CHAPTER XIV.
A MIGRATION.
All that summer John tended the work stock, keeping them together on good feeding ground during the short night and driving them into camp soon after daylight.
Much of this work was very pleasant; the two herders, Curran and John, met regularly and many were the long talks and interchanges of experiences they enjoyed.
The rainless summer nights were cool enough to be refreshing and yet warm enough to make the time spent in the open air delightful. But when rain came all this was changed. The horses became nervous and restless and required constant watchfulness and continual riding, regardless of treacherous foothold and hidden, water-filled prospect holes. The long, yellow "slicker" or oilskin coat, being cut deep in the back and hanging over the rider's legs to his spurred heels, served but poorly to keep out the driving rain, and by morning he was fairly soaked. Arriving in camp with his dripping charges, he would dismount stiffly, and after a half-cold breakfast crawl into a damp bed under an oozing tent.
John, however, learned to take things as they came, good or ill, gathering valuable experience from right and left. Curran was a horseman of long standing, and gave the fast-maturing boy a great many points that served him in good stead later in life. He taught him how to detect any uneasiness in the stock that might grow into fright and start a stampede; how to check this by voice and by constant active presence; and, above all, by force of example he showed that only through quick thought and unhesitating exposure of himself to danger could harm to his charges be averted. By nature courageous, almost to recklessness, John learned these lessons unconsciously.
And so the summer passed—herding horses at night, sleeping and panning gold by day. By the latter operation he was able to add, on an average, fifty cents a day to his hardly princely income of seven dollars a week.
As the warm season drew to a close, the night wrangler's work became more of a hardship and less a pleasure; only by dint of constant exercise and a roaring fire was the life made endurable. The night's work over, horse and rider would come in stiff with cold and not infrequently wet as well.
"Well, kid, the outfit breaks camp this week," said cook to John one cold, wet morning in November as he slid off his patient beast. "Here's your coffee; keep it out of the wet."
"Can't break any too soon for me," said John, sipping the steaming beverage and clinging tightly to the tin cup with both hands for the sake of the warmth it contained.
"Must be pretty tough this time o' year," said cook sympathetically. "More coffee?"
"You bet," answered the other. "I couldn't stand it if I wasn't all-fired tough. I'll have to be tough if I go range-ridin' this winter."
Curran put this thought into his head, where it had been growing until it became a resolve.
"So you're goin' range-ridin', eh, kid?"
John nodded and asked the cook where he was going.
"Well, I'll tell yer," he said, stopping to wipe his hands on the flour bag that served for an apron, "I'm goin' straight back East where my folks live; soon's I get back to town I'm goin' to buy a railroad ticket East and go right off."
"Good enough," said John confidently, but rather sceptical at heart, for he knew of many men whose good resolutions melted under the direful influence of the first glass of whiskey that went down their throats. "Well, I'm off to bed," he concluded, making for the bed that Frank had vacated but a little while before. He knew he needed all the rest he could get. The following morning, as he came near the collection of tents with the horses, he heard Murphy shouting: "Rustle round now, boys; get the cook outfit loaded, the tents down, and your beds rolled up—quick. We'll be in town by noon."
The work was taken up with such a will that John barely got his share of coffee, bacon, beans, and bread before the cook's stores were stowed away ready for travelling.
It was a very different crowd that now set out for the town, and yet it was the same lot of men. Nine months' heavy, open-air work had dispelled weakness and brought strength, had replaced bad temper with cheerfulness, and had, moreover, filled pockets with Uncle Sam's good coin.
Frank and John, his chum, again sat on the scraper that trailed behind a wagon, not now for fear of contact with ill-tempered, almost desperate men, but for the sake of comparative quiet and to escape the practical jokes that none in the wagon could avoid.
"Well," said Frank, "would you rather wrestle dishes in Helena or wrangle horses in the open?"
"I'd rather wrangle than wrestle," said John, taking the cue with a laugh, "weather or no; and I'd like to go out again soon."
