“Well, he never found out what I was after,” sighed Andy. “It wasn’t my fault I didn’t come up with him, and my intentions were peaceful and innocent. But do yuh know what happened? He got out uh sight down Dry Spring Gulch—yuh know where that elephant-head rock sticks out, and the trail makes a short turn around it—that’s where I lost sight of him. But he wasn’t very far in the lead, and I was dead anxious to give him his rope, so I loped on down—”
“You were taking long chances, old-timer; that’s mighty rough going, along there,” hinted Chip, gravely.
“Sure, I was,” Andy agreed easily. “But yuh recollect, I was in a hurry. So I’d just rounded the elephant’s head, when bing! something spats the rock, just over my right shoulder, and my horse squatted down on his rump and said he’d gone far enough. I kinda felt the same way about it, so when he wheeled and humped himself back up the trail, I didn’t argue none with him.”
There was silence so deep one could hear the saddle-bunch cropping the thick grasses along the creek. If this were true—this tale that Andy was telling—The Happy Family, half tempted to believe, glanced furtively at one another.
“Aw, gwan!” It was the familiar, protesting croak of Happy Jack. “What did yuh turn tail for? Why didn’t yuh have it out with him?” The Happy Family drew a long breath, and the temptation to believe was pushed aside.
“Because my gun was rolled up in my bed,” Andy replied simply. “I ain’t as brave as you are, Happy. I ain’t got the nerve to ride right up on a man that’s scared plumb silly and pumping lead my way fast as he can work the lever on his rifle, and lick him with my fists till he howls, and then throw him and walk up and down his person and flap my wings and crow. It’s awful to have to confess it, but I’m willing to run from any man that’s shooting at me when I can’t shoot back. I’d give a lot to be as brave as you are, Happy.”
Happy Jack growled and subsided.
“Well, by golly, there’s times when we’d be justified in shooting yuh, but I don’t see what he’d want to do it for,” objected Slim.
“Guilty conscience, I told yuh,” retorted Andy. “He seen I was chasing him up, and I guess he thought it was somebody that had got next to what happened—Lord, I wish I knew what did happen, down there in the breaks! Boys,” Andy got up and stood looking earnestly down at them in the twilight, “you can’t make me believe that there hasn’t been a murder done! That fellow has been up to something, or he wouldn’t be acting so damn’ queer. And if it was just plain stealing, Dan would sure be hot on his trail—because Dan thought more of his money than most men do of their wives. It was about all he lived for, and he wasn’t any coward. That old man never would get it off him without a big ruction, and if he did, Dan would be right after him bigger’n a wolf. There’s something wrong, you take my word.”
“What do yuh want us to do about it?” It was Chip who asked the question, and his tone was quite calm and impersonal.
Andy looked at him reproachfully. “Do? What is there to do, except go down there and see? If we can find that out, we can put the sheriff wise and let him do the rest. It sure does seem kinda tough, if a man can do a murder and robbery and get off with it, just because nobody cares enough about it to head him off.”
The Happy Family stirred uneasily. Of course, it was all just a josh of Andy’s—but he was such a convincing liar! Almost they felt guilty of criminal negligence that they did not at once saddle up and give chase to the murderer, who had tried to kill Andy for following him, and who was headed for Chinook after unnecessarily proclaiming himself bound for Dry Lake.
“Do you want the whole outfit to turn out?” asked Chip calmly at last.
“No-o—”
“Say, is it anywheres near that prehistoric castle you found once?” Ping asked maliciously, unbelief getting strong hold of him again.
Andy turned toward him, scowling. “No, Angel-child, it ain’t,” he snapped. “And you fellows can back up and snort all yuh darn please, and make idiots of yourselves. But yuh can’t do any business making me out a hot-air peddler on this deal. I stand pat, just where I stood at first, and it’ll take a lot uh cackling to make me back down. That old devil did lie about Dan, and he did take a shot at me—”
“He took yuh for a horse-thief, most likely,” explained Jack Bates.
“He didn’t need no field glass to see you was a suspicious character, by golly,” chortled Slim.
“He thought yuh was after what little your friend Dan had overlooked, chances is,” added Cal Emmett.
“Did the fog roll down and hide the horrible sight?” asked Jack Bates.
That, and much more, brought about a distinct coldness between the Happy Family and one Andy Green, so that the sun went down upon Andy’s wrath, and rose to find it still bubbling hotly in the outraged heart of him.
It was Jack Bates who precipitated an open war by singing an adapted version of “Massa’s In the Cold, Cold Ground,” just when they were eating breakfast. As an alleged musical effort it was bad enough, but as a personal insult it was worse. One hesitates to repeat the doggerel, even in an effort to be exact. However, the chorus, bellowed shamelessly by Jack, was this:
“Down in the Bad-lands, hear that awful sound.
Andy Green is there a-weeping—”
Jack Bates got no further than that, for Andy first threw his plate at Jack and then landed upon him with much force and venom, so that Jack went backwards and waved long legs convulsively in the air, and the Happy Family stood around and howled their appreciation of the spectacle.
When it dawned upon them that Andy was very much in earnest, and that his fist was landing with unpleasant frequency just where it was most painful to receive it, they separated the two by main strength and argued loudly for peace. But Andy was thoroughly roused and would have none of it, and hurled at them profanity and insulting epithets, so that more than Jack Bates looked upon him with unfriendly eyes and said things which were not calculated to smooth roughened tempers.
“That’s a-plenty, now,” quelled Chip, laying detaining hand upon the nearest, who happened to be Andy himself. “You sound like a bunch of old women. What do you want to do the worst and quickest, Andy?—and I don’t mean killing off any of these alleged joshers, either.”
Andy clicked his teeth together, swallowed hard and slowly unclenched his hands and grinned; but the grin was not altogether a pleasant one, and the light of battle still shone in the big, gray eyes of him.
“You’re the boss,” he said, “but if yuh don’t like my plans you’ll just have one less to pay wages to. What I’m going to do is throw my saddle on my private horse and ride down into the Bad-lands and see for myself how the cards lay. Maybe it’s awful funny to the rest of yuh, but I’m takin’ it kinda serious, myself, and I’m going to find out how about it before I’m through. I can’t seem to think it’s a josh when some old mark makes a play like that fellow did, and tries to put a bullet into my carcass for riding the same trail he took. It’s me for the Bad-lands—and you can think what yuh damn’ please about it.”
Chip stood quite still till he was through, and eyed him sharply. “You better take old Buck to pack your blankets and grub,” he told him, in a matter-of-fact tone. “We’ll be swinging down that way in two or three days; by next Saturday you’ll find us camped at the mouth of Jump-off Coulee, if nothing happens. That’ll give you four days to prowl around. Come on, boys—we’ve got a big circle ahead of us this morning, and it’s going to be hot enough to singe the tails off our cayuses by noon.”
That, of course, settled the disturbance and set the official seal of approval upon Andy’s going; for Chip was too wise to permit the affair to grow serious, and perhaps lose a man as good as Andy; family quarrels had not been entirely unknown among the boys of the Flying U, and with tact they never had