by B. M. Bower
WHEN THE COOK FELL ILL
It was four o'clock, and there was consternation in the round-up campof the Flying U; when one eats breakfast before dawn--July dawn atthat--covers thirty miles of rough country before eleven o'clock dinnerand as many more after, supper seems, for the time being, the mostimportant thing in the life of a cowboy.
Men stood about in various dejected attitudes, their thumbs tuckedinside their chap-belts, blank helplessness writ large upon theirperturbed countenances--they were the aliens, hired but to make a fullcrew during round-up. Long-legged fellows with spurs a-jingle hurriedin and out of the cook-tent, colliding often, shouting futilequestions, commands and maledictions--they were the Happy Family:loyal, first and last to the Flying U, feeling a certain degree ofproprietorship and a good deal of responsibility.
Happy Jack was fanning an incipient blaze in the sheet-iron stove withhis hat, his face red and gloomy at the prospect of having to satisfyfifteen outdoor appetites with his amateur attempts at cooking. Behindthe stove, writhing bulkily upon a hastily unrolled bed, lay Patsy,groaning most pitiably.
"What the devil's the matter with that hot water?" Cal Emmett yelled atHappy Jack from the bedside, where he was kneeling sympathetically.
Happy Jack removed his somber gaze from the licking tongue of flamewhich showed in the stove-front. "Fire ain't going good, yet," he saidin a matter-of-fact tone which contrasted sharply with Cal'sexcitement. "Teakettle's dry, too. I sent a man to the crick for abucket uh water; he'll be back in a minute."
"Well, _move_! If it was you tied in a knot with cramp, yuh wouldn'ttake it so serene."
"Aw, gwan. I got troubles enough, cooking chuck for this here layout.I got to have some help--and lots of it. Patsy ain't got enough stuffcooked up to feed a jack-rabbit. Somebody's got to mosey in here andpeel the spuds."
"That's your funeral," said Cal, unfeelingly.
Chip stuck his head under the lifted tent-flap. "Say, I can't findthat cussed Three-H bottle," he complained. "What went with it, Cal?"
"Ask Slim; he had it last. Ain't Shorty here, yet?" Cal turned againto Patsy, whose outcries were not nice to listen to, "Stay with it,old-timer; we'll have something hot to pour down yuh in a minute."
Patsy replied, but pain made him incoherent. Cal caught the word"poison", and then "corn"; the rest of the sentence was merely asuccession of groans.
The face of Cal lengthened perceptibly. He got up and went out towhere the others were wrangling with Slim over the missing bottle ofliniment.
"I guess the old boy's up against it good and plenty," he announcedgravely. "He says he's poisoned; he says it was the corn."
"Well he had it coming to him," declared Jack Pates. "He's stuck thatdarned canned corn under our noses every meal since round-up started.He--"
"Oh, shut up," snarled Cal. "I guess it won't be so funny if he cashesin on the strength of it. I've known two or three fellows that waslaid out cold with tin-can poison. It's sure fierce."
The Happy Family shifted uneasily before the impending tragedy, andtheir faces paled a little; for nearly every man of the range dreadsptomaine poisoning more than the bite of a rattler. One can kill arattler, and one is always warned of its presence; but one never cantell what dire suffering may lurk beneath the gay labels of cannedgoods. But since one must eat, and since canned vegetables are far andaway better than no vegetables at all, the Happy Family ate and tooktheir chance--only they did not eat canned corn, and they had discussedthe matter profanely and often with Patsy.
Patsy was a slave of precedent. Many seasons had he cooked beneath around-up tent, and never had he stocked the mess-wagon for a long tripand left canned corn off the list. It was good to his palate and itwas easy to prepare, and no argument could wean him from imperturbablyopening can after can, eating plentifully of it himself and throwingthe rest to feed the gophers.
"Ain't there anything to give him?" asked Jack, relenting. "ThatThree-H would fix him up all right--"
"Dig it up, then," snapped Cal. "There's sure something got to bedone, or we'll have a dead cook on our hands."
"Not even a drop uh whisky in camp!" mourned Weary. "Slim, you oughtto be killed for getting away with that liniment."