On reaching town the men parted company, each to seek the pleasure that most attracted him. John at once hunted up Tom Malloy, who was still prosperous and evidently glad to see him.
"Well, kid, how did you get along?" he said, in his old, familiar, kindly way. The boy first paid him for the saddle he had borrowed, to which he had become accustomed and attached, and then told in detail of his experiences.
"Do you want to get back to pot-wrestling?" asked Molloy at length.
"No; not on your life!" and John told him of his liking for work in the open and his distaste for town life.
"Right you are, kid," said Tom encouragingly, "the town's no place for you, or for me, either," he added rather sadly. "I'll be done up some day"—a prophecy which proved but too true.
John and Frank took lodgings together, and for a time did nothing but travel round the town, noting the changes that had been made since they had been away and taking in such cheap amusement as the place offered. It was on one of these jaunts round the streets that John met his friend the cook, blear-eyed, slouchy, and dirty, the bold mustache he was usually so proud of drooping dismally.
"Why, cook, I thought you were in the East by this time," said the ex-wrangler, remembering the solemn resolution confided to him a few days before.
"No, I just stopped for one drink and that settled it," confessed the other. "Haven't a quarter to buy a dinner with now."
John took him to a restaurant and fed him.
This was the first of a series of encounters with ex-campmates. The first feeling was one of wonder and disgust that the demon of drink could make such short work of a man; and then came the fear that the constant drafts upon him would use up his small savings.
"Frank," he said one day, "I've got to get out of this or I'll be stone broke; do you know of any fellow that will take me on a range?"
"Why, what's the matter?"
"Oh," said John, "this gang takes me for the treasurer of an inebriates' home, I guess, and will soon scoop every cent I've got."
"That's it, eh?" returned Bridges. "Well, I'll go down the Missouri with you. I'm pretty well acquainted a hundred and fifty miles or so below, and I know where I can go range-ridin' for a big cattleman any time."
"If you think you can work me in, I'll go," exclaimed the younger. "I'll buy that sorrel cayuse from Murphy. I can get him for fifteen, I guess, and we'll go to-morrow-that is, if you can work me in." This last was spoken rather dubiously, but Frank assured him that he would fix it somehow, and the compact was sealed.
The balance of the day was spent in getting their outfit ready. Frank was already provided with horse, saddle, and bridle, and the other appurtenances of the rider: chaps, spurs, oilskin slicker, and blankets. Some of these John possessed also, but he still lacked a horse; a few simple necessaries in the shape of a frying-pan, tin cups, coffee, flour, sugar, and the inevitable beans must be supplied for both. The dicker for John's sorrel was made in short order, and by nightfall all the outfit was complete. At daylight the following morning they were busy making up the packs, and a hard job they found it, for nothing seemed to fit, and apparently there was enough stuff to load a whole train. It was made up at last into two packs and lashed securely behind the saddles; they mounted and rode out of the fast-awakening town. One of the two at least was leaving it for a long time, to return under very different circumstances. Nothing of this sort entered their minds, however, and they went out as unconsciously as if off for a half-day's trip.
Frank knew the country pretty thoroughly, having been over it once or twice before, so it was plain sailing most of the time. Day after day they travelled along at a dog trot—a gait that the Western horse can keep up all day and one which a rider brought up to it finds perfectly comfortable, but which would shake the teeth out of an Easterner. The trail was clearly marked, easily followed, and much of the way wide enough to allow the horsemen to ride side by side.
Though the two had been partners for several months they had seen but little of each other; during the day at the railroad camp Frank worked while John slept, and during the night the reverse was the case. This was the first chance either had of really knowing the other, and both were well pleased. There was plenty of time and opportunity to talk, and they soon found that they had plenty of acquaintances in common.
"Ever been to Miles City?" John said one day as they were trotting steadily along. The leather of the saddles creaked and the cooking utensils made a regular accompaniment to the thudding hoof-beats.
EACH MAN TOOK HIS ROPE AND FLUNG IT OVER THE HORSE HE WANTED. ([Page 281.])
