by B. M. Bower
CHAPTER 15. THE KID HAS IDEAS OF HIS OWN
The Old Man sat out in his big chair on the porch, smoking and staringdully at the trail which led up the bluff by way of the Hog's Back tothe benchland beyond. Facing him in an old, cane rocking chair, theHonorable Blake smoked with that air of leisurely enjoyment whichbelongs to the man who knows and can afford to burn good tobacco and whohas the sense to, burn it consciously, realizing in every whiff its richfragrance. The Honorable Blake flicked a generous half-inch of ash fromhis cigar upon a porch support and glanced shrewdly at the Old Man'sabstracted face.
"No, it wouldn't do," he observed with the accent of a secondconsideration of a subject that coincides exactly with the first. "Itwouldn't do at all. You could save the boys time, I've no doubt--timeand trouble so far as getting the cattle back where they belongis concerned. I can see how they must be hampered for lack ofsaddle-horses, for instance. But--it wouldn't do, Whitmore. If theycome to you and ask for horses don't let them have them. They'll managesomehow--trust them for that. They'll manage--" "But doggone it, Blake,it's for--"
"Sh-sh--" Blake held up a warning hand. "None of that, my dear Whitmore!These young fellows have taken claims in--er--good faith." His brightblue eyes sparkled with a sudden feeling. "In the best of good faith, ifyou ask me. I--admire them intensely for what they have started out todo. But--they have certain things which they must do, and do alone. Ifyou would not thwart them in accomplishing what they have set out to do,you must go carefully; which means that you must not run to their aidwith your camp-wagons and your saddle-horses, so they can gather thecattle again and drive them back where they belong. You would not behelping them. They would get the cattle a little easier and a littlequicker--and lose their claims."
"But doggone it, Blake, them boys have lived right here at the FlyingU--why, this has been their home, yuh might say. They ain't like thegeneral run of punchers that roam around, workin' for this outfit andfor that; they've stuck. Why, doggone it, what they done here when Igot hurt in Chicago and they was left to run themselves, why, that aloneputs me under obligations to help 'em out in this scrape. Anybody couldsee that. Ain't I a neighbor? Ain't neighbors got a right to jump in andhelp each other? There ain't no law agin--"
"Not against neighbors--no." Blake uncrossed his perfectly trouseredlegs and crossed them the other way, after carefully avoiding anybagging tendency. "But this syndicate--or these contestants--will try toprove that you are not a neighbor only, but a--backer of the boys in aland-grabbing scheme. To avoid--"
"Well, doggone your measly hide, Blake, I've told you fifty timesI ain't!" The Old Man sat forward in his chair and shook his fistunabashed at his guest. "Them boys cooked that all up amongstthemselves, and went and filed on that land before ever I knowed a thingabout it. How can yuh set there and say I backed 'em? And that blondeJezebel--riding down here bold as brass and turnin' up her nose at Dell,and callin' me a conspirator to my face!"
"I sticked a pin in her saddle blanket, Uncle Gee-gee. I'll bet shewished she'd stayed away from here when her horse bucked her off."The Kid looked up from trying to tie a piece of paper to the end of abrindle kitten's switching tail, and smiled his adorable smile--that hada gap in the middle.
"Hey? You leave that cat alone or he'll scratch yuh. Blake, if you can'tsee--"
"He! He's a her and her name's Adeline. Where's the boys, UncleGee-gee?"
"Hey? Oh, away down in the breaks after their cattle that got away. Youkeep still and never mind where they've gone." His mind swung back tothe Happy Family, combing the breaks for their stock and the stock ofthe nesters, with an average of one saddle-horse apiece and a camp outfitof the most primitive sort--if they had any at all, which he doubted.The Old Man had eased too many roundups through that rough country notto realize keenly the difficulties of the Happy Family.
