by B. M. Bower
She stooped and tried to catch a baby trout in her cupped palms, just as she used to try when she was a child. If those four calves were stolen, then there was a “rustler” in the country. And if there were, then no one’s stock was safe. The deduction was terribly simple and as exact as the smallest sum in addition. And Billy Louise could not afford to pay toll to a rustler out of her forty-seven head of cattle.
The next day she rode early to the Cove and learned some things from Marthy which she had not gleaned from Charlie. She learned that two of the calves were a deep red, except for a wide, white strip on the nose of one and white hind feet on the other; that another was spotted on the hindquarters, and that the fourth was white, with large, red blotches. She had known cattle all her life. She would know these, if she saw them anywhere.
She also discovered for herself that they could not have broken out of that pasture, and that the river bank was impassable, because of high, thick bushes and miry mud in the open spaces. She had a fight with Blue over these latter places and demonstrated beyond doubt that they were miry, by getting him in to the knees in spite of his violent objections. They left deep tracks behind them when they got out. The calves had not gone investigating the bank, for there was not a trace anywhere. And the bluff was absolutely unscalable. Billy Louise herself would have felt doubtful of climbing out that way. The gray rim-rock stood straight and high at the top, with never a crevice, so far as she could see. And the gorge was barred, so that it was impossible to go that way without lifting heavy poles out of deep sockets and sliding them to one side.
“I’ve got an idea about a gate here,” Charlie confided suddenly. “There won’t be any more mysteries like this. I’m going to fix a swinging gate in place of these bars, Miss Louise. I shall have it swing uphill, like this; and I’ll have a weight arranged so that it will always close itself, if one is careless enough to ride on and leave it open. I have it all worked out in my alleged brain. I shall do it right away, too. Aunt Marthy is rather nervous about this gorge, now. Every evening she walks up here herself to make sure the bars are closed.”
“You may as well make up your mind to it,” said Billy Louise irrelevantly, in a tone of absolute certainty. “Those calves were driven out of the gorge. That means stolen. You needn’t accuse anyone in particular; I don’t suppose you could. But they were stolen.”
Charlie frowned and glanced up speculatively at the bluff’s rim.
“Oh, your mountain-sheep theory is no good,” Billy Louise giggled. “I doubt if a lizard, even, would try to leave the Cove over the bluff.” Which certainly was a sweeping statement, when you consider a lizard’s habits. “A mountain sheep couldn’t, anyway.”
“They’re hummers to climb—”
“But calves are not, Mr. Fox! Not like that. You know yourself they were stolen; why not admit it?”
“Would that do any good—bring them back?” he countered, looking up at her.
“N-o, but I do hate to see a person deliberately shut his eyes in front of a fact. We may as well admit to ourselves that there is a rustler in the country. Then we can look out for him.”
Charlie’s eyes had the troubled look. “I hate to think that. Aunt Martha insists that is what we are up against, but—”
“Well, she knows more about it than you do, believe me. If you’ll let down the bars, Mr. Fox, I’ll hit the trail. And if I find out anything, I’ll let you know at once.”
When she rode over the bleak upland she caught herself wishing that she might talk the thing over with Ward. He would know just what ought to be done. But winter was coming, and she would drive her stock down into the fields she had ready. They would be safe there, surely. Still, she wished Ward would come. She wanted to talk it over with a man who understood and who knew more about such things than she did.
CHAPTER VII
WARD HUNTS WOLVES
The fate of the four heifer calves became permanently wrapped in the blank fog of mystery. Billy Louise watched for them when she rode out in the hills, and spent a good deal of time heretofore given over to dreaming in trying to solve the riddle of their disappearance. Charlie Fox insisted upon keeping to the theory that they had merely strayed. Marthy grumbled sometimes over the loss, and Ward—well, Ward did not put in an appearance again that fall or winter and so did not hear of the incident.