Slim was too downhearted to resent the tone. "By golly, I can't thinkwhat I done with it after I used it on Banjo. Seems like I stood it onthat rock--"
"Oh, hell!" snorted Cal. "That's forty miles back."
"Say, it's sure a fright!" sympathized Jack Bates as a muffled shriekcame through the cloth wall of the tent. "What's good for tincaneetis,I wonder?"
"A rattling good doctor," retorted Chip, throwing things recklesslyabout, still searching. "There goes the damn butter--pick it up, Cal."
"If old Dock was sober, he could do something," suggested Weary. "Iguess I'd better go after him; what do yuh think?"
"He could send out some stuff--if he was sober enough; he's sure wiseon medicine."
Weary made him a cigarette. "Well, it's me for Dry Lake," he said,crisply. "I reckon Patsy can hang on till I get back; can poisondoesn't do the business inside several hours, and he hasn't been sicklong. He was all right when Happy Jack hit camp about two o'clock.I'll be back by dark--I'll ride Glory." He swung up on the nearesthorse, which happened to be Chip's and raced out to the saddle bunch aquarter of a mile away. The Happy Family watched him go and calledafter him, urging him unnecessarily to speed.
Weary did not waste time having the bunch corralled but rode in amongthe horses, his rope down and ready for business. Glory staredcuriously, tossed his crimpled, silver mane, dodged a second too lateand found himself caught.
It was unusual, this interruption just when he was busy cropping sweetgrasses and taking his ease, but he supposed there was some good reasonfor it; at any rate he submitted quietly to being saddled and merelynipped Weary's shoulder once and struck out twice with an ivory-white,daintily rounded hoof--and Weary was grateful for the docile mood heshowed.
He mounted hurriedly without a word of praise or condemnation, and hissilence was to Glory more unusual than being roped and saddled on therange. He seemed to understand that the stress was great, and fairlybolted up the long, western slope of the creek bottom straight towardthe slant of the sun.
For two miles he kept the pace unbroken, though the way was not of thesmoothest and there was no trail to follow. Straight away to the west,with fifteen miles of hills and coulees between, lay Dry Lake; and inDry Lake lived the one man in the country who might save Patsy.
"Old Dock" was a land-mark among old-timers. The oldest pioneer foundDock before him among the Indians and buffalo that ran riot over thewind-brushed prairie where now the nation's beef feeds quietly. Why hewas there no man could tell; he was a fresh-faced young Frenchman withmuch knowledge of medicine and many theories, and a reticenceun-French. From the Indians he learned to use strange herbs thathealed almost magically the ills of man; from the rough out-croppingsof civilization he learned to swallow vile whiskey in great gulps, andto thirst always for more.
So he grew old while the West was yet young, until Dry Lake, which grewup around him, could not remember him as any but a white-bearded,stooped, shuffling old man who spoke a queer jargon and was always justgetting drunk or sober. When he was sober his medicines never failedto cure; when he was drunk he could not be induced to prescribe, sothat men trusted his wisdom at all times and tolerated his infirmities,and looked upon him with amused proprietorship.
When Weary galloped up the trail which, because a few habitations arestrewn with fine contempt of regularity upon either side, is called bycourtesy a street, his eyes sought impatiently for the familiar,patriarchal figure of Old Dock. He felt that minutes were worth muchand that if he would save Patsy he must cut out all superfluities, sohe resolutely declined to remember that cold, foamy beer refreshes oneamazingly after a long, hot ride in the dust and the wind.
Upon the porch of Rusty Brown's place men were gathered, and it wasevident ev
en at a distance that they were mightily amused. Wearyheaded for the spot and stopped beside the hitching pole. Old Dockstood in the center of the group and his bent old figure was tremblingwith rage. With both hands he waved aloft his coat, on which wasplastered a sheet of "tangle-foot" fly-paper.
"Das wass de mean treeck!" he was shouting. "I don'd do de harm wis nomans. I tend mine business, I buy me mine clothes. De mans wass dodees treeck, he buy me new clothes--you bet you! Dass wass de mean--"
"Say, Dock," broke in Weary, towering over him, "you dig up some dopefor tin-can poison, and do it quick. Patsy's took bad."
Old Dock looked up at him and shook his shaggy, white beard. "Das wassde mean treeck," he repeated, waving the coat at Weary. "You see dass?Mine coat, she ruint; dass was new coat!"
