The Floating Outfit 21

by J. T. Edson

  Remembering the necessary etiquette, despite his uneasiness, Dusty halted the paint on the edge of the clearing and announced his presence.

  “Hello the camp. Can I come on in?”

  Dusty felt surprised at the casual manner in which the travelers accepted his appearance. Most folks would have displayed some agitation at suddenly hearing a voice and seeing a rider looming from out of the darkness. Even dudes fresh out from the east—or perhaps them more than most, for the blood and thunder novels of the day gave a graphic, if not entirely accurate, picture of the dangers and perils of the range country—usually showed more concern. Any party which had been as long on the trail as the trio must have, should know caution by now.

  Instead of showing concern, the trio rose to their feet and turned towards Dusty. While the men’s faces never lost their grave expression, they seemed amiable enough, and the girl smiled warmly at him.

  “Come, please,” said the elder man.

  With permission granted, and not before, Dusty swung from the paint’s saddle and walked forward. Although free, the stallion followed on his heels like a well trained hound-dog.

  “Howdy, ma’am, gents,” he greeted.

  “Good evening,” replied the elder man and the younger nodded.

  “Mind if I share your fire for the night, sir?”

  “Of course not. Vaza, lay out a meal for our guest.”

  “Don’t go to any trouble, ma’am,” Dusty told the girl. “I’ve—”

  “But it is no trouble,” smiled the girl. “Please come and sit at the table while I prepare something.”

  The younger man flashed a glance at the girl, almost as if objecting to her suggestion and an embarrassed expression flickered across her expressive face. Yet the man displayed no hostility to Dusty and raised no objections to accepting the small Texan as a guest.

  “Perhaps you would wish to care for your horse,” the elder man suggested. “Vaza can prepare your meal while you do so.”

  “I was just going to say that, sir,” Dusty replied, noticing the relief that flickered on the younger man’s face. “But if it’ll put you—”

  “I can easily prepare food for you,” the girl, to whom Dusty’s last words had been directed, replied.

  “If you require any help, I will come with you,” the younger man went on.

  “Thanks, but I can handle him better alone,” Dusty answered, puzzled by the other’s friendly offer and earlier conduct.

  Turning, Dusty took the paint’s reins and led it across the clearing in the direction of the stream. Not until after he had removed the bit and allowed his horse to lower its head towards the clear waters did he realize that no questions had been asked about the shooting. Possibly the wind, blowing from the direction of the camp, and the thickness of the trees helped blanket the sound, but the travelers ought to have heard enough to arouse their interest if nothing more. He sensed their eyes on him and expected that at any moment one or another would come over and ask questions. Time passed, the horse drank its fill and still the expected questions never came. Then Dusty realized that none of the trio spoke even among themselves, after he walked away from them.

  With the horse satisfied, Dusty took it closer to the wagon. Stripping off the saddle and blanket, he stood back and allowed the horse to indulge in a good roll on the ground. He spent the time in opening his bedroll and extracting the set of hobbles from the top of his warbag.

  While Dusty could trust the paint not to roam too far, he knew its nature too well to leave it free in the presence of strange horses.

  Unnoticed by Dusty, the girl crossed the clearing, leaving her cooking pot steaming on the fire, and walked towards him. On completing its roll, the horse lurched to its feet and stood patiently waiting for the nightly ritual its master always followed. Before offering to feed the horse, Dusty checked on its general condition and examined its shoes. The fact that he looked at the near hind leg first did not imply lack of faith in Morley’s work, but came about because Dusty happened to be closest to that leg when starting his examination. Checking the horse’s shoes at the end of a day’s work came naturally to Dusty. Such small details could mean the difference between life and death to a man who rode dangerous trails and so might at any time need the unrestricted speed that only a well-shod horse could give him.

  Hearing the paint’s explosive warning snort, Dusty glanced up. He saw the girl approaching and did not need to observe the horse’s laid-back ears and flaring nostrils to become aware of her danger. Well-trained the paint might be, but it was still a spirited stallion and did not take kindly to strangers approaching too close.

