by B. M. Bower
At four o’clock it still rained dismally—and the Happy Family, waking unhappily one after another, remembered that this was the Fourth that they had worked and waited for so long, “swore a prayer or two and slept again.” At six the sun was shining, and Jack Bates, first realizing the blessed fact, called the others jubilantly.
Weary sat up and observed darkly that he wished he knew what son-of-a-gun got the tent to leaking over him, and eyed Pink suspiciously; but Pink only knuckled his eyes like a sleepy baby and asked if it rained in the night, and said he had been dead to the world. Happy Jack came blundering under the ban by asking Weary to remember that he told him it would rain. As he slept beside Weary, his guilt was certain and his punishment, Weary promised himself, would be sure.
Then they went out and faced the clean-washed prairie land, filled their lungs to the bottom with sweet, wine-like air, and asked one another why in the dickens the night-hawk wasn’t on hand with the cavvy, so they could get ready to start.
At nine o’clock, had you wandered that way, you would have seen the Happy Family—a clean-shaven, holiday-garbed, resplendent Happy Family—roosting disconsolately wherever was a place clean enough to sit, looking wistfully away to the skyline.
They should, by now, have been at the picnic, and every man of them realized the fact keenly. They were ready, but they were afoot; the nighthawk had not put in an appearance with the saddle bunch, and there was not a horse in camp that they might go in search of him. With no herd to hold, they had not deemed it necessary to keep up any horses, and they were bewailing the fact that they had not forseen such an emergency—though Happy Jack did assert that he had all along expected it.
“By golly, I’ll strike out afoot and hunt him up, if he don’t heave in sight mighty suddent,” threatened Slim passionately, after a long, dismal silence. “By golly, he’ll wisht I hadn’t, too.”
Cal looked up from studying pensively his patent leathers. “Go on, Slim, and round him up. This is sure getting hilarious—a fine way to spend the Fourth!”
“Maybe that festive bunch that held up the Lewistown Bank, day before yesterday, came along and laid the hawk away on the hillside so they could help themselves to fresh horses,” hazarded Jack Bates, in the hope that Happy Jack would seize the opening to prophesy a new disaster.
“I betche that’s what’s happened, all right,” said Happy, rising to the bait. “I betche yuh won’t see no horses t’day—ner no night-hawk, neither.”
The Happy Family looked at one another and grinned.
“Who’ll stir the lemonade and help pass the sandwiches?” asked Pink, sadly. “Who’ll push, when the school-ma’am wants to swing? Or Len Adams? or—”
“Oh, saw off!” Weary implored. “We can think up troubles enough, Cadwolloper, without any help from you.”
“Well, I guess your troubles are about over, cully—I can hear ’em coming.” Pink picked up his rope and started for the horse corral as the belated cavvy came jingling around the nose of the nearest hill. The Happy Family brightened perceptibly; after all, they could be at the picnic by noon—if they hurried. Their thoughts flew to the crowd—and to the girls in frilly dresses—under the pine trees in a certain canyon just where the Bear Paws reach lazily out to shake hands with the prairie land.
Up on the high level, with the sun hot against their right cheeks and a lazy breeze flipping neckerchief ends against their smiling lips, the world seemed very good, and a jolly place to live in, and there was no such thing as trouble anywhere. Even Happy Jack was betrayed into expecting much pleasure and no misfortune, and whistled while he rode.
Five miles slipped behind them easily—so easily that their horses perked ears and tugged hard against the bits. The next five were rougher, for they had left the trail and struck out across a rough bit of barrenness on a short cut to the ford in Sheep Coulee. All the little gullies and washouts were swept clean and smooth with the storm, and the grass roots showed white where the soil had washed away. They hoped the rain had not reached to the mountains and spoiled the picnic grounds, and wondered what time the girls would have dinner ready.
So they rode down the steep trail into Sheep Coulee, galloped a quarter mile and stopped, amazed, at the ford. The creek was running bank full; more, it was churning along like a mill-race, yellow with the clay it carried and necked with great patches of dirty foam.
