Wild Roses: A Tale of the Rockies

Chapter XIII

AT SHADOW POOL

“I hardly know; it seems to be a number of old Indian tales the poet has woven together about some big chief. The story is strange, but I rather like it.”

“Read some to me,” she requested.

“I’d rather hear you read,” he half objected.

“That’s not fair; you know the story. Won’t you, please? I’m hungry to hear something good.”

“Yes,” he responded, “if you really wish it.”

They sat down on the grassy bank together and he began by telling her briefly the beginnings of the poem, the stories of the peace pipe and the four winds.

“This myth of the morning star and the east wind is rather charming, I think,” and he read with appreciative feeling these lines:

Alta sat silent a moment as he finished—then, “What a beautiful myth!” she said. “I wonder if the Indians really did tell such tales?”

Her companion did not reply. He was listening to something else.

“I’m afraid something’s wrong with my cattle,” he said, handing her the book and jumping to his feet. “Just wait here a few moments till I chase out and see what’s up.”

“Certainly,” said Alta, continuing silently to read, as, leaping on Brownie, he dashed out toward the flat.

Intent on the developing poem, Alta was oblivious to the fact that she was being watched by a pair of wicked eyes that peered through the willows only a few steps away. These same eyes, indeed, had been watching with jealous flash the scene we have just pictured.

Had it been Dick Davis instead of Fred whom Bud Nixon had found with Alta that morning, there is no telling the result; for he was still hot with hate. As it was, he had hard work to hold down his impulse to kill.

Out with his bunch of Indian thieves, he had caught sight of Alta as she was galloping into the brush along the trail to meet Fred. Seized with a passion to follow and torment her—or do worse, the White Injun, ordering his band to wait in the cover of the trees, dashed after the unsuspecting girl. Guessing her purpose to fish, for he had sighted her rod, he made sure to catch her off her horse and unprotected along the creek.

Hiding and tying his pony in the brush, he stole along the trail Alta had taken till his ear caught the sound of voices. He hesitated an instant, then with smothered rage in his heart, he crept inch by inch under the willows till he caught sight of the two friends.

Any but ugly eyes would have found the picture beautiful. On the bank of velvety green they sat, their faces animated with the poet pictures they were sharing. The aspens cast cooling shadows over them, while the stream sang its soothing song as it rippled over the pebbles into Shadow Pool.

But Bud found no beauty in the scene. Fighting mad to be robbed of his chance to do deviltry, his one thought was to get the boy out of his way. Once his hand went to his revolver, but he checked it. Another plan came to his thick brain. He would set his bucks upon the boy’s herd and draw him away. It was a silly, serious trick, but he stole back to execute it. And the plan worked. Fred, hearing the bellowing cows, hurried to find the cause of trouble, while Nixon, coming back through the brush, stepped out of it suddenly before Alta.

With an exclamation of fright she jumped up, half-dazed with the sight of a man decked in gaudy Indian trappings standing before her. It was as if the Indian she was reading about had suddenly jumped into reality before her very eyes. Her impulse was to scream, but she held it, to demand—

“Who are you?”

“You don’t know me, Miss Alta?” he leered.

“Know you!”—she scanned him more closely—“yes, I do. Why do you spring at me in this way, Bud Nixon?”

“Oh, don’t get mad, little gal; that ain’t the way to treat old friends. Come, meet me decent.” He grabbed at her as he spoke and tried to kiss her.

“Stand back, you insulting devil!” half screamed the girl, giving his ugly face a stinging slap.

“You damned little fury! I’ll show you,” he snarled, grabbing her arm. He flung his other arm about her and bent his face toward hers.

With the strength of desperation she fought to free herself from his brutal embrace. But the more she struggled, the more determined he grew to wreak his ugly will. In despair, she gave a cry for help.

Fred, who was already galloping back to tell her he must go rally his scattered herd, caught the cry and dashed through the brush. The sight set him on fire. Jumping from his mare, he leaped toward the struggling pair and struck Bud on the head. The cur, taken by surprise, loosed his hold and turned to get another blow full in the face. He staggered and fell over the bank backward into Shadow Pool.

