Hidden Water Part 28

Cowman--think I'll make one myself."

He halted behind a rock and scrutinized the approaching hors.e.m.e.n over the top.

"That's Jasp, in front," he observed impersonally. "I wouldn't mind ownin' that black mule of his'n, neither. We'll jest wait until they dip down into the canon and then double in back of him, and scare up them _hombres_ over at the mouth of h.e.l.l's Hip Pocket. We want to git 'em started out of that. I believe you're right, though, Rufe--we can run this bunch out without firin' a shot."

That evening after the day's riding Creede sat down on his heels by the fire and heated the end of an iron rod. In his other hand he held a horn, knocked from the bleaching skeleton of a steer that had died by the water, and to its end where the tip had been sawed off he applied the red-hot iron, burning a hole through to the hollow centre.

"Jim," he said, turning to one of the Clark boys, "do you want a little excitement to-morrow? Well then, you take this old horn and go play hide 'n' seek with Jasp. Keep him chasin', and while the rest of the boys are gatherin' cattle Rufe and me will move a few sheep."

"Well, say," broke in Ben Reavis impatiently, "where do us fellers come in on this play? I thought there was goin' to be a few shap lessons and a little night work."

"Well," responded the _rodeo_ boss philosophically, "any time you fellers want to go up against them thirty-thirties you can do so. It's your own funeral, and I'll promise to do the honors right. But I'm a law-abidin' cuss myself. I'm all the law now, ever since I talked with Jim Swope--it's the greatest graft they is."

He paused, busily sc.r.a.ping his horn with a piece of gla.s.s.

"They's no doubt about it, fellers," he said at last, "we've been slow in the head. It's a wonder we ain't all of us makin' hat bands in Yuma, by this time. I used to think that if you didn't like a sheepman's looks the way to do was to wade in and work him over a little; but that's a misdemeanor, and it don't go now. It took as good a man as Rufe, here, to put me wise; but I leave my gun in camp after this. I've got them Greasers buffaloed, anyhow, and Jasp knows if he plugs me when I'm unarmed it'll be a sure shot for the pen. The time may come when guns is necessary, but I move that every man leave his six-shooter in his bed and we'll go after 'em with our bare hands.

What d' ye say, Ben?"

Ben Reavis rose up on one elbow, rolled his eyes warily, and pa.s.sed a jet of tobacco juice into the hissing fire.

"Not f'r me," he said, with profane emphasis.

"No, ner f'r me, either," chimed in Charley Clark. "A man stays dead a long time in this dry climate."

"Well, you fellers see how many of my steers you can ketch, then,"

said Creede, "and I'll move them sheep myself--leastways, me and Rufe."

"All right," a.s.sented Reavis resignedly, "but you want to hurry up. I saw a cloud o' dust halfway to Hidden Water this afternoon."

The next morning as the _rodeo_ outfit hustled out to pick up what cattle they could before they were scattered by the sheep, Jim Clark, tall, solemn-faced, and angular, rode by devious ways toward the eastern shoulder of the Four Peaks, where a distant clamor told of the great herds which mowed the mountain slopes like a thousand sickles.

Having seen him well on his way Creede and Hardy galloped down the canon, switched off along the hillside and, leaving their horses among the rocks, climbed up on a rocky b.u.t.te to spy out the land below. High ridges and deep canons, running down from the flanks of the Four Peaks, lay to the east and north and west; and to the south they merged into the broad expanse of Bronco Mesa.

There it lay, a wilderness of little hills and valleys, flat-topped benches and sandy gulches threaded minutely with winding trails and cow paths, green with the illusion of drought-proof giant cactus and vivid desert bushes, one vast preserve of browse and gra.s.s from the Peaks to the gorge of the Salagua. Here was the last battle-ground, the last stand of the cowmen against the sheep, and then unless that formless myth, "The Government," which no man had ever seen or known, stepped in, there would be no more of the struggle; the green mesa would be stripped of its evanescent glory and the sheep would wander at will. But as long as there was still a chance and the cows had young calves that would die, there was nothing for it but to fight on, warily and desperately, to the end.

