Collected Works of Zane Grey

by Zane Grey

  “My Gawd!” burst out Brazos, as if to himself.

  “Miss Holly is boss of this ootfit an’ you’re beholden to her,” went on Britt, driving his appeal home. “I cain’t let any of you go. An’ she wouldn’t. She doesn’t care what you do so long as you’re loyal to her.”

  “Cap, thet means not to steal from her — not to stand fer a pard double-crossin’ her!” queried Brazos, with ringing passion.

  “You hit it plumb centre, Brazos.”

  “Cap, I did,” cried Brazos, poignantly.

  “Did what, you locoed cowboy?” demanded Britt, fiercely. “Don’t tell me you stole from Holly Ripple!”

  “Stole? Me! — God, no! But Dillon stole an’ I ketched him. I made him swear never to do it again. I trusted him. Stood fer it! Never told you! An’ the — low-down skunk double-crossed me.”

  “Tell Miss Holly. She will forget thet, Brazos.”

  “But thet wasn’t loyalty.”

  “Not to her. But it was to Dillon. Mark my word, cowboy, she will forgive you. But tell her yourself.”

  “I hate to, wuss’n poison. But I will.”

  “Fine!” ejaculated Britt, with intense relief. By that he knew Brazos would reverse his decision to quit. The cowboys settled back to more comfortable positions. Laigs Mason finished his task of bandaging, and helped Brazos get back into his spirit. Conversation lagged again. All this excitement and talk without a word about the fate of Mugg Dillon! Jim ordered the Mexican lads out to guard the remuda. The noisy coyotes ventured close to camp, to snarl and snap over bones thrown away by Jose. Wolves bayed out on the range and the bawling of cows attested to the merciless carnage enacted out there. The night settled down black and starry. Britt felt that he must start for the rancho. Yet he liked to linger there around the camp fire, among these hard-faced youths. Meanwhile he watched Brazos, trying to read that worthy’s mind.

  “I forgot, Jim,” suddenly Britt spoke up. “Rustle oot this week an’ then home. Thet’s my orders to all the men.”

  “I was wonderin’,” replied Jim. “Next Wednesday week is the anniversary of thet great party Kurnel Ripple gave Miss Holly nigh on three years ago. We ain’t heahed nothin’, but I reckon the party will come off. This would be the third.”

  “It’ll come off, bigger’n ever,” Britt assured Jim. “Some of you was there last year. Wal, this time Miss Holly is givin’ a dinner to her ootfit before the party.”

  “You don’t say?” ejaculated Jim.

  “There!” shouted Laigs Mason, suddenly vehement, shaking a finger in Brazos’ face. “I told you. Now you’ll miss thet grand purty.”

  “Miss nothin’,” growled Brazos. “Shore I quit. But I’m gonna ask Miss Holly to take me back.... She wouldn’t have it without me.”

  “Haw! Haw!... If you ain’t the conceitedest cowhand on this range!”

  Britt got up to join in the laugh that broke the restraint and established something of a genial’ atmosphere once more. He took advantage of the moment.

  “Wal, somebody fetch my hawse. I’ll be rustlin’.”

  “Boss, shall we send someone with you?” asked Jim.

  “Brazos, do you want to come?”

  “Aw!... Not just yet.”

  “Wal, never mind then, Jim.” After a moment, as he stepped to his horse, which Santone had led up, Britt gazed hard at his crippled cowboy.

  “Say, Brazos, I reckon I’m to figger thet bullet-hole in yore shoulder jest happened you know — oot of a clear sky,” he drawled.

  “Cap, I don’t get shot oot of a clear sky,” retorted the cowboy.

  “Wal, then?” But there did not seem to be an answer forthcoming. Brazos stiffly arose to his lofty height. Then Britt launched sharply at him: “Did Mugg Dillon shoot you?”

  “Hell no! — Thet hombre never even got his gun oot,” replied Brazos just as sharply, and with that he stalked away from the camp fire.

  Britt had his answer. His glance at Jim corroborated his interpretation of Brazos’ curt reply. A cold wrench tugged at Britt’s vitals. Dillon had been a fine rider, a good chap, except when under the influence of strong drink. The bottle and evil companions had ruined him. A common story on the ranges! Britt sighed as he mounted.

  “Adios, boys,” he said. “Keep yore eyes peeled, an’ rustle in on time.” Then he rode out into the dark, lonely, melancholy night.

