THE SPIRIT OF THE RANGE
Cal Emmett straightened up with his gloved hand pressed tight againstthe small of his back, sighed "Hully Gee!" at the ache of his musclesand went over to the water bucket and poured a quart or so of cool,spring water down his parched throat. The sun blazed like a furnacewith the blower on, though it was well over towards the west; the airwas full of smoke, dust and strong animal odors, and the throatybawling of many cattle close-held. For it was nearing the end ofspring round-up, and many calves were learning, with great physicaland mental distress, the feel of a hot iron properly applied. Calshouted to the horse-wrangler that the well had gone dry--meaning thebucket--and went back to work.
"I betche we won't git through in time for no picnic," predictedHappy Jack gloomily, getting the proper hold on the hind leg of athree-months-old calf. "They's three hundred to decorate yet, ifthey's one; and it'll rain--"
"You're batty," Cal interrupted. "Uh course we'll get through--we've_got_ to; what d'yuh suppose we've been tearing the bone out for thelast three weeks for?"
Chip, with a foot braced against the calf's shoulder, ran a U on itsribs with artistic precision. Chip's Flying U's were the pride ofthe whole outfit; the Happy Family was willing at any time, to betall you dare that Chip's brands never varied a quarter-inch inheight, width or position. The Old Man and Shorty had been contentto use a stamp, as prescribed by law; but Chip Bennett scorned somechanical a device and went on imperturbably defying the law withhis running iron--and the Happy Family gloated over his independenceand declared that they would sure deal a bunch of misery to the manthat reported him. His Flying U's were better than a stamp, anyhow,they said, and it was a treat to watch the way he slid them on, justwhere they'd do the most good.
"I'm going home, after supper," he said, giving just the proper widthto the last curve of the two-hundredth U he had made that afternoon."I promised Dell I'd try and get home to-night, and drive over to thepicnic early to-morrow. She's head push on the grub-pile, I believe,and wants to make sure there's enough to go around. There's abouttwo hundred and fifty calves left. If you can't finish up to-night,it'll be your funeral."
"Well, I betche it'll rain before we git through--it always does,when you don't want it to," gloomed Happy, seizing another calf.
"If it does," called Weary, who was branding--with a stamp--not faraway, "if it does, Happy, we'll pack the bossies into the cook-tentand make Patsy heat the irons in the stove. Don't yuh cry, littleboy--we'll sure manage _somehow_."
"Aw yes--_you_ wouldn't see nothing to worry about, not if yuh wasbeing paid for it. They's a storm coming--any fool can see that; andshe's sure going to come down in large chunks. We ain't got thisamatoor hell for nothing! Yuh won't want to do no branding in thecook-tent, nor no place else. I betche--"
"Please," spoke up Pink, coiling afresh the rope thrown off a calf hehad just dragged up to Cal and Happy Jack, "won't somebody lend me ahandkerchief? I want to gag Happy; he's working his hoodoo on usagain."
Happy Jack leered up at him, consciously immune--for there was notime for strife of a physical nature, and Happy knew it. Everyonewas working his fastest.
"Hoodoo nothing! I guess maybe yuh can't see that bank uhthunderheads. I guess your sight's poor, straining your eyes towardsthe Fourth uh July ever since Christmas. If yuh think yuh can comeChristian Science act on a storm, and bluff it down jest by sayin' itain't there, you're away off. I ain't that big a fool; I--" hetrailed into profane words, for the calf he was at that minuteholding showed a strong inclination to plant a foot in Happy'sstomach.
Cal Emmett glanced over his shoulder, grunted a comprehensiverefutation of Happy Jack's fears and turned his whole attention towork. The branding proceeded steadily, with the hurry of skill thatmakes each motion count something done; for though not a man of themexcept Happy Jack would have admitted it, the Happy Family wasanxious. With two hundred and fifty calves to be branded in the openbefore night, on the third day of July; with a blistering sun sappingthe strength of them and a storm creeping blackly out of thesouthwest; with a picnic tugging their desires and twenty-five longprairie miles between them and the place appointed, one can scarcewonder that even Pink and Weary--born optimists, both of them--eyedthe west anxiously when they thought no one observed them. Undersuch circumstances, Happy Jack's pessimism came near beingunbearable; what the Happy Family needed most was encouragement.
