Cow-Country

by B. M. Bower

  CHAPTER FOUR: BUDDY GIVES WARNING

  Buddy swung down from his horse, unsaddled it and went staggering to thestable wall with the burden of a stock-saddle much too big for him. Hehad to stand on his boot-toes to reach and pull the bridle down over theears of Whitefoot, which turned with an air of immense relief into thecorral gate and the hay piled at the further end. Buddy gave himone preoccupied glance and started for the cabin, walking with thecowpuncher's peculiar, bowlegged gait which comes of wearing chaps andthrowing out the knees to overcome the stiffness of the leather. Atthirteen Buddy was a cowboy from hat-crown to spurs-and at thirteenBuddy gloried in the fact. To-day, however, his mind was weighted withmatters of more importance than himself.

  "The Utes are having a war-dance, mother," he announced when he hadclosed the stout door of the kitchen behind him. "They mean it thistime. I lay in the brush and watched them last night." He stood lookingat his mother speculatively, a little grin on his face. "I told you, youcan't change an Injun by learning him to eat with a knife and fork," headded. "Colorou ain't any whiter than he was before you set out to learnhim manners. He was hoppin' higher than any of 'em."

  "Teach, Buddy, not learn. You know better than to say 'learn himmanners.'"

  "Teach him manners," Buddy corrected himself obediently. "I was thinkingmore about what I saw than about grammar. Where's father? I guess I'dbetter tell him. He'll want to get the stock out of the mountains, Ishould think."

  "Colorou will send me word before they take the warpath," motherobserved reassuringly. "He always has. I gave him a whole pound of teaand a blue ribbon the last time he was here."

  "Yes, and the last time they broke out they got away with more 'n ahundred head of cattle. You got to Laramie, all right, but he didn'ttell father in time to make a roundup back in the foothills. They'reDANCING, mother!"

  "Well, I suppose We're due for an outbreak," sighed mother. "Colorousays he can't hold his young men off when some of the tribe have beenkilled. He himself doesn't countenance the stealing and the occasionalkilling of white men. There are bad Indians and good ones."

  "I know a couple of good ones," Buddy murmured as he made for the washbasin. "It's the bad ones that were doing the dancing, mother," he flungover his shoulder. "And if I was you I'd take Dulcie and the cats andhit for Laramie. Colorou might get busy and forget to send word!"

  "If I WAS you?" Mother came up and nipped his ear between thumb andfinger. "Robert, I am discouraged over you. All that I teach you in thewinter seems to evaporate from your mind during the summer when you goout riding with the boys."

  Buddy wiped his face with an up-and-down motion on the roller towel andclanked across to the cupboard which he opened investigatively. "Anypie?" he questioned as he peered into the corners. "Say, if I had thehandling of those Utes, mother, I'd fix 'em so they wouldn't be breakingout every few months and making folks leave their homes to be pawed overand burnt, maybe." He found a jar of fresh doughnuts and took three.

  "They'll tromp around on your flower-beds--it just makes me SICK whenI think how they'll muss things up around here! I wish now," He blurtedunthinkingly, "that I hadn't killed the Injun that stole Rattler."

  "Buddy! Not YOU." His mother made a swift little run across the kitchenand caught him on his lean, hard-muscled young shoulders. "You--youbaby! What did you do? You didn't harm an Indian, did you, laddie?"

  Buddy tilted his head downward so that she could not look into his eyes."I dunno as I harmed him--much," he said, wiping doughnut crumbs fromhis mouth with one hasty sweep of his forearm. "But his horse cameouta the brush, and he never. I guess I killed him, all right. Anyway,mother, I had to. He took a shot at me first. It was the day we lostRattler and the bronks," He added accurately.

  Mother did not say anything for a minute, and Buddy hung his head lower,dreading to see the hurt look which he felt was in her eyes.

  "I have to pack a gun when I ride anywhere," he reminded herdefensively. "It ain't to balance me on the horse, either. If Injunstake in after me, the gun's so I can shoot. And a feller don't shootup in the air--and if an Injun is hunting trouble he oughta expect thatmaybe he might get shot sometime. You--you wouldn't want me to just runand let them catch me, would you?"