November brought a long, tiresome storm of snow and sleet and chill winds, which even the beasts would not face, except when they were forced. After that there were days of chilly sunlight, nights of black frost, and more wind and rain and snow. Each little ranch oasis withdrew into itself and settled down to pass the winter in physical comfort and mental isolation. Even Billy Louise seldom rode abroad unless she was compelled to, which was not often. The stage which passed through the Wolverine basin twice a week left scanty mail in the starch-box which Billy Louise had herself nailed to a post nearest the trail. Now and then a chance traveler pulled thankfully out of the trail, stopped for a warm dinner or a bed, and afterwards went his way. But from October until the hills were green, there was never a sight of Ward, and Billy Louise changed her mood and her opinion of him three or four times a week.
Ward, as a matter of fact, had a very good reason for his absence. He was working for a rancher over on the other side of the mountains, and when he got leave of absence, it was merely that he might ride to his claim and sleep there a night in compliance with the law, and see that nothing was disturbed. He was earning forty dollars a month, which he could not afford to jeopardize by any prolonged absence; and he was to take part of his pay in cows. Also, he had made arrangements to keep his few head of stock with the rancher’s for a nominal sum, which barely saved Ward from the humiliation of feeling that the man was giving him something for nothing. Junkins, the rancher, was a good fellow, and he had a fair sense of values. He knew that he could pay Ward these wages and let him winter his stock there—I believe Ward had seven or eight head at that time—and still make a fair profit on his labor. For Ward stuck to his work, and he worked fast, with the drive of his nervous energy and the impatience he always felt toward any obstacle. Junkins considered privately that Ward was giving him the work of two men, while he had the appetite of one. So that it was to his interest to induce Ward to stay until spring opened and gave him plenty to do on his own claim; and such was Ward’s anxiety to acquire some property and a certain financial security, that he put behind him the temptation to ride down to the Wolverine until he was once more his own master. He had sold his time to Junkins. He would not pilfer the hours it would take to ride twenty miles and back again, even to see Billy Louise; which proves that he was no moral weakling, whatever else he might be.
Then, in April, he left Junkins and drove home a nice little bunch of ten cows and a two-year-old and two yearlings. One of the cows had a week-old calf, and there would be more before long. Ward sang the whole of Chisholm Trail at the top of his voice, as he drifted the cattle slowly up the long hill to the top of the divide, from where he could look down over lower hills into his own little creek-bottom.
“With my knees in the saddle and my seat in the sky,
I’ll quit punching cows in the sweet by-and-by,”
he finished exuberantly and promised himself that he would ride down to the Wolverine the very next day “and see how the folks came through the winter.” He wanted to tell William Louisa that he was some cowman himself, these days. He thought he had made a pretty good showing in the last twelve months; for when he first met her, at the Cedar Creek ford, he hadn’t owned a hoof except the four which belonged to Rattler, his horse. He thought that maybe, if the play came right and he didn’t lose his nerve, he might tell William Louisa something else! It seemed to him that he had earned the right now.
He rode three miles oblivious to his surroundings, while he went carefully over his acquaintance—no, his friendship—with Billy Louise and tried to guess what she would say when he told her what he had wanted to tell her for a year; what he had b
een hungry to tell her. Sometimes he smiled a little, and sometimes he looked gloomy. He ended by hurrying the cattle down the canyon so that he might ride on to the Wolverine that night. It would be tough on Rattler, but then, what’s a range cayuse made for, anyway? Rattler had had a snap, all winter; he could stand a hard deal once, for a change. It would do the old skate good to lift himself over fifty miles once more.
Whether it did Rattler any good or not, it put new heart into Ward to ride down the bluff and see the wink of the cabin window once more. He smiled suddenly to himself, threw back his shoulders, and lifted up his voice in the doggerel that had come to be a sort of bond between the two.
“I’m on my best horse and a-comin’ on the run,
Best blamed cowboy that ever pulled a gun,”
he shouted gleefully. A yellow square opened in the cabin’s side, and a figure stood outlined against the shining background. Ward laughed happily.