Luckily, during the struggle, his revolver had dropped out of its holster. Fred grabbed it, and when the bully, foaming with fury, sputtered back upon the bank, he faced his own weapon.

“Go!” Fred commanded, “go! before I kill you!”

Nixon needed no second warning. He plunged like a whipped dog into the brush and skulked away to safety. Alta sank to the ground exhausted.

“Come, Alta, get on Eagle, quick; we must leave this place.”

He hurried to bring the horse and helped her into the saddle. She could hardly hold herself there.

“Now, Alta,” he said, “be brave; I’ll take care of you.” He vaulted into his own saddle as he spoke and rode close by her side, supporting her with one arm as they went slowly along the trail.

“Fred,” she said, as they neared the Morgan ranch, “you needn’t go any farther. I’m all right.”

“But I mean to see you safely home.”

“Please don’t,” she pleaded; “go back to your herd. Uncle must not know a word of this. It will drive him wild with worry and anger.”

“Surely you don’t want that devil to escape. I’ll rouse the valley to capture and punish him.”

“Let him go, Fred; God will punish him.”

“Well, if you wish it,” he said reluctantly; “but it’s hard to hold down my feelings.”

“Thank you, I’ll see you again. God bless you for being so good to me. But take care of yourself, Fred.”

She touched her reins as she spoke and Eagle carried her on gently toward home. Fred watched until she passed through the ranch gate, then with a strange feeling tugging at his heart, he turned to gallop back and gather up his herd.

Why didn’t she want him to tell? What could it all mean? were the tormenting questions that kept buzzing through his brain as he scouted about the brush to round up his scattered herd. For several hours he hunted and worried and worried and hunted. The sun wheeled far down the west before he had his herd together; and then to his dismay, when he counted up, one of his best cows was missing. Heading the rest toward the ranch, he took one more look up the creek. Half a mile away he found the poor beast shot dead.

It was the work of that dastardly white Indian, Fred felt sure of that. But the coward had no weapon. How could he do it? The boy examined the ground about the animal. Several moccasin tracks and the print of pony hoofs told him that Nixon was not alone.

His first impulse was to strike for the ranch and rouse the valley. But his promise to Alta held him from doing anything. He would keep his eyes open and find out for himself what was wrong. The time might come when he could strike. “And if it ever does come,” he said to himself, “I’ll strike hard.”

Chapter XIV

AT THE OLD SHACK

Wild ducks and geese and cranes and swans filled the air or swam on pond and rivers. Partridges whirred through the groves; sage hens flocked upon the flats. Deer and elk gathered out of their retreats far up among the snowy peaks to come down into the less frosty canyons. Herds of antelope fed and frolicked over the rolling hills. It was the time of peace and plenty that precedes the gloomy days when “all wild things lie down to sleep.”

The Indians, alive to their needs for the oncoming winter, made the most of the time to lay in an ample store of meat and skins. The hunters scoured the hills for game. Nixon, fearing the outcome of his attack on Alta, held his band of marauders in check for a time. Fred kept closer watch of his herd, grazing them nearer home until, when haying was over, they were turned into the fenced meadows and he was set at other work. All hands were needed now for the roundup.

Nixon knew that his thieving business was about over, so to finish his work with a flourish that would give him added glory in the eyes of the Indians, and at the same time glut his desire for revenge, he made his final scheme. This worked out, he would “quit the hole forever.” His evil thought proved prophetic.

All the ranches were astir with preparation for the roundup. Getting ready the outfit, broncho-breaking, roping contests were the order of the day. The old rangers welcomed the change. They did not take kindly to following the “hay basket,” hauling timber, and doing the other “greaser” jobs.

“I’d a heap ruther be aboard a horse trailin’ steers,” said Jim. “If this fencin’ business keeps up, there won’t be any use for cow-punchers in a few years. I hate them horse-murderin’ wires anyway.”

