The Andy Adams Western MEGAPACK ™: 19 Classic Cowboy Tales

by Andy Adams

  Early evening found the patient installed, not in the dug-out, but in a roomy tent. A quarter of beef hung on a willow, the one-room shack was bountifully provisioned, while the foreman remained to await the arrival of a physician. The day had brought forth wonders to Joel and Dell—from the dark hour of want to the dawn of plenty, while the future was a sealed book. In addition to the promised horses, Forrest’s saddle hung in the sod stable, while two extra ponies aroused the wonder of the questioning boys.

  “I just brought these two along,” explained the foreman, “as their backs were galled during a recent rainy spell. You can see they are unfit for saddle, but with a little attention can be cured—I’ll show you how. You have an abundance of water, and after I leave, wash their backs, morning and evening, and they’ll be well in a month. Since you are running a trail hospital, you want to cater to man and beast. Of course, if you boys nurse this man through to health and strength, I’ll make an appeal to Mr. Lovell to give you these ponies. They’ll come in handy, in case you return to the Solomon, or start a little cattle ranch here.”

  The sun set in benediction on the little homestead. The transformation seemed magical. Even the blight of summer drouth was toned and tempered by the shadows of evening. The lesson of the day had filled empty hearts with happiness, and when darkness fell, the boys threw off all former reserve, and the bond of host and guest was firmly established. Forrest, even, cemented the tie, by dividing any needful attention between the boys.

  “Do you know,” said he to the foreman indifferently, in the presence of the lads, “that I was thinking of calling the oldest one Doc and the youngest one Nurse, but now I’m going to call them just plain Joel and Dell, and they can call me Mr. Quince. Honor bright, I never met a boy who can pour water on a wound, that seems to go to the right spot, like Dell Wells. One day with another, give me a red-headed boy.”

  CHAPTER II

  THE HOSPITAL ON THE BEAVER

  The patient passed a feverish night. Priest remained on watch in the tent, but on several occasions aroused the boys, as recourse to pouring water was necessary to relieve the pain. The limb had reached a swollen condition by morning, and considerable anxiety was felt over the uncertainty of a physician arriving. If summoned the previous evening, it was possible that one might arrive by noon, otherwise there was no hope before evening or during the night.

  “Better post a guide on the trail,” suggested Joel. “If a doctor comes from the Republican, we can pilot him across the prairie and save an hour’s time. There’s a dim wagon trail runs from here to the first divide, north of the trail crossing on Beaver. Pa used it when he went to Culbertson to draw his pension. It would save the doctor a six or seven mile drive.”

  “Now, that suggestion is to the point,” cheerfully assented the trail foreman. “The herd will noon on the first divide, and we can post the boys of the cut-off. They’ll surely meet the doctor this afternoon or evening. Corral the horses, and I’ll shorten up the stirrup straps on Forrest’s saddle. Who will we send?”

  “I’ll go,” said Dell, jumping at the opportunity. He had admired the horses and heavy Texas saddles the evening previous, and now that a chance presented itself, his eyes danced at the prospect. “Why, I can follow a dim wagon track,” he added. “Joel and I used to go halfway to the divide, to meet pa when he bought us new boots.”

  “I’ll see who can best be spared,” replied Priest. “Your patient seems to think that no one can pour water like you. Besides, there will be plenty of riding to do, and you’ll get your share.”

  The foreman delayed shortening the stirrup straps until after the horse stood saddled, when he adjusted the lacings as an object lesson to the boys. Both rode the same length of stirrup, mounting the horse to be fitted, and when reduced to the proper length, Dell was allowed to ride past the tent for inspection.

  “There’s the making of a born cowman,” said Forrest, as Dell halted before the open tent. “It’s an absolute mistake to think that that boy was ever intended for a farmer. Notice his saddle poise, will you, Paul? Has a pretty foot, too, even if it is slightly sun-burned. We must get him some boots. With that red hair, he never ought to ride any other horse than a black stallion.”