“I guess here’s where we don’t cross,” said Weary, whistling mild dismay.
“Now, wouldn’t that jostle yuh?” asked Pink, of no one in particular.
“By golly, the lemonade’ll be cold, and so’ll the san’wiches, before we git there,” put in Slim, with one of his sporadic efforts to be funny. “We got t’ go back.”
“Back nothing,” chorused five outraged voices. “We’ll hunt some other crossing.”
“Down the creek a piece—yuh mind where that old sandbar runs half across? We’ll try that.” Weary’s tone was hopeful, and they turned and followed him.
Half a mile along the raging little creek they galloped, with no place where they dared to cross. Then, loping around a willow-fringed bend, Weary and Pink, who were ahead, drew their horses back upon their haunches. They had all but run over a huddle of humanity lying in the fringe of weeds and tall grasses that grew next the willows.
“What in thunder—” began Cal, pulling up. They slid off their horses and bent curiously over the figure. Weary turned it investigatively by a shoulder. The figure stirred, and groaned. “It’s somebody hurt; take a hand here, and help carry him out where the sun shines. He’s wet to the skin,” commanded Weary sharply.
When they lifted him he opened his eyes and looked at them; while they carried him tenderly out from the wet tangle and into the warmth of the sun, he set his teeth against the groans that would come. They stood around him uneasily and looked down at him. He was young, like themselves, and he was a stranger; also, he was dressed like a cowboy, in chaps, high-heeled boots and silver-mounted spurs. The chaps were sodden and heavy with water, as was the rest of his clothing.
“He must uh laid out in all that storm, last night,” observed Cal, in a subdued voice. “He—”
“Somebody better ride back and have the bed wagon brought up, so we can haul him to a doctor,” suggested Pink. “He’s hurt.”
The stranger’s eyes swept the faces of the Happy Family anxiously. “Not on your life,” he protested weakly. “I don’t want any doctor—in mine, thank yuh. I—it’s no use, anyhow.”
“The hell it ain’t!” Pink was drawing off his coat to make a pillow. “You’re hurt, somehow, ain’t yuh?”
“I’m—dying,” the other said, laconically. “So yuh needn’t go to any trouble, on my account. From the looks—yuh was headed for some—blowout. Go on, and let me be.”
The Happy Family looked at one another incredulously; they were so likely to ride on!
“I guess you don’t savvy this bunch, old-timer,” said Weary calmly, speaking for the six. “We’re going to do what we can. If yuh don’t mind telling us where yuh got hurt—”
The lips of the other curled bitterly. “I was shot,” he said distinctly, “by the sheriff and his bunch. But I got away. Last night I tried to cross the creek, and my horse went on down. It was storming—fierce. I got out, somehow, and crawled into the weeds. Laying out in the rain—didn’t help me none. It’s—all off.”
“There ought to be something—” began Jack Bates helplessly.
“There is. If yuh’ll just put me away—afterwards—and say nothing,—I’ll be—mighty grateful.” He was looking at them sharply, as if a great deal depended upon their answer.
The Happy Family was dazed. The very suddenness of this unlooked-for glimpse into the somber eyes of Tragedy was unnerving. The world had seemed such a jolly place; ten minutes ago—five minutes, even, their greatest fear had been getting to the picnic too late for dinner. And here was a man at their feet, calmly telling them that he was about to die, and asking only a hurried burial
and a silence after. Happy Jack swallowed painfully and shifted his feet in the grass.
“Of course, if yuh’d feel better handing me over—”
“That’ll be about enough on that subject,” Pink interrupted with decision. “Just because yuh happen to be down and out—for the time being—is no reason why yuh should insult folks. You can take it for granted we’ll do what we can for yuh; the question is, what? Yuh needn’ go talking about cashing in—they’s no sense in it. You’ll be all right.—”
“Huh. You wait and see.” The fellow’s mouth set grimly upon another groan. “If you was shot through, and stuck to the saddle—and rode—and then got pummeled—by a creek at flood, and if yuh laid out in the rain—all night— Hell, boys! Yuh know I’m about all in. I’m hard to kill, or I’d have been—dead— What I want to know—will yuh do what I—said? Will yuh bury me—right here—and keep it—quiet?”