  The girl halted just beyond the reach of the paint’s jaws and stood looking directly at it. Tensing for a spring, and hoping he would be in time to save Vaza from an attack, Dusty became aware of a change in the paint’s behavior. Although the girl never spoke, the big horse relaxed; its ears came erect and the angry snort died off. Walking closer, the girl laid her hand on the horse’s neck and it lowered its head to gently nuzzle at the front of her dress.

  “This is a fine animal,” she said. “Did you have its shoe—replaced?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Dusty replied, trying to hide his relief; and a trifle puzzled at the paint’s unusual docility.

  “Why were you so worried when I came here?”

  “I thought you might get hurt. Was I you, I’d not make a habit of going up to a strange horse like that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Like I said, you could get hurt. Some horses, including that one of mine, don’t take to strangers handling them. Although I reckon he showed mighty good taste this time.”

  It seemed that Vaza did not understand Dusty’s compliment at first. A gentle frown creased her brow; then it died away and she smiled once more. Her eyes went to the hobbles in Dusty’s hand and she showed some interest as he knelt down to fix them in place.

  “Why do you do that?” she asked, watching him buckle one cuff of the hobbles to each of the paint’s forelegs.

  “I don’t want this ornery cuss going over and starting a fight with your stock in the night.”

  “Couldn’t you No. I suppose not. I can see how it restricts the horse’s movements. It is a good idea. We never thought of it.”

  “How’d you fasten your horses at nights then?”

  “We haven’t needed—Come and look.”

  “I’ll just finish him off first,” Dusty replied.

  “Oh!” the girl gasped. “Your meal. I will go and attend to it. Perhaps you will show Jarrel these—”

  “We call them hobbles,” Dusty explained, guessing that she did not know the English word, but mildly puzzled at her failing to recognize such familiar objects. “He will be most interested, for he was saying earlier that he thought our way of securing the horses was inadequate.”

  “I’ll take a look,” Dusty promised and lifted a nosebag from out of his bedroll. “Just let me feed my horse first.”

  “Speaking of food,” Vaza said. “I’d better go and see to your meal.”

  “I don’t want to put you to any trouble, Miss—?”

  “You may call me ‘Vaza’,” the girl smiled.

  “Thank you, ma’am. I’d like some hot water so that I can clean my guns when I’ve fed.”

  “I will have some waiting for you.”

  With that the girl walked away. Dusty strapped the paint’s feed bag in place and watched his horse commence feeding. A low chuckle left Dusty’s lips and he warned the horse that there would be no more grain-feeding until they came to the next town.

  “Does he understand you?” asked the younger man, coming up.

  “If he does, he’s sure tolerant, some of the things I’ve called him at times,” Dusty replied. “It gets to be a habit, talking to your horse, when you ride alone for a spell.”

  “Then you haven’t found a way to communicate with animals?”

  “Not so’s we can sit down and talk about the weather.”

 
“We haven’t advanced to that stage ourselves yet. Vaza tells me that you have an interesting manner of securing your horse.”

  “Don’t you use hobbles back in your old country?” asked Dusty.

  “No. May I look?”

  “Feel free. Just let me hold his head.”

  Bending down, the younger of the strangers examined the hobbles with interest. “Interesting,” he said.

  “How do you hold your horses?” asked Dusty.

  “We have no need, they do not run away.”

  “That’s a chance I’d rather not take,” Dusty drawled. “Especially in wooded country. Happen a cougar spooks them, you’ll never get them back again.”

  “Spooks?”

  “Frightens them so that they run away. It’s none of my affair, but I’d fasten them and move them closer to the fire before you go to bed. They’ll let you know if they catch cat scent and you can soon scare the cougar away. Mind if I look your stock over?”

  “As you would say, feel free.”