“It sure ain’t what it was a few years back,” added Noisy, a new recruit at the ranch, whose sobriquet had been given because of his tendency to brag long and loudly. “Why, when I worked fer old Peg Leg Jones over on North Platte, we could ride a month and never see a fence. You knew old Peg Leg, didn’t you, Jim?”

“Yes, I remember the old cuss, well enough. He owes me two months’ pay yet.”

“Well, he was mean all right; but he could ride any bronk that ever bucked.”

“He couldn’t ride a winter-killed jackass,” said Jim.

“Couldn’t, eh? Well, you never seen him, that’s all. I watched a cayuse pitch over back’ards with him one day; an’ blame me, if Old Peg didn’t come back up with that cayuse when he got up, clingin’ to the saddle and swingin’ his old rag hat, and that brute a buckin’ to beat the band. Beat anything I ever seen. Broke his old wooden leg, but it never hurt him.”

“Is that a true lie?” asked Jim dryly.

“It’s straight goods.”

The crowd laughed.

“Wall, that ridin’s nuthin’ to crow about,” Jim went on to better the braggart. “You ought to see Bill Hicks bust bronchos. I saw one pitch him thirty feet in the air and he lit right back in the saddle without a scratch. Didn’t he, Pat?”

“Sure an’ he did, and that ain’t all. When the baste began to buck again, Bill took off that saddle, while the horse was pitchin’ him, mind ye, and the bridle, too; and then he stuck to him till the bloomin’ baste was glad to quit. And then fer a grandstand finish, he made him climb the ladder up a haystack.”

The crowd roared at the extravagant nonsense. Even Noisy gave up, and joined in the fun.

“The best ridin’ I ever did see, fer honest,” said Jim, “was when Tim Carter, down on Henry’s Fork, brought Old Panther to time, that roan outlaw of the Diamond C bunch. He stuck to the leapin’ devil like a cocklebur fer a whole hour. You remember it, don’t you, Dan?”

“That was good riding,” came Dan’s quiet response; “they were both ready to give up, but Tim won out at last.”

“He was a bully roper, too,” added Jim, “’specially when he was on Old Buck. That old yaller horse had more sense than most men. The way he’d hold a big steer was a caution. Wonder where Tim is now.”

“Loafing round a Denver hospital last I heard,” returned Dan; “steers got him at last.”

“How?”

“Didn’t you hear how he was trampled in a stampede down on Bitter Creek?”

“Nary a word; how did it happen?”

“Well, he came nearly ending his trail there. He would have done it if Old Buck hadn’t saved him.”

“Tell us about it,” urged Fred, as Dan paused. The crowd were all eager to hear Dan talk.

“There isn’t much to tell,” he went on quietly; “it was just a regular stampede. We were trailing a bunch of longhorns through to Montana and one night we had them rounded up on a sagebrush flat down in the Green River country. Tim and I were taking night shift. The sky was clear enough in early evening; but ’long ’bout ten o’clock it had got black with thunder clouds. The steers began to act nervous, so we kept swinging slowly round them, humming a quiet tune to keep ’em down. Finally, as we were passing each other, Tim said:

“‘You’d better hike for camp and rustle the boys; I smell trouble. Git a move; for there’s no tellin’ when these devils’ll jump.’

“I struck out, roused the boys, and hit back for the herd, but just before I reached it, there was a blinding flash of lightning and a cracking clap of thunder. The herd jumped as if shot, and bolted away in the darkness. I heard Tim’s yell to check them, but it wasn’t any use. The herd plunged on. He was somewhere in front of them, and I was following the roar blindly, trying to join him.

“The thunder cracked and boomed above our heads and the rain pelted down. The best I could do was to cling to the flanks of the herd. I couldn’t get ahead of them. It would have been madness to try. We charged on yelling and firing our revolvers in an effort to swing the mad leaders toward the drag end of the herd. If we could have got them ‘milling,’ or going in a circle, we might have stopped them.