As Jefferson Creede looked out across that n.o.ble landscape which he had struggled so resolutely to save and saw the dust clouds of the sheep drifting across it, the tears came to his eyes and blinded his keen vision. Here at last was the end of all his struggles and all his dreams; another year, or two years, and the mesa would be devastated utterly; his cows would be hollow-flanked and gaunted; his calves would totter and die, their tender lips pierced with the spiny cactus upon which their hard-mouthed mothers starved; and all that fair land which he knew and loved so well would be lost to him forever. He raised his hand to his eyes as if shading them from the sun, and brushed the tears away.

"Well, look at those sons o' guns hike," he said, baring his teeth venomously, "and every band headed for Hidden Water! Go it, you tarriers--and if you can't stop to eat the gra.s.s, tromple on it! But wait, and if I don't push in some Greaser's face to-day it'll be because every one of them bands is headin' for the western pa.s.s."

He clambered slowly down from his perch and swung up into the saddle.

"Talkin' never did do much good with a sheep-herder," he observed wisely. "As the old judge used to say, 'you've got to appeal to his better nature'--with a club."

The most southerly of the seven bands was strung out in marching order, the goats in front, the hungriest sheep in the lead; and on both flanks and far behind, the groups and cl.u.s.ters of feeders, pus.h.i.+ng out into the gra.s.sy flats and rearing up against the trees and bushes. Without a word to the herders Creede and Hardy took down their ropes and, swinging the _hondas_ upon the goats, turned the advance guard northwest. The main herd and the drag followed, and then the herders, all in a bunch for courage.

"This is the last time I talk to you," said Creede, his voice stifled with anger. "Turn to the north, now, and keep a-goin'."

He put spurs to his horse and rode west to the second herd, and by noon they had turned all seven toward the western pa.s.s. Every herder had his cow's horn and some of them were blowing continually, but no one answered, and a messenger was sent east for aid. They camped for the heat of the day, making smoke upon the ridges, but no help came.

As the sun sank low and the curly-necked Merinos rose up from their huddle and began to drift the Mexicans turned them perforce to the north, looking back sulkily toward the mouth of h.e.l.l's Hip Pocket where other smokes rose against the sky. Until the sun set they travelled, making their three miles and more, and not until they had corralled their flocks for the night did Chico and Grande, the little and big terrors of the sheep, give way from their strenuous labors.

It was two hours after dark when they rode wearily into the camp at Carrizo Creek. The fire was dying down to embers and the _rodeo_ outfit, worn out, had turned in, some in the tin house, others outside, under the brush _ramada_ to escape the dew. No one moved as they approached but Creede did not scruple to wake up Jim Clark in order to learn the news.

"How'd the old horn work?" he inquired cheerily.

"No good," grunted Clark, rolling over.

"Aw, go on, wouldn't they chase ye?"

"Nope. Nothin' doin'. Say, lemme sleep, will ye?"

"Sure," said Creede, "when I git through with you. Which way was them sheep travellin'?"

"Well, some was goin' straight up over the Four Peaks and the rest was p'intin' west. You and your old horn--I nigh blowed my fool head off and never got a rise! They was all blowin' them horns over by the Pocket this aft."

"Um," said Creede, "they was _all_ blowin', hey? And what else was they doin'?"

"Shootin', fer further orders, and driftin' their sheep. They's about a hundred thousand, right over the hill."

"Huh!" grunted Creede, turning to his belated dinner, "what d'ye make of that, Rufe?"

"Nothing," replied Hardy, "except more work."

It seemed as if he had hardly fallen asleep when Creede was up again, hurling the wood on the fire.

"Pile out, fellers!" he shouted. "You can sleep all day bimebye. Come on, Rufe--d'ye want to find them sheep in the corral when you go back to Hidden Water?" And so with relentless energy he roused them up, divided out the work, and was off again for Bronco Mesa.

It was early when they arrived at the first deserted sheep camp, but search as they would they could see no signs of the sheep. The puny fire over which the herders had fried their bread and mutton was wind-blown and cold, the burros and camp rustlers were gone, and there was no guiding dust cloud against the sky. From the little b.u.t.te where Creede and Hardy stood the lower mesa stretched away before them like a rocky, cactus-covered plain, the countless ravines and gulches hidden by the dead level of the benches, and all empty, lifeless, void. They rode for the second camp, farther to the west, and it too was deserted, the sheep tracks cunningly milled in order to hide the trail.

"They're gittin' foxy," commented Creede, circling wide to catch the trend of their departure, "but I bet you money no bunch of Chihuahua Greasers can hide twenty thousand sheep in my back yard and me not know it. And I'll bet you further that I can find every one of them sheep and have 'em movin' before twelve o'clock, noon."