  While walking towards the four team horses, Dusty studied the man at his side. He found it hard to gauge the other’s age. The beard and face seemed to be that of a man in his late middle-age, yet he walked as spry as a youngster and had a fairly powerful frame under the sober suit. Nor could Dusty form any conclusion about the relationship of the man and girl. There did not seem to be any family likeness between them, for he was dark haired and the girl fair.

  Putting aside his thoughts on the humans, Dusty turned his attention to the horses. The first thing to catch his eye was that, although ideally built for haulage work, the animals did not appear to belong to any breed with which he had become familiar. Strong, powerful, well developed for pulling a heavy wagon, the four horses stood free, their feed bags in place; although not in a manner which met with Dusty’s approval.

  “What is wrong with the nose-bags?” asked Jarrel. “You haven’t strapped them up tight enough,” Dusty replied. “Hanging loose like that, the horse can’t touch the food in the bottom and starts tossing its head trying to reach it, spills most of it.”

  Not until he stopped speaking did Dusty wonder how the other knew what he thought about the set of the nose-bags. Before he could mention the fact, Dusty saw Jarrel step forward and make the necessary adjustments.

  After the horses had fed on the grain, Dusty helped remove the nose-bags and showed Jarrel how to turn them inside out to facilitate drying. Then they took the animals closer to the campfire and he improvised hobbles from rope. By which time the girl announced that the food was ready.

  “Thanks, ma’am,” he said, walking towards the table. “Reckon we’d best get acquainted. I’m sorry for not doing it before.”

  While not an egoist, Dusty felt mildly surprised at the lack of response to his name. His fame had spread far over the Western ranges and even extended to the East, where highly colored stories of his adventures occasionally appeared in the Police Gazette and New York Ledger. Consequently many dudes reacted to hearing his name, but the trio showed no sign that it meant anything to them.

  “We are pleased to know you, Mr. Fog,” said the elder man.

  “I’ve never been one for ‘mister-ing’,” Dusty replied. “If it’s all one with you, I’d rather you said ‘Dusty’.”

  “Dusty?” repeated the girl, looking puzzled.

  “It’s short for Dustine. I was called that after my uncle. But it’s a mite too long to be yelled in a hurry, so it was shortened to ‘Dusty’.”

  “I see,” she smiled.

  “I am Adek,” the elder man introduced. “This is Jarrel and Vaza.”

  “Right pleased to know all of you,” Dusty answered.

  “And now you must eat,” Vaza told him.

  “We must attend to our chores, Jarrel,” Adek remarked. “Come.”

  At the table a surprise awaited Dusty. Instead of the stew he expected, a plate of boiled potatoes, peas, beef and gravy met his gaze.

  “It is all right?” the girl asked.

  “It sure is,” agreed Dusty and wondered how she managed to produce such a meal when using only one pan.

  “Then eat, please. ”

  Dusty’s surprise did not end as he sat down and started to eat. On taking up his knife to cut the beef, he found the task considerably easier than usual. While the Texas longhorn possessed many sterling qualities, Dusty was the first to admit that its meat left much to be desired. Often he and his uncle had discussed the possibility and advisability of trying to introduce a new strain of cattle, one giving better beef, to the range; but could not think of another breed capable of living the half wild existence of the longhorn.

  The meat into which Dusty cut did not come from any longhorn, of that he felt sure. Yet it could hardly be any other kind. Sure, there were beef strains in the East, but not in any quantity; which explained why the longhorn, bred in vast numbers on the open ranges of the west, found such a ready sale that the expense of trying to introduce a better meat strain did not justify itself.

  Tasting the meat, Dusty knew it to be beef and not the flesh of deer, wapiti, buffalo, antelope or any other wild animal. Yet it did not seem possible that the trio could have brought meat and kept it fresh, all the way from the east.

  “I hope it is satisfactory,” Vaza remarked after Dusty had been eating for a short time.

  “It sure is, Miss Vaza,” he answered. “This’s mighty good beef. Did you buy it on the trail?”

  “No. We brought it with us,” she replied and poured out a cup of coffee.