The smoke hung thicker in the parched air and stung more sharplytheir bloodshot, aching eyeballs. The dust settled smotheringly uponthem, filled nostrils and lungs and roughened their patience intopeevishness. A calf bolted from the herd, and a "hold-up" manpursued it vindictively, swearing by several things that he wouldbreak its blamed neck--only his wording was more vehement. A cindergot in Slim's eye and one would think, from his language, that such athing was absolutely beyond the limit of man's endurance, and a blotupon civilization. Even Weary, the sweet-tempered, grew irritableand heaped maledictions on the head of the horse-wrangler because hewas slow about bringing a fresh supply of water. Taken altogether,the Happy Family was not in its sunniest mood.
When Patsy shouted that supper was ready, they left their workreluctantly and tarried just long enough to swallow what food wasnearest. For the branding was not yet finished, and the stormthreatened more malignantly.
Chip saddled Silver, his own particular "drifter," eyed the cloudsappraisingly and swung into the saddle for a fifteen-mile ride to thehome ranch and his wife, the Little Doctor. "You can make it, allright, if yuh half try," he encouraged. "It isn't going to cut loosebefore dark, if I know the signs. Better put your jaw in a sling,Happy--you're liable to step on it. Cheer up! to-morrow's the Day weCelebrate in letters a foot high. Come early and stay late, andbring your appetites along. Fare-you-well, my brothers." He rodeaway in the long lope that eats up the miles with an ease astonishingto alien eyes, and the Happy Family rolled a cigarette apiece andwent back to work rather more cheerful than they had been.
Pleasure, the pleasure of wearing good clothes, dancinglight-footedly to good music and saying nice things that bring smilesto the faces of girls in frilly dresses and with brown, wind-tannedfaces and eyes ashine, comes not often to the veterans of the"Sagebrush Cavalry." They were wont to count the weeks and the days,and at last the hours until such pleasure should come to them. Theydid not grudge the long circles, short sleeps and sweltering hours atthe branding, which made such pleasures possible--only so they werenot, at the last, cheated of their reward.
Every man of them--save Pink--had secret thoughts of some particulargirl. And more than one girl, no doubt, would be watching, at thepicnic, for a certain lot of white hats and sun-browned faces tododge into sight over a hill, and looking for one face among thegroup; would be listening for a certain well-known, well-belovedchorus of shouts borne faintly from a distance--the clear-toned,care-naught whooping that heralded the coming of Jim Whitmore's HappyFamily.
To-morrow they would be simply a crowd of clean-hearted, clean-limbedcowboys, with eyes sunny and untroubled as a child's, and laughs thatwere good to hear and whispered words that were sweet to dream overuntil the next meeting. (If you ask the girls of the range-land, andbelieve their verdict, cowboys make the very best and most piquant oflovers.) Tomorrow there would be no hint of the long hours in thesaddle, or the aching muscles and the tired, smarting eyes. Theymight, if pressed, own that they burnt the earth getting there, butthe details of that particular conflagration would be far, far behindthem--forgotten; no one could guess, to-morrow, that they were everhot or thirsty or tired, or worried over a threatening storm, or thatthey ever swore at one another ill-naturedly from the sheer strain ofanxiety and muscle-ache.
By sundown, so great was their industry, the last calf had scampered,blatting resentment, to seek his mother in the herd. Slim kicked theembers of the branding fire apart and emptied the water-bucket overthem with a satisfied grunt.
"By golly, I ain't mourning because brandin's about
over," he said."I'm plumb tired uh the sight uh them blasted calves."
"And we got through ahead of the storm," Weary sweetly reminded HappyJack.
Happy looked moodily up at the muttering black mass nearly over theirheads and said nothing; Happy never did have anything to say when hisgloomy predictions were brought to naught.
"I'm going to get on the bed-ground without any red tape or argument,if yuh ask _me_," volunteered Cal Emmett, rubbing his aching arms."We want to get an early start in the morning."