"All right--I'll take your word for it, Dock. Tell me what's good fortin--"
"Aw, I knows you fellers. You t'inke Ole Dock, she Dock, she don'dknow nothings! You t'ink--"
Weary sighed and turned to the crowd. "Which end of a jag is this?" hewanted to know. "I've got to get some uh that dope-wisdom out uh him,somehow. Patsy's a goner, sure, if I don't connect with some medicine."
The men crowded close and asked questions which Weary felt bound toanswer; everyone knew Patsy, who was almost as much a part of Dry Lakescenery as was Old Dock, and it was gratifying to a Flying-U man to seethe sympathy in their faces. But Patsy needed something more potentthan sympathy, and the minutes were passing.
Old Dock still discoursed whimperingly upon the subject of his ruinedcoat and the meanness of mankind, and there was no weaning his interestfor a moment, try as Weary would. And fifteen miles away in apicturesque creek-bottom a man lay dying in great pain for want of onelittle part of the wisdom stored uselessly away in the brain of thisdrunken, doddering old man.
Weary's gloved hand dropped in despair from Old Dock's bent shoulder."Damn a drunkard!" he said bitterly, and got into the saddle. "Rusty,I'll want to borrow that calico cayuse uh yours. Have him saddled upright away, will yuh? I'll be back in a little bit."
He jerked his hat down to his eyebrows and struck Glory with the quirt;but the trail he took was strange to Glory and he felt impelled to stopand argue--as only Glory could argue--with his master. Minutes passedtumultuously, with nothing accomplished save some weird hoof-prints inthe sod. Eventually, however, Glory gave over trying to stand upon hishead and his hind feet at one and the same instant, and permittedhimself to be guided toward a certain tiny, low-eaved cabin in a meadowjust over the hill from the town.
Weary was not by nature given to burglary, but he wrenched open thedoor of the cabin and went in with not a whisper of conscience to sayhim nay. It was close and ill-smelling and very dirty inside, butafter the first whiff Weary did not notice it. He went over andstopped before a little, old-fashioned chest; it was padlocked, so heleft that as a last resort and searched elsewhere for what hewanted--medicine. Under the bed he found a flat, black case, such asold-fashioned doctors carried. He drew it out and examined ifcritically. This, also, was locked, but he shook it tentatively andheard the faintest possible jingle inside.
"Bottles," he said briefly, and grinned satisfaction. Somethingbrushed against his hat and he looked up into a very dusty bunch ofherbs. "You too," he told them, breaking the string with one yank."For all I know, yuh might stand ace-high in this game. Lord! if Icould trade brains with the old devil, just for to-night!"
He took a last look around, decided that he had found all he wanted,and went out and pulled the door shut. Then he tied the black medicinecase to the saddle in a way that would give it the least jar, stuffedthe bunch of dried herbs into his pocket and mounted for the homewardrace. As he did so the sun threw a red beam into his eyes as thoughreminding him of the passing hours, and ducked behind the ridge whichbounds Lonesome Prairie on the east.
The afterglow filled sky and earth with a soft, departing radiance whenhe stopped again in front of the saloon. Old Doc was stillgesticulating wildly, and the sheet of fly-paper still clung to theback of his coat. The crowd had thinned somewhat and displayed lessinterest; otherwise the situation had not changed, except that a pintopony stood meekly, with head drooping, at the hitching-pole.
"There's your horse," Rusty Brown called to Weary. "Yours played out?"
"Not on your life," Weary denied proudly. "When yuh see Glory playedout, you'll see him with four feet in the air."
"I seen him that way half an hour ago, all right," bantered Bert Rogers.
Weary passed over the joke. "Mamma! Has it been that long?" he crieduneasily. "I've got to be moving some. Here, Dock, you put on thatcoat--and never mind the label; it's got to go--and so have you."
"Aw, he's no good to yuh, Weary," they protested. "He's too drunk totell chloroform from dried apricots."
"That'll be all right," Weary assured them confidently. "I guess he'llbe some sober by the time we hit camp. I went and dug up his dope-box,so he can get right to work when he arrives. Send him out here."