Having crystallized his convictions into this sporting proposition the _rodeo_ boss left the wilderness of tracks and headed due south, riding fast until he was clear of sheep signs.

"Now here's where I cut all seven trails," he remarked to his partner. "I happen to know where this sheep outfit is headin' for."

With which enigmatic remark he jerked a thumb toward Hidden Water and circled to the west and north. Not half an hour later he picked up a fresh trail, a broad path stamped hard by thousands of feet, and spurring recklessly along it until he sighted the herd he plunged helter-skelter into their midst, where they were packed like sardines in the broad pocket of a dry wash.

"Hey there! _Whoopee--hep--hep!_" he yelled, ploughing his way into the pack; and Hardy swinging quickly around the flank, rushed the ruck of them forward in his wake. Upon the brow of the hill the boss herder and his helpers brandished their carbines and shouted, but their words were drowned in the blare and bray which rose from below. Shoot they dared not, for it meant the beginning of a b.l.o.o.d.y feud, and their warnings were unheeded in the _melee_. The herd was far up the wash and galloping wildly toward the north before the frantic Mexicans could catch up with it on foot, and even then they could do nothing but run along the wings to save themselves from a "cut." More than once, in the night-time, the outraged cowmen of the Four Peaks country had thus dashed through their bands, scattering them to the wolves and the coyotes, destroying a year's increase in a night, while the herders, with visions of shap lessons before them, fired perfunctory rifle shots at the moon. It was a form of reprisal that they liked least of all, for it meant a cut, and a cut meant sheep wandering aimlessly without a master until they became coyote bait--at the rate of five dollars a head.

The _padron_ was a kind man and called them _compadres_, when he was pleased, but if one of them suffered a cut he cursed, and fired him, and made him walk back to town. Hence when Chico and Grande suddenly gave over their drive and rode away to the northwest the Mexican herders devoted all their attention to keeping the herd together, without trying to make any gun plays. And when the stampede was abated and still no help came they drifted their sheep steadily to the north, leaving the camp rustlers to bring up the impedimenta as best they could. Jasper Swope had promised to protect them whenever they blew their horns, but it was two days since they had seen him, and the two _Americanos_ had harried them like hawks.

Never had armed men so lacked a leader as on that day. Their orders were to shoot only in self-defence; for a war was the last thing which the Swope brothers wanted, with their entire fortunes at stake, and no show of weapons could daunt the ruthless Grande and Chico. All the morning the cow horns bellowed and blared as, sweating and swinging their _hondas_, the stern-eyed _Americanos_ rushed band after band away. Not a word was pa.s.sed--no threats, no commands, no warnings for the future, but like avenging devils they galloped from one herd to the other and back again, shoving them forward relentlessly, even in the heat of noon. At evening the seven bands, hopelessly mixed and mingled in the panic, were halfway through the long pa.s.s, and the herders were white with dust and running. But not until dusk gathered in the valleys did Creede rein in his lathered horse and turn grimly back to camp.

His face was white and caked with dust, the dirt lay clotted in his beard, and only the whites of his eyes, rolling and sanguinary, gave evidence of his humanity; his s.h.i.+rt, half torn from his body by plunging through the cat-claws, hung limp and heavy with sweat; and the look of him was that of a madman, beside himself with rage. The dirt, the sweat, the grime, were as heavy on Hardy, and his eyes rolled like a negro's beneath the mask of dust, but weariness had overcome his madness and he leaned forward upon the horn. They glanced at each other indifferently and then slumped down to endure the long ten miles which lay between them and home. It had been a stern fight and the excitement had lulled their hunger, but now the old, slow pang gnawed at their vitals and they rolled like drunkards in the saddle.

It was a clear, velvety night, and still, after the wind of the day.

Their horses jogged dumbly along, throwing up their heads at every step from weariness, and the noises of the night fell dully upon their jaded ears. But just as they turned into Carrizo Creek Canon, Creede suddenly reined in old Bat Wings and held up his hand to Hardy.

"Did you hear that?" he asked, still listening. "There! Didn't you hear that gun go off? Well, I did--and it was a thirty-thirty, too, over there toward the Pocket."

"Those herders are always shooting away their ammunition," said Hardy peevishly. "Come on, let's get back to camp."