” he growled. “They’ll go to the herd to look for me. Mr. Perkins, the time has come to fly. If only I had a horse that could drift!”
Pink thought he caught the meaning. “Is … is mine any good, Mr. Weary?” he quavered. “If he is, you can have him. I … I’ll stay and fool them as … long as I can.”
“Perkins,” said Weary solemnly, “you’re sure all right! Let that posse think you’re the man they want for half an hour, and I’m safe. I’ll never forget yuh!”
He had not thought of changing horses, but the temptation mastered him. He was riding a little sorrel, Glory by name, that could beat even the Happy Family itself for unexpected deviltry. Yielding to Pink’s persuasions, he changed mounts, clasped Pink’s hand affectionately, and sped away just as the posse appeared over a rise, riding furiously.
Pink, playing his part, started toward them, then wheeled and sped away in the direction that would lead them off Weary’s trail. That is, he sped for ten rods or so. After that he seemed to revolve on an axis. And there was an astonishing number of revolutions to the minute.
A Century of Great Western Stories Page 14