  Mother's hand slipped up to his head and pressed it against her breastso that Buddy heard her heart beating steady and sweet and true. Motherwasn't afraid--never, never!

  "I know--it's the dreadful necessity of defending our lives. But you'reso young--just mother's baby man!"

  Buddy looked up at her then, a laugh twinkling in his eyes. After all,mother understood.

  "I'm going to be your baby man always if you want me to, mother," Hewhispered, closing his arms around her neck in a sturdy hug. "But I'mfather's horse-wrangler, too. And a horse-wrangler has got to holdup his end. I--I didn't want to kill anybody, honest. But Injuns aredifferent. You kill rattlers, and they ain't as mean as Injuns. That oneI shot at was shooting at me before I even so much as knew there was onearound. I just shot back. Father would, or anybody else."

  "I know--I know," she conceded, the tender womanliness of her sighingover the need. In the next moment she was all mother, ready to fight forher young. "Buddy, never, never ride ANYWHERE without your rifle! And arevolver, too--be sure that it is in perfect condition. And--have youa knife? You're so LITTLE!" she wailed. "But father will need you, andhe'll take care of you--and Colorou would not let you be hurt if heknew. But--Buddy, you must be careful, and always watching--never letthem catch you off your guard. I shall be in Laramie before you andfather and the boys, I suppose, if the Indians really do break out. Andyou must promise me--"

  "I'll promise, mother. And don't you go and trust old Colorou an inch.He was jumping higher than any of 'em, and shaking his tomahawk andyelling--he'd have scalped me right there if he'd seen me watching 'em.Mother, I'm going to find father and tell him. And you may as well bepacking up, and--don't leave my guitar for them to smash, will you,mother?"

  His mother laughed then and pushed him toward the door. She had an ideaof her own and she did not want to be hindered now in putting it intoaction. Up the creek, in the bank behind a clump of willows, was asmall cave--or a large niche, one might call it--where many householdtreasures might be safely hidden, if one went carefully, wading in thecreek to hide the tracks. She followed Buddy out, and called to Ezrawho was chopping wood with a grunt for every fall of the axe and manyrest--periods in the shade of the cottonwood tree.

  At the stable, Buddy looked back and saw her talking earnestly to Ezra,who stood nodding his head in complete approval. Buddy's knowledge ofwomen began and ended with his mother. Therefore, to him all womenwere wonderful creatures whom men worshipped ardently because they werecreated for the adoration of lesser souls. Buddy did not know what hismother was going to do, but he was sure that whatever she did would beright; so he hoisted his saddle on the handiest fresh horse, and lopedoff to drive in the remuda, feeling certain that his father would moveswiftly to save his cattle that ranged back in the foothills, and thatthe saddle horses would be wanted at a moment's notice.

  Also, he reasoned, the range horses (mares and colts and the unbrokengeldings) would not be left to the mercy of the Indians. He did notquite know how his father would manage it, but he decided that he wouldcorral the REMUDA first, and then drive in the other horses, that fedscattered in undisturbed possession of a favorite grassy creek-bottomfarther up the Platte.

  The saddle horses, accustomed to Buddy's driving, were easily corralled.The other horses were fat and "sassy" and resented his coming among themwith the shrill whoop of authority. They gave him a hot hour's ridingbefore they finally bunched and went tearing down the river bottomtoward the ranch. Even so, Buddy left two of the wildest careening upa narrow gulch. He had not attempted to ride after them; not because hewas afraid of Indians, for he was not. The war-dance held every youngbuck and every old one in camp beyond the Pass. But the margin of safetymight be narrow, and Buddy was taking no chances that day.

 
; When he was convinced that it was impossible for one boy to be in half adozen places at once, and that the cowboys would be needed to corral therange bunch, Buddy whooped them all down the creek below the home ranchand let them go just as his father came riding up to the corral.

  "They're war-dancing, father," Buddy shouted eagerly, slipping off hishorse and wiping away the trickles of perspiration with a handkerchiefnot much redder than his face. "I drove all the horses down, so they'dbe handy. Them range horses are pretty wild. There was two I couldn'tget. What'll I do now?"

