Cow-Country

by B. M. Bower

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN: WHY BUD MISSED A DANCE

  "Bud, you're fourteen kinds of a damn fool and I can prove it," Jerryannounced without prelude of any kind save, perhaps, the viciousnesswith which he thrust a pitchfork into a cock of hay. The two wereturning over hay-cocks that had been drenched with another unwelcomestorm, and they had not been talking much. "Forking" soggy hay whenthe sun is blistering hot and great, long-billed mosquitoes are boringindefatigably into the back of one's neck is not a pastime conducive topolite and animated conversation.

  "Fly at it," Bud invited, resting his fork while he scratched a smartingshoulder. "But you can skip some of the evidence. I know seven of thekinds, and I plead guilty. Any able-bodied man who will deliberatelymake a barbecue of himself for a gang of blood-thirsty insects ought tobe hanged. What's the rest?"

  "You can call that mild," Jerry stated severely. "Bud, you're playing tolose the shirt off your back. You've got a hundred dollar forfeit upon next Sunday's running match, so you'll run if you have to race Boiseafoot. That's all right if you want the risk--but did it ever occur toyou that if all the coin in the neighborhood is collected in one man'spocket, there'll be about as many fellows as there are losers, that willlay awake till sun-up figuring how to heel him and ride off with theroll? I ain't over-stocked with courage, myself. I'd rather be broke inBurroback Valley than owner of wealth. It's healthier."

  He thrust his fork into another settled heap, lifted it clear of theground with one heave of his muscular shoulders, and heard within astrident buzzing. He held the hay poised until a mottled graysnake writhed into view, its ugly jaws open and its fangs showingmalevolently.

  "Grab him with your fork, Bud," Jerry said coolly. "A rattler--thevalley's full of 'em,--some of 'em 's human."

  The snake was dispatched and the two went on to the next hay-cock.Bud was turning over more than the hay, and presently he spoke moreseriously than was his habit with Jerry.

  "You're full enough of warnings, Jerry. What do you want me to do aboutit?"

  "Drift," Jerry advised. "There's moral diseases just as catching assmallpox. This part of the country has been settled up by men that camehere first because they wanted to hide out. They've slipped into darncrooked ways, and the rest has either followed suit or quit. All throughthis rough country. It's the same-over in the Black Rim, across ThunderMountains, and beyond that to the Sawtooth, a man that's honest is aman that's off his range. I'd like to see you pull out--before you'replanted."

  Bud looked at Jerry, studied him, feature by feature. "Then what are youdoing here?" he demanded bluntly. "Why haven't you pulled out?"

  "Me?" Jerry bit his lip. "Bud, I'm going to take a chance and tell youthe God's-truth. I dassent. I'm protected here because I keep my mouthshut, and because they know I've got to or they can hand me over. I hadsome trouble. I'm on the dodge, and Little Lost is right handy to theSinks and--Catrock Canyon. There ain't a sheriff in Idaho that wouldhave one chance in a thousand of getting me here. But you--say!" Hefaced Bud. "You ain't on the dodge, too, are yuh?"

  "Nope," Bud grinned. "Over at the Muleshoe they seemed to think I was. Ijust struck out for myself, and I want to show up at home some day witha stake I made myself. It's just a little argument with my dad that Iwant to settle. And," he added frankly, "I seem to have struck theright place to make money quickly. The very fact that they're a bunch ofcrooks makes my conscience clear on the point of running my horse. I'mnot cheating them out of a cent. If Jeff's horse is faster than Smoky,Jeff is privileged to let him out and win if he can. It isn't my faultif he 's playing to let me win from the whole bunch in the hope thathe can hold me up afterwards and get the roll. It's straight 'give andtake'--and so far I've been taking."

  Jerry worked for a while, moodily silent. "What I'd like is to see youtake the trail; while the takin's good," he said later. "I've got tokeep my mouth shut. But I like yuh, Bud. I hate like hell to see youwalking straight into a trap."

  "Say, I'm as easily trapped as a mountain lion," Bud told himconfidently.

  Whereat Jerry looked at him pityingly. "You going to that dance up atMorgan's?"