  When the question arose as to which of the boys was to be sent to intercept the moving herd and await the doctor, Forrest decided the matter. “I’ll have to send Joel,” said he, “because I simply can’t spare Dell. The swelling has benumbed this old leg of mine, and we’ll have to give it an occasional rubbing to keep the circulation up. There’s where Dell has the true touch; actually he reminds me of my mother. She could tie a rag around a sore toe, in a way that would make a boy forget all his trouble. Hold Joel a minute.”

  The sound of a moving horse had caught the ear of the wounded man, and when the older boy dismounted at the tent opening, he continued: “Now, Joel, don’t let that cow outfit get funny with you. Show them the brand on that horse you’re riding, and give them distinctly to understand, even if you are barefooted, that you are one of Don Lovell’s men. Of course you don’t know him, but with that old man, it’s love me, love my dog. Get your dinner with the outfit, and watch for a dust cloud in the south. There’s liable to be another herd along any day, and we’ll need a cow.”

  Forrest was nearly forty, while Priest was fully fifty years of age; neither had ever had children of his own, and their hearts went out in manly fullness to these waifs of the plain. On the other hand, a day had brought forth promise and fulfillment, from strangers, to the boys, until the latter’s confidence knew no bounds. At random, the men virtually spoke of the cattle on a thousand hills, until the boys fully believed that by merely waving a wand, the bells would tinkle and a cow walk forth. Where two horses were promised, four had appeared. Where their little store of provision was as good as exhausted, it had been multiplied many fold. Where their living quarters were threatened with intrusion, a tent, with fly, was added; all of which, as if by magic, had risen out of a dip in the plain.

  There was no danger, at the hands of the trail men, of any discourtesy to Joel, but to relieve any timidity, the foreman saddled his horse and accompanied the boy a mile or more, fully reviewing the details of his errand. Left behind, and while rubbing the wounded limb, Dell regaled his patient with a scrap of family history. “Pa never let us boys go near the trail,” said he. “It seemed like he was afraid of you Texas men; afraid your cattle would trample down our fields and drink up all our water. The herds were so big.”

  “Suppose the cattle would drink the water,” replied Forrest, “the owner would pay for it, which would be better than letting it go to waste. One day’s hot winds would absorb more water than the biggest herd of cattle could drink. This ain’t no farming country.”

  “That’s so,” admitted Dell; “we only had one mess of peas this season, and our potatoes aren’t bigger than marbles. Now, let me rub your knee, there where the bullet skipped, between the bandages.”

  The rubbing over, Forrest pressed home the idea of abandoning farming for cattle ranching. “What your father ought to have done,” said he, “was to have made friends with the Texas drovers; given them the water, with or without price, and bought any cripples or sore-footed cattle. Nearly every herd abandons more or less cattle on these long drives, and he could have bought them for a song and sung it himself. The buffalo grass on the divides and among these sand hills is the finest winter grazing in the country. This water that you are wasting would have yearly earned you one hundred head of cripples. A month’s rest on this creek and they would kick up their heels and play like calves. After one winter on this range, they would get as fat as plover. Your father missed his chance by not making friends with the Texas trail men.”

  “Do you think so?” earnestly said Dell.

  “I know it,” emphatically asserted the wounded man. “Hereafter, you and Joel want to be friendly with these drovers and thei
r men. Cast your bread upon the waters.”

  “Mother used to read that to us,” frankly admitted Dell. There was a marked silence, only broken by a clatter of hoofs, and the trail boss cantered up to the tent.

  “That wagon track,” said he, dismounting, “is little more than a dim trail. Sorry I didn’t think about it sooner, but we ought to have built a smudge fire where this road intersects the cattle trail. In case the doctor doesn’t reach there by noon, I sent orders to fly a flag at the junction, and Joel to return home. But if the doctor doesn’t reach there until after darkness, he’ll never see the flag, and couldn’t follow the trail if he did. We’ll have to send Joel back.”

  “It’s my turn,” said Dell. “I know how to build a smudge fire; build it in a circle, out of cattle chips, in the middle of the road.”

  “You’re a willing boy,” said Priest, handing the bridle reins to Dell, “but we’ll wait until Joel returns. You may water my horse and turn him in the corral.”

  The day wore on, and near the middle of the afternoon Joel came riding in. He had waited fully an hour after the departure of the herd, a flag had been left unfurled at the junction, and all other instructions delivered. Both Forrest and Priest knew the distance to the ford on the Republican, and could figure to an hour, by different saddle gaits, the necessary time to cover the distance, even to Culbertson. Still there was a measure of uncertainty: the messenger might have lost his way; there might not have been any physician within call; accidents might have happened to horse or rider,—and one hour wore away, followed by another.

  Against his will, Dell was held under restraint until six o’clock. “It’s my intention to follow him within an hour,” said the foreman, as the boy rounded a bluff and disappeared. “He can build the fire as well as any one, and we’ll return before midnight. That’ll give the doctor the last minute and the benefit of every doubt.”

  The foreman’s mount stood saddled, and twilight had settled over the valley, when the occupants of the tent were startled by the neigh of a horse. “That’s Rowdy,” said Forrest; “he always nickers when he sights a wagon or camp. Dell’s come.”

  Joel sprang to the open front. “It’s Dell, and there’s a buckboard following,” he whispered. A moment later the vehicle rattled up, led by the irrepressible Dell, as if in charge of a battery of artillery. “This is the place, Doctor,” said he, as if dismissing a troop from cavalry drill.

  The physician proved to be a typical frontier doctor. He had left Culbertson that morning, was delayed in securing a relay team at the ford on the Republican, and still had traveled ninety miles since sunrise. “If it wasn’t for six-shooters in this country,” said he, as he entered the tent, “we doctors would have little to do. Your men with the herd told me how the accident happened.” Then to Forrest, “Son, think it’ll ever happen again?”

  “Yes, unless you can cure a fool from lending his pistol,” replied Forrest.

  “Certainly. I’ve noticed that similarity in all gunshot wounds: they usually offer good excuses. It’s healing in its nature,” commented the doctor, as he began removing the bandages. As the examination proceeded, there was a running comment maintained, bordering on the humorous.

  “If there’s no extra charge,” said Forrest, “I wish you would allow the boys to see the wounds. You might also deliver a short lecture on the danger of carrying the hammer of a pistol on a loaded cartridge. The boys are young and may take the lesson seriously, but you’re wasting good breath on me. Call the boys—I’m an old dog.”

  “Gunshot wounds are the only crop in this country,” continued the doctor, ignoring the request, “not affected by the drouth. There’s an occasional outbreak of Texas fever among cattle, but that’s not in my department. Well, that bullet surely was hungry for muscle, but fortunately it had a distaste for bone. This is just a simple case of treatment and avoiding complications. Six weeks to two months and you can buckle on your six-shooter again. Hereafter, better wear it on the other side, and if another accident occurs, it’ll give you a hitch in each leg and level you up.”

  “But there may be no fool loafing around to borrow it,” protested Forrest.

  “Never fear, son; the fool’s eternal,” replied the doctor, with a quiet wink at the others.

  The presence and unconcern of the old physician dispelled all uneasiness, and the night passed without anxiety, save between the boys. Forrest’s lecture to Dell during the day, of the importance of making friends with the drovers, the value of the water, the purchase of disabled cattle, was all carefully reviewed after the boys were snugly in bed. “Were you afraid of the men with the herd today?—afraid of the cowboys?” inquired Dell, when the former subject was exhausted.

  “Why, no,” replied Joel rather scornfully, from the security of his bunk; “who would be afraid? They are just like any other folks.”

  Dell was skeptical. “Not like the pictures of cowboys?—not shooting and galloping their horses?”

  “Why, you silly boy,” said Joel, with contempt; “there wasn’t a shot fired, their horses were never out of a walk, never wet a hair, and they changed to fresh ones at noon. The only difference I could see, they wore their hats at dinner. And they were surely cowboys, because they had over three thousand big beeves, and had come all the way from Texas.”

  “I wish I could have gone,” was Dell’s only comment.

  “Oh, it was a great sight,” continued the privileged one. “The column of cattle was a mile long, the trail twice as wide as a city street, and the cattle seemed to walk in loose marching order, of their own accord. Not a man carried a whip; no one even shouted; no one as much as looked at the cattle; the men rode away off yonder. The herd seemed so easy to handle.”

  “And how many men did it take?” insisted Dell.

  “Only eleven with the herd. And they had such queer names for their places. Those in the lead were point men, those in the middle were swing men, and the one who brought up the rear was the drag man. Then there was the cook, who drove the wagon, and the wrangler, who took care of the horses—over one hundred and forty head. They call the band of saddle horses the remuda; one of the men told me it was Spanish for relay—a relay of horses.”

  “I’m going the next time,” said Dell. “Mr. Quince said he would buy us a cow from the next herd that passed.”

  “These were all big beeves today, going to some fort on the Yellowstone River. And they had such wide, sweeping horns! And the smartest cattle! An hour before noon one of the point men gave a shrill whistle, and the whole column of beeves turned aside and began feeding. The men called it ‘throwing the herd off the trail to graze.’ It was just like saying halt! to soldiers—like we saw at that reunion in Ohio.”

  “And you weren’t afraid?” timidly queried the younger brother.

  “No one else was afraid, and why should I be? I was on horseback. Stop asking foolish questions and go to sleep,” concluded Joel, with pitying finality, and turned to the wall.

  “But suppose those big Texas beeves had stampeded, then what?” There was challenge in Dell’s voice, but the brother vouchsafed no answer. A seniority of years had given one a twelve hours’ insight over the other, in range cattle, and there was no common ground between sleepy bedfellows to justify further converse. “I piloted in the doctor, anyhow,” said Dell defensively. No reply rewarded his assertion.

  Morning brought little or no change in the condition of the wounds. The doctor was anxious to return, but Priest urged otherwise. “Let’s call it Sunday,” said he, “and not work today. Besides, if I overtake the herd, I’ll have to make a hand. Wait until tomorrow, and we’ll bear each other company. If another herd shows up on the trail today, it may have a cow. We must make these boys comfortable.”

  The doctor consented to stay over, and amused himself by quarreling with his patient. During the forenoon Priest and Joel rode ou
t to the nearest high ground, from which a grove was seen on the upper Beaver. “That’s what we call Hackberry Grove,” said Joel, “and where we get our wood. The creek makes a big bend, and all the bottom land has grown up with timber, some as big as a man’s body. It doesn’t look very far away, but it takes all day to go and come, hauling wood. There’s big springs just above, and the water never fails. That’s what makes the trees so thrifty.”

  “Too bad your father didn’t start a little ranch here,” said Priest, surveying the scene. “It’s a natural cattle range. There are the sand hills to the south; good winter shelter and a carpet of grass.”

  “We were too poor,” frankly admitted the boy. “Every fall we had to go to the Solomon River to hunt work. With pa’s pension, and what we could earn, we held down the homestead. Last fall we proved up; pa’s service in the army counted on the residence required. It doesn’t matter now if we do leave it. All Dell and I have to do is to keep the taxes paid.”

  “You would be doing wrong to leave this range,” said the trail boss in fatherly tones. “There’s a fortune in this grass, if you boys only had the cattle to eat it. Try and get a hundred cows on shares, or buy young steers on a credit.”

  “Why, we have no money, and no one would credit boys,” ruefully replied Joel.

  “You have something better than either credit or money,” frankly replied the cowman; “you control this range. Make that the basis of your beginning. All these cattle that are coming over the trail are hunting a market or a new owner. Convince any man that you have the range, and the cattle will be forthcoming to occupy it.”

  “But we only hold a quarter-section of land,” replied the boy in his bewilderment.

  “Good. Take possession of the range, occupy it with cattle, and every one will respect your prior right,” argued the practical man. “Range is being rapidly taken up in this western country. Here’s your chance. Water and grass, world without end.”