  It was Holly Ripple’s bad luck — and Britt averred that anything untoward for Holly simply multiplied itself for him — to have an east-bound caravan, a troop of dragoons, two tribes of trading Indians, and a band of trappers, all arrive at Don Carlos’ Rancho the week-end before the great party.

  This would have augured ill at any time, but the fact of Holly’s cowboys all riding in, after a month out on the range, made the situation unmanageable.

  The Horn brothers, traders, had always contested the Ripple right to the land upon which their post was situated. Holly objected strongly to the saloon and gambling-hall they maintained, but she did not want to force them off or interfere with their business because there were many advantages in having the trading-post and store near at hand. Caravans and stage-coaches all stopped overnight at the post. Britt had always advised Holly to make the best of it, and so far only ordinary brawls had been the outcome. But this was different. Britt was mightily concerned. All three of his outfits had ridden in late on Friday, and they had clamoured for their wages. He had the money to pay them, but was afraid to do it. With Holly’s annual party only a few days away he was at his wits’ end to meet the situation.

  Saturday morning Britt had breakfast and a conference with Holly, after which, fortified by her forceful instructions and the money for her riders — both of which he intended to keep to himself if possible — he strode valiantly into the big bunk-house. This was a long structure of adobe, with kitchen and storeroom at the back, and in front a single hall-like room, running the full width of the house. It contained twenty-odd bunks in rows of three, one over the other, built out from the wall, very roomy and comfortable. A huge, open fire-place centred the back wall. From a rough-hewn rafter hung a large lamp, under which stood an enormous table.

  As Britt entered, the room appeared to blaze and roar at him. Red blankets and every variety of colourful cowboy accoutrements, and a score of clean, tanned, freshly-shaven faces, leaped at Britt. His entrance, however, stopped the babel of voices.

  “Mawnin’, men,” he said, cheerily, and gazed around the room, trying to be casual. The cowboys sat and lounged and lay everywhere. Brazos, as usual, was the centre of observation, and this time it was in the middle of the floor, where he sat cross-legged like an aborigine. The ruddy-faced Beef Talman inclined his large bulk on the table; Stinger, pale but brighteyed, dangled his bow-legs from a bunk; Cherokee, the Indian, leaned straight and dark against the stone mantel; Handsome Gaines straddled a chair.

  Before Britt could survey half of his outfit, Brazos, in his inimitable manner, claimed attention.

  “Cap, what the hell do you think of a cowboy who throws his sombrero on the floor, hangs up his spurs an’ sprawls aboot with two heavy guns hangin’ low on his thighs?”

  That was a long speech for Brazos. A dancing devil beamed from his blue eyes. Britt had only to hear him and get one glance at his fair and brazen face to know that Brazos was in his happiest and most bewildering mood.

  “Wal, I reckon thet cowboy is some oot of the ordinary,” replied Britt, with a laugh. “Sounds Texan to me. Who you mean, Brazos?”

  “There’s the dog-gone hombre,” rejoined Brazos, pointing. Renn Frayne sat in a chair, tipped back against the window-seat. He was in his shirt-sleeves, and for the rare moment a slight smile gave charm to his leonine features. The whole outfit, except Brazos, had taken to this outlaw. He had been a cowboy for years; he possessed all the qualities that cowboys admired or revered or strove to attain; and his notorious renown sat lightly upon him. Britt caught a twinkle in the half-shut grey eyes, and he felt anew that Frayne was
vastly more than what he had claimed to be — a lone wolf of the ranges. He liked the young, fair-haired firebrand, and he understood him.

  “Brazos,” he began, coolly. “The way you asked Britt that sounds friendly. But really it’s not. It’s a slur. You’re always giving me a dig. I must rub you the wrong way.”

  “Yu do, Frayne,” replied Brazos, flushing as red as an embarrassed girl. Frayne had at last called his bluff.

  “All right. That’s frank. I’m glad you came out in the open. You’re always bragging about putting the cards on the table. Just why do I rub you the wrong way? Can it be because I always pack two guns — that I am Renn Frayne — and you, like an ordinary fool cowboy who’s quick on the draw, want to try me out? I’d be ashamed of you for that. And I don’t believe it. You’re a wild youngster, Brazos, but you are genuine. I like you. I never did you a wrong, or even hurt your feelings, which I know are damned sensitive. So come out with it. What have you against me?”

  “Wal, Frayne, since you push me — not a — thing,” rejoined Brazos, with a hint of contempt for himself, as if he had been driven. “I reckon I’m a cross-grained cuss.”