"They need horses," he groaned to Blake, "and they need help. If youknowed the country and the work as well as I do you'd know they've gotto have horses and help. And there's their claims--fellers squattingdown on every eighty--four different nesters fer every doggoned one ofthe bunch to handle! And you tell me I got to set here and not lift ahand. You tell me I can't put men to work on that fence they want built.You tell me I can't lend 'em so much as a horse!"
Blake nodded. "I tell you that, and I emphasize it," he assured theother, brushing off another half inch of ash from his cigar. "If youwant to help those boys hold their land, you must not move a finger."
"He's wiggling all of 'em!" accused the Kid sternly, and pointed to theOld Man drumming irritatedly upon his chair arms. "He don't want to helpthe boys, but I do. I'll help 'em get their cattle, Mr. Blake. I'm oneof the bunch anyway. I'll lend 'em my string."
"You've been told before not to butt in to grownup talk," his unclereproved him irascibly. "Now you cut it out. And take that stringoff'n that cat!" he added harshly. "Dell! Come and look after this kid!Doggone it, a man can't talk five minutes--"
The Kid giggled irrepressibly. "That's one on you, old man. You sawDoctor Dell go away a long time ago. Think she can hear yuh when she'saway up on the bench?"
"You go on off and play!" commanded the Old Man. "I dunno what yuh wantto pester a feller to death for--and say! Take that string off'n thatcat!"
"Aw gwan! It ain't hurting the cat. She likes it." He lifted the kittenand squeezed her till she yowled. "See? She said yes, she likes it."
The Old Man returned to the trials of the Happy Family, and the Kidsat and listened, with the brindle kitten snuggled uncomfortably, headdownward in his arms.
The Kid had heard a good deal, lately, about the trials of his beloved"bunch." About the "nesters" who brought cattle in to eat up the grassthat belonged to the cattle of the bunch. The Kid understood thatperfectly--since he had been raised in the atmosphere of range talk.He had heard about the men building shacks on the claims of the HappyFamily--he understood that also; for he had seen the shacks himself,and he had seen where there had been slid down hill into the bottom ofAntelope Coulee. He knew all about the attack on Patsy's cabin andhow the Happy Family had been fooled, and the cattle driven off andscattered. The breaks--he was a bit hazy upon the subject of breaks. Hehad heard about them all his life. The stock got amongst them and had tobe hunted out. He thought--as nearly as could be put in words--that itmust be a place where all the brakes grow that are used on wagons andbuggies. These were of wood, therefore they must grow somewhere. Theygrew where the Happy Family went sometimes, when they were gone fordays and days after stock. They were down there now--it was down in thebreaks, always--and they couldn't round up their cattle because theyhadn't horses enough. They needed help, so they could hurry back andslide those other shacks off their claims and into Antelope Couleewhere they had slid the others. On the whole, the Kid had a very fairconception of the state of affairs. Claimants and contestants--thosewords went over his head. But he knew perfectly well that the nesterswere the men that didn't like the Happy Family, and lived in shacks onthe way to town, and plowed big patches of prairie and had children thatwent barefooted in the furrows and couldn't ride horses to save theirlives. Pilgrim kids, that didn't know what "chaps" were--he had talkedwith a few when he went with Doctor Dell and Daddy Chip to see the sicklady.
After a while, when the Honorable Blake became the chief speaker andleaned forward and tapped the Old Man frequently on a knee with hisfinger, and used long words that carried no meaning, and said contestantand claimant and evidence so often that he became tiresome, the Kid slidoff the porch and went away, his small face sober with deep meditations.
He would need some grub--maybe the bunch was hungry without anycamp-wagons. The Kid had stood around in the way, many's the time, andwatched certain members of the Happy Family stuff emergency rations intoflour sacks, and afterwards tie the sack to their saddles and ride off.He knew all about that, too.
He hunted up a flour sack that had not had all the string pulled out ofit so it was no longer a sack but a dish-towel, and held it behind hisback while h
e went cautiously to the kitchen door. The Countess wasnowhere in sight--but it was just as well to make sure. The Kid went in,took a basin off the table, held it high and deliberately dropped iton the floor. It, made a loud bang, but it did not elicit any shrillprotest from the Countess; therefore the Countess was nowhere around.The Kid went in boldly and filled his four-sack so full it dragged onthe floor when he started off.
