by Zane Grey
“Les, you’re a sweet kid, but kinda knot-haided an’ dotty.”
“I’m nothing of the kind. You’ve worried Dad, and Sterl is hurt …deeply hurt. I thought you were his pard, his devoted friend.”
“Wal, Les, a man’s feelin’s get worked on out in the open. An’ this country is gonna be tough. Me an’ Sterl don’t agree on some things.”
“But Sterl is right. Any fool could see that.”
“I must be one, then,’ cause I cain’t see it.”
“Oh, you’ve been drinking. I saw a bottle sticking out of your pocket. Drink changes men. It does Dad. And I ran from Ormiston, when he’d been drinking.”
“You’d better run from me, pronto, or I’ll spank the daylights out of you.”
“You…you…!” Leslie was too amazed and furious to find words. She looked around to see how Sterl, and her parents took this offense. They could not help hearing. Mrs. Slyter called for Leslie to leave the campfire. Sterl sat with bowed head. Her father smoked calmly, his back to the fire. Leslie found her voice, and her dignity. “Mister Krehl, some things are evident, and one is that you’re no gentleman. You leave my campfire, or I will.”
Day came, and the guards trooped in to breakfast. Red did not show up at Slyter’s camp until time to drive the herd across the stream. The wagons crossed only hub deep at a bar below camp. But the cattle were put to the deep water. The take-off was steep, and many of the steers leaped only to go under. Splashing, cracking horns, bawling, the mob swam across, then waded out. The horses, following in the deep trough cut into the bank, trooped down to take their plunge.
It was well Sterl had an oilskin cover over his rifle as King went in, up to his neck. The black loved the water. Leslie came last. She bestrode Duke who hated water, but showed that he could not be left behind. He pranced, he reared.
“Come on, Les,” called Sterl cheerily. “Give him the steel.”
“OK,” trilled the girl, spirited and sure. She spurred the big sorrel, and he plunged to go clear under, letting the swirling water come above Leslie’s waist. She kept her seat. The sorrel came up with a snort and swam powerfully. Leslie caught up with Sterl, who had held King back. “Oooo! It’s cold,” cried Leslie.
“All in the day’s ride, cowgirl,” called Sterl.
“Dog-gone it, I wet my biscuits,” was Leslie’s reply.
They waded out on the heels of the herd, already stringing ahead in line with Drake and his drovers. The rear-end of the wedge was narrow, holding Sterl and comrades relatively close together. Friday walked between Sterl and the girl. The horses slowed down, their noses reaching for the grass, and then began the long slow day’s trek. Half a mile or more to their right, the other mobs spread across the floor of the valley, a ponderously moving mass. The course of the winding stream could be located by the lines of stately eucalyptus trees. Kangaroos were conspicuous for their absence. A flock of blackbirds, rising, swooping, settling, followed the cattle. Flocks of parrots sped overhead like bullets with their whistling flight. Trees were white with squalling cockatoos. Birds of prey sailed high in the air on the scent for meat.
At last the sun rose high enough to be warm and to dry wet garments. At noon it was hot. By the almost imperceptible increase in temperature and the changing nature of the verdure, Sterl became aware of the tropics. He saw strange trees and flowering shrubs along with those he already knew. No mile passed that he did not observe a beautifully plumaged bird that was new. On a bare slope his sharp eyes located a herd of brumbies, as Jones had called them.
Leslie rode over to offer Sterl one of her wet biscuits. She had recovered from her shyness, or else in the broad sunlight and mounted on a horse that would jump at a touch she had something of audacity. Presently he chased her back toward her station, when with her eyes flashing back and her sombrero swinging, she sang out: “Sterl, what was it you called me last night?”
He waved her away, almost convinced of her developing coquettishness. He would play more than square with this kid, he thought, but he grew more aware of her captivating charm and freshness as the nights and days passed. He had no illusion about any cowboy, even himself. Yet he was disgusted with being wooed so easily from a lamentable love affair. He should hate all women. And then presently he forgot Leslie, and did not think of her even when he saw her, lax and dreaming in her saddle.
Afternoon was waning when Sterl sighted far ahead two large, colorful mounds, one scarlet, the other gold. And he had to ride another mile before he discerned them to be trees in blossom. The gold one was, of course, a wattle.