“I caught sight of Tim just once. A vivid flash of lightning gave me a glimpse of him, struggling like a Trojan in his midnight battle with the brutes. He was right in front of that wave of clashing horns. I clapped spurs into my pony to reach and help him; but the herd swept on like a torrent. And it kept on going until daylight broke. When I could get my bearings, I found myself miles away from camp with only about half the bunch. Tim was nowhere to be seen. After a while two of the boys came up and we headed the herd back. They were tired enough to be pretty tame. About sun-up we found Tim, half dead, and almost buried under Old Buck, whose useful life had been crushed out under the ripping hoofs of the steers. We carried Tim to camp, made a litter out of poles and blankets, and took him between two horses to the nearest station, flagged a through train and sent him down to Denver. He got over it enough to live, but he’s a cripple and always will be.”

“That’s too damned bad!” said Jim, soberly; “but it’s the kind o’ pay that’s coming to a good many of us cowpunchers.”

“Oh, cheer up, Jamie, cheer up, me boy,” said Pat; “ye can’t die more’n once.”

“’Tain’t the dyin’ that rubs,” returned Jim; “it’s this livin’ on when ye’re dead. I’d rather hev my old candle snuffed out first shot.”

“Sure, me boy, sure!” agreed Pat, “but phwat would it mane, d’ye think, if we all got pitched out of this old world without a word o’ warnin’? The angels wouldn’t be ready fer us at all, at all. We’d git a hill of a wilcome.”

“We’ll git that anyway,” Jim broke into the laugh that followed.

“Will, I don’t know as I moind that so bad,” Pat went on dryly, “since I heard Mike O’Larney tell about it.”

“How was that?” asked Jim.

“Will, Mike had a dream one night. He dreamed he wint to the Great Behoind, and while he was there he visited both places.

“‘And how did you like ’em?’ I asked of him when he was a-tellin’ me.

“‘Will, Pat,’ sez he, ‘to be honest wid ye, I like hiven fer scenery; but give me hill for auld acquaintance.’”

“That’s all right, Pat,” said Jim, when the boys quieted again, “but I’m thinkin’ that I don’t want to be livin’ in hell here, like Tim Carter.”

“Well,” said Pat, “maybe the other side ain’t such a hivenly place, after all. Fer my part, I don’t think I’d take kindly to wearin’ wings an’ playin’ Jews’ harps fer all eternity.”

“I guess you’re right, old boy; but who knows?—I tell you, Pat, let’s make a bargain.”

“What’s that?”

“Well, if I die first, I’ll send my ghost back to tell you how things are over there; and if you die first you come back and tell me.”

“The divil you say. That’s a mighty spooky bargain, Jamie. I’ll agree to it though; but to spake me moind freely, me boy, I’ve no likin’ for ghosts.”

“Oh, bah! there ain’t any,” said Noisy.

“Ain’t, eh! well, you niver seen one, that’s all.”

“Naw—ner never will!”

“I’m not so sure about that. I think I spied one the other night when I was gittin’ some water.”

“Where?”

“Out by that grave, ’long the road where ole Bill Peter’s boy was buried, an’ afterwards dug up.

“Git out with your ghost stuff; there ain’t no such thing,” said Noisy. “Let’s have some music, Dick, and cheer up this scary bunch.”

“All right,” said Dick, as he lifted down from the log wall his battered guitar, inwardly pleased to center the attention of the crowd himself. He struck up a jigging chord and led out with a stanza from “Juanita.” The others chimed in, and the old shack was soon ringing with their rough music. They tried scraps of this old melody and of that till they were about sung out; then some one called for an Irish song from Pat.

“Will, be jabers,” he said, “I’m no nightingale; but here goes; now jine in the chorus”; and he sang lustily to Dick’s jigging accompaniment:

“Now all togither,” said Pat, beating time; and they gave this lusty refrain:

“Bully boy, Pat. You’re a born meadow lark!” came the compliments as he finished.

“Oh, thank ye, thank ye!” said Pat, making an operatic bow with flourishes. “Now let’s try, ‘We won’t go home till mornin’.”

“No, give us ‘In the evenin’ by the moonlight’ and let’s tumble in,” said Jim; “I’m gettin’ sleepy.”