"Say, he can't never top off Powderface, Weary. I thought yuh wasgoing to ride him yourself. It's plumb wicked to put that oldcenturion on him. He wouldn't be able to stay with him a mile."
"That's a heap farther than he could get with Glory," said Weary,unmoved. "Yuh don't seem to realize that Patsy's just next thing to adead man, and Dock has got the name of what'll cure him sloshing aroundamongst all that whiskey in his head. I can't wait for him to soberup--I'm just plumb obliged to take him along, jag and all. Come on,Dock; this is a lovely evening for a ride."
Dock objected emphatically with head, arms, legs and much mixeddialect. But Weary climbed down and, with the help of Bert Rogers,carried him bodily and lifted him into the saddle. When the pintobegan to offer some objections, strong hands seized his bridle and heldhim angrily submissive.
"He'll tumble off, sure as yuh live," predicted Bert; but Weary neverdid things by halves; he shook his head and untied his coiled rope.
"By the Lord! I hate to see a man ride into town and pack off the onlyheirloom we got," complained Rusty Brown. "Dock's been handed downfrom generation to Genesis, and there ain't hardly a scratch on him.If yuh don't bring him back in good order Weary Davidson, there'll bethings doing."
Weary looked up from taking the last half-hitch around the saddle horn."Yuh needn't worry," he said. "This medical monstrosity is morevaluable to me than he is to you, right now. I'll handle him careful."
"Das wass de mean treeck!" cried Dock, for all the world like a parrot.
"It sure is, old boy," assented Weary cheerfully, and tied the pinto'sbridle-reins into a hard knot at the end. With the reins in his handhe mounted Glory. "Your pinto'll lead, won't he?" he asked Rusty then.It was like Weary to take a thing for granted first, and ask questionsabout it afterward.
"Maybe he will--he never did, so far," grinned Rusty. "It's plumbinsulting to a self-respecting cow-pony to make a pack-horse out uhhim. I wouldn't be none surprised if yuh heard his views on thesubjects before yuh git there."
"It's an honor to pack heirlooms," retorted Weary. "So-long, boys."
Old Dock made a last, futile effort to free himself and then settleddown in the saddle and eyed the world sullenly from under frost-whiteeyebrows heavy as a military mustache. He did not at that time lookparticularly patriarchal; more nearly he resembled a humbled, entrappedSanta Claus.
They started off quite tamely. The pinto leaned far back upon thebridle-reins and trotted with stiff, reluctant legs that did notpromise speed; but still h went, and Weary drew a relieved breath. Hisarm was like to ache frightfully before they covered a quarter of thefifteen miles, but he did not mind that much; besides, he guessedshrewdly that the pinto would travel better once they were well out oftown.
The soft, warm dusk of a July evening crept over the land and a fewstars winked at them facetiously. Over by the reedy creek, frogs_cr-ek-ek-ekked_ in a tuneless medley and night-hawks flapped silentlythrough the still air,
swooping suddenly with a queer, whooing rushlike wind blowing through a cavern. Familiar sounds they were toWeary--so familiar that he scarce heard them; though he would have felta vague, uneasy sense of something lost had they stilled unexpectedly.Out in the lane which leads to the open range-land between wide reachesof rank, blue-joint meadows, a new sound met them--the faint, insistenthumming of millions of mosquitoes. Weary dug Glory with his spurs andcame near having his arm jerked from its socket before he could pullhim in again. He swore a little and swung round in the saddle.
"Can't yuh dig a little speed into that cayuse with your heels, Dock?"he cried to the resentful heirloom. "We're going to be naturallychewed up if we don't fan the breeze along here."
"Ah don'd care--das wass de mean treeck!" growled Dock into his beard.
Weary opened his mouth, came near swallowing a dozen mosquitoes alive,and closed it again. What would it profit him to argue with a drunkenman? He slowed till the pinto, still moving with stiff, reluctantknees, came alongside, and struck him sharply with his quirt; the pintosidled and Dock lurched over as far as Weary's rope would permit.
"Come along, then!" admonished Weary, under his breath.
The pinto snorted and ran backward until Weary wished he had beencontent with the pace of a snail. Then the mosquitoes swooped downupon them in a cloud and Glory struck out, fighting and kickingviciously. Presently Weary found himself with part of the pinto'sbridle-rein in his hand, and the memory of a pale object disappearinginto the darkness ahead.
