Cow-Country

by B. M. Bower

  CHAPTER TWELVE: SPORT O' KINGS

  Sunday happened to be fair, with not too strong a wind blowing. Beforenoon Little Lost ranch was a busy place, and just before dinner itbecame busier. Horse-racing seemed to be as popular a sport in thevalley as dancing. Indeed, men came riding in who had not come to thedance. The dry creek-bed where the horses would run had no road leadingto it, so that all vehicles came to Little Lost and remained there whilethe passengers continued on foot to the races.

  At the corral fresh shaven men, in clean shirts to distinguish this as adress-up occasion, foregathered, looking over the horses and making betsand arguing. Pop shambled here and there, smoking cigarettes furiouslyand keeping a keen ear toward the loudest betting. He came sidling up toBud, who was leading Smoky out of the stable, and his sharp eyes took inevery inch of the horse and went inquiringly to Bud's face.

  "Goin' to run him, young feller--lame as what he is?" he demandedsharply.

  "Going to try, anyway," said Bud. "I've got a bet up on him, dad."

  "Sho! Fixin' to lose, air ye? You kin call it off, like as not. Jeffain't so onreason'ble 't he'd make yuh run a lame horse. Air yuh, Jeff?"

  Jeff strolled up and looked Smoky over with critical eyes. "What's thematter? Ain't the kid game to run him? Looks to me like a good littlegoer."

  "He's got a limp--but I'll run him anyway." Bud glanced up. "Maybe whenhe's warmed up he'll forget about it."

  "Seen my Skeeter?"

  "Good horse, I should judge," Bud observed indifferently. "But I ain'tworrying any."

  "Well, neither am I," Jeff grinned.

  Pop stood teetering back and forth, plainly uneasy. "I'd rub him rightgood with liniment," he advised Bud. "I'll git some't I know ought t'help."

  "What's the matter, Pop? You got money up on that cayuse?" Jeff laughed.

  Pop whirled on him. "I ain't got money up on him, no. But if he wasn'tlame I'd have some! I'd show ye 't I admire gameness in a kid. I wouldso."

  Jeff nudged his neighbor into laughter. "There ain't a gamer old birdin the valley than Pop," Jeff cried. "C'm awn, Pop, I'll bet yuh tendollars the kid beats me!"

  Pop was shuffling hurriedly out of the corral after the liniment. ToJeff's challenge he made no reply whatever. The group around Jeff shooedSmoky gently toward the other side of the corral, thereby convincingthemselves of the limp in his right hind foot. While not so pronouncedas to be crippling, it certainly was no asset to a running horse, andthe wise ones conferred together in undertones.

  "That there kid's a born fool," Dave Truman stated positively. "Thehorse can't run. He's got the look of a speedy little animal--butshucks! The kid don't know anything about running horses. I've beentalking to him, and I know. Jeff, you're taking the money away from himif you run that race."

  "Well, I'm giving the kid a chance to back out," Jeff hastened todeclare. "He can put it off till his horse gits well, if he wants to. Iain't going to hold him to it. I never said I was."

  "That's mighty kind of you," Bud said, coming up from behind with abottle of liniment, and with Pop at his heels. "But I'll run him justthe same. Smoky has favored this foot before, and it never seemed tohurt him any. You needn't think I'm going to crawfish. You must thinkI'm a whining cuss--say! I'll bet another ten dollars that I don't comein more than a neck behind, lame horse or not!"

  "Now, kid, don't git chancey," Pop admonished uneasily. "Twenty-five isenough money to donate to Jeff."

  "That's right, kid. I like your nerve," Jeff cut in, emphasizing hisapproval with a slap on Bud's shoulder as he bent to lift Smoky's leg."I've saw worse horses than this one come in ahead--it wouldn't be nosport o' kings if nobody took a chance."

  "I'm taking chance enough," Bud retorted without looking up. "If I don'twin this time I will the next, maybe."

  "That's right," Jeff agreed heartily, winking broadly at the othersbehind Bud's back.

  Bud rubbed Smoky's ankle with liniment, listened to various and sundryself-appointed advisers and, without seeming to think how the sums wouldtotal, took several other small bets on the race. They were small--Popbegan to teeter back and forth and lift his shoulders and pull hisbeard--sure signs of perturbation.

  "By Christmas, I'll just put up ten dollars on the kid," Pop finallycackled. "I ain't got much to lose--but I'll show yuh old Pop ain'tgoing to see the young feller stand alone." He tried to catch Bud's eye,but that young man was busy saddling Smoky and returning jibe for jibewith the men around him, and did not glance toward Pop at all.