Sunset had come and passed when the main mob ceased to move, indicating that the drovers on the right had halted for camp. Slyter followed suit, and, when his lengthy herd had massed again, he loped in behind his comrades.
It was almost dusk when Sterl arrived, too late to see clearly the scarlet and gold trees. Jones, having come to appreciate Sterl’s weakness, had halted his wagon in the lea of the flaming tree, at which Sterl gazed with wonder and admiration. Red sat his horse, waiting.
“Pard,” he said, low-voiced, as Sterl halted close, “I’ll eat with thet other outfit tonight. Meet you at the big campfire after supper. Spring the dodge then, but, as I told you, don’t sock me too hard, or I’ll get sore.”
“Depends on how mean you get,” replied Sterl with a mirthless laugh. “Red, honest Injun, I don’t like the dodge.”
“Hell, no! But, pard, it’s for them, an’ us, too,” Red returned sharply. “It’s our deal, an’ I’ve stacked the cairds. Play the game, you!”
Red rode away at a swinging canter. That last from him stirred Sterl out of his lethargy. One of Red’s great qualities was the virtue of never deviating from a set course of action once decided. Sterl felt justly reproved.
King, turned loose, made for the bare spot where Duke and another horse were rolling. With a heave King thumped down, and in one single motion he rolled clear over, and with another he rolled back, which quick and powerful act, in a cowboy’s opinion, argued for a great horse. Friday helped Sterl pitch the tent. Darkness descended, and the cook pounded a kettle to call all to supper. Leslie omitted her usual custom of waiting on Sterl, then eating with him.
Stanley Dann’s community campfire blazed brightly in the center of a circle of bronzed faces. In addition to the six partners there were present a score or more of the drovers. Dann had barbecued a beef. It hung, revolving, over a pit full of red-hot coals. The hour was the early evening before night guard. Sterl, purposely late, took in this scene, appreciative of its rugged beauty and significance. He observed other things, too, one of which, Ormiston’s attention to Leslie, added a slumbering resentment to his mood.
In the merriment that prevailed Sterl’s soft step was not heard, as he came up behind Ormiston to hear him say: “But Leslie, my sweet girl, surely you cannot hold that against me?”
Sterl could not see her face, but her silent acceptance of Ormiston’s speech inflamed Sterl. He smothered an impulse to kick the man with all his might. Probably Red’s arrival, more than his restraint, checked the precipitation of an issue that was bound to come. There were two drovers with Red, trying to hold him back, as he wrestled good-naturedly with them and broke out in loud, lazy voice: “Dog-gone it, fellers. Lemme be. Wasser masser with you? I’m a ladies’ man…I am…an’ I’ve seen some punkins in my day.”
His companions let him go and kept back out of the circle of light. Krehl made a picturesque figure of rough life out on the range. How vividly he recalled to Sterl many and many a fire-spirited cowboy, under the influence of the bottle, humorous and harmless, unless inflamed. But Red was not drunk. And Sterl nerved himself to the pre-arranged split between Red and himself.
Red, however, shouldered Ormiston aside, to bend over Leslie, no doubt inspired by unexpected opportunity. “Les, I been huntin’ you all over this heah dog-gone camp,” Red said with a gallant tone.
“I’ve been here, Red,” replied Leslie quickly, evidently glad to welcome him, drunk or
sober. “Come, sit down.”
“You shore air my sweet lil’ girl fren’,” Red returned gleefully.
What his next move might have been did not transpire, for Ormiston confronted him belligerently. Sterl’s alert eye had caught the drover scrutinizing Red for the gun usually in plain sight. Tonight it was absent. Ormiston shoved Red violently. He had not seen Sterl, and here apparently was a golden opportunity, not by any means to be lost. “You drunken Yankee pup! This is an English girl, not one of your trail-drabs to mouth over.”
Sterl did not risk Red’s reaction to that. He leaped between them, facing Ormiston. “Careful, you fool!” he called piercingly, in a voice that silenced the others. “Haven’t you any sense? Krehl has killed men for less.”
Opposition to Ormiston, the sudden menace, checked any further motion or word toward Red.
“He’s drunk,” rejoined the drover presently. “His presence here, his familiarity with Leslie is insufferable.”