Dick struck another chord and they all joined in the old negro melody. Their voices grew tender as they sang the refrain:

At this juncture, Cap Hanks, who had been out making arrangements with other ranchers for the roundup, rode up to the shack.

“Here, Noisy,” he called, “I want you to carry a message to Blake’s ranch for me. And Jim, you come out to the barn with me while I put up my horse; I want to talk over my plans with you.”

“Boys, I’ll tell ye,” said Pat, when they were out of hearing, “here’s our chance to try out Noisy’s belief in ghosts. I’ve a scheme in me head. Come on.”

Eager to join in Pat’s fun, Fred and Dick jumped up and left the shack with him. On the outside lay some tent poles and a strip of white canvas. At Pat’s suggestion, they grabbed up these and a rope, and hurried through the brush for the grave of which Pat had spoken. It was close to the road. The parents of the cowboy that had been buried there had requested that the body be sent home, and the boys in exhuming it had only half refilled the grave.

Into this hole Pat stuck the tent pole, making it stand up firmly. The canvas was thrown into the grave loose, and the rope, tied to one corner of the canvas, was threaded through an iron ring at the top of the pole. This done, the boys, holding the rope, hid in the brush a rod or so away from the grave. They had hardly quieted their chuckling before hoof beats were heard and Noisy came galloping up the road.

Suddenly a ghost rose out of the grave.

Noisy reined his horse so hard that he almost threw him on his haunches, and stared for a second; the ghost slowly sank back as he sat there stupefied with his terror. He put spurs to his horse to dash by, but up came the ghost again. Noisy whirled his pony and sped back to the barn in a panic.

“What the devil’s up?” demanded Hanks.

“I seen a-a-ghost-out-thar”—Noisy’s voice trembled like the palsy.

“Oh, to hell with your ghosts! There ain’t no such thing!” said Jim, roaring with laughter.

“Go on with your message,” ordered Hanks.

“I’ll be damned if I will,” said Noisy, frightened out of his wits.

“What!” said the foreman; “well, you go or you’ll lose your job.”

“I wouldn’t go past that grave to-night for forty jobs,” said Noisy, with desperate determination in his shaking voice.

“Get off that horse, then, you cowardly son of a shotgun,” said Jim, “and give me the message. I’ll carry it through, ghosts or no ghosts.”

The boys who had caused the mischief stopped to listen to all this talk as they were stealing back to the shack, holding their mouths for fear of laughing too loud and giving their fun away.

Hearing Jim’s decision to go, they dashed back to the grave again to try it out on him.

Hardly were they settled when up Jim came on a swift gallop toward the grave. And up came the ghost as before.

Jim checked his horse suddenly and calmly demanded, “Who be ye?”

No answer came from the ghost; it simply stood there quietly in the moonlight. The rope had caught in the ring and it could not sink back.

“Speak!” ordered Jim, reaching for his revolver. No answer from the ghost.

“Ping!” went a shot. A yelling and scrambling through the brush followed. “Don’t shoot, don’t shoot!” cried Dick.

“I thought you could speak,” said Jim; “I never seen a ghost that couldn’t.” With that he spurred his pony up to the open grave and emptied his revolver into the canvas. Then he rode on, chuckling to himself.

It cost the mischief-makers a dollar apiece to pay for the shot-riddled canvas, but the fun was worth the money.

As for Noisy, Hanks forgave him, and offered to let him keep his job, but he found it even harder to face his tormentors than ghosts.

Chapter XV

THE FATAL THROW

Dick immediately challenged him to a test of skill at roping. Fred hesitated. He knew that it was not a good thing to fret his herd; but he finally yielded to Dick’s bantering, handed over his rope, for Dick happened to have none, and the sport began.

For an hour or more the boys kept chasing through the herd on their ponies, casting the lasso at the excited cattle. Now and again they landed well; but oftener they failed to land at all. Several times they tripped up some charging heifer rather cleverly. It was great sport,—for the boys. They so lost themselves in the fun of it that dusk was on them before they had noticed how the day was slipping away.

“Here, Dick,” called Fred, suddenly realizing the work before him to gather his scattered herd, “we’ll have to stop this business and put for home.”