  "I'll take this bottle in my pocket, Pop," he said with his back towardthe old man, and mounted carelessly. "I'll ride him around a little andgive him another good rubbing before we run. I'm betting," he added tothe others frankly, "on the chance that exercise and the liniment willtake the soreness out of that ankle. I don't believe it amounts toanything at all. So if any of you fellows want to bet--"

  "Shucks! Don't go 'n-" Pop began, and bit the sentence in two, droppingimmediately into a deep study. The kid was getting beyond Pop'sunderstanding.

  A crowd of perhaps a hundred men and women--with a generous sprinklingof unruly juveniles--lined the sheer bank of the creek-bed and watchedthe horses run, and screamed their cheap witticisms at the losers, andtheir approval of those who won. The youngster with the mysterious pastand the foolhardiness to bet on a lame horse they watched and discussed,the women plainly wishing he would win--because he was handsome andyoung, and such a wonderful musician. The men were more cold-blooded.They could not see that Bud's good looks or the haunting melody of hisvoice had any bearing whatever upon his winning a race. They called hima fool, and either refused to bet at all on such a freak proposition asa lame horse running against Skeeter, or bet against him. A few of thewise ones wondered if Jeff and his bunch were merely "stringing the kidalong "; if they might not let him win a little, just to make him more"chancey." But they did not think it wise to bet on that probability.

  While three races were being run Bud rode with the Little Lost men, andSmoky still limped a little. Jerry Myers, still self-appointed guardianof Bud, herded him apart and called him a fool and implored him to callthe race off and keep his money in his own pocket.

  Bud was thinking just then about a certain little woman who sat on thecreek bank with a wide-brimmed straw hat shading her wonderful eyes, anda pair of little, high-arched feet tapping heels absently against thebank wall. Honey sat beside her, and a couple of the valley women whomBud had met at the dance. He had ridden close and paused for a fewfriendly sentences with the quartette, careful to give Honey theattention she plainly expected. But it was not Honey who wore the widehat and owned the pretty little feet. Bud pulled his thoughts back froma fruitless wish that he might in some way help that little woman whosetrouble looked from her eyes, and whose lips smiled so bravely. He didnot think of possession when he thought of her; it was the look in hereyes, and the slighting tones in which Honey spoke of her.

  "Say, come alive! What yuh going off in a trance for, when I'm talkingto yuh for your own good?" Jerry smiled whimsically, but his eyes wereworried.

  Bud pulled himself together and reined closer.

  "Don't bet anything on this race, Jerry," he advised "Or if you do,don't bet on Skeeter. But--well, I'll just trade you a little advice forall you've given me. Don't bet!"

  "What the hell!" surprise jolted out of Jerry.

  "It's my funeral," Bud laughed. "I'm a chancey kid, you see--but I'dhate to see you bet on me." He pulled up to watch the next race--fournervy little cow-horses of true range breeding, going down to thequarter post.

  "They 're going to make false starts aplenty," Bud remarked after thefirst fluke. "Jeff and I have it out next. I'll just give Smoke anothertreatment." He dismounted, looked at Jerry undecidedly and slapped himon the knee. "I'm glad to have a friend like you," he said impulsively."There's a lot of two-faced sinners around here that would steal a manblind. Don't think I'm altogether a fool."

  Jerry looked at him queerly, opened his mouth and shut it again
sotightly that his jawbones stood out a little. He watched Bud bathingSmoky's ankle. When Bud was through and handed Jerry the bottle to keepfor him, Jerry held him for an instant by the hand.

  "Say, for Gawdsake don't talk like that promiscuous, Bud," he begged."You might hit too close--"

  "Ay, Jerry! Ever hear that old Armenian proverb, 'He who tells the truthshould have one foot in the stirrup'? I learned that in school."

  Jerry let go Bud's hand and took the bottle, Bud's watch that had hismother's picture pasted in the back, and his vest, a pocket of whichcontained a memorandum of his wagers. Bud was stepping out of his chaps,and he looked up and grinned. "Cheer up, Jerry. You're going to laugh ina minute." When Jerry still remained thoughtful, Bud added soberly, "Iappreciate you and old Pop standing by me. I don't know just what you'vegot on your mind, but the fact that there's something is hint enough forme." Whereupon Jerry's eyes lightened a little.

  The four horses came thundering down the track, throwing tiny pebbleshigh into the air as they passed. A trim little sorrel won, and therewas the usual confusion of voices upraised in an effort to be heard.When that had subsided, interest once more centered on Skeeter andSmoky, who seemed to have recovered somewhat from his lameness.