“Yeah, it is, and I’ll handle him,” Sterl retorted. “But in your conceit don’t imagine you can hide your familiarity any longer.”
“What do you mean?” blustered Ormiston.
“You know what I mean.” Sterl backed away from Ormiston, vigilant for any move on that worthy’s part. The drover’s gaze told volumes.
“Here, men,” Dann boomed, striding over. “Can’t we have one little hour free from work and fight?”
“Boss, there’ll not be any fight,” Sterl replied. “And Ormiston is not to blame this time, for any more than one of his two-faced cracks…. It’s Red.”
“Boss, I wasn’t huntin’ trouble,” interposed Red sulkily. “Shore I’ve had a coupla drinks. But whasser masser thet? I ain’t drunk. I jest said a playful word to Leslie, an’ I gets insulted by Ormiston heah, an’ then my pard. Dog-gone it, thet’s too much.”
“Well, Krehl, you don’t look ugly to me,” rejoined the leader and left them.
“Red, I’m disgusted with you,” Sterl declared angrily. “This is the second time. I warned you.”
“What’n’ll do I care? You make me sick with yore preachin’. Jest ’cause I fell in with some real pards who ain’t afraid of red likker, you get sore. I ain’t a-gonna stand it no more.”
“Cowboy, you’d gone to hell long ago, but for me.”
“Shore. But I’m on my way again. We’ll all be on our way, if we stick to the big boss’s idee, an’ trek off into thet Never Never.”
“Red! You’re not shifting to Ormiston’s side?” protested Sterl, aghast.
“Shore am. Changed my figgerin’, pard, an’ if you don’t like it, you can lump it.”
Sterl worked himself into a manifest rage. Laying a powerful left hand on Red’s collar, he jerked him so hard that the cowboy’s red head shot forward and back. “Why you double-crossing, lowdown coward!” raged Sterl. “You fail us for a few drinks, for this slick-tongued Ormiston!”
“Wal, they ain’t so pore. An’ it shore looks like I got the decidin’ vote,” rang out the cowboy, with perfectly convincing elation.
Sterl let out a fierce cry of disappointment and wrath. And he knocked Red flat. Despite his promise not to hit him too hard, he feared he had done so.
Beryl Dann leaped up to run and drop upon her knees beside Red. “Oh, he’s terribly hurt!” She glanced up at Sterl, face and eyes flaming in the light. “You! You are the discord…the villain on this trek!”
Sterl bowed scornfully and left the campfire. Scarcely had he reached the cover of darkness, when Friday appeared at his side like a shadow out of nowhere. “Me watches close up,” he said. “Ormiston he glad. Me tink it bad.”
“Not bad, Friday. Me and Red friends. Work black magic on Ormiston. Fool Ormiston. Red all same find out what Ormiston wants…. Savvy, Friday?”
But this was one time when the black held silent. He stalked beside Sterl across to their campfire, which he replenished. Sterl sat down, still in the throes of controlled anger. But that seizure was being lessened by his satisfaction with the part he and Red had played so deceptively, and by a humorous concern in regard to what his comrade was going to say about that jolt on the jaw. Red was going to be outraged.
He appeared to be alone in camp, Friday having stalked off somewhere. It was still early, and, lighting a cigarette, Sterl settled down to smoke and think and listen, when rapid footfalls told that someone was coming on the run. He turned around to see Leslie appear out of the darkness, to make for him and grasp his arm with a strong hand, while the other pressed to her heaving breast. At that moment she appeared most distressingly pretty, wild, and desirable.
“Can’t you ever walk like a lady should?” queried Sterl gruffly.
“I can…but not in…the dark…with Ormiston at large,” she panted.
“After you again?”
“Yes, he is…. Bare-faced as…anything.”
“Are you two-faced, same as Ormiston?”
“Oh-h, Sterl!”
“You have encouraged him.”
“I…have not,” she cried in distress.
“Leslie, I don’t believe you,” Sterl returned quite brutally. Somehow that little incident beside Dann’s campfire had roused unreasonable jealousy. If she could hurt him, then he must like her, which Sterl resented.
“So you…think I…I could…lie to you?” she whispered huskily.
“Well, you’re a woman, same as all the rest.”
“Sterl Hazelton, I might be…ten times a woman…but I couldn’t tell you a lie.”
“And why not?”