At the door he went down the steps ahead of the sack, and bent his smallback from the third step and pulled the sack upon his shoulders. Itwobbled a good deal, and the Kid came near falling sidewise off the laststep before he could balance his burden. But he managed it, beingthe child of his parents and having a good deal of persistence inhis makeup; and he went, by a roundabout way, to the stable with thegrub-sack bending him double. Still it was not so very heavy; it wasmade bulky by about two dozen fresh-made doughnuts and a loaf of breadand a jar of honey and a glass of wild-currant jelly and a pound or soof raw, dried prunes which the Kid called nibblin's because he liked tonibble at them, like a prairie dog at a grass root.
Getting that sack tied fast to the saddle after the saddle was onSilver's back was no easy task for a boy who is six, even though he islarge for his age. Still, being Chip's Kid and the Little Doctor's hedid it--with the help of the oats box and Silver's patient disposition.
There were other things which the bunch always tied on their saddles; ablanket, for instance, and a rope. The Kid made a trip to the bunk-houseand pulled a gray blanket off Ole's bed, and spent a quarter of an hourrolling it as he had seen the boys roll blankets The oats box, withSilver standing beside it, came in handy again. He found a discardedrope and after much labor coiled it crudely and tied it beside thesaddle-fork.
The Kid went to the door, stood beside it and leaned away over so thathe could peek out and not be seen Voices came from the house--the voiceof the Old Man; to be exact, high-pitched and combative. The Kid lookedup the bluff, and the trail lay empty in the afternoon sun. Still, hedid not like to take that trail. Doctor Dell might come riding downthere almost any minute. The Kid did not want to meet Doctor Dell justright then.
He went back, took Silver by the bridle reins and led him out of thebarn and around the corner where he could not be seen from the WhiteHouse. He thought he had better go down the creek, and out through thewire gate and on down the creek that way. He was sure that the "breaks"were somewhere beyond the end of the coulee, though he could not haveexplained why he was sure of it. Perhaps the boys, in speaking of thebreaks, had unconsciously tilted heads in that direction.
The Kid went quickly down along the creek through the little pasture,leading Silver by the reins. He was terribly afraid that his mothermight ride over the top of the hill and see him and call him back.If she did that, he would have to go, of course. Deliberate, opendisobedience had never yet occurred to the Kid as a moral possibility.If your mother or your Daddy Chip told you to come back, you had tocome; therefore he did not want to be told to come. Doctor Dell had toldhim that he could go on roundup some day--the Kid had decided that thiswas the day, but that it would be foolish to mention the decision toanyone. People had a way of disagreeing with one's decisions--especiallyDoctor Dell, she always said one was too little. The Kid thought he wasgetting pretty big, since he could stand on something and put the saddleon Silver his own self, and cinch it and everything; plenty big enoughto get out and help the bunch when they needed help.
He did not look so very big as he went trudging down alongside thecreek, stumbling now and then in the coarse grass that hid the scatteredrocks. He could not keep his head twisted around to look under Silver'sneck and watch the hill trail, and at the same time see where he wasputting his feet. And if he got on Silver now he would be seen andrecognized at the first glance which Doctor Dell would give to thecoulee when she rode over the brow of the hill. Walking beside Silver'sshoulder, on the side farthest from the bluff, he might not be seen atall; Doctor Dell might look and think it was just a horse walking alongthe creek his own self.
The Kid was extremely anxious that he should not be seen. The bunchneeded him. Uncle Gee-gee said they needed help. The Kid thought theywould expect him to come and help with his "string", He helped DaddyChip drive the horses up from the little pasture, these days; justyesterday he had brought the whole bunch up, all by his own self, andhad driven them into the big corral alone, and Daddy Chip had stoodby the gate and watched him do it. Daddy Chip had lifted him down fromSilver's back, and had squeezed him hard, and had called him a real, oldcowpuncher. The Kid got warm all inside him when he, thought of it.
