"Say, are you tryin' to hog it all yourself?" protested Bronco.
"Nope, Take your turn now."
Bronco wasted no time, and the other two listened to the click of his spoon against the tin can. After a few seconds, he raised up, saying, "All right, Holy. You're next!"
"How is it?" asked Holy as he leaned over the can.
"Fine as silk," was Bronco's recommendation.
"Best ice-scream I ever et," asserted Roarer.
Holy's spoon tattooed on the tin; it scraped forlornly, then there was breathless silence, a grunt, followed by the sound of an empty ice-cream freezer receiving several vigorous kicks accompanied by a terrific volley of cuss-words.
"You darn chumps," he gasped at last, "what made you go and take the one that hadn't northin' in it!"
"Oh, darn it all. What's the use," piped Roarer's gentle voice. "Let's go back and go to bed. Thar ain't nothin' else to do in this yere town."
They were settled in their beds when Limber opened the door and peered into the room.
"Hello! I been lookin' all over for you," he announced. "When did you get back? I was up here a while ago and none of you was in."
"Oh, we was just walkin' around town a piece," was Bronco's answer.
"Well, I got your guns for you. You all went off in sech a hurry from the church that you forgot 'em. It's too bad you boys didn't stay for the feed. It was fine."
"Oh, we knowed we had a hard day's work ahead of us," drawled Bronco, "so we figured we'd better come home and git to bed."
"Some one stole one of the freezers," continued Limber, soberly. "But whoever done it got the empty one."
"Served the derned galoots right," pronounced Bronco virtuously.
"That's what I say," endorsed Roarer, while Holy expressed his sentiments more forcibly.
Limber struck a match which he held to his cigarette, but his eyes regarded the grave faces of the boys. The match flickered out and the room was again in darkness, but not before they had seen the ghost of a twinkle in Limber's grey eyes.
"They got the freezer all right," he continued in the darkness.
"Who found it?" asked Bronco carelessly, pretending to smother a yawn.
"I done it," said Limber. "I was just a walkin' around town a piece, like you all was doin', and I come across it accidental like."
Silence was the only comment.
"The Inspector will be ready for us at eleven o'clock. Agent says the cars will be here by that time, so we can load out and get back to the ranch by supper."
"All right," chorused three voices in the dark, and Limber went to his own room. As he lighted the lamp there was a broad grin on his face, and his eyes danced with laughter, while he reiterated Bronco's denunciation, "Served the darned galoots right!"
Willcox slept late Sunday morning, so no one noticed shadowy figures dismount from three cowponies two hours before daylight. A struggling calf was making a heroic fight for freedom, but found itself propelled toward the picket fence surrounding the church and thrust through the gate. The mysterious men hitched the animal firmly inside the fence, then two placards of pasteboard, tied loosely together, were thrown across the calf's back and secured like a pack-saddle by strong cord. This accomplished, the three men mounted their ponies and disappeared in the starlight.
Willcox woke, rubbed its eyes and remembered a minister was to hold Divine Services that day of the year. Ten o'clock arrived. The first youngsters and their adult family connections approached the church gate. They congregated in animated groups, were joined by others, and finally spectators across the street, realizing that something interesting was detaining the congregation from entering the church, sauntered over. These inquirers hastened back to town and circulated news that caused a veritable stampede.
By the time the minister reached the scene the crowd composed the entire population of the town – men, women, children and dogs, several of the latter adding to the excitement by proceeding to settle feuds of long standing.
The Reverend Silas Hunter passed through the gate and his eyes swept the crowd, then rested on the centre of attraction – a husky, white-faced calf tethered to the fence by a rope. The animal had been lying down, in no way disturbed by the people or dog-fights, but as the Dominie scrutinized it, it rose and bellowed loudly into his face amid shouts of laughter. Across the calf's back swung the placards on which, printed in irregular letters, were the words;
"Oh!" ejaculated the Reverend Hunter, beaming upon the assemblage. "I see we have a donation. We will keep the calf, sell it and apply the proceeds to our Church Funds. Now," he addressed two half-grown lads, "you boys sit close to the door during services and see that the calf does not get away. Some unprincipled person might try to steal it, you know. We will find a place to care for it after services."
Across the street Bronco, Roarer and Holy stood in consultation. They had hovered on the edge of the crowd when the minister made his announcement, and they realized there was to be no opportunity to get possession of that calf in order to turn it loose – as they had planned.
"Say, he sure called our hands," said Holy despondently. "He's too derned smart to be a minister. What the devil are we goin' to do about it?"
"Let him keep the doggone calf and we'll have to put up a jackpot for the feller that owns it," advised Bronco.
"It ain't marked," squeaked Roarer excitedly. "Did any of you see the brand on the cow it was with?"
None of them had noticed such a trifle in their desire to capture the calf and accomplish the trick without discovery.
"Well, I guess we'll have to own up," asserted Holy, as they dropped side by side on the wooden bench in front of the hotel, and stared hopelessly across at the calf and the widely-opened church door.
"We sure got a hoodoo on us this trip," said Bronco. "First we got buncoed out of the ice-scream by that female window-curtain, then we goes and steals an empty ice-cream freezer and now we're stuck about that air calf. It'd be easy enough, to pay for it if we knowed the mother's brand, but seein' as we didn't pay attention to that, we've just got to buck up and go to that gospel-shark and tell him we done it. There's no tellin' what he'll do about it, let alone the feller that owns the calf. Darn it all, why didn't Limber stick along with us all the time and keep us from gettin' into this mix-up?"
"Looks to me like Limber can't do nothin' more'n he's done, except he chloroforms us the next time we get in town," replied Holy emphatically.
Then the unexpected happened. The restless calf, working against the stiff, new rope, untied it. Before any one in the church had observed it, the animal was down the railroad track and pushing its way among numbers of cattle that always congregated near the inspection chutes. It moved to and fro, searching for its mother. The watching cowboys could see the two placards still firmly in place.
"Gee! If we could just get them pasteboards off'n her, nobody would know what calf it is"; Bronco said breathlessly.
"Come along!"
It was Holy who spoke and led the way to where their ponies stood tied and saddled ready for work when Limber and the Inspector arrived.
"We kin ride down there and scoop it off in no time."
The ponies dashed forward in a cloud of dust, but as they neared the group, a long-horned buckskin cow turned angrily as the calf pushed against it, and with a sidesweep of her horn she caught the string that held the placards. The string broke, but the placards snapped over the cow's eyes, twisted lightly to her horn, and with a frightened bellow she dashed down the railroad track, past the emerging congregation, with the pasteboards banging and flapping across her face until she disappeared.
"That's the fust decent buckskin cow I ever seed," said Bronco. "She may have a yeller