Steve Yeager
Page 4
CHAPTER IV
THE EXTRA
From the first Yeager enjoyed his work with the Lunar Company. Young andfull-blooded, he liked novelty and adventure, life in the open, newscenes and faces. As a film actor he did not have to seek sensations.They came to him unsought. He had the faculty of projecting himself withall his mind into the business of the moment, so that he soon knew whatit was to be a noble and self-conscious hero as well as an unmitigatedvillain.
One day he was a miner making his last stand against a band of Mexicanbanditti, the next he was crawling through the mesquite to strike downan intrepid ranger who laughed at death. He fought desperate singlecombats, leaped from cliffs into space or across bridgeless chasms, tookpart in dozens of sets illustrating scenes of frontier life as BillyThreewit conceived these. Sometimes Steve smiled. The director's ideashad largely been absorbed in New York from reading Western fiction. Butso long as he drew down his two-fifty a day and had plenty of fun doingit, Steve was no stickler for naked realism. The "bad men" of Yeager'sacquaintance had usually been quiet, soft-spoken citizens, notablechiefly for a certain chilliness of the eye and an efficient economy ofexpression that eliminated waste. Those that Threewit featured were of adifferent type. They strutted and bragged and made gun plays on everypossible occasion.
Perhaps this was why Harrison's stuff got across. By nature a swaggeringbully, he had only to turn loose his real impulses to register what thedirector wanted of a bad man. In the rough-and-tumble life he had led,it had been Yeager's business to know men. He made no mistake aboutHarrison. The fellow might be a loud-mouthed braggart; none the less hewould go the limit. The man was game.
Lennox met Steve one day as the latter was returning from the propertyroom with a saddle Threewit had asked him to adjust. The star stoppedhim good-naturedly.
"Care to put the gloves on with me some time, Yeager?"
The cowpuncher's face brightened. "I sure would. The boys say you're thebest ever with the mitts."
"I'm a pretty good boxer, but I don't trail in your class as a fighter.What you need is to take some lessons. If you'd care to have me show youwhat I know--"
"Say, you've rung the bell first shot."
"Come up to the hotel to-night, then. No need advertising it. Harrisonmight pick another quarrel with you to show you what you don't know."
Steve laughed. "He's ce'tainly one tough citizen. He can look at a pineboard so darned sultry it begins to smoke. All right. Be up thereto-night, Mr. Lennox."
From that day the boxing lessons became a regular thing. The claimLennox had made for himself had scarcely done him justice. He was one ofthe best amateur boxers in the West. In Yeager he had a pupil quick tolearn. The extra was a perfect specimen physically, narrow of flank,broad of shoulder, with the well-packed muscles of one always trained tothe minute. Fifteen years in the saddle had given him a toughness offiber no city dweller could possibly equal. Nights under the multiplestars in the hills, cool, invigorating mornings with the pine-filled airstrong as wine in his clean blood, long days of sunshine full of action,had all contributed to make him the young Hermes that he was. Cool andwary, supple as a wildcat, light as a dancing schoolgirl on his feet, hehad the qualities which go to help both the fighter and the boxer.Lennox had never seen a man with more natural aptitude for the sport.
Sometimes Farrar was present at these lessons. Often Baldy Cummings, wholiked the cowpuncher because Steve was always willing to help him getthe properties ready for the required sets, would put on the gloves withhim and try him out for a round or two. Manderson, the melancholycomedian, occasionally dropped in with some other member of the company.
The same thought was in the mind of all of them except Yeager himself.The extra was being trained to meet Harrison. It was apparent to all ofthem that the prizefighter was nursing a grudge. The jaunty insoucianceof the young range-rider irritated him as a banderilla goads a bull inthe ring.
"Steve gets under his hide. Some day he's going to break loose again,"Farrar told Manderson as they watched Lennox and Yeager box.
"The kid shapes fine. If Mr. Chad Harrison waits long enough he's liableto find himself in trouble when he tackles that young tiger cub,"answered the comedian. "Ever see anybody quicker on his feet? Reminds meof Jim Corbett when he was a youngster."
The news of the boxing lessons traveled to Harrison. He set his heavyjaw and waited. He intended that Yeager should go to the hospital aftertheir next mix-up.
Meanwhile he found other causes for disliking the new man. Always avain man, his jealousy was inflamed because Steve was a better riderthan he. At any time he was ready with a sneer for what he called thecowpuncher's "grandstanding."