  Raised in a land where one did not question others too closely, Dusty did not ask if she understood his questions, or inquire how the travelers managed to keep their meat fresh during the long train journey West and during their wagon trip from the railroad town at which they arrived.

  “Adek wondered about getting more fuel for the fire,” she said. “We found sufficient for our needs by the place where we made our fire.”

  “Don’t you carry any in the possum-belly of your wagon?” asked Dusty.

  “Possum-belly, what is that?”

  Turning, Dusty looked towards the wagon, directing his glance underneath but not seeing the sheet of rawhide usually fastened there to act as a repository for firewood. He explained to the girl what he meant and she nodded.

  “Of course. Possum is short for opossum and that is a marsupial, carrying its young in a pouch under its belly. Oh, I would love to see one. Are there any in this area?”

  “Maybe. I don’t know much about this section of Kansas. We have plenty of them down home, but the only time we see them is when we’re running the hounds at night after coon. About that wood …?”

  “Adek and Jarrel are already attending to gathering more,” Vaza replied.

  Dusty swung his head from looking at the wagon and saw the two men walking off into the trees. Then he glanced at the girl. She had removed the sun-bonnet and golden blonde hair framed her face, hanging shoulder long.

  Thinking of the girl’s lack of knowledge, he put it down to her not speaking English as a native tongue. Yet he found himself hard-pressed to guess at what her language might be, not having heard her, or her companions, speak anything but English. All the trio looked Anglo-Saxon in their features, but their names did not sound English. Nor did they strike Dusty as being Norwegian, Dutch, German or belonging to any of the other North European nations. Range etiquette did not allow the asking of direct questions, but Dusty figured that he would satisfy his curiosity before leaving the party.

  “Do you folks have any guns?” he asked, suddenly realizing that he had seen no weapons around the camp.

  “Of course not. We are peace-loving people.”

  “So am I,” Dusty replied.

  “But you go armed,” Vaza objected.

  “Yes, ma’am. That’s so that other folks respect my wanting.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Look at it this way,” Dusty explained. “A cougar will jump a whole herd of doe whitetails
—whitetail deer—and kill them all, because they’ve no way of fighting back. But he’ll think long before he tried it on a big old buck with a hat rack head of horns.”

  “Hat rack?”

  “Take a set of buck’s horns and hang them on the wall, and you’ve pegs for visitors to hang their hats on.”

  “You must think me terribly silly not knowing such things.”

  “No,” Dusty answered. “You’re just not used to speaking English, I reckon.”

  “That is true. But your ideas about the cougar do not meet my argument. I can’t quite follow them.”

  “The best way to live in peace is to make good and sure that you’ve something around to defend yourself against folks who don’t want to leave you peaceable. The whitetail buck’s got horns for that.”

  “But animals and human beings are different.”

  “There are times, and folk, that make me think there’s no difference,” Dusty replied.

  “You mean those men in the town we visited?” asked Vaza. “Did you have any further trouble with them?”

  “Nothing to talk about.”

  “Who were they and why did they act like they did?”

  “I never learned their names, but I’ve seen their kind around almost every big town. Lord knows why they do things, just ornery I guess. I hope they didn’t scare you too much, Miss Vaza.”

  “I was afraid,” the girl admitted. “I thought that I could communicate with them, but it did not work.”

  “The best way to communicate with that sort is from behind a ten gauge shotgun,” Dusty drawled. “And talking of guns, I’d like to clean mine.”

  “There is water in the pan,” the girl replied and looked to where her two companions returned, each carrying a good pile of wood.

  Having finished his meal while talking, Dusty left the table. Not until he stood by the fire and looked into the pan full of hot water did he realize that the girl had not taken it out of his sight or washed it, yet it showed no signs of being used for cooking his meal.

  Ten – Mighty Strong Iron

  “May I watch you?” asked Jarrel, dropping the pile of wood he carried and walking to where Dusty stood unbuckling the gunbelt ready to clean his weapons.