  Not a man save Pop and Bud had placed a bet on Smoky, yet every manthere seemed keenly interested in the race. They joshed Bud, who grinnedand took it good-naturedly, and found another five dollars in--hispocket to bet--this time with Pop, who kept eyeing him sharply--and itseemed to Bud warningly. But Bud wanted to play his own game, this time,and he avoided Pop's eyes.

  The two men rode down the hoof-scored sand to the quarter post,Skeeter dancing sidewise at the prospect of a race, Smoky now and thententatively against Bud's steady pressure of the bit.

  "He's not limping now," Bud gloated as they rode. But Jeff only laughedtolerantly and made no reply.

  Dave Truman started them with a pistol shot, and the two horses dartedaway, Smoky half a jump in the lead. His limp was forgotten, and forhalf the distance he ran neck and neck with Skeeter. Then he dropped toSkeeter's middle, to his flank--then ran with his black nose evenwith Skeeter's rump. Even so it was a closer race than the crowd hadexpected, and all the cowboys began to yell themselves purple.

  But when they were yet a few leaps from the wire clothes-line stretchedhigh, from post to post, Bud leaned forward until he lay flat alongsideSmoky's neck, and gave a real Indian war-whoop. Smoky lifted andlengthened his stride, came up again to Skeeter's middle, to hisshoulder, to his ears--and with the next leap thrust his nose pastSkeeter's as they finished.

  Well, then there was the usual noise, everyone trying to shout louderthan his fellows. Bud rode to where Pop was sitting apart on a pacinggray horse that he always rode, and paused to say guardedly,

  "I pulled him, Pop. But at that I won, so if I can pry another raceout of this bunch to-day, you can bet all you like. And you owe me fivedollars," he added thriftily.

  "Sho! Shucks almighty!" spluttered Pop, reaching reluctantly into hispocket for the money. "Jeff, he done some pullin' himself--I wish Iknowed," he added pettishly, "just how big a fool you air."

  "Hey, come over here!" shouted Jeff. "What yuh nagging ole Pop about?"

  "Pop lost five dollars on that race," Bud called back, and loped overto the crowd. "But he isn't the only one. Seems to me I've got quite abunch of money coming to me, from this crowd!"

  "Jeff, he'd a beat him a mile if his bridle rein had busted," anarrogant voice shouted recklessly. "Jeff, you old fox, you know damnwell you pulled Skeeter. You must love to lose, doggone yuh."

  "If you think I didn't run right," Jeff retorted, as if a littlenettled, "someone else can ride the horse. That is, if the kid hereain't scared off with your talk. How about it, Bud? Think you won fair?"

  Bud was collecting his money, and he did not immediately answer thechallenge. When he did it was to offer them another race. He would not,he said, back down from anyone. He would bet his last cent onlittle Smoky. He became slightly vociferative and more than a littlevain-glorious, and within half an hour he had once more staked all themoney he had in the world. The number of men who wanted to bet withhim surprised him a little. Also the fact that the Little Lost men werebetting on Smoky.

  Honey called him over to the bank and scolded him in tones much like hername, and finally gave him ten dollars which she wanted to wager onhis winning. As he whirled away, Marian beckoned impulsively and leanedforward, stretching out to him her closed hand.

  "Here's ten," she smiled, "just to show that the Little Lost stands byits men--and horses. Put it on Smoky, please." When Bud was almost outof easy hearing, she called to him. "Oh--was that a five or a ten dollarbill I gave you?"

  Bud turned back, unfolding the banknote. A very tightly folded scrap ofpaper slid into his palm.

  "Oh, all right--I have the five here in my pocket," called Marian, andlaughed quite convincingly. "Go on and run! We won't be able to breathefreely until the race is over."

  Wherefore Bud turned back, puzzled and with his heart jumping. For somereason Marian had taken this means of getting a message into his hands.What it could be he did not conjecture; but he had a vague, unreasoninghope that she trusted him and was asking him to help her somehow. Hedid not think that it concerned the race, so he did not risk opening thenote then, with so many people about.

  A slim, narrow-eyed youth of about Bud's weight was chosen to rideSkeeter, and together they went back over the course to the quarterpost, with Dave to start them and two or three others to make sure thatthe race was fair. Smoky was full now of little prancing steps, and heldhis neck arched while his nostrils flared in excitement, showing pinkwithin. Skeeter persistently danced sidewise, fighting the bit, crazy torun.

  Skeeter made two false starts, and when the pistol was fired, jumpedhigh into the air and forward, shaking his head, impatient against therestraint his rider put upon him. Halfway down the stretch he lungedsidewise toward Smoky, but that level-headed little horse swerved andwent on, shoulder to shoulder with the other. At the very last Skeeterrolled a pebble under his foot and stumbled--and again Smoky came inwith his slaty nose in the lead.