  Britt felt that he alone understood Brazos’ strange antipathy for Frayne, and that the cowboy had lied. Holly Ripple’s only too evident interest in the most notorious of her men was responsible for it. Frayne, of course, had no inkling of this, and Brazos imagined his secret was safe. Britt welcomed the byplay and hoped it would clarify the atmosphere.

  “Brazos, the last thing we want in this outfit is a disorganizer,” went on Frayne, earnestly. “You never were that kind of a cowboy. I trailed cattle for ten years. I know the game. I know cowboys. And I’m telling you that never again in the West will there be an aggregation such as Britt has gotten together to ride for Miss Ripple. The day will come when you’ll be proud of it. I’m proud now to be one of you. Like Britt, I see what’s coming. We’re older, Brazos, and we look forward. There’s just going to be bloody hell on this range. Some of us will stop lead. But our outfit must not break up from internal strife. It must not, Brazos. Can’t you see that?”

  “I see it better’n I did,” said Brazos, the blue flame of his eyes on Frayne, as if to pierce through the man’s cool, earnest mask. “Shore we mustn’t fight among ourselves.... Frayne, I’ll come clean before the ootfit. I apologize fer naggin’ you. But don’t misunderstand thet naggin’. I never had no hankerin’ to mix draws with you, Frayne. Not me!... An’ heah’s my hand, if you’ll shake.”

  Frayne’s chair crashed to the floor as he moved to meet Brazos half-way. The meeting of this gunman and cowboy held more for Britt than the smoothing out of a rough discord in the outfit. The cowboy’s subtle search for a motive behind Frayne’s impassive refusal to be insulted, for his eloquent appeal for harmony, struck Britt as singularly thought-provoking. Brazos had the keen intuition and perspicuity of a lover. Why should Renn Frayne, one of the marked bad men of the plains, prove so strong and eager to keep Holly Ripple’s great outfit of cowboys intact? As Frayne never looked at Holly, or spoke to her unless addressed, as he had never sat at her famous table or been in her house, and as his indifference had become so marked as to excite comment among his com-panions, it followed then that his stand was simply that of a man.

  “Brazos — Frayne,” sang out Britt, happy for whatever had corrected this rift, “I’m shore glad to see you shake hands. An’ I’ll bet the ootfit is, too.”

  “Boss, give us some pesos an’ we’ll go drink to them, an’ to an outfit thet can’t be busted now,” called out some cowboy unseen by Britt. The voice sounded like Rebel McNulty’s, young brother of the famous Captain McNulty, of the Texas Rangers.

  “He coppered the trick, boss.”

  “Wager a whole month back before we rode out.”

  “Britt, we’re plumb busted.”

  “Aw, come on, Cap, an’ be a good fellar. We all need boots an’ pants.”

  The clamour grew until Britt threw up his hands.

  “Boys, I have the money right heah, but..

  That was a blunder, as Britt deduced by the ensuing uproar. Nevertheless he waved them back and held his ground until they quieted down.

  “Wait! — Brazos, Frayne, Jim — I leave it to you. Is it safe to shell oot yore wages jest four days before Miss Holly’s party?”

  “I reckon so, Cap,” grinned Brazos, slyly.

  “No,” declared Frayne.

  “Boss, I hate to have this pack of range dawgs snappin’ at me, but dog-gone if I’d pay them till after the party,” added Jim, vehemently.

  But these few older heads availed nothing against the young bloods who were hot to spend, to buy, to drink, to gamble. Britt, driven to succumb against his better judgment, drew a chair up to the table, and hauled forth rolls of greenbacks and a handful of gleaming gold.

  “Listen, you dumb-haids!” he yelled. “Miss Holly made me take this money. I didn’t want it fer another week. But she insisted. ‘Pay my cowboys,’ she said. ‘But tell them thet if any one of them comes to my party drunk I’ll never speak to him again!’... There! Thet’s the kind of mistress you have. Do you want yore wages now?”

  “Who’s gonna get drunk?” asked the irrepressible Brazos, with his beautiful smile.

  “Line up, then, an’ let’s get it over,” called Britt, slapping the table. “With two months’ wages comin’ you can all afford to pay each other what you owe.”

  Brazos got his first, and with the gleeful face of an imp, he clanked for the door.

  “Hyar, Brazos,” bawled Laigs Mason. “You owe me ten pesos.”

  “Chase him, Laigs,” said Britt, as he paid the cowboy.