For the time being he was wholly occupied with his own horse; but whenGlory was minded to go straight ahead instead of in a circle, he gavethought to his mission and thanked the Lord that Dock was headed in theright direction. He gave chase joyfully; for every mile covered inthat fleet fashion meant an added chance for Patsy's life. Even themosquitoes found themselves hopelessly out of the race and beat upharmlessly in the rear. So he galloped steadily upon the homewardtrail; and a new discomfort forced itself upon his consciousness--thediscomfort of swift riding while a sharp-cornered medicine-case ofgenerous proportions thumped regularly against his leg. At first hedid not mind it so much, but after ten minutes of riding so, the thinggrew monotonously painful and disquieting to the nerves.
Five miles from the town he sighted the pinto; it was just disappearingup a coulee which led nowhere--much less to camp. Weary'sself-congratulatory mood changed to impatience; he followed after. Twomiles, and he reached the unclimbable head of the coulee--and no pinto.He pulled up and gazed incredulously at the blank, sandstone walls;searched long for some hidden pathway to the top and gave it up.
He rode back slowly under the stars, a much disheartened Weary. Hethought of Patsy's agony and gritted his teeth at his own impotence.After awhile he thought of Old Dock lashed to the pinto's saddle, andhis conscience awoke and badgered him unmercifully for the thing he haddone and the risk he had taken with one man's life that he might savethe life of another.
Down near the mouth of the coulee he came upon a cattle trail windingup toward the stars. For the lack of a better clue he turned into itand urged Glory faster than was wise if he would save the strength ofhis horse; but Glory was game as long as he could stand, and took thehill at a lope with never a protest against the pace.
Up on the top the prairie stretched mysteriously away to the sky-line,with no sound to mar the broody silence, and with never a movement todisturb the deep sleep of the grass-land. All day had the hills beenbuffeted by a sweeping West wind; but the breeze had dropped with thesun, as though tired with roistering and slept without so much as adream-puff to shake the dew from the grasses.
Weary stopped to wind his horse and to listen, but not a hoof-beat cameto guide him in his search. He leaned and shifted the medicine case abit to ease his bruised leg, and wished he might unlock the healingmysteries and the magic stored within. It seemed to him a cruel worldand unjust that knowledge must be gleaned slowly, laboriously, whilemen died miserably for want of it. Worse, that men who had gleanedshould be permitted to smother such precious knowledge in thestupefying fumes of whiskey.
If he could only have appropriated Dock's brain along with hismedicines, he might have been in camp by now, ministering to Patsybefore it was too late to do anything. Without a doubt the boys werescanning anxiously the ridge, confident that he would not fail themthough impatient for his coming. And here he sat helplessly upon ahilltop under the stars, many miles from camp, with much medicine justunder his knee and a pocket crammed with an unknown, healing herb, asuseless after all his effort as he had been in camp when they could notfind the Three-H liniment.
Glory turned his head and regarded him gravely out of eyes near humanin their questioning, and Weary laid caressing hand upon his silverymane, grateful for the sense of companionship which it gave.
"You're sure a wise little nag." he said wistfully, and his voicesounded strange in the great silence. "Maybe you can find 'em--and ityou can, I'll sure be grateful; you can paw the stars out uh highheaven and I won't take my quirt off my saddle-horn; hope I may die ifI do!"
Glory stamped one white hoof and pointed both ears straight forward,threw up his head and whinnied a shrill question into the night. Wearyhopefully urged him with his knees. Glory challenged once again andstruck out eagerly, galloping lightly in spite of the miles he hadcovered. Far back on the bench-land came faint answer to his call, andWeary laughed from sheer relief. By the stars the night was yet young,and he grew hopeful--almost complacent.
Glory planted both forefeet deep in the prairie sod and skidded on thebrink of a deep cut-bank. It was a close shave, such as comes often tothose who ride the range by night. Weary looked down into blacknessand then across into gloom. The place was too deep and sheer to rideinto, and too wide to jump; clearly, they must go around it.
Going around a gulley is not always the simple thing it sounds,especially when one is not sure as to the direction it takes. To findthe head under such conditions requires time.