"Meaning sun-up, I suppose," fleered Pink, who had no especial,feminine reason for looking forward with longing. With Pink, it waspleasure in the aggregate that lured him; there would be horse racingafter dinner, and a dance in the school-house at night, and a seasonof general hilarity over a collection of rockets and Roman candles.These things appealed more directly to the heart of Pink than did thefeminine element; for he had yet to see the girl who could disturbthe normal serenity of his mind or fill his dreams with visionsbeautiful. Also, there was one thing about these girls that did notplease him; they were prone to regard him as a sweet, amusing littleboy whose dimples they might kiss with perfect composure (though ofcourse they never did). They seemed to be forever taking the "Isn'the cunning!" attitude, and refused to regard him seriously, or treathim with the respect they accorded to the rest of the Happy Family.Weary's schoolma'am had offended him deeply, at a dance the winterbefore, by patting him indulgently on the shoulder and telling him to"Run along and find you a partner." Such things rankled, and he knewthat the girls knew it, and that it amused them very much. Worse,the Happy Family knew it, and it amused them even more than it amusedthe girls. For this reason Pink would much prefer to sleepluxuriously late and ride over to the picnic barely in time fordinner and the races afterward. He did not want too long a time withthe girls.
"Sure, we'll start at sun-up," Cal answered gravely. "We've got tobe there by ten o'clock, so as to help the girls cut the cake andround up all the ham sandwiches; haven't we, Weary?"
"I should smile to remark," Weary assented emphatically. "Sun-upsure sees us on the road, Cadwolloper--and yuh want to be sure andwear that new pink silk handkerchief, that matches the roses in yourcheeks so nice. My schoolma'am's got a friend visiting her, andshe's been hearing a lot about yuh. She's plumb wild to meet yuh.Chip drawed your picture and I sent it over in my last letter, andthe little friend has gone plumb batty over your dimples (Chip drawedyuh with a sweet smile drifting, like a rose-leaf with the dew on it,across your countenance, and your hat pushed back so the curls wouldshow) and it sure done the business for Little Friend. Schoolma'amsays she's a good-looker, herself, and that Joe Meeker has took toparting his hair on the dead center and wearing a four-inch,celluloid collar week days. But he's all to the bad--she just looksat your picture and smiles sad and longing."
"I hate to see a man impose on friendship," murmured Pink. "I don'twant to spoil your face till after the Fourth, though that ain'tsaying yuh don't deserve it. But I will say this: You're a liar--youain't had a letter for more than six weeks."
"Got anything yuh want to bet on that?" Weary reached challenginglytoward an inner pocket of his vest.
"Nit. I don't give a darn, anyway yuh look at it. I'm going tobed." Pink unrolled his "sooguns" in their accustomed corner next toWeary's bed and went straightway to sleep.
Weary thumped his own battered pillow into some semblance ofplumpness and gazed with suspicion at the thick fringe of curledlashes lying softly upon Pink's cheeks.
"If I was a girl," he said pensively to the others, "I'd sure be inlove with Cadwolloper myself. He don't amount to nothing, but hisface 'd cause me to lose my appetite and pine away like a wiltedvi'let. It's straight, about that girl being stuck on his picture;I'd gamble she's counting the hours on her fingers, right now, tillhe'll stand before her. Schoolma'am says it'll be a plumb sin if hedon't act pretty about it and let her love him." He eyed Pinksharply from the tail of his eye, but not a lash quivered; the breathcame evenly and softly between Pink's half-closed lips--and if heheard there was nothing to betray the fact.
Weary sighed and tried again. "And that ain't the worst of it,either. Mame Beckman has got an attack; she told Schoolma'am shecould die for Pink and never bat an eye. She said she never knowedwhat true love was till she seen him. She says he looks just likethe cherubs--all but the wings--that she's been working in red threadon some pillow shams. She was making 'em for her sister a present,but she can't give 'em up, now; she calls all the cherubs 'Pink,' andkisses 'em night and morning, regular." He paused and watchedanxiously Pink's untroubled face. "I tell yuh, boys, it's awful tohave the fatal gift uh beauty, like Cadwolloper's got. He means allright, but he sure trifles a lot with girls' affections--which ain'tright. Mamma! don't he look sweet, laying there so innocent? I'msure sorry for Mame, though." He eyed him sidelong. But Pink sleptpeacefully on, except that, after a half minute, he stirred slightlyand muttered something about "drive that darned cow back." ThenWeary gave up in despair and went to sleep. When the tent becamesilent, save for the heavy breathing of tired men. Pink's longlashes lifted a bit, and he grinned maliciously up at the cloth roof.