“Oh, cut it, I’m goin’ to snub that black devil ’fore we quit.”

“Leave her alone,” Fred shouted, “or you’ll get into trouble.”

Dick’s response to this warning was to strike straight for the spirited heifer, his rope swinging round his head. A wicked dig of his spurs in Ginger’s ribs brought him within rope’s length. He flung at her front legs; but as luck would have it, the lasso caught round her neck. In a flash Dick wound the rope round his saddle horn, his pony checked speed, stopped short, and braced himself; the heifer was jerked squarely about; but maddened with fright at being suddenly snubbed, she flung back and struggled frantically to free herself from the strangling rope. Dick was in a dilemma. He could not let go without losing the lariat and the heifer wouldn’t let him slip it off.

Fred dashed up to help him, and jumped off Brownie to loose the lasso, but just as he reached to grab hold of it at the choking heifer’s neck, she plunged wildly; and Dick, taken unawares, let slip his hold. The rope scorched through his fingers. The heifer, finding herself free, dashed away through a thicket of willows, dragging the lariat. Before Fred could leap on Brownie she had disappeared.

“Go it, you bitch, go!” shouted Dick, nursing his rope-burnt fingers.

“Let’s get her quick,” called Fred; “she’ll get tangled and kill herself in that brush.”

“Oh, to hell with her! I’m not going to scratch my eyes out in that thicket to-night. Let ’er go; she’ll turn up all right. Let’s rustle the rest and hike for camp. I’m hungry.”

Fred hesitated a moment, full of trouble. “No,” he said decidedly, “I’ll find that heifer first. You can help or not, just as you please. It’s all your fault.” He struck off in the direction the heifer had taken.

“All my fault, eh!” bawled Dick after him; “well, you’ll hunt your own cows for that cut, kid”; and giving a whoop, he struck for camp, leaving Fred to wrestle with his trouble alone.

The boy beat about the savage brush till darkness forced him to quit; then he turned to rally the rest of his scattered herd. Luck served him better here, for they had gathered themselves after their chasing and were slowly trailing across the flat toward home. A ray of hope came that he might find the missing heifer among them; but the hope was vain. He was up early next morning, expectant to see that she had wandered back. She was not there. He planned to spend the day searching; but Cap Hanks ordered the herd to the pasture that morning, and set Fred helping get the roundup outfit into shape.

“I’d like to hunt up a heifer that was missing last night,” Fred suggested rather nervously.

“Heifer missin’—hell you say! You oughter watched ’em closer. Never mind, let ’er go. You help Pat sling things together; the boys’ll pick the straggler up.”

Fred was prompted right then to make a clean breast of the business, but the echo of these words flashed over him: “Don’t be a cow-baby, don’t beller.” He held down his impulse and turned to his new work.

Dick knew that he had played a mean trick. His conscience stung him a little as he dashed away, leaving Fred to hunt in the darkness, but his foolish pride kept his manliness from asserting itself. He would not turn back.

In happy-go-lucky fashion Dick drifted along in the easier currents of life, trusting to luck to bring things out for him.

“Let ’er go; she’ll turn up all right,” was expressive of his attitude toward life. The thought of harm coming to the poor beast might have crossed his mind; but if it did, he did not care. And as to further trouble for himself,—“Oh, well, even if the kid does beller,” he thought, “I’ll get out of it all right. The rope ain’t mine.”

But he had no need to fear. Fred was fully determined not to tell on him.

Chapter XVI

THE ROUNDUP

“Holy mither of Moses!” he broke loose, “and where’s the rist of me tin china? Hev them bloomin’ cow-punchers swallowed dish an’ all wid their praties? It’s no more than half my utensils I can dig up at all, at all.” He gave way to an outburst of profanity that made Fred stare. Suddenly he stopped short:—“Hold on, Patsy, me boy. That’s enough. Now cast the divil out of ye—cast him out, I say.” Pat grabbed his flask of whisky as he spoke, and took a drink. “There!” he said solemnly, “that’s better. Me feelin’s and me conscience are both relaved. There’s nuthin’ loike good spirits for castin’ out the divil, me boy. Here’s to make sure!” A long drink followed, while Fred broke into a laugh that loosed the tension of his worry and made things go better. They pitched in then and soon had things ready.