Weary thought he knew the place and turned north secure in the beliefthat the gulley ran south into the coulee he had that eveningfruitlessly explored. As a matter of fact it opened into a couleenorth of them, and in that direction it grew always deeper and moreimpassable even by daylight.
On a dark night, with only the stars to guide one and to accentuate thedarkness, such a discovery brings with it confusion of locality. Wearydrew up when he could go no farther without plunging headlong intoblackness, and mentally sketched a map of that particular portion ofthe globe and tried to find in it a place where the gulch mightconsistently lie. After a minute he gave over the attempt and admittedto himself that, according to his mental map, it could not consistentlylie anywhere at all. Even Glory seemed to have lost interest in thequest and stood listlessly with his head down. His attitude irritatedWeary very much.
"Yuh damn', taffy colored cayuse!" he said fretfully. "This is as muchyour funeral as mine--seeing yuh started out all so brisk to find thatpinto. Do yah suppose yuh could find a horse if he was staked ten feetin front of your nose? Chances are, yuh couldn't. I reckon you'd havetrouble finding your way around the little pasture at the ranch--unlessthe sun shone real bright and yuh had somebody to lead yuh!"
This was manifestly unjust and it was not like Weary; but this night'smission was getting on his nerves. He leaned and shifted themedicine-case again, and felt ruefully of his bruised leg. That alsowas getting upon his nerves.
"Oh, Mamma!" he muttered disgustedly. "This is sure a sarcasticlayout; dope enough here to cure all the sickness in Montana--if afellow knew enough to use it--battering a hole in my leg you couldthrow a yearling calf into, and me wandering wild over the hills like alocoed sheepherder! Glory, you get a move on yuh, you knock-kneed,buzzard-headed--" He subsided into incoherent grumbling and rode backwhence he came, up the gully's brim.
When the night was far gone and the slant of the Great Dipper told himthat day-dawn was near, he heard a horse nicker wistfully, awa
y to theright. Wheeling sharply, his spurs raking the roughened sides ofGlory, he rode recklessly toward the sound, not daring to hope that itmight be the pinto and yet holding his mind back from despair.
When he was near the place--so near that he could see a dim, formlessshape outlined against the sky-line,--Glory stumbled over a sunken rockand fell heavily upon his knees. When he picked himself up he hobbledand Weary cursed him unpityingly.
When, limping painfully, Glory came up with the object, the heart ofWeary rose up and stuck in his throat; for the object was a pinto horseand above it bulked the squat figure of an irate old man.
"Hello, Dock," greeted Weary. "How do yuh stack up?"
"_Mon Dieu_, Weary Davitson, I feex yous plandy. What for do you deest'ing? I not do de harrm wis you. I not got de mooney wort' all deestroubles what you makes. Dees horse, she lak for keel me also. Shebuck, en keeck, en roon--_mon Dieu_, I not like dees t'ing."
"Sober, by thunder!" ejaculated Weary in an ecstatic half-whisper."Dock, you've got a chance to make a record for yourself to-night--ifwe ain't too late," he added bodefully. "Do yuh know where we'reheaded for?"
"I t'ink for de devil," retorted Old Dock peevishly.
"No sir, we aren't. We're going straight to camp, and you're going tosave old Patsy--you like Patsy, you know; many's the time you've tankedup together and then fell on each other's necks and wept because thegood old times won't come again. He got poisoned on canned corn; theLord send he ain't too dead for you to cure him. Come on--we betterhit the breeze. We've lost a heap uh time."
"I not like dees rope; she not comforte. I have ride de bad horse whenyou wass in cradle."
Weary got down and went over to him. "All right, I'll unwind yuh.When we started, yuh know, yuh couldn't uh rode a rocking chair. I wasplumb obliged to tie yuh on. Think we'll be in time to help Patsy? Hewas taken sick about four o'clock."
Old Dock waited till he was untied and the remnant of bridle-rein wasplaced in his hand, before he answered ironically: "I not do de mageec,_mon cher_ Weary. I mos' have de medicine or I can do nottings, I notwave de fingaire an' say de vord."
"That's all right--I've got the whole works. I broke into your shackand made a clean haul uh dope. And I want to tell yuh that for adoctor you've got blame poor ventilation to your house. But I foundthe medicine."