  "Sure! I'm going to take Honey and--I think Mrs. Morris if she decidesto go. Honey mentioned it last night. Why?"

  "Oh, nothing." Jerry shouldered his fork and went off to where a jug ofwater was buried in the hay beside a certain boulder which markedthe spot. He drank long, stopped for a short gossip with Charley, whostrolled over for a drink, and went to work on another row.

  Bud watched him, and wondered if Jerry had changed rows to avoidfurther talk with him; and whether Jerry had merely been trying to getinformation from him, and had either learned what he wanted to know,or had given up the attempt. Bud reviewed mentally their desultoryconversation and decided that he had accidentally been very discreet.The only real bit of information he had given Jerry was the fact that hewas not "on the dodge"--a criminal in fear of the law--and that surelycould harm no man.

  That he intended to run against Boise on Sunday was common knowledge;also that he had a hundred dollar forfeit up on the race. And that hewas going to a dance with Honey was of no consequence that he could see.

  Bud was beginning to discount the vague warnings he had received. Unlesssomething definite came within his knowledge he would go about hisbusiness exactly as if Burroback Valley were a church-going community.He would not "drift."

  But after all he did not go to the dance with Honey, or with anyone. Hecame to the supper-table freshly shaved and dressed for the occasion,ate hungrily and straightway became a very sick young man. He did notcare if there were forty dances in the Valley that night. His head wassplitting, his stomach was in a turmoil. He told Jerry to go ahead withHoney, and if he felt better after a while he would follow. Jerry atfirst was inclined to scepticism, and accused Bud of crawfishing at thelast minute. But within ten minutes Bud had convinced him so completelythat Jerry insisted upon staying with him. By then Bud was too sick tocare what was being done, or who did it. So Jerry stayed.

  Honey came to the bunk-house in her dance finery, was met in the doorwayby Jerry and was told that this was no place for a lady, and reluctantlyconsented to go without her escort.

  A light shone dimly in the kitchen after the dancers had departed,wherefore Jerry guessed that Marian had not gone with the others,and that he could perhaps get hold of mustard for an emetic or aplaster--Jerry was not sure which remedy would be best, and thepatient, wanting to die, would not be finicky. He found Marian measuringsomething drop by drop into half a glass of water. She turned, saw whohad entered, and carefully counted three more drops, corked the bottletightly and slid it into her apron pocket, and held out the glass toJerry.

  "Give him this," she said in a soft undertone. "I'm sorry, but I hadn'ta chance to say a word to the boy, and so I couldn't think of any otherway of making sure he would not go up to Morgan's. I put something intohis coffee to make him sick. You may tell him, Jerry, if you like. Ishould, if I had the chance. This will counteract the effects of theother so that he will be all right in a couple of hours."

  Jerry took the glass and stood looking at her steadily. "That sure wasone way to do it," he observed, with a quirk of the lips. "It's none ofmy business, and I ain't asking any questions, but--"

  "Very sensible, I'm sure," Marian interrupted him. "I wish he'd leavethe country. Can't you--?"

  "No. I told him to pull out, and he just laughed at me. I knowed theywas figuring on ganging together to-night--"

  Marian closed her hands together with a gesture of impatience. "Jerry, Iwish I knew just how bad you are!" she exclaimed. "Do you dare stand byhim? Because this thing is only beginning. I couldn't bear to see him goup there to-night, absolutely unsuspecting--and so I made him sick. Tellthat to anyone, and you can make me--"

  "Say, I ain't a damned skunk!" Jerry muttered. "I'm bad enough, maybe.At any rate you think so." Then, as usually happened, Jerry decided tohold his tongue. He turned and lifted the latch of the screen door. "Yousure made a good job of it
," he grinned. "I'll go an' pour this into Bud'fore he loses his boots!"

  He did so, and saved Bud's boots and half a night's sleep besides.Moreover, when Bud, fully recovered, searched his memory of that supperand decided that it was the sliced cucumbers that had disagreed withhim, Jerry gravely assured him that it undoubtedly was the combinationof cucumber and custard pie, and that Bud was lucky to be alive aftersuch reckless eating.