When a turn in the narrow creek-bottom hid him completely from the ranchbuildings and the hill trail, the Kid led Silver alongside a low bank,climbed into the saddle. Then he made Silver lope all the way to thegate.
He had some trouble with that gate. It was a barbed wire gate, such asbigger men than the Kid sometimes swear over. It went down all right,but when he came to put it up again, that was another matter. He simplyhad to put it up before he could go on. You always had to shut gatesif you found them shut--that was a law of the range which the Kid hadlearned so long ago he could not remember when he had learned And therewas another reason--he did not want em to know he had passed that way,if they took a notion to call him back. So he worked and he tugged andhe grew so red in the face it looked as if he were choking. But he gotthe gate up and the wire loop over the stake--though he had to hunt upan old piece of a post to stand on, and even then had to stand on histoes to reach the loop--since he was Chip's Kid and the Little Doctor's.
He even remembered to scrape out the tell-tale prints of his small feetin the bare earth there, and the prints of Silver's feet where he wentthrough. Yarns he had heard the Happy Family tell, in the bunk-house onrainy days, had taught him these tricks. He was extremely thorough inall that he did--being a good deal like his dad--and when he went thegrass, no one would have suspected that he had passed that way.
After a while he left that winding creek-bottom and climbed a longridge. Then he went down hill and pretty soon he climbed another hillthat made old Silver stop and rest before he went on to the top. TheKid stood on the top for a few minutes and stared wistfully out overthe tumbled mass of hills, and deep hollows, and hills, and hill andhills--till he could not see where they left off. He could not see anyof the bunch; but then, he could not see any brakes growing anywhere,either. The bunch was down in the brakes--he had heard that often enoughto get it fixed firmly in his mind. Well, when he came to where thebrakes grew--and he would know them, all right, when he saw them!--hewould find the bunch. He thought they'd be s'prised to see him ride up!The bunch didn't know that he could drive stock all his own self, andthat he was a real, old cowpuncher now. He was a lot bigger. He didn'thave to hunt such a big rock, or such a high bank, to get on Silver now.He thought he must be pretty near as big as Pink, any way. They wouldcertainly be s'prised!
The brakes must be farther over. Maybe he would have to go over on theother side of that biggest hill before he came to the place where theygrew. He rode unafraid down a steep, rocky slope where Silver picked hisway very, very carefully, and sometimes stopped and smelt of a ledge ora pile of rocks, and then turned and found some other way down.
The Kid let him choose his path--Daddy Chip had taught him to leavethe reins loose and let Silver cross ditches and rough places where hewanted to cross. So Silver brought him safely down that hill whereeven the Happy Family would have hesitated to ride unless the need wasurgent.
He could not go right up over the next hill--there was a rock ledge thatwas higher than his head when he sat on Silver. He went down a narrowgulch--ah, an awfully narrow gulch! Sometimes he was afraid Silverwas too fat to squeeze through; but Silver always did squeeze throughsomehow. And still there were no brakes growing anywhere. Justchoke-cherry trees, and service-berries, and now and then a little flatfilled with cottonwoods and willows--familiar trees and bushes that hehad known all his six years of life.
So the Kid went on and on, ov
er hills or around hills or down along theside of hill. But he did not find the Happy Family, and he did not findthe brakes. He found cattle that had the Flying U brand--they had acomfortable, homey look. One bunch he drove down a wide coulee, hazingthem out of the brush and yelling "HY-AH!" at them, just the way theHappy Family yelled. He thought maybe these were the cattle the HappyFamily were looking for; so he drove them ahead of him and didn't letone break back on him and he was the happiest Kid in all Montana withthese range cattle, that had the Flying U brand, galloping awkwardlyahead of him down that big coulee.