  It was noteworthy that the brothers Tex and Mex Southard, half-breed vaqueros, asked for only “Cinco pesos” each; and the lithe Cherokee, with a smile breaking his sombre bronze, said: “Me take ten dollar.” When they had all rushed out, eager as boys released from school, Britt discovered Frayne leaning on his knee, with his foot up on the window-seat. He was watching the cowboys make down the slope for the village.

  “Frayne, come get yore money,” called Britt. “What was yore wages?”

  “Miss Ripple did not speak of any,” rejoined Frayne, as he turned. “She just asked me to ride for her, and I agreed.”

  “Shore. She overlooked it. Thet’ll annoy her. But I won’t tell her.... How much, Frayne? I’m payin’ the cowboys forty. Jim gets more, an’ so I reckon you should, bein’ older.”

  “Suppose we just pass the wages up.”

  “What?” queried Britt, dumbfounded at the idea of a cowman not wanting his wages.

  “I have plenty of money,” returned Frayne, his voice cool, his face impassive. “My needs are few. I’m through with drink and cards. So never mind wages for me, for the present, anyway.”

  “Miss Holly won’t like thet,” declared Britt dubiously.

  “You won’t tell her.”

  “But Frayne!... See heah, man, you’re not gonna ride away on us?”

  “I gave my word.”

  “Excuse me, I forgot.... But it’s not regular.... Frayne, have this your own way. I don’t savvy you, atall. Think a heap of you, though. Thet was sure fine of you to slap it on our smart-alec Brazos. You jest hit me right. I’d like to get better acquainted with you.”

  “Well, why don’t you?... I’ve an idea, Britt. These boys will go on a tear. Some of them will be drunk for Miss Ripple’s party. I won’t go myself, but I’ll see they’re all sober. I’ll get Cherry to help me. The day of the party we’ll hunt out every drunk or drinking cowboy, and dump him into the creek. It’s cold as ice. Then we’ll tie them in their bunks.”

  “Frayne, you do have idees,” drawled Britt. “Thet’s a darn good one. It’ll work, an’ Miss Holly will be tickled.... But what’s this aboot yore not goin’ to her party?”

  “I’d rather not, Britt.”

  “Why in hell not?”

  “Look here, old timer, do I have to tell you that? I’m no roistering cowboy.
I’m a man with enemies. This rancher, Sewall McCoy, is one of them. He made an outlaw of me. And he’s the crookedest cattleman I ever knew.”

  “Hell you say,” snapped Britt, deeply stirred. “Thet’s news, most interestin’! But what’s it got to do with yore comin’ to Holly’s party?”

  “McCoy might come. Everyone on the range is invited, you know. Or some other enemy of mine might bob up.”

  “Ah-huh. An’ you’d have to draw?”

  “I would. Even at Miss Ripple’s table.”

  “All right. We’ll chance it. You’re comin’. I won’t see Holly hurt.”

  “Nonsense, Britt,” ejaculated Frayne, his composure broken. “How could it possibly matter to her?”

  “Wal, it does. Yore attitude to Holly has already hurt her.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “I knew before she told me.”

  “Vain little Spaniard,” declared Frayne, with heat. “Britt, are you sure you understand your mistress?... I’ve heard all about her affairs. Don’t get me wrong, old timer. Miss Ripple is as good as gold, as proud as her mother, as fine as the Colonel must have been. But she’s a spoiled girl. She is a flirt. She is like a princess. She wants all these cowboys to adore her, bow down to her. Well, I won’t do it. I daresay she made a sort of hero out of me. But I’m no hero, nor a romancing cowboy to be made eyes at. I’ve forgotten who I was, but I’ll never forget what I am. Is that plain, Britt?”

  “Plain as print,” retorted the foreman. “You figger Holly right, as she was. But thet girl has changed lately. I wouldn’t swear it’s permanent. An’ I wouldn’t swear you had all to do with it. Only you shore had somethin’.... An’ I’m remindin’ you, Frayne, thet so far as her respect fer you is concerned, an’ mine, yore past doesn’t count. I’m remindin’ you thet this is New Mexico in seventy-four with hell aboot to pop heah. What we need oot heah is men. What Holly Ripple will need sooner or later is a man. She’s blood of the West. A few years now an’ this wild frontier will slow up. If you live, an’ if you air loyal to Holly — which means turn yore back square against yore past — you’ll have as good a chance with her as Brazos or any other cowboy. An’ from cowboys Holly Ripple will choose her mate!”