A few hours later they were on the road, Pat driving the team at a lusty trot, while Fred, trailing the extra saddle horses, jogged along in the dust behind. The sun was still several hours above the western hills when they reached the rendezvous. Two other outfits had already arrived, and another swung into camp shortly afterward.

The team unhitched, and another pony caught to relieve Brownie, Pat and Fred began hurriedly to get supper for the hungry range riders, who, they knew, would shortly begin to straggle in as hungry as wolves. A big quaking aspen fire was soon talking cheerily, and it was not long before the bacon and “praties” were singing in the frying pans, while the Dutch ovens were doing duty to put a tempting brown on the baking powder batter that had been poured into them.

The sun had just slipped behind a bank of flaming clouds that hovered above the western hills, when the first herd of cattle was driven in, and a half-dozen cowboys whooped into camp. Too ravenous to wait, they began to attack the smoking food. Half an hour later, another bunch came; and from then on till midnight the cooks were kept busy with feeding the cowboys that continued to drift in.

“Be jabers, and it’s worse than a short order café,” complained Pat. “This ‘meals at all hours’ will keep the cook up all night, I’m thinkin’.” But he kept bravely at it till all of the boys were fed.

Night herders were posted to keep the big bunch of cattle within bounds. The “horse wranglers” were assigned their watch, and the other tired men, pillowing their heads on coats and saddles, tucked their blankets about them and slept like logs under the star-sown sky.

Nothing unusual happened that night. Daylight broke to find the cattle still somewhat nervous, but manageable. The horses were grazing peacefully not far away; while half a dozen weary cowboys clung about the herd, half asleep in their saddles.

After a time the cooks began to get busy, and one after another the sleeping cow-punchers got up, “sayin’ their prayers backwards,” as Pat put it, by damning themselves and the world in general as they stretched and yawned, and waited for breakfast.

Sunrise found them all awake, fed, and ready for business. Saddling their ponies, they struck for the herd as lively as the bucking bronchos that they rode.

Fred was given the task at first to herd the extra horses; but Noisy happened to get pitched from his pony, sustaining a sprained ankle, and he was given this lighter task, while Fred, much to his joy, was sent to help Dan, Dick, and Jim cut out the Bar B cattle from the big herd, which was now bunched rather compactly on the flat, with cowboys circled about it.

The term “roundup” has a rather romantic connotation. It has gathered a picturesque meaning. All the cowboy life seems to focus in this crowning part of his work. The excitement of the chase, the tests of skill with rope and horse, the grit and daring of it all, added to the unexpected that always happens—so thrill and fill the roundup with significance that it is small wonder this time has come to stand out so distinctly as the cowboy’s carnival.

Fred came to this, his first roundup, with joyous anticipation. His reading of cowboy stories, so-called, had given him a good many impressions that needed correcting. Before the day had passed he found out that there is more reality than romance in the roundup.

All day long, amid the bawling roar of the excited herd, in clouds of choking dust, whipped up by the shifting cattle and plunging horses, the cutting out went on. From early morn till just before dark, the dust-covered, sweat-streaked men and ponies kept up their struggle to separate the cattle that belonged to their respective ranches from the rest of the big bellowing bunch.

Slowly the watchful rider and horse, working together like a centaur, would circle the herd till the right mark or brand was spied. A touch of the rider’s heel and the horse would leap straight toward the animal that bore the brand, pushing in among the restless cattle till close upon the picked “critter,” and there the horse would stay till the cow was crowded to the edge and forced to break from the herd, to be rushed with a whoop, at cow-gallop, pell-mell across the flat to the growing bunch where she belonged.

Dan and Jim were adept at the business. Their trained horses, too, showed almost human intelligence. Chief was especially skillful. Once he sighted his victim, he clung to its flanks like a leech, turning, twisting, following its every move till he chased it home. Dick and Fred, given the task of helping hold the main herd, had no part at the beginning in the “cutting out”; but after a time Dan, to give Chief a rest, told them to go into the fun for a while. Both of them leaped at the chance, and they managed fairly well for “tenderfeet.”