  Bob Birnie looked at his youngest rider and smoothed his beard with onehand. "You're an ambitious lad, Buddy. It's the Utes you're meaning--oris it the horses?"

  Buddy lifted his head and stared at his father disapprovingly.

  "Colorou is going to break out. I know. They've got their war paint allon and they're dancing. I saw them myself. I was going after the glovesColorou s squaw was making for me,--but I didn't get 'em. I laid in thebrush and watched 'em dance." He stopped and looked again doubtfully athis father. "I thought you might want to get the cattle outa the way," headded. "I thought I could save some time--"

  "You're sure about the paint?"

  "Yes, I'm sure. And Colorou was just a-going it with his war bonnet onand shaking his tomahawk and yelling--"

  "Ye did well, lad. We'll be leaving for Big Creek to-night, so run awaynow and rest yourself."

  "Oh, and can I go?" Buddy's voice was shrill with eagerness.

  "I'll need you, lad, to look after the horses. It will give me one morehand with the cattle. Now go tell Step-and-a-Half to make ready for aweek on the trail, and to have supper early so he can make his startwith the rest."

  Buddy walked stiffly away to the cook's cabin where Step-and-a-Half satleisurely gouging the worst blemishes out of soft, old potatoes with achronic tendency to grow sprouts, before he peeled them for supper Hiscrippled leg was thrust out straight, his hat was perched precariouslyover one ear because of the slanting sun rays through the window, anda half-smoked cigarette waggled uncertainly in the corner of his mouthwhile he sang dolefully a most optimistic ditty of the West:

  "O give me a home where the buff-alo roam, Where the deer and theantelope play, Where never is heard a discouraging word And the sky isnot cloudy all day."

  "You're going to hear a discouraging word right now," Buddy broke inruthlessly upon the song. Whereupon, with a bit of importance inhis voice and in his manner, he proceeded to spoil Step-and-a-Half'sdisposition and to deepen, if that were possible, his loathing ofIndians. Too often had he made dubious soup of his dishwater and theleavings from a roundup crew's dinner, and watched blanketed buckssmack lips over the mess, to run from them now without feeling utterlydisgusted with life. Step-and-a-Half's vituperations could be heardabove the clatter of pots and pans as he made ready for the journey.

  That night's ride up the pass through the narrow range of high-peakedhills to the Tomahawk's farthest range on Big Creek was a tediousaffair to Buddy. A man had been sent on a fast horse to warn the nearestneighbor, who in turn would warn the next,--until no settler wouldbe left in ignorance of his danger. Ezra was already on the trail toLaramie, with mother and Dulcie and the cats and a slat box full ofchickens, and a young sow with little pigs.

  Buddy, whose word no one had questioned, who might pardonably haveconsidered himself a hero, was concerned chiefly with his mother'sflower garden which he had helped to plant and had watered more orless faithfully with creek water carried in buckets. He was afraid theIndians would step on the poppies and the phlox, and trample down thefour o'clocks which were just beginning to branch out and look nice andbushy, and to blossom. The scent of the four o'clocks had been in hisnostrils when he came out at dusk with his fur overcoat which mother hadtold him must not be left behind. Buddy himself merely liked flowers:but mother talked to them and kissed them just for love, and pitied themif Buddy forgot and let them go thirsty. He would have stayed to fightfor mother's flower garden, if it would have done any good.

  He was thinking sleepily that next year he would plant flowers in boxesthat could be carried to the cave if the Indians broke out again, whenTex Farley poked him in the ribs and told him to wake up or he'd falloff his horse. It was a weary climb to the top of the range that dividedthe valley of Big Creek from the North Platte, and a wearier climb down.Twice Buddy caught himself on the verge of toppling out of the saddle.For after all he was only a thirteen-year Old boy, growing like anyother healthy young animal. He had been riding hard that day and half ofthe preceding night when he had raced back from the Reservation togive warning of the impending outbreak. He needed sleep, and nature wasdetermined that he should have it.