“Coma ti yi youpy, youpy-a, youpy-a,” he sang uproariously.
Billy Louise turned her head toward the interior of the cabin and then left the light and merged into the darkness without. Ward risked a broken neck and went down the last bit of slope as if he were trying to head a steer. By the time he galloped up to the gate, Billy Louise was leaning over it. He could see her form dimly there.
“’Lo, Bill,” he said softly and slid out of the saddle and went up to her. “How you was, already?” Again his voice was like a kiss.
“’Lo, Ward!” (in a tone that returned the kiss). “Don’t know whether the stopping’s good tonight or not. We’ve quit taking in tramps. Where the dickens have you been for the last ten years?” And that, on top of a firm conviction in Billy’s Louise’s mind that she did not care whether Ward ever crossed her trail again, and that when he did, he would have to do a lot of explaining before she would thaw to anything approaching friendliness. Oh, well, we all change our minds sometimes.
“I felt like it was twenty,” Ward affirmed. “Do I get any supper, William? I like to have ridden my horse to a standstill getting here tonight; know that? I hope you appreciate the fact.”
“It’s a wonder you wouldn’t have started a little sooner, then,” Billy Louise retorted. “Along about Christmas, for instance.”
“Wasn’t my fault I didn’t, William. Think I’ve got nothing to do but chase around the country calling on young ladies? I’ve been a wage slave, Bill-Loo. Come on while I put up my horse. Poor devil, I drove cattle from Junkins’ place with him, and they weren’t what you could call trail-broke, either. And then I came on down here. I’ve been in the saddle since daylight, young lady; and Rattler’s been under it.”
“Well, I’m very sure that it is not my fault,” Billy Louise disclaimed, as she walked beside him to the stable.
“I’m not so sure of that! I might produce some pretty strong evidence that the last twenty miles is your fault. Say, you didn’t know I’ve gone into the cow business myself, did you, William? I’ve been working like one son-of-a-gun all fall and winter, and I’m in the cattle-king class—to the extent of twelve head. I knew you were crazy to hear the glad tidings, so I tried to kill off a horse to get here and tell you. You and me’ll be running a wagon and full crew in another year, don’t you reckon? And send reps over into Wyoming and around, to look after our interests!” He laughed at himself with a perfect understanding of his own insignificance as a cattle-owner, and Billy Louise laughed with him, though not at him, for it seemed to her that Ward had done well, considering his small opportunities.
To be sure, in these days when civilization travels by million-dollar milestones, and the hero of a ten-dollar story scorns any enterprise which requires less than five figures to name its profits, Ward and Billy Louise and Charlie Fox—and all their neighbors—do not amount to much. But it is a fact that real men and women in the real world beyond the horizon work hard and fight real battles for a very small success compared with Big Interests and the modern storyman. And I’m telling you of some real people in a real world out in the sagebrush country, where not even a story hero may consistently become a millionaire in ten chapters. There is no millionaire material in the sagebrush country, you know, unless it is planted there by the Big Interests; and the Big Interests do not plant in barren soil. So if twelve head of cattle look too trifling to mention, I can’t help it. Ward worked mighty hard for those few animals, and saved and schemed, and denied himself much pleasure. Therefore, he did as well as any man under the circumstances could do and be honest.
He did not do so very well when it came to telling Billy Louise something. Twice during his visit he had to admit to himself that the play came right to tell her. And both times Ward shied like a horse in the moonlight. For all that he sang about half the way home, the next day, and for the rest of the way he built castles; which proves that his visit had not been disappointing.
He rode out into the pasture where his cattle were grazing and sat looking at them while he smoked a cigarette. And while he smoked, that small herd grew and multiplied before the eyes of his imagination, until he needed a full crew of riders to take care of them. He shipped a trainload of beef to Chicago before he threw away the cigarette stub, and he laughed to himself when he rode back to the log cabin in the grove of quaking aspens.