But it wasn’t all fun. They went at it nervously and soon both they and their horses were ready to quit. Noon came and passed. There was no stopping for dinner. The dust grew thicker as they grew hungrier. Their tempers began to get a rough edge; and occasionally they let loose their ugly feelings.

Fred was sent to help hold the Bar B herd. The big bunch had dwindled to a handful. Finally the last cow was cut out and Dick and Jim brought her whooping across the flat. For a closing flourish as they plunged up to their herd, they jerked out their revolvers and emptied them into the air. The nervous cattle jumped as if shot and bolted across the flat with the boys full chase behind them. Fred was on Brownie, who was straining every nerve to get ahead and turn the herd, when suddenly she lurched and fell, throwing the boy over her head. The herd swept on. Fred lay dazed for a moment, then he rose and went to his little mare. She had staggered to her feet and stood trembling with pain. The boy was stunned to find one of her front legs broken. A badger hole had done its wicked work. The boy turned heartsick; he threw his arms about the suffering animal’s neck and cried like a child.

Jim was the first to find the boy in his trouble.

“It’s a damned shame, Teddy, and it’s all my doin’s, damme. I orter had better sense. But brace up, boy; brace up. I’ll do the square thing.”

Dan and Dick had ridden up. Dan leaped from his horse and examined the broken leg carefully.

“No use,” he shook his head soberly; “the little mare’s done for. There’s just one thing left to do, Fred; you must end her sufferings quickly.”

“Oh, I can’t do it; I can’t do it!” replied Fred, chokingly.

“Come, don’t beller,” blurted Dick. “Gimme a gun. I’ll do it.”

“No, you don’t,” said Fred, with a touch of anger. “If she has to die, no heartless cuss shall kill her.” He paused—then turning to Dan asked feelingly—“Won’t you please do it for me?”

“If you wish it, my boy.”

Fred stroked the suffering mare’s forehead, and laid his face against her glossy brown cheek. She pressed his face gently in response to his sympathy, then he turned quickly and walked hurriedly toward camp, never once looking back. The boys sat silent, respecting his sorrow, all but Dick. His face carried a flush of anger and the suggestion of a sneer, which made Jim say, when Fred was out of hearing,

“That was damned mean of you, Dick, to jeer at a man in trouble.”

Dick winced, but held his tongue.

Fred had just reached the camp wagon, when Dan’s revolver was heard. Brownie’s sufferings were over; this was the one comforting thought that echoed through his brain through the long gloomy night.

Jim and Dan planned to get the boys to “chip in” and buy Fred another saddle horse; but before they could put their generous thoughts into execution, both of them were sent with the beef steers to the shipping point, three days’ drive away. When they returned, Fred had left the ranch. No one knew where he had gone.

It happened in this way. He was sitting out on the corral fence one day with Cap Hanks and Dick, when suddenly the foreman turned on Dick and asked, “Have you been ropin’ any cattle around this ranch?”

“No,” said Dick, a little confused.

“Well, some one has,” said the foreman, “for Jim found one of the blooded heifers up the creek strangled to death with this rope on, and he says that the string belongs to you.”

“Don’t know a damned thing about it,” said Dick. “The rope ain’t mine, that’s dead sure.”

“Well, Teddy, it’s up to you. Is this your lasso?”

“Yes, sir, it is.”

“Then you roped the heifer?”

“No, sir, I didn’t.”

“Who did?”

“It’s not my place to tell.”

“It ain’t, eh? Well, you’ll tell or you’ll git, and mighty quick, too!” The foreman was angry.

“Then I’ll go,” replied Fred; “if the fellow that threw that rope won’t own up and take his medicine, I’ll take it for him; but I won’t tell.”

And he went. Rolling his few clothes in a bundle, he slipped out of the old shack into the grove near by. All the word he left was this note, which he put in the till of Dan’s trunk: