Just One Thing After Another
:
The Flying U's Last Stand
A gray clarity of the air told that daylight was near. The skyline
retreated, the hills came out of the duskiness like a photograph in the
developer tray. Irish dipped down the steep slope into Antelope Coulee,
cursing the sprinkle of new shacks that stood stark in the dawn on
every ridge and every hilltop, look where one might. He loped along the
winding trail through the coulee's bottom and climbed the hill beyond.
A
the top he glanced across the more level upland to the east and his
eyes lightened. Far away stood a shack--Patsy's, that was. Beyond that
another, and yet another. Most of the boys had built in the coulees
where was water. They did not care so much about the view--over which
Miss Allen had grown enthusiastic.
He pulled up in a certain place near the brow of the hill, and looked
down into the narrower gulch where huddled the shacks they had moved. He
grinned at the sight. His hand went involuntarily to his pocket and the
grin widened. He hurried on that he might the sooner tell the boys of
their good luck; all the material for that line fence bought and paid
for--there would certainly laugh when they heard where the money had
come from!
First he thought that he would locate the cattle and tell his news to
the boys on guard. He therefore left the trail and rode up on a ridge
from which he could overlook the whole benchland, with the exception of
certain gulches that cut through. The sky was reddening now, save where
banked clouds turned purple. A breeze crept over the grass and carried
the fresh odor of rain. Close beside him a little brown bird chittered
briskly and flew away into the dawn.
He looked away to where the Bear Paws humped, blue-black against the
sky, the top of Old Baldy blushing faintly under the first sun rays. He
looked past Wolf Butte, where the land was blackened with outcroppings
of rock. His eyes came back leisurely to the claim country. A faint
surprise widened his lids, and he turned and sent a glance sweeping to
the right, toward Flying U Coulee. He frowned, and studied the bench
land carefully.
This was daybreak, when the cattle should be getting out for their
breakfast-feed. They should be scattered along the level just before
him. And there were no cattle anywhere in sight. Neither were there any
riders in sight. Irish gave a puzzled grunt and turned in his saddle,
looking back toward Dry Lake. That way, the land was more broken, and
he could not see so far. But as far as he could see there were no cattle
that way either. Last night when he rode to town the cattle of the
colonists had been feeding on the long slope three or four miles from
where he stood, across Antelope Coulee where he had helped the boys
drive them.
He did not waste many minutes studying the empty prairie from the
vantage point of that ridge, however. The keynote of Irish's nature
was action. He sent his horse down the southern slope to the level, and
began looking for tracks, which is the range man's guide-book. He was
not long in finding a broad trail, in the grass where cattle had lately
crossed the coulee from the west. He knew what that meant, and he swore
when he saw how the trail pointed straight to the east--to the broken,
open country beyond One Man Coulee. What had the boys been thinking
of, to let that nester stock get past them in the night? What had the
line-riders been doing? They were supposed to guard against just such a
move as this.
Irish was sore from his fight in town, and he had not had much sleep
during the past forty-eight hours, and he was ravenously hungry. He
followed the trail of the cattle until he saw that they certainly had
gotten across the Happy Family claims and into the rough country beyond;
then he turned and rode over to Patsy's shack, where a blue smoke column
wobbled up to the fitful air-current that seized it and sent it flying
toward the mountains.
There he learned that Dry Lake had not hugged to itself all the events
of the night. Patsy, smoking a pipefull of Durham while he waited for
the teakettle to boil, was wild with resentment. In the night, while
he slept, something had heaved his cabin up at one corner. In a minute
another corner heaved upward a foot or more. Patsy had yelled while he
felt around in the darkness for his clothes, and had got no answer, save
other heavings from below.
Patsy was not the man to submit tamely to such indignities. He had
groped and found his old 45-70 riffle, that made a noise like a young
cannon and kicked like a broncho cow. While the shack lurched this way
and that, Patsy pointed the gun toward the greatest disturbance and
fired. He did not think: he hit anybody, but he apologized to Irish for
missing and blamed the darkness for the misfortune. Py cosh, he sure
tried--witness the bullet holes which he had bored through the four
sides of the shack; he besought Irish to count them; which Irish did
gravely. And what happened then?
Then? Why, then the Happy Family had come; or at least all those who had
been awake and riding the prairie had come pounding up out of the dark,
their horses running like rabbits, their blood singing the song of
battle. They had grappled with certain of the enemy--Patsy broke open
the door and saw tangles of struggling forms in the faint starlight.
The Happy Family were not the type of men who must settle every argument
with a gun, remember. Not while their hands might be used to fight with.
Patsy thought that they licked the nesters without much trouble. He
knew that the settlers ran, and that the Happy Family chased them clear
across the line and then came back and let the shack down where it
belonged upon the rock underpining.
"Und py cosh! Dey vould move my shack off'n my land!" he grunted
ragefully as he lived over the memory.
Irish went to the door and looked out. The wind had risen in the last
half hour, so that his hat went sailing against the rear wall, but he
did not notice that. He was wondering why the settlers had made this
night move against Patsy. Was it an attempt to irritate the boys to some
real act of violence--something that would put them in fear of the law?
Or was it simply a stratagem to call off the night-guard so that they
might slip their cattle across into the breaks? They must have counted
on some disturbance which would reach the ears of the boys on guard. If
Patsy had not begun the bombardment with his old rifle, they would very
likely have fired a few shots themselves--enough to attract attention.
With that end in view, he could see why Patsy's shack had been chosen
for the attack. Patsy's shack was the closest to where they had been
holding the cattle. It was absurdly simple, and evidently the ruse had
worked to perfection.
"Where are the boys at now?" he asked abruptly, turning to Patsy who had
risen and knocked the ashes from his pipe and was slicing bacon.
"Gone after the cattle. Dey stampede alreatty mit all der noise," Patsy
growled, with his back to Irish.
So it was just as Irish had suspected. He faced the west and the
gathering bank of "thunder heads" that rode swift on the wind and
muttered sullenly as they rode, and he hesitated. Should he go after the
boys and help them round up the stock and drive it back, or should he
stay where he was and watch the claims? There was that fence--he must
see to that, too.
He turned and asked Patsy if all the boys were gone. But Patsy did not
know.
Irish stood in the doorway until breakfast was ready whereupon he sat
down and ate hurriedly--as much from habit as from any present need of
haste. A gust of wind made the flimsy cabin shake, and Patsy went to
close the door against its sudden fury.
"Some riders iss coming now," he said, and held the door half closed
against the wind. "It ain't none off der boys," he added, with the
certainty which came of his having watched, times without number, while
the various members of the Happy Family rode in from the far horizons to
camp. "Pilgrims, I guess--from der ridin'."
Irish grunted and reached for the coffee pot, giving scarce a thought to
Patsy's announcement. While he poured his third cup of coffee he made a
sudden decision. He would get that fence off his mind, anyway.
"Say, Patsy, I've rustled wire and posts--all we'll need. I guess I'll
just turn this receipt over to you and let you get busy. You take the
team and drive in today and get the stuff headed out here pronto.
The nesters are shipping in more stock--I heard in town that they're
bringing in all they can rustle, thinkin' the stock will pay big money
while the claims are getting ready to produce. I heard a couple of marks
telling each other just how it was going to work out so as to put 'em
all on Easy Street--the darned chumps! Free grass--that's what they
harped on; feed don't cost anything. All yuh do is turn 'em loose and
wait till shippin' season, and then collect. That's what they were
talking.
"The sooner that fence is up the better. We can't put in the whole
summer hazing their cattle around. I've bought the stuff and paid for
it. And here's forty dollars you can use to hire it hauled out here.
Us fellows have got to keep cases on the cattle, so you 'tend to this
fence." He laid the money and Fred's receipt upon the table and set
Patsy's plate over them to hold them safe against the wind that rattled
the shack. He had forgotten all about the three approaching riders,
until Patsy turned upon him sharply.
"Vot schrapes you been into now?" he demanded querulously. "Py cosh
you done somet'ings. It's der conshtable comin' alreatty. I bet you be
pinched."
"I bet I don't," Irish retorted, and made for the one window, which
looked toward the hills. "Feed 'em some breakfast, Patsy. And you drive
in and tend to that fencing right away, like I told you."
He threw one long leg over the window sill, bent his lean body to pass
through the square opening, and drew the other leg outside. He startled
his horse, which had walked around there out of the wind, but he caught
the bridle-reins and led him a few steps farther where he would be out
of the direct view from the window. Then he stopped and listened.
He heard the three ride up to the other side of the shack and shout to
Patsy. He heard Patsy moving about inside, and after a brief delay open
the door. He heard the constable ask Patsy if he knew anything about
Irish, and where he could be found; and he heard Patsy declare that he
had enough to do without keeping track of that boneheaded cowpuncher who
was good for nothing but to fight and get into schrapes.
After that he heard Patsy ask the constable if they had had any
breakfast before leaving town. He heard certain saddle-sounds which
told of their dismounting in response to the tacit invitation. And then,
pulling his hat firmly down upon his head, Irish led his horse quietly
down into a hollow behind the shack, and so out of sight and hearing of
those three who sought him.
He did not believe that he was wanted for anything very serious; they
meant to arrest him, probably, for laying out those two gamblers with
a chair and a bottle of whisky respectively. A trumped-up charge, very
likely, chiefly calculated to make him some trouble and to eliminate
him from the struggle for a time. Irish did not worry at all over their
reason for wanting him, but he did not intend to let them come close
enough to state their errand, because he did not want to become guilty
of resisting an officer--which would be much worse than fighting nesters
with fists and chairs and bottles and things.
In the hollow he mounted and rode down the depression and debouched upon
the wide, grassy coulee where lay a part of his own claim. He was not
sure of the intentions of that constable, but he took it for granted
that he would presently ride on to Irish's cabin in search of him; also
that he would look for him further, and possibly with a good deal of
persistence; which would be a nuisance and would in a measure hamper the
movements and therefore the usefulness of Irish. For that reason he was
resolved to take no chance that could be avoided.
The sun slid behind the scurrying forerunners of the storm and struggled
unavailingly to shine through upon the prairie land. From where he was
Irish could not see the full extent of the storm-clouds, and while he
had been on high land he had been too absorbed in other matters to pay
much attention. Even now he did no more than glance up casually at the
inky mass above him, and decided that he would do well to ride on to his
cabin and get his slicker.
By the time he reached his shack the storm was beating up against the
wind which had turned unexpectedly to the northeast. Mutterings of
thunder grew to sharper booming. It was the first real thunderstorm of
the season, but it was going to be a hard one, if looks meant anything.
Irish went in and got his slicker and put it on, and then hesitated over
riding on in search of the cattle and the men in pursuit of them.
Still, the constable might take a notion to ride over this way in spite
of the storm. And if he came there would be delay, even if there were
nothing worse. So Irish, being one to fight but never to stand idle,
mounted again and turned his long-suffering horse down the coulee as the
storm swept up.
First a few large drops of rain pattered upon the earth and left blobs
of wet where they fell. His horse shook its head impatiently and went
sidling forward until an admonitory kick from Irish sent him straight
down the dim trail. Then the clouds opened recklessly the headgates and
let the rain down in one solid rush of water that sluiced the hillsides
and drove muddy torrents down channels that had been dry since the snow
left.
Irish bent his head so that his hat shielded somewhat his face, and
rode doggedly on. It was not the first time that he had been out in a
smashing, driving thunderstorm, and it would not be his last if his
life went on logically as he had planned it. But it was not the more
comfortable because it was an oft-repeated experience. And when the
first fury had passed and still it rained steadily and with no promise
of a let-up, his optimism suffered appreciably.
His luck in town no longer cheered him. He began to feel the loss of
sleep and the bone-weariness of his fight and the long ride afterwards.
His breakfast was the one bright spot, and saved him from the gnawing
discomfort of an empty stomach--at first.
He went into One Man Coulee and followed it to the arm that would
lead to the rolling, ridgy open land beyond, where the "breaks" of the
Badlands reached out to meet the prairie. He came across the track of
the herd, and followed it to the plain. Once out in the open, however,
the herd had seemed to split into several small bunches, each going in
a different direction. Which puzzled Irish a little at first. Later, he
thought he understood.
The cattle, it would seem, had been driven purposefully into the edge of
the breaks and there made to scatter out through the winding gulches
and canyons that led deeper into the Badlands. It was the trick of
range-men--he could not believe that the strange settlers, ignorant
of the country and the conditions, would know enough to do this. He
hesitated before several possible routes, the rain pouring down
upon him, a chill breeze driving it into his face. If there had been
hoofprints to show which way the boys had gone, the rain had washed them
so that they looked dim and old and gave him little help.
He chose what seemed to him the gorge which the boys would be most
likely to follow--especially at night and if they were in open pursuit
of those who had driven the cattle off the benchland; and that the
cattle had been driven beyond this point was plain enough, for otherwise
he would have overtaken stragglers long before this.
It was nearing noon when he came out finally upon a little, open flat
and found there Big Medicine and Pink holding a bunch of perhaps a
hundred cattle which they had gleaned from the surrounding gulches and
little "draws" which led into the hills. The two were wet to the skin,
and they were chilled and hungry and as miserable as a she-bear sent up
a tree by yelping, yapping dogs.
Big Medicine it was who spied him first through the haze of falling
water, and galloped heavily toward him, his horse flinging off great
pads of mud from his feet as he came.
"Say!" he bellowed when he was yet a hundred yards away. "Got any grub
with yuh?"
"No!" Irish called back.
"Y'AIN'T" Big Medicine's voice was charged with incredulous reproach.
"What'n hell yuh doin' here without GRUB? Is Patsy comin' with the
wagon?"
"No. I sent Patsy on in to town after--"
"Town? And us out here--" Big Medicine choked over his wrongs.
Irish waited until he could get in a word and then started to explain.
But Pink rode up with his hatbrim flapping soggily against one dripping
cheek when the wind caught it, and his coat buttoned wherever there were
buttons, and his collar turned up, and looking pinched and draggled and
wholly miserable.
"Say! Got anything to eat?" he shouted when he came near, his voice
eager and hopeful.
"No!" snapped Irish with the sting of Big Medicine's vituperations
rankling fresh in his soul.
"Well why ain't yuh? Where's Patsy?" Pink came closer and eyed the
newcomer truculently.
"How'n hell do I know?" Irish was getting a temper to match their own.
"Well, why don't yuh know? What do yuh think you're out here for? To
tell us you think it's going to rain? If we was all of us like you,
there'd be nothing to it for the nester-bunch. It's a wonder you come
alive enough to ride out this way at all! I don't reckon you've even got
anything to drink!" Pink paused a second, saw no move toward producing
anything wet and cheering, and swore disgustedly. "Of course not! You
needed it all yourself! So help me Josephine, if I was as low-down
ornery as some I could name I'd tie myself to a mule's tail and let him
kick me to death! Ain't got any grub! Ain't got--"
Irish interrupted him then with a sentence that stung. Irish, remember,
distinctly approved of himself and his actions. True, he had forgotten
to bring anything to eat with him, but there was excuse for that in the
haste with which he had left his own breakfast. Besides how could he
be expected to know that the cattle had been driven away down here, and
scattered, and that the Happy Family would not have overtaken them long
before? Did they think he was a mind-reader?
Pink, with biting sarcasm, retorted that they did not. That it took a
mind to read a mind. He added that, from the looks of Irish, he must
have started home drunk, anyway, and his horse had wandered this far of
his own accord. Then three or four cows started up a gulch to the right
of them and Pink, hurling insults over his shoulder, rode off to turn
them back. So they did not actually come to blows, those two, though
they were near it.
Big Medicine lingered to bawl unforgivable things at; Irish, and
Irish shouted back recklessly that they had all acted like a bunch of
sheepherders, or the cattle would never have been driven off the bench
at all. He declared that anybody with the brains of a sick sage hen
would have stopped the thing right in the start. He said other things
also.
Big Medicine said things in reply, and Pink, returning to the scene with
his anger grown considerably hotter from feeding upon his discomfort,
made a few comments pertinent to the subject of Irish's shortcomings.
You may scarcely believe it, unless you have really lived, and have
learned how easily small irritations grow to the proportions of real
trouble, and how swiftly--but this is a fact: Irish and Big Medicine
became so enraged that they dismounted simultaneously and Irish jerked
off his slicker while Big Medicine was running up to smash him for some
needless insult.
They fought, there in the rain and the mud and the chill wind that
whipped their wet cheeks. They fought just as relentlessly as though
they had long been enemies, and just as senselessly as though they were
not grown men but schoolboys. They clinched and pounded and smashed
until Pink sickened at the sight and tore them apart and swore at them
for crazy men and implored them to have some sense. They let the cattle
that had been gathered with so much trouble drift away into the gulches
and draws where they must be routed out of the brush again, or perhaps
lost for days in that rough country.
When the first violence of their rage had like the storm settled to a
cold steadiness of animosity, the two remounted painfully and turned
back upon each other.
Big Medicine and Pink drew close together as against a common foe, and
Irish cursed them both and rode away--whither he did not know nor care.