  Having missed the dance altogether, Bud looked forward with impatienceto Sunday. It is quite possible that others shared with him thatimpatience, though we are going to adhere for a while to Bud's point ofview and do no more than guess at the thoughts hidden behind the fairwords of certain men in the Valley.

  Pop's state of mind we are privileged to know, for Pop was seen makingdaily pilgrimage to the pasture where he could watch Smoky limpingdesultorily here and there with Stopper and Sunfish. On Saturdayafternoon Bud saw Pop trying to get his hands on Smoky, presumably toexamine the lame ankle. But three legs were all Smoky needed to keep himout of Pop's reach. Pop forgot his rheumatism and ran pretty fast for aman his age, and when Bud arrived Pop's vocabulary had limbered up to amore surprising activity than his legs.

  "Want to bet on yourself, Pop?" Bud called out when Pop was runningback and forth, hopefully trying to corner Smoky in a rocky draw. "I'mwilling to risk a dollar on you, anyway."

  Pop whirled upon him and hurled sentences not written in the book ofParlor Entertainment. The gist of it was that he had been trying allthe week to have a talk with Bud, and Bud had plainly avoided him afterpromising to act upon Pop's advice and run so as to make some money.

  "Well, I made some," Bud defended. "If you didn't, it's just because youdidn't bet strong enough."

  "I want to look at that horse's hind foot," Pop insisted.

  "No use. He's too lame to run against Boise. You can see that yourself."

  Pop eyed Bud suspiciously, pulling his beard. "Are you fixin' todouble-cross me, young feller?" he wanted to know. "I went and made somepurty big bets on this race. If you think yo're goin' to fool ole Pop,you 'll wish you hadn't. You got enemies already in this valley, lemmetell yuh. The Muleshoe ain't any bunch to fool with, and I'm willingto say 't they're laying fer yuh. They think," he added shrewdly, "'tyou're a spotter, or something. Air yuh?"

  "Of course I am, Pop! I've spotted a way to make money and havefun while I do it." Bud looked at the old man, remembered Marian'sdeclaration that Pop was not very reliable, and groped mentally for away to hearten the old man without revealing anything better kept tohimself, such as the immediate effect of a horse hair tied just abovea horse's hoof, also the immediate result of removing that hair.Wherefore, he could not think of much to say, except that he would notattempt to run a lame horse against Boise.

  "All I can say is, to-morrow morning you keep your eyes open, Pop, andyour tongue between your teeth. And no matter what comes up, you useyour own judgment."

  To-morrow morning Pop showed that he was taking Bud's advice. When thecrowd began to gather--much earlier than usual, by the way, and muchlarger than any crowd Bud had seen in the valley--Pop was trotting hereand there, listening and pulling his whiskers and eyeing Bud sharplywhenever that young man appeared in his vicinity.

  Bud led Smoky up at noon--and Smoky was still lame. Dave looked at himand at Bud, and grinned. "I guess that forfeit money's mine," he said inhis laconic way. "No use running that horse. I could beat him afoot."

  This was but the beginning. Others began to banter and jeer Bud, Jeff'scrowd taunting him with malicious glee. The singin' kid was going tohave some of the swelling taken out of his head, they chortled. He hadbeen crazy enough to put up a forfeit on to-day's race, and now hishorse had just three legs to run on.

  "Git out afoot, kid!" Jeff Hall yelled. "If you kin run half as fast asyou kin talk, you'll beat Boise four lengths in the first quarter!"

  Bud retorted in kind, and led Smoky around the corral as if he hopedthat the horse would recover miraculously just to save his master'spride. The crowd hooted to see how Smoky hobbled along, barely touchingthe toe of his lame foot to the ground. Bud led him back to the mangerpiled with new hay, and faced the jeering crowd belligerently. Budnoticed several of the Muleshoe men in the crowd, no doubt drawn toLittle Lost by the talk of Bud's spectacular winnings for two Sundays.Hen was there, and Day Masters and Cub. Also there were strangers whohad ridden a long way, judging by their sweaty horses. In the midst ofthe talk and laughter Dave led out Boise freshly curried and brushed andarching his neck proudly.

  "No use, Bud," he said tolerantly. "I guess you're set back that forfeitmoney--unless you want to go through the motions of running a lamehorse."