The query nonplused Leslie. A dark wave of color changed the paleness of her face. “I…I just couldn’t,” she faltered.
“Yeah?” taunted Sterl, when he simply had to believe her.
“Sterl, I lied to Mum…and Dad about Ormiston. I was scared …. But I’d not lie to you.”
“Very well, then, I apologize…. But you must confess that I had cause to suspect something…seeing him so close to you and hearing what he said.”
“The devil! Yes, you had. He sat down by me, took hold of me, began his soft-soaping talk…. What could I do?”
“You could have got up and left. In the future you do that, or you’ll find yourself in trouble with me.”
“I promise…that, Sterl. Red said something today…that I didn’t know it and you didn’t know it…but I…I was your girl.”
“The rattle-brained cowboy? Leslie, don’t let him bamboozle you.”
“What’s bamboozle?”
“Make a little fool of you.”
“Oh! Then, it isn’t…. true?” she whispered plaintively.
Sterl could have shaken her, but there was an irresistible sweetness in her candor. “Of course, it’s true, in a way, for this trek,” he replied, trying to keep from putting his arm around her, rather than carefully choosing his words.
“Then I can be happy, in spite of your brutality to Red,” she rejoined most earnestly, hanging to his arms and devouring his face with dark eyes of wonder and sorrow. “He was drunk, I know. But Red is so funny and so nice. Then I would have been glad to have him sit by me. Only Ormiston spoiled it. Why didn’t you hit him, instead of your friend?”
“I was angry, Leslie. What happened after I left?”
“Oh, it would have tickled you. It did me…. Beryl has a tender heart for anyone hurt. And Red was hurt. She bent over him and almost cried over him. I bent over him, too, and I could see Red was not only hurt but glorying in it. He never looked at me with such eyes. Then it happened. Ormiston dragged us away from Red. He was perfectly white in the face and quivering with fury…jealous fury. Why, the madman thinks he can have us both! I wrenched free, for I’m strong, Sterl. But Beryl couldn’t, and Ormiston led her away to her dad, who was watching. Then poor, dear Red sat up, his hand to his face, and he said…‘Leslie, tell thet pard of mine thet I’ll get even for the sock he gave me….’ Others were coming, so I ran off.”
“Poor, dear Red,” muttered Sterl, and then he laughe
d. It was funny, too. “Listen,” he continued, in sudden feeling. Then Leslie dropped her head, as if her neck muscles had collapsed. “Leslie!”
“When you whisper that way…I…I can’t hear…any more,” she returned in a betrayal of which she was not conscious.
“Don’t be a little dunce,” flashed Sterl, shaking her, remorseful with himself. “You’re no kid any more, despite what Red says. You’ve got to be a woman…to use your wits to help us…to be cunning. Listen, can I trust you?”
She looked up wonderingly. “Yes, Sterl.”
“That quarrel and fight with Red was all pretense. Red wasn’t drunk. He was just making believe. Our plan is for him to make it look like he split with me…to hobnob with those drovers and spy on Ormiston. To find out what the hombre has up his sleeve. Leslie, we know Ormiston is crooked. I can’t explain that. Neither can we prove anything, till we find out. Your father and our leader would not damn any man, much less a partner, on mere hearsay, on the suspicions of foreigners. Red and I have worked this trick before. It may take longer, more clever work here, but Red will do it. Now, I’m confiding in you because I won’t have you believing me a brute.”
“Who thought you were a brute? Oh, so Red wasn’t drunk? How glad I am! I just adore him.”
“Fine, as long as you can say it that way.”
“Will Beryl be in on the secret?”
“No, indeed. Only your dad, Stanley Dann, and you.”
“So that was it,” mused the girl.
“That was what?”
“Beryl’s sweetness toward Red. The cat! Ormiston has twisted her around his little finger, and now that she thinks Red has gone over to Ormiston’s side, she’s so sweet sugar wouldn’t melt in her mouth.”
“Right-o, Leslie. Now you overcome or hide those perfectly human feelings and practice deceit yourself. Oh, don’t look like that. You can, for you belong to the feminine gender. Make friends with Beryl, at any cost. Be a ninny. Be the little softy who looks up to the proud Miss Dann. But you be cunning, sharp as a fox, and find out all that is possible about Ormiston through her.”