For obvious reasons he was the only one of the lot who heard with nomisgivings the vicious swoop of the storm; so long as the tent-pegsheld he didn't care how hard it rained. But the others who woke tothe roar of wind and the crash of thunder and to the swish and beatof much falling water, turned uneasily in their beds and hoped thatit would not last long. To be late in starting for that particularscene of merry-making which had held their desires for so long wouldbe a calamity they could not reflect upon calmly.
At three o'clock Pink, from long habit, opened his eyes to the dullgray of early morning. The air in the tent was clammy and chill andfilled with the audible breathing of a dozen sleeping men; overheadthe canvas was dull yellow and sodden with the steady drip, drip,drop of rain. There would be no starting out at sunrise--and perhapsthere would be no starting at all, he thought with lazydisappointment, and turned on his side for another nap. His glancefell upon Weary's up-turned, slumber-blank face, and his memoryreverted revengefully to the baiting of the night before. He wouldfix Weary for that, he told himself spitefully; mentally measured aperpendicular line from Weary's face to the roof, reached up and drewhis finger firmly down along the canvas for a good ten inches--and ifyou don't know why, try it yourself some time in a tent with the rainpouring down upon the land. As if that were not enough he repeatedthe operation again and again, each time in a fresh place, until therain came through beautifully all over the bed of Weary. Then he laydown, cuddled the blankets up to his ears, closed his eyes andcomposed himself to sleep, at peace with his conscience and theworld--and it did not disturb his self-satisfaction when Wearypresently awoke, moved sleepily away from one drip and directly underanother, shifted again, swore a little in an undertone and at lastwas forced to take refuge under his tarpaulin. After that Pink wentblissfully off to dreamland.
At four o'clock it still rained dismally--and the Happy Family,waking unhappily one after another, remembered that this was theFourth that they had worked and waited for so long, "swore a prayeror two and slept again." At six the sun was shining, and Jack Bates,first realizing the blessed fact, called the others jubilantly.
Weary sat up and observed darkly that he wished he knew whatson-of-a-gun got the tent to leaking over him, and eyed Pinksuspiciously; but Pink only knuckled his eyes like a sleepy baby andasked if it rained in the night, and said he had been dead to theworld. Happy Jack came blundering under the ban by asking Weary toremember that he _told_ him it would rain. As he slept beside Weary,his guilt was certain and his punishment, Weary promised himself,would be sure.
Then they went out and faced the clean-washed prairie land, filledtheir lungs to the bottom with sweet, wine-like air, and asked oneanother why in the dickens the night-hawk wasn't on hand with thecavvy, so they could get ready to start.
At nine o'cloc
k, had you wandered that way, you would have seen theHappy Family--a clean-shaven, holiday-garbed, resplendent HappyFamily--roosting disconsolately wherever was a place clean enough tosit, looking wistfully away to the skyline.
They should, by now, have been at the picnic, and every man of themrealized the fact keenly. They were ready, but they were afoot; thenighthawk had not put in an appearance with the saddle bunch, andthere was not a horse in camp that they might go in search of him.With no herd to hold, they had not deemed it necessary to keep up anyhorses, and they were bewailing the fact that they had not forseensuch an emergency--though Happy Jack did assert that he had all alongexpected it.
"By golly, I'll strike out afoot and hunt him up, if he don't heavein sight mighty suddent," threatened Slim passionately, after a long,dismal silence. "By golly, he'll wisht I hadn't, too."
Cal looked up from studying pensively his patent leathers. "Go on,Slim, and round him up. This is sure getting hilarious--a fine wayto spend the Fourth!"
"Maybe that festive bunch that held up the Lewistown Bank, day beforeyesterday, came along and laid the hawk away on the hillside so theycould help themselves to fresh horses," hazarded Jack Bates, in thehope that Happy Jack would seize the opening to prophesy a newdisaster.
