“What would happen to old Scotty Douglas if he lost a bunch, for gosh sake? Drop dead, I reckon,” grumbled Duke. “He’s sure making a lot of fuss over one measly yearlin’.”
“Yeah––but I’ve saw bigger fusses made over smaller matters, son,” Tom drawled whimsically. “I saw two men killed over a nickel in change, once. It ain’t the start; it’s the finish that counts.”
“Well, looking at it that way, uh course––”
“That’s the only way to look at it, son. Did you think, maybe, that I hazed you over to find that hide and bury it, just to keep it from scentin’ up the scenery? It’s what I could smell farther ahead that I was after. If you’d looked ahead a little further, maybe you’d of looked a little closer in the willers.”
To this Duke had nothing to say; and presently he loped on, leaving Tom to ride slowly and turn the matter of the spotted yearling over and over in his mind until he had reached some definite conclusion.
Tom had the name of being a dangerous man, but he had not earned it by being hasty. His anger was to be feared because it smoldered long, rather than because it exploded into quick violence. He wanted to see the trail ahead of him––and just now he thought he saw Trouble waiting on the turn. No Lorrigan had ever ridden the other way because Trouble waited ahead, but one Lorrigan at least would advance with his eyes open and his weapons ready to his hand.
“Bring your proof,” he had said in effect to Aleck Douglas, “or stand trial for libel. Since you won’t fight with guns, I’ll fight you with the law.” Very good, if he could be sure that the Douglas would fail to produce his proof.
Tom knew well enough the reputation he bore in the Black Rim country. Before the coming of Belle, and later, of the boys, Tom had done his share toward earning that reputation. But Belle and the boys had changed his life far more than appeared on the surface. They had held his rope from his neighbors’ cattle, for one thing, though his neighbors never had credited him with honesty.
It is true that Tom could remember certain incidents of the round-up that had added to his herd and brought him a little nearer the million-dollar mark. Without remorse he remembered, and knew that any cowman in the country would do the same, or worse if he dared. For branding irons do not always inquire very closely into the parentage of a calf that comes bouncing up stiff-legged at the end of a cowpuncher’s rope. Nor need a maverick worry very long because he belongs to no one, so long as cowmen ride the range. Cattle would always stray into the Black Rim country from ranges across the mountains, and of these the Black Rim took its toll. He supposed strange irons were set now and then on the hide of an NL animal across the mountains––but the branders had better not let him catch them at it! On the other hand, he would see to it that they did not catch him branding mavericks on his own range. To Tom that seemed fair enough,––a give-and-take game of the rangeland. According to Tom’s code he was as honest as his neighbors, and that was honest enough for practical purposes.
It happened that he had not killed Aleck Douglas’ spotted yearling. And to be accused of the theft hurt.
“Why, humpin’ hyenas! If I’d a beefed that critter, old Scotty wouldn’t ever have found no hide to catch me on! What kinda mark does he think I am! Rustle a beef and leave the hide laying around? why, any darn fool would know better than that!”
It was characteristic of the Lorrigan influence that when Tom rode into camp every one of the crew save his own sons quieted a little; not enough to suggest timidity, but to a degree that told how well they knew that their master was present.
That master quietly took stock of his men while they ate their supper and loafed and smoked and talked. Cheyenne had unobtrusively retired to the bed tent. With his thumbs pushed down inside his belt Tom strolled past and slanted a glance inside. Cheyenne was squatted on his heels shaving with cold lather and a cracked looking-glass propped against a roll of bedding, and a razor which needed honing. In turning his head to look at Tom he nicked his chin and while he stopped the bleeding with a bit of old newspaper the size of a small finger-nail he congratulated himself in the mistaken belief that Tom had not seen him at all.
Cheyenne did not know Tom very well, else he would have taken it for granted that Tom not only had seen him, but had also made a guess at his reason for shaving in the middle of the week.
Tom walked on, making a mental tally of the girls within riding distance from camp. Jennie Miller was reported engaged to an AJ man, and besides, she lived too far away and was not pretty enough to be worth the effort of a twenty-five mile ride just to hear her play hymns distressingly on an organ with a chronic squeak in one pedal. There was Alice Boyle at the AJ, and there was Mary Hope Douglas, who was growing to be quite a young lady,––pretty good-looking, too, if she wouldn’t peel her hair back so straight and tight. Mary Hope Douglas, Tom decided, was probably the girl. It struck Tom as significant that she should be the daughter of the man who mourned the loss of the yearling. He had not reached the rear of the tent before he decided that he himself would do a little riding that night. He caught and saddled Coaley, his own pet saddle horse that had never carried any man save Tom––never would, so long as Tom had anything to say about it––and set off toward the Devil’s Tooth ranch. Cheyenne ducked his head under the tent flap when he heard the sound of hoof beats passing close, saw that it was his boss, noted the direction he was taking, and heaved a sigh of relief. While he labored with the knot in his handkerchief which must be tied exactly right before he would leave the tent, Cheyenne had been composing a reason for leaving camp. Now he would not need a reason, and he grinned while he plastered his hair down in a sleek, artistically perfect scallop over his right eyebrow. Tom was going to the home ranch,––to round up Al, very likely. He would be gone all night and he would not know how many of his men rode abroad that night.
So presently Cheyenne saddled the freshest horse in his string and loped off, making an insulting sign with one hand when the boys wished him luck with the girl and offered to go along and talk religion with “feyther” just to help him out.
Very soon after that Sam Pretty Cow drifted away, and no one noticed his absence. Sam Pretty Cow’s wanderings never did attract much attention. He was Injun, and Injuns have ways strange to white men. For instance, he did not sleep in the tent, but spread his blankets under whatever shelter he could find within hailing distance from the others. He was always around when he was wanted, and that seemed to be all that was expected of him. Sleep settled on the Devil’s Tooth round-up camp, and the night guard sang to the cattle while they rode round and round the herd, and never dreamed that this night was not as other nights had been.
CHAPTER SIX
BELLE MEETS AN EMERGENCY IN HER OWN WAY
A Meadow Lark, his conscience comfortable after a generous breakfast of big and little worms carried to his mate hidden away under a thick clump of rabbit weed down by the creek, spread rigid wings and volplaned to the crooked post beside the corral gate, folded his feathers snug and tilted his head aslant. “Cler, cler, cler, cler-ee, cler-ee!” he sang, and perked a wary eye toward the low-roofed stable.
“Oh, I hear you, you sassy little sinner! I wouldn’t think you’d have the nerve, after what you’ve done to my radishes. I’m sure going to mix with you, if you––Rosa! Lift a heel at me and you die! Stand over––don’t you try squeezing me against the wall, or I’ll take my quirt to you! Get over there, before I brain you! Hay-ah-h, you––”
From the sounds one would imagine that a bear, two lions and a mule had come to handgrips in the stable, and that a woman of the Amazons