The Happy Family moved uncomfortably. They hated to see him lying that way, and talking in short, jerky sentences, and looking so ghastly, and yet so cool—as if dying were quite an everyday affair.
“I don’t see why yuh ask us to do it,” spoke Cal Emmet bluntly. “What we want to do is get yuh to help. The chances is you could be—cured. We—”
“Look here.” The fellow raised himself painfully to an elbow, and fell back again. “I’ve got folks—and they don’t know—about this scrape. They’re square—and stand at the top—And they don’t—it would just about— For God sake, boys! Can’t yuh see—how I feel? Nobody knows—about this. The sheriff didn’t know—they came up on me in the dusk—and I fought. I wouldn’t be taken—And it’s my first bad break—because I got in with a bad—lot. They’ll know something—happened, when they find—my horse. But they’ll think—it’s just drowning, if they don’t find—me with a bullet or two— Can’t yuh see?”
The Happy Family looked away across the coulee, and there were eyes that saw little of the yellow sunlight lying soft on the green hillside beyond. The world was not a good place; it was a grim, pitiless place, and—a man was dying, at their very feet.
“But what about the rest oh the bunch?” croaked Happy Jack, true to his misanthropic nature, but exceeding husky as to voice. “They’ll likely tell—”
The dying man shook his head eagerly. “They won’t; they’re both—dead. One was killed—last night. The other when we first tried—to make a getaway. It—it’s up to you, boys.”
Pink swallowed twice, and knelt beside him; the others remained standing, grouped like mourners around an open grave.
“Yuh needn’t worry about us,” Pink said softly, “You can count on us, old boy. If you’re dead sure a doctor—”
“Drop it!” the other broke in harshly. “I don’t want to live. And if I did, I couldn’t. I ain’t guessing—I know.”
They said little, after that. The wounded man seemed apathetically waiting for the end, and not inclined to further speech. Since they had tacitly promised to do as he wished, he lay with eyes half closed, watching idly the clouds drifting across to the skyline, hardly moving.
The Happy Family sat listlessly around on convenient rocks, and watched the clouds also, and the yellow patches of foam racing down the muddy creek. Very quiet they were—so quiet that little, brown birds hopped close, and sang from swaying weeds almost within reach of them. The Happy Family listened dully to the songs, and waited. They did not even think to make a cigarette.
The sun climbed higher and shone hotly down upon them. The dying man blinked at the glare, and Happy Jack took off his hat and tilted it over the face of the other, and asked him if he wouldn’t like to be moved into the shade.
“No matter—I’ll be in the shade—soon enough,” he returned quietly, and something gripped their throats to aching. His voice, they observed, was weaker than it had been.
Weary took a long breath, and moved closer. “I wish you’d let us get help,” he said, wistfully. It all seemed so horribly brutal, their sitting around him like that, waiting passively for him to die.
“I know—yuh hate it. But it’s—all yuh can do. It’s all I want.” He took his eyes from the drifting, white clouds, and looked from face to face. “You’re the whitest bunch—I’d like to know—who yuh are. Maybe I can put in—a good word for yuh—on the new range—where I’m going. I’d sure like to do—something—”
“Then for the Lord’s sake, don’t say such things!” cried Pink, shakily. “You’ll have us—so damn broke up—”
“All right—I won’t. So long,—boys. See yuh later—”
“Mamma!” whispered Weary, and got up hastily and walked away. Slim followed him a few paces, then turned resolutely and went back. It seemed cowardly to leave the rest to bear it—and somebody had to. They were breathing quickly, and they were staring across the coulee with eyes that saw nothing; their lips were shut very tightly together. Weary came back and stood with his back turned. Pink moved a bit, glanced furtively at the long, quiet figure beside him, and dropped his face into his gloved hands.
Glory threw up his head, glanced across the coulee at a band of range horses trooping down a gully to drink at the river, and whinnied shrilly. The Happy Family started and awoke to the stern necessities of life. They stood up, and walked a little way from the spot, avoiding one another’s eyes.
“Somebody’ll have to go back to camp,” said Cal Emmett, in the hushed tone that death ever compels from the living. “We’ve got to have a spade—”
“It better be the handiest liar, then,” Jack Bates put in hastily. “If that old loose-tongued Patsy ever gets next—”
“Weary better go—and Pink. They’re the best liars in the bunch,” said Cal, trying unsuccessfully to get back his everyday manner.
Pink and Weary went over and took the dragging bridle-reins of their mounts, caught a stirrup and swung up into the saddles silently.
“And say!” Happy Jack called softly, as they were going down the slope. “Yuh better bring—a blanket.”
Weary nodded, and they rode away, their horses stepping softly in the thick grasses. When they were passed quite out of the presence of the dead, they spurred their horses into a gallop.
The sun marked mid-afternoon when they returned, and the four who had waited drew long breaths of relief at sight of them.
“We told Patsy we’d run onto a—den—”
“Oh, shut up, can’t yuh?” Jack Bates interrupted shortly. “Yuh’ll have plenty uh time to tell us afterwards.”
“We’ve got a place picked out,” said Cal, and led them a little distance up the slope, to a level spot in the shadow of a huge, gray bowlder. “That’s his headstone,” he said, soberly. “The poor devil won’t be cheated out uh that, if we can’t mark it with his name. It’ll last as long as he’ll need it.”
Only in the West, perhaps, may one find a funeral like that. No minister stood at the head of the grave and read, “Dust to dust” and all the heartbreaking rest of it. There was no singing but from a meadowlark that perched on a nearby rock and rippled his brief song when, with their ropes, they lowered the blanket wrapped form. They stood, with bare heads bowed, while the meadow lark sang. When he had flown, Pink, looking a choir-boy in disguise, repeated softly and incorrectly the Lord’s prayer.
The Happy Family did not feel that there was any incongruity in what they did. When Pink, gulping a little over the unfamiliar words, said:
“Thine be power and glory—Amen;” five clear, youthful voices added the Amen quite simply. Then they filled the grave and stood silent a minute before they went down to where their horse stood waiting patiently, with now and then a curious glance up the hill to where their masters grouped.
The Happy Family mounted and without a backward glance rode soberly away; and the trail they took led, not to the picnic, but to camp.
THE UNHEAVENLY TWINS
There was a dead man’s estate to be settled, over beyond the Bear Paws, and several hundred head of cattle and horses had been sold to the hig
hest bidder, who was Chip Bennett, of the Flying U. Later, there were the cattle and horses to be gathered and brought to the home range; and Weary, always Chip’s choice when came need of a trusted man, was sent to bring them. He was to hire what men he needed down there, work the range with the Rocking R, and bring home the stock—when his men could take the train and go back whence they had come.
The Happy Family was disappointed. Pink and Irish, especially, had hoped to be sent along; for both knew well the range north of the Bear Paws, and both would like to have made the trip with Weary. But men were scarce and the Happy Family worked well together—so well that Chip grudged every man of them that ever had to be sent afar. So Weary went alone, and Pink and Irish watched him wistfully when he rode away and were extremely unpleasant companions for the rest of that day, at least.
Over beyond the Bear Paws men seemed scarcer even than around the Flying U range. Weary scouted fruitlessly for help, wasted two days in the search, and then rode to Bullhook and sent this wire—collect—to Chip, and grinned as he wondered how much it would cost. He, too, had rather resented being sent off down there alone.
“C. BENNETT, Dry Lake:
Can’t get a man here for love or money. Have tried both, and held one up with a gun. No use. Couldn’t top a saw horse. For the Lord’s sake, send somebody I know. I want Irish and Pink and Happy—and I want them bad. Get a move on.
W. DAVIDSON.”
Chip grinned when he read it, paid the bill, and told the three to get ready to hit the trail. And the three grinned answer and immediately became very busy; hitting the trail, in this case, meant catching the next train out of Dry Lake, for there were horses bought with the cattle, and much time would be saved by making up an outfit down there.