"Mon Dieu!" was the astonished comment, and after that they rode insilence and such haste as Glory's lameness would permit.
The first beams of the sun were touching redly the hilltops and thebirds were singing from swaying weeds when they rode down the lastslope into the valley where camped the Flying-U.
The night-hawk had driven the horses into the rope-corral and men wereinside watching, with spread loop, for a chance to throw. Happy Jack,with the cook's apron tied tightly around his lank middle, stooddespondently in the doorway of the mess-tent and said no word as theyapproached. In his silence--in his very presence there--Weary readdisaster.
"I guess we're too late," he told Dock, in hushed tones; for the minutehe hated the white-bearded old man whose drunkenness had cost theFlying-U so dear. He slipped wearily from the saddle and let the reinsdrop to the ground. Happy Jack still eyed them silently.
"Well?" asked Weary, when his nerves would bear no more.
"When I git sick," said Happy Jack, his voice heavy with reproach,"I'll send you for help--if I want to die."
"Is he dead?" questioned Weary, in hopeless fashion.
"Well," said Happy Jack deliberately, "no, he ain't dead yet--but it'sno thanks to you. Was it poker, or billiards? and who won?"
Weary looked at him dully a moment before he comprehended. He had nothad any supper or any deep, and he had ridden many miles in the longhours he had been away. He walked, with a pronounced limp on the legwhich had been next the medicine-case, to where Dock stood leaningshakily against the pinto.
"Maybe we're in time, after all," he said slowly. "Here's some kind uhdried stuff I got off the ceiling; I thought maybe yuh might needit--you're great on Indian weeds." He pulled a crumpled, faintlyaromatic bundle of herbs from his pocket.
Dock took it and sniffed disgustedly, and dropped the herbscontemptuously to the ground. "Dat not wort' notting--she what youcall--de--cat_neep_." He smiled sourly.
Weary cast a furtive glance at Happy Jack, and hoped he had notoverheard. Catnip! Still, how could he be expected to know what theblamed stuff was? He untied the black medicine-case and brought it andput it at the feet of Old Dock. "Well, here's the joker, anyhow," hesaid. "It like to wore a hole clear through my leg, but I was carefuland I don't believe any uh the bottles are busted."
Dock looked at it and sat heavily down upon a box. He looked at thecase queerly, then lifted his shaggy head to gaze up at Weary. Andbehind the bleared gravity of his eyes was something very like atwinkle. "Dis, she not cure seek mans, neider. She--" He pressed atiny spring which Weary had not discovered and laid the case open uponthe ground. "You see?" he said plaintively. "She not good forPatsy--she tree-dossen can-openaire."
Weary stared blankly. Happy Jack came up, looked and doubledconvulsively. Can-openers! Three dozen of them. Old Dock wasexplaining in his best English, and he was courteously refraining fromthe faintest smile.
"Dey de new, bettaire kind. I send for dem, I t'ink maybe I sell. Iput her in de grip--so--I carry dem all togedder. My mediceen, she inde beeg ches'."
Weary had sat down and his head was dropped dejectedly into his hands.He had bungled the whole thing, after all. "Well," he saidapathetically. "The chest was locked; I never opened it."
Old Dock nodded his head gravely. "She lock," he assented, gently."She mooch mediceen--she wort' mooch mooney. De key, she in minepocket--" "Oh, I don't give a damn where the key is--now," flaredWeary. "I guess Patsy'll have to cash in; that's all."
"Aw, gwan!" cried Happy Jack. "A sheepman come along just after youleft, and he had a quart uh whisky. We begged it off him and givePatsy a good bit jolt. That eased him up some, and we give himanother--and he got to hollerin' so loud for more uh the same, so wejust set the bottle in easy reach and let him alone. He's in therenow, drunk as a biled owl--the lazy old devil. I had to get supper andbreakfast too--and looks like I'd have to cook dinner. Poison--hell!I betche he never had nothing but a plain old belly-ache!"
Weary got up and went to the mess-tent, lifted the flap and looked inupon Patsy lying on the flat of his back, snoring comfortably. Heregarded him silently a moment, then looked over his shoulder to whereOld Dock huddled over the three dozen can-openers.
"Oh, mamma!" he whispered, and poured himself a cup of coffee.