  Pop rode into the centre of the yelling crowd, his whiskers bristling."Shucks almighty!" he cried. "What fer ridin' do yuh call that there?Jeff Hall, that feller held Skeeter in worse'n what you did yourself! Ikin prove it! I got a stop watch, an' I timed 'im, I did. An' I kin tellyuh the time yore horse made when he run agin Dave's Boise. He's threeseconds--yes, by Christmas, he's four seconds slower t'day 'n what he'sever run before! What fer sport d' you call that?" His voice went up andcracked at the question mark like a boy in his early teens.

  Jeff stalked forward to Skeeter's side. "Jake, did you pull Skeeter?"he demanded sternly. "I'll swan if this ain't the belly-achiness bunchI ever seen! How about it, Jake? Did Skeeter do his durndest, or didn'the?

  "Shore, he did!" Jake testified warmly. "I'da beat, too, if he hadn'tstumbled right at the last. Didn't yuh see him purty near go down? Andwasn't he within six inches of beatin'? I leave it to the crowd!"

  The crowd was full of argument, and some bets were paid under protest.But they were paid, just the same. Burroback Valley insisted that themain points of racing law should be obeyed to the letter. Bud collectedhis winnings, the Scotch in him overlooking nothing whatever in theshape of a dollar. Then, under cover of getting his smoking material, hedared bring out Marian's note. There were two lines in a fine, even handon a cigarette paper, and Bud, relieved at her cleverness, unfolded thepaper and read while he opened his bag of tobacco. The lines were likethose in an old-fashioned copy book:

  "Winners may be losers. Empty pockets, safe owner."

  And that was all. Bud sifted tobacco into the paper, rolled it into acigarette and smoked it to so short a stub that he burnt his lips.Then he dropped it beside his foot and ground it into the sand while hetalked.

  He would run Smoky no more that day, he declared, but next Sunday hewould give them all a chance to settle
their minds and win back theirlosings, providing his horse's ankle didn't go bad again with to-day'srunning. Pop, Dave, Jeff and a few other wise ones examined the weakankle and disagreed over the exact cause and nature of the weakness. Itseemed all right. Smoky did not flinch from rubbing, though he did lifthis foot away from strange hands. They questioned Bud, who could offerno positive information on the subject, except that once he and Smokyhad rolled down a bluff together, and Smoky had been lame for a whileafterwards.

  It did not occur to anyone to ask Bud which leg had been lamed, and Buddid not volunteer the detail. An old sprain, they finally decided, andBud replaced his saddle, got his chaps and coat from Jerry, who wassmiling over an extra twenty-five dollars, and rode over to give thegirls their winnings.

  He stayed for several minutes talking with them and hoping for a chanceto thank Marian for her friendly warning. But there was none, and herode away dissatisfied and wondering uneasily if Marian thought he wasreally as friendly with Honey as that young lady made him appear to be.

  He was one of the first to ride back to the ranch, and he turned Smokyin the pasture and caught up Stopper to ride with Honey, who said shewas going for a ride when the races were over, and that if he liked togo along she would show him the Sinks. Bud had professed an eagernessto see the Sinks which he did not feel until Marian had turned her headtoward Honey and said in her quiet voice:

  "Why the Sinks? You know that isn't safe country to ride in, Honey."

  "That's why I want to ride there," Honey retorted flippantly. "I hatesafe places and safe things."

  Marian had glanced at Bud--and it was that glance which he wasremembering now with a puzzled sense that, like the note, it had meantsomething definite, something vital to his own welfare if he could onlyfind the key. First it was Hen, then Jerry, and now Marian, all warninghim vaguely of danger into which he might stumble if he were notcareful.

  Bud was no fool, but on the other hand he was not one to stampedeeasily. He had that steadfast courage, perhaps, which could face dangerand still maintain his natural calm--just as his mother had correctedgrammatical slips in the very sentences which told her of an impendingoutbreak of Indians long ago Bud saddled Stopper and the horse whichHoney was to ride, led them to the house and went inside to wait untilthe girl was ready. While he waited he played--and hoped that Marian,hearing, would know that he played for her; and that she would come andexplain the cryptic message. Whether Marian heard and appreciated themusic or not, she failed to appear and let him know. It seemed to himthat she might easily have come into the room for a minute when she knewhe was there, and let him have a chance to thank her and ask her justwhat she meant.

  He was just finishing the AVE MARIA which Marian had likened to a breathof cool air, when Honey appeared in riding skirt and light shirtwaist.She looked very trim and attractive, and Bud smiled upon herapprovingly, and cut short the last strain by four beats, which was oneway of letting Marian know that he considered her rather unappreciative.