"I betche that's what's happened, all right," said Happy, rising tothe bait. "I betche yuh won't see no horses t'day--ner nonight-hawk, neither."
The Happy Family looked at one another and grinned.
"Who'll stir the lemonade and help pass the sandwiches?" asked Pink,sadly. "Who'll push, when the school-ma'am wants to swing? Or LenAdams? or--"
"Oh, saw off!" Weary implored. "We can think up troubles enough,Cadwolloper, without any help from you."
"Well, I guess your troubles are about over, cully--I can hear 'emcoming." Pink picked up his rope and started for the horse corral asthe belated cavvy came jingling around the nose of the nearest hill.The Happy Family brightened perceptibly; after all, they could be atthe picnic by noon--if they hurried. Their thoughts flew to thecrowd--and to the girls in frilly dresses--under the pine trees in acertain canyon just where the Bear Paws reach lazily out to shakehands with the prairie land.
Up on the high level, with the sun hot against their right cheeks anda lazy breeze flipping neckerchief ends against their smiling lips,the world seemed very good, and a jolly place to live in, and therewas no such thing as trouble anywhere. Even Happy Jack was betrayedinto expecting much pleasure and no misfortune, and whistled while herode.
Five miles slipped behind them easily--so easily that their horsesperked ears and tugged hard against the bits. The next five wererougher, for they had left the trail and struck out across a roughbit of barrenness on a short cut to the ford in Sheep Coulee. Allthe little gullies and washouts were swept clean and smooth with thestorm, and the grass roots showed white where the soil had washedaway. They hoped the rain had not reached to the mountains andspoiled the picnic grounds, and wondered what time the girls wouldhave dinner ready.
So they rode down the steep trail into Sheep Coulee, galloped aquarter mile and stopped, amazed, at the ford. The creek was runningbank full; more, it was churning along like a mill-race, yellow withthe clay it carried and necked with great patches of dirty foam.
"I guess here's where we don't cross," said Weary, whistling milddismay.
"Now, wouldn't that jostle yuh?" asked Pink, of no one in particular.
"By golly, the lemonade 'll be cold, and so'll the san'wiches, beforewe git there," put in Slim, with one of his sporadic efforts to befunny. "We got t' go back."
"Back nothing," chorused five outraged voices. "We'll hunt someother crossing."
"Down the creek a piece--yuh mind where that old sandbar runs halfacross? We'll try that." Weary's tone was hopeful, and they turnedand followed him.
Half a mile along the raging little creek they galloped, with noplace where they dared to cross. Then, loping around awillow-fringed bend, Weary and Pink, who were ahead, drew theirhorses back upon their haunches. They had all but run over a huddleof humanity lying in the fringe of weeds and tall grasses that grewnext the willows.
"What in thunder--" began Cal, pulling up. They slid off theirhorses and bent curiously over the figure. Weary turned itinvestigatively by a shoulder. The figure stirred, and groaned."It's somebody hurt; take a hand here, and help carry him out wherethe sun shines. He's wet to the skin," commanded Weary sharply.
When they lifted him he opened his eyes and looked at them; whilethey carried him tenderly out from the wet tangle and into the warmthof the sun, he set his teeth against the groans that would come.They stood around him uneasily and looked down at him. He was young,like themselves, and he was a stranger; also, he was dressed like acowboy, in chaps, high-heeled boots and silver-mounted spurs. Thechaps were sodden and heavy with water, as was the rest of hisclothing.
"He must uh laid out in all that storm, last night," observed Cal, ina subdued voice. "He--"
"Somebody better ride back and have the bed wagon brought up, so wecan haul him to a doctor," suggested Pink. "He's hurt."
The stranger's eyes swept the faces of the Happy Family anxiously."Not on your life," he protested weakly. "I don't want anydoctor--in mine, thank yuh. I--it's no use, anyhow."
"The hell it ain't!" Pink was drawing off his coat to make a pillow."You're hurt, somehow, ain't yuh?"
"I'm--dying," the other said, laconically. "So yuh needn't go to anytrouble, on my account. From the looks--yuh was headed forsome--blowout. Go on, and let me be."