“I’m getting my money’s worth out of that bunch, just in the fun of planning ahead,” he realized, while he whittled shavings from the edge of a cracker-box to start his supper fire. “A few cows and calves make the best day-dream material I’ve struck yet; wish I had more of the same. I’d make old Dame Fortune put a different brand on me, pronto. She could spell it with an F, but it wouldn’t be football. If the cards fall right,” he mused, when the fire was hot and crackling, and he was slicing bacon with his pocket-knife, “I’ll get the best of her yet. And—” His coffee-pail boiled over and interrupted him. He burned his fingers before he slid the pail to a cooler spot, and after that he thought of the joys of having a certain gray-eyed girl for his housekeeper, and for a time he forgot about his newly acquired herd.
And then his day-dreams received a severer jolt, and one more lasting. He began to realize something that he had always known: that there is something more to the cattle business than branding the calves and selling the beef.
When the first calf went to dull the hunger of the wolves that howled o’nights among the rocks and stunted pines on Bannock Butte, Ward swore a good deal and resolved to ride with his rifle tied on the saddle hereafter. Also, he went back immediately, got a little fat, blue bottle of strychnine, and returned and “salted” the small remnant of the carcass. It was no part of his dreams to have the profit chewed off his little herd by wolves.
When the second calf was pulled down in spite of the mother’s defense, within half a mile of his cabin, Ward postponed a trip he had meant to make to the Wolverine and went out on the trail of the wolves. In the loose soil of the lower ridge he tracked them easily and rode at a shuffling trot along the cow-trail they had followed, his eyes keen for some further sign of them. He guessed that there would be at least one den farther up in the gulch that opened out ahead, and if he could find it and get the pups—well, the bounty on one litter would even his loss, even if he were not lucky enough to get one of the old ones. He had a shovel tied to the saddle under his left leg, to use in case he found a den.
So, planning a crusade against these enemies to his enterprise, he picked his way slowly up the side of the deep gully that had a little stream wandering through rocks at the bottom. His eyes, that Billy Louise had found so quick and keen, noted every little jutting shelf of rock, every badger hole, every bush. It looked like a good place for dens of wolf or coyote. And with the sun shining down warm on his shoulders, and the meadow larks singing from swaying weeds, and rabbits scuttling away through the rocks now and then, Ward began to forget the ill-luck that had brought him out and to enjoy the hunt for its own sake.
Farther along there were so many places that would bear investigation that he l
eft Rattler on a level spot, and with his rifle and six-shooter, went forward on foot, climbing over ledges of rock, forcing his way through green-budded, wild-rose bushes or sliding down loose, gravelly slopes.
One place—a tiny cave under a huge bowlder—looked promising. There were wolf tracks going in and out, plenty of them. But there were no bones or offal anywhere around, and Ward decided that it was not a family residence, but that the wolves had perhaps invaded the nest of some other animal. He went on hopefully. That side of the gulch was cobwebbed with tracks.
Then, quite accidentally, he glanced across to the far side, his eyes attracted to something which had moved. He could see nothing at first, though from the corner of his eye he had certainly caught a flicker of movement over there. Yellow sand, gray rocks and bushes, and above a curlew circling, with long beak outstretched before, and long, red legs stretched out behind. He almost believed he had but caught the swift passing of a cloud shadow over there and was on the point of climbing farther up his own slope, to where a yawning hole in the hill showed signs of being pawed and trampled. Then an outline slowly defined itself among a jumble of rocks; head, sloping back, two points for ears. It might be a rock, but it began to look more and more like a wolf sitting up on its haunches watching him fixedly.
Even while Ward lifted his rifle and got the ivory bead snugly fitted into the notch of the rear sight with his eye, he would not have bet two-bits that he was aiming at an animal. He pulled the trigger with a steady crooking of his forefinger and the whole gulch clamored with the noise. The object over there leaped high, came down heavily, and rolled ten feet down the hill to another level, where it bounded three or four times convulsively, slid a few feet farther, and lay still behind a bush.