"It gets across, Harrison," Threewit told him bluntly one day. "We'venever had a rider whose work was so snappy. He's doing fine."
"Watch him blow up one of these days--nothing to him," growled theheavy.
"There's a whole lot to him," disagreed the producing director as hewalked away to superintend the arrangement of a set.
Several days after this some new horses were added to the remuda of theLunar Company. Harrison picked a young mustang to ride in a chase scenethey were going to pull off. The pony was a wiry buckskin with powerfulflanks and withers. The prizefighter was no sooner in the saddle than itdeveloped that the animal had not been half broken. It took to pitchingat once and presently spilled the rider.
Steve, sitting on the corral fence with Jackson and Orman, two otherriders for the company, called across cheerfully,--
"Not hurt, are you?"
The heavy got up swearing. "Any of your damned business, is it?"
He caught at the pony bridle, jerked it violently, and hammered thelifted head of the dancing mustang with his fist. After several attemptshe succeeded in kicking its ribs. Yeager said nothing, but his eyesgleamed. In the cow country men interfere rarely when a vicious riderabuses his mount, but such a man soon finds himself under an unvoicedban.
Harrison backed the mustang to a corner, swung to the saddle, and tuggedsavagely at the reins. Two minutes later he took the dust again. Thehorse had spent the interval in a choice variety of pitching thatincluded sun-fishing, fence-rowing, and pile-driving.
To Jackson Steve made comment. "Most generally it don't pay to beat up ahorse. A man's liable to get piled, and if he gets tromped on folksdon't go into mourning."
Harrison could not hear the words, but he made a fair guess at theirmeaning. He turned toward Yeager with a snarl.
"Got anything to say out loud, young fella?"
"Only that any horse is likely to act that way when it gets its back up.I wouldn't ride a horse without any spirit."
"Think you can ride this one, mebbe?"
Without speaking Yeager slid down from the fence and approached themustang. The animal backed away, muscles a-tremble and eyes full offear. Steve's movements were slow, but not doubtful. He stroked thepony's neck and gentled it. His low voice murmured soft words into thealert ear cocked back suspiciously. Then, without any haste orunevenness of motion, he swung up and dropped gently into the saddle.
For an instant the horse stood trembling. Yeager leaned forward andpatted the neck of the colt softly. His soothing voice still comfortedand reassured. Gradually its terror subsided.
"Open the gate," Steve called to Orman.
He rode out to the creosote flats and cantered down the road. A quarterof an hour later he swung from the saddle beside Threewit.
"Plumb gentle. You can make any horse a devil when you're one yourself."
They were standing in front of the stable. Threewit started to reply,but the words were taken out of his mouth. From out of the stable strodeHarrison, a cold anger in his eyes.
"That's your opinion, is it?"
Yeager's light blue eyes met his steadily. "You've heard it."
"I've heard other things, too. You're taking boxing lessons. You'regoing to need them, my friend."
"The sooner the quicker," answered Steve evenly.
"Y
ou'll cut that out, both of you," ordered Threewit curtly. "I'll fireyou both if you don't behave."
"I'm no school-kid, Threewit. I play my own hand. Sabe?" Harrison turnedhis cold eyes on the range-rider. "And I serve notice right here thatnext time my young rube friend and me mixes you'd better bring a basketto gather up the pieces."
Yeager brushed a fly languidly from his gauntlet. "That's twice he'sused the word 'friend.' I reckon he don't know I'm some particular whocalls me that."
"That'll be enough, Yeager. Don't start anything here. We're amoving-picture outfit, not a bunch of pugs." Briskly the directorchanged the subject. "I want you to choose a couple of the boys and godown to Yarnell's after a herd of cattle we're going to need in thatTapidero Jim picture. If you need more help the old man will let youhave one or two of his riders."
Harrison had turned to leave, but he stopped to examine the conchas on apair of leathers. Steve had a fleeting thought that the man waslistening; also that he was covering the fact with a manner of elaboratecarelessness.
"Want I should start right away?"
"Yep. Can you get back by to-morrow night?"
"I reckon. Has Yarnell got 'em rounded up?" asked Yeager.
"He telephoned me this morning they were ready."
"Then we'd ought to reach Los Robles late to-morrow night if we hit thetrail steady."
"Good enough. Who do you want to take with you?"
"I'll take Shorty and Orman."
The details were arranged on the spot. Harrison was still giving hisattention to the conchas on the chaps. They were made of 'dobe dollars.He had seen Jackson wear them fifty times and had never before showedthe least interest in them.