The Happy Family looked at one another incredulously; they were solikely to ride on!
"I guess you don't savvy this bunch, old-timer," said Weary calmly,speaking for the six. "We're going to do what we can. If yuh don'tmind telling us where yuh got hurt--"
The lips of the other curled bitterly. "I was shot," he saiddistinctly, "by the sheriff and his bunch. But I got away. Lastnight I tried to cross the creek, and my horse went on down. It wasstorming--fierce. I got out, somehow, and crawled into the weeds.Laying out in the rain--didn't help me none. It's--all off."
"There ought to be _something_--" began Jack Bates helplessly.
"There is. If yuh'll just put me away--afterwards--and saynothing,--I'll be--mighty grateful." He was looking at them sharply,as if a great deal depended upon their answer.
The Happy Family was dazed. The very suddenness of this unlooked-forglimpse into the somber eyes of Tragedy was unnerving. The world hadseemed such a jolly place; ten minutes ago--five minutes, even, theirgreatest fear had been getting to the picnic too late for dinner.And here was a man at their feet, calmly telling them that he wasabout to die, and asking only a hurried burial and a silence after.Happy Jack swallowed painfully and shifted his feet in the grass.
"Of course, if yuh'd feel better handing me over--"
"That'll be about enough on that subject," Pink interrupted withdecision. "Just because yuh happen to be down and out--for the timebeing--is no reason why yuh should insult folks. You can take it forgranted we'll do what we can for yuh; the question is, _what_? Yuhneedn' go talking about cashing in--they's no sense in it. You'll beall right.--"
"Huh. You wait and see." The fellow's mouth set grimly upon anothergroan. "If you was shot through, and stuck to the saddle--androde--and then got pummeled--by a creek at flood, and if yuh laid outin the rain--all night-- Hell, boys! Yuh know I'm about all in.I'm hard to kill, or I'd have been--dead-- What I want to know--willyuh do what I--said? Will yuh bury me--right here--and keepit--quiet?"
The Happy Family moved uncomfortably. They hated to see him lyingthat way, and talking in short, jerky sentences, and looking soghastly, and yet so cool--as if dying were quite an everyday affair.
"I don't see why yuh ask us to do it," spoke Cal Emmet bluntly."What we want to do is get yuh to help. The chances is you couldbe--cured. We--"
"Look here." The fellow raised himself painfully to an elbow, andfell back again.
"I've got folks--and they don't know--about thisscrape. They're square--and stand at the top--And they don't--itwould just about-- For God sake, boys! Can't yuh see--how I feel?Nobody knows--about this. The sheriff didn't know--they came up onme in the dusk--and I fought. I wouldn't be taken--And it's my firstbad break--because I got in with a bad--lot. They'll knowsomething--happened, when they find--my horse. But they'llthink--it's just drowning, if they don't find--me with a bullet ortwo-- Can't yuh _see_?"
The Happy Family looked away across the coulee, and there were eyesthat saw little of the yellow sunlight lying soft on the greenhillside beyond. The world was not a good place; it was a grim,pitiless place, and--a man was dying, at their very feet.
"But what about the rest oh the bunch?" croaked Happy Jack, true tohis misanthropic nature, but exceeding husky as to voice. "They'lllikely tell--"
The dying man shook his head eagerly. "They won't; they'reboth--dead. One was killed--last night. The other when we firsttried--to make a getaway. It--it's up to you, boys."
Pink swallowed twice, and knelt beside him; the others remainedstanding, grouped like mourners around an open grave.
"Yuh needn't worry about us," Pink said softly, "You can count on us,old boy. If you're dead sure a doctor--"
"Drop it!" the other broke in harshly. "I don't want to live. Andif I did, I couldn't. I ain't guessing--I know."
They said little, after that. The wounded man seemed apatheticallywaiting for the end, and not inclined to further speech. Since theyhad tacitly promised to do as he wished, he lay with eyes halfclosed, watching idly the clouds drifting across to the skyline,hardly moving.