  "No, sir, I'm not going to hand over any forfeit money without makinga fight for it!" Bud told him, anger showing in his voice. "I'm no suchpiker as that. I won't run Smoky, lame as he is "--Bud probably nudgedhis own ribs when he said that!--"but if you'll make it a mile, I'llcatch up my old buckskin packhorse and run the race with him, bythunder! He's not the quickest horse in the world, but he sure can run along while!"

  They yelled and slapped one another on the back, and otherwise comportedthemselves as though a great joke had been told them; never dreaming,poor fools, that a costly joke was being perpetrated.

  "Go it, kid. You run your packhorse, and I'll rive yuh five to one onhim!" a friend of Jeff Hall's yelled derisively.

  "I'll just take you up on that, and I'll make it one hundred dollars,"Bud shouted back. "I'd run a turtle for a quarter, at those odds!"

  The crowd was having hysterics when Bud straddled a Little Lost horseand, loudly declaring that he would bring back Sunfish, led Smokylimping back to the pasture. He returned soon, leading the buckskin. Thecrowd surged closer, gave Sunfish a glance and whooped again. Bud's facewas red with apparent anger, his eyes snapped. He faced them defiantly,his hand on Sunfish's thin, straggling mane.

  "You're such good sports, you'll surely appreciate my feelings when Isay that this horse is mine, and I'm going to run him and back him towin!" he cried. "I may be a darn fool, but I'm no piker. I know whatthis horse can do when I try to catch him up on a frosty morning--andI'm going to see if he can't go just as fast and just as long when I'mon him as he can when I'm after him."

  "We'll go yuh, kid! I'll bet yuh five to one," a man shouted. "You namethe amount yourself."

  "Fifty," said Bud, and the man nodded and jotted down the amount.

  "Bud, you're a damn fool. I'll bet you a hundred and make it ten toone," drawled Dave, stroking Boise's face affectionately while he lookedsuperciliously at Sunfish standing half asleep in the clamor, with hishead sagging at the end of his long, ewe neck. "But if you'll take myadvice, go turn that fool horse back in the pasture and run the bay ifyou must run something."

  "The bay's a rope horse. I don't want to spoil him by running him. Thatlittle horse saved my life, down in the Sinks. No, Sunfish has run timesenough from me--now he 's got to run for me, by thunder. I'll bet onhim, too!"

  Jeff pushed his way through to Bud. He was smiling with that craftylook in his eyes which should have warned a child that the smile went nodeeper than his lips.

  "Bud, doggone it, I like yore nerve. Besides, you owe me something forthe way you trimmed me last Sunday. I'll just give you fifteen to one,and you put up Skeeter at seventy-five, and as much money as yo're amind to. A pile of it come out of my pocket, so-"

  "Well, don't holler your head off, Jeff. How's two hundred?"

  "Suits me, kid." He winked at the others, who knew how sure a thing hehad to back his wager. "It 'll be a lot of money if I should lose--"He turned suddenly to Dave. "How much was that you put up agin the kid,Dave?"

  "One hundred dollars, and a ten-to-one shot I win," Dave drawled. "Thatought to satisfy yuh it ain't a frame-up. The kid's crazy, that's all."

  "Oh! Am I?" Bud turned hotly. "Well, I've bet half of all the moneyI have in the world. And I'm game for the other half--" He stoppedabruptly, cast one look at Sunfish and another at Boise, s
tepping aboutuneasily, his shiny coat rippling, beautiful. He turned and combedSunfish's scanty mane with his gloved fingers. Those nearest saw thathis lips were trembling a little and mistook his hidden emotion foranger.

  "You got him going," a man whispered in Jeff's ear. "The kid's crazy mad.He'll bet the shirt off his back if yuh egg him on a little more."

  Jeff must have decided to "egg" Bud on. By the time the crowd hadreached the course, and the first, more commonplace races were over,the other half of his money was in the hands of the stake-holder, whohappened on this day to be Jerry. And the odds varied from four to oneup to Jeff Hall's scornful fifteen.

  "Bet yuh five hundred dollars against your bay horse," Lew offered whenBud confessed that he had not another dollar to bet.--

  "All right, it's a go with me," Bud answered recklessly. "Get hishundred, Jerry, and put down Stopper."

  "What's that saddle worth?" another asked meaningly.

  "One hundred dollars," snapped Bud. "And if you want to go further,there are my chaps and spurs and this silver-mounted bridle-and my bootsand hat-and I'll throw in Sunfish for whatever you say his hide's worth.Who wants the outfit?"

  "I'll take 'em," said Jeff, and permitted Jerry and Dave to appraise theoutfit, which Bud piled contemptuously in a heap.

  He mounted Sunfish bareback with a rope halter. Bud was bareheaded andin his sock feet. His eyes were terribly blue and bright, and his facewas flushed as a drunken man's. He glanced over to the bank wherethe women and children were watching. It seemed to him that one womanfluttered her handkerchief, and his heart beat unevenly for a minute.

  Then he was riding at a walk down the course to the farthest post, andthe crowd was laughing at the contrast between the two horses. Boisestepped springily, tossing his head, his eyes ablaze with ardor for therace. Beside him Sunfish walked steadily as if he were carrying a pack.He was not a pretty horse to look at. His neck was long and thin, hismane and tail scanty and uneven, a nondescript sorrel. His head lookedlarge, set on the end of that neck, his nose was dished in and his eyeshad a certain veiled look, as if he were hiding a bad disposition underthose droopy lids. Without a saddle he betrayed his high, thin withers,the sway in his back, his high hip bones. His front legs were flat, withlong, stringy-looking muscles under his unkempt buckskin hide. Even thewomen laughed at Sunfish.

  Beside them two men rode, the starter and another to see that the startwas fair. So they receded down the flat, yellow course and dwindled tomere miniature figures against the sand, so that one could not tell onehorse from another.

  The crowd bunched, still laughing at how the singin' kid was going tofeel when he rode again to meet them. It would cure him of racing, theysaid. It would be a good lesson; serve him right for coming in there andthinking, because he had cleaned up once or twice, that he could not bebeaten.

  "Here they come," Jeff Hall announced satisfiedly, and spat into thesand as a tiny blue puff of smoke showed beside one of the dots, and twoother dots began to grow perceptibly larger within a yellow cloud whichrolled along the earth.

  Men reined this way and that, or stood on their toes if they were afoot,the better to see the two rolling dots. In a moment one dot seemedlarger than the other. One could glimpse the upflinging of knees as twohorses leaped closer and closer.

  "Well-l-he's keepin' Dave in sight--that's more than what I expectedhe'd do," Jeff observed.

  It was Pop who suddenly gave a whoop that cracked and shrilled intofalsetto.

  "Shucks a'mighty! Dave, he's a-whippin' up to keep the KID in sight!" hequavered. "Shucks--a'MIGHTY, he 's a-comin'!"

  He was. Lying forward flattened along Sunfish's hard-muscled shoulders,Bud was gaining and gaining--one length, then two lengths as he shotunder the wire, slowed and rode back to find a silent crowd watchinghim.

  He was clothed safely again in chaps, boots, spurs, hat--except that Ihave named the articles backward; cowpuncher that he was, Bud put on hishat before he even reached for his boots--and was collecting his wagersrelentlessly as Shylock ever took his toll, before he paid any attentionto the atmosphere around him. Then, because someone shouted a questionthree inches from his ear, Bud turned and laughed as he faced them.

  "Why, sure he's from running stock! I never said he wasn't--because noneof you make-believe horsemen had sense enough to see the speed in himand get curious. You bush-racers never saw a real race-horse before, Iguess. They aren't always pretty to look at, you know. Sunfish hasall the earmarks of speed if you know how to look for them. He'sthoroughbred; sired by Trump, out of Kansas Chippy--if that meansanything to you fellows." He looked them over, eyes meeting eyes untilhis glance rested on Jeff Hall. "I've got his registration papers in mygrip, if you aren't convinced. And," he added by way of rubbing it in,"I guess I've got about all the money there is in this valley."

  "No, you ain't!" Pop Truman cackled, teetering backward and forwardwhile he counted his winnings. "I bet on ye, young feller. Brought me insomething, too. It did so!"