The Happy Family sat listlessly around on convenient rocks, andwatched the clouds also, and the yellow patches of foam racing downthe muddy creek. Very quiet they were--so quiet that little, brownbirds hopped close, and sang from swaying weeds almost within reachof them. The Happy Family listened dully to the songs, and waited.They did not even think to make a cigarette.
The sun climbed higher and shone hotly down upon them. The dying manblinked at the glare, and Happy Jack took off his hat and tilted itover the face of the other, and asked him if he wouldn't like to bemoved into the shade.
"No matter--I'll be in the shade--soon enough," he returned quietly,and something gripped their throats to aching. His voice, theyobserved, was weaker than it had been.
Weary took a long breath, and moved closer. "I wish you'd let us gethelp," he said, wistfully. It all seemed so horribly brutal, theirsitting around him like that, waiting passively for him to die.
"I know--yuh hate it. But it's--all yuh can do. It's all I want."He took his eyes from the drifting, white clouds, and looked fromface to face. "You're the whitest bunch--I'd like to know--who yuhare. Maybe I can put in--a good word for yuh--on the newrange--where I'm going. I'd sure like to do--something--"
"Then for the Lord's sake, don't say such things!" cried Pink,shakily. "You'll have us--so damn broke up--"
"All right--I won't. So long,--boys. See yuh later--"
"Mamma!" whispered Weary, and got up hastily and walked away. Slimfollowed him a few paces, then turned resolutely and went back. Itseemed cowardly to leave the rest to bear it--and somebody had to.They were breathing quickly, and they were staring across the couleewith eyes that saw nothing; their lips were shut very tightlytogether. Weary came back and stood with his back turned. Pinkmoved a bit, glanced furtively at the long, quiet figure beside him,and dropped his face into his gloved hands.
Glory threw up his head, glanced across the coulee at a band of rangehorses trooping down a gully to drink at the river, and whinniedshrilly. The Happy Family started and awoke to the stern necessitiesof life. They stood up, and walked a little way from the spot,avoiding one another's eyes.
"Somebody'll have to go back to camp," said Cal Emmett, in the hushedtone that death ever compels from the living. "We've got to have aspade--"
"It better be the handiest liar, then," Jack Bates put in hastily."If that old loose-tongued Patsy ever gets next--"
"Weary better go--and Pink. They're the best liars in the bunch,"said Cal, trying unsuccessfully to get back his everyday manner.
Pink and Weary went over and took the dragging bridle-reins of theirmounts, caught a stirrup and swung up into the saddles silently.
"And say!" Happy Jack called softly, as they were going down theslope. "Yuh better bring--a blanket."
Weary nodded, and they rode away, their horses stepping softly in thethick grasses. When they were passed quite out of the presence ofthe dead, they spurred their horses into a gallop.
The sun marked mid-afternoon when they returned, and the four who hadwaited drew long breaths of relief at sight of them.
"We told Patsy we'd run onto a--den--"
"Oh, shut up, can't yuh?" Jack Bates interrupted shortly. "Yuh'llhave plenty uh time to tell us afterwards."
"We've got a place picked out," said Cal, and led them a littledistance up the slope, to a level spot in the shadow of a huge, graybowlder. "That's his headstone," he said, soberly. "The poor devilwon't be cheated out uh that, if we _can't_ mark it with his name.It'll last as long as he'll need it."
Only in the West, perhaps, may one find a funeral like that. Nominister stood at the head of the grave and read, "Dust to dust" andall the heartbreaking rest of it. There was no singing but from ameadowlark that perched on a nearby rock and rippled his brief songwhen, with their ropes, they lowered the blanket wrapped form. Theystood, with bare heads bowed, while the meadow lark sang. When hehad flown, Pink, looking a choir-boy in disguise, repeated softly andincorrectly the Lord's prayer.
The Happy Family did not feel that there was any incongruity in whatthey did. When Pink, gulping a little over the unfamiliar words,said:
"Thine be power and glory--Amen;" five clear, youthful voices addedthe Amen quite simply. Then they filled the grave and stood silent aminute before they went down to where their horse stood waitingpatiently, with now and then a curious glance up the hill to wheretheir masters grouped.
The Happy Family mounted and without a backward glance rode soberlyaway; and the trail they took led, not to the picnic, but to camp.