"Sure. Two years ago this spring."
"That was about the time Dick Bradford and Charley Lang shot each other, wasn't it?" John was referring to a "killing" that was famous the country round.
"Yes, and I was right there in Brown's place at the time."
"Tell me about it, Frank. Some say Bradford was to blame and some say that Lang deserved it. I knew Charley Lang a little and thought him a nice fellow."
"Well," said Frank, "it isn't a long story; it all happened the same day, the quarrel and the killing. For some reason there was bad blood between them; both had been drinking, and a little dispute was enough to make them ready to pull their guns on each other."
"Charley was pretty quick with his gun," interpolated John, full of interest.
"So was Dick; but their friends took their shootin' irons away from 'em, and finally persuaded them to shake hands, and for a time there was no further trouble, but all the old hands feared that the business would not end there. Both men came to Brown's place before supper. Maybe you know the joint—a good many things have happened there, and Brown himself could tell enough stories to fill a dozen dime novels."
John nodded.
"It wasn't very pleasant there then; the two were plainly looking for each other's gore, and we all wished we could put a couple of hundred miles between them. Well, anyway, Dick saw Charley and called him an ugly name and then invited him to take a drink. He might have refused; that would have been bad enough, but he did worse, accepted, and took the glass in his left hand—which, as everybody knows, is a deadly insult, to accept a man's hospitality with your left hand, leaving your right free to pull your gun."
"But I should think it might just happen so," suggested John.
"So it might, but Charley made his meaning clear by the look he gave Dick. Nothing occurred then—neither had a gun—but after supper they managed to get a six-shooter apiece and soon turned up at Brown's again. When I came in Charley was sitting on the end of the bar, talking to the 'barkeep,' his hat on the back of his head, his legs swinging, the spurs on his heels jingling when they touched—the most unconcerned man going. Dick was leaning against the wall the other side of the room. He was mad clean through. A couple of fellers were with him, but they couldn't stop him from jerking out his gun. He fired, but Charley had had his eye on him and reached for his six-shooter. The same instant the ball hit him in the chest. He slid off the bar, but as he fell he fired twice, and both shots went through Dick's heart. Dick died right off and Charley lived only a few minutes—he died in my arms."
"What a way to die!" was the only comment John made.
"Those were the very last words Charley spoke," said Frank, more to himself than to his listener.
"I guess Miles City was the toughest place going then," said the boy. "Why, I was driving through the town with my father one day (that was when we were opening a big coal mine down the Yellowstone) and we went under a half-finished railroad bridge and there, hanging from the ties, were the bodies of three men. Lynched. Ugh!" John shuddered at the remembrance of it.
"Was that the case where there was some talk of the men being killed first and hung afterwards?" inquired Frank.
"Yes. There had been a row in Brown's place, and these three had been put in jail, but during the night they were taken out and in the morning were found as we saw them. The regular vigilance committee had not done it, and the doctor said death first, hanged afterwards."
Both of these characteristic stories were common talk whenever a crowd got together, but neither Frank nor John had heard the facts told by an eye-witness before.
It must not be thought all the conversation of these two was of this blood-and-thunder variety. Frank had lived in the East, and marvellous were the tales he told about the buildings, the people, and their doings. The two were so interested in each other, and what each had seen, that the time passed very quickly, and so John was surprised when Frank said late one afternoon: "See that blue range of hills about thirty miles ahead?"
John looked and nodded an assent.
"Well, Baker's ranch is right at the foot of them, and Sun River runs through it. That's where we're goin'."
The following morning they rode towards the ranch house, past the minor buildings, the barns and sheds, past the hay stack, now bulging with its winter store, past the inevitable horse corral, just then containing several horses which were circling round trying to avoid a cow-puncher's "rope." As they reached the ranch house proper—a low, single-storied house built of logs and roofed with split logs covered with turf—a chunky, white-haired man in overalls stepped out of the door.
"Hello, Mr. Baker," said Frank. "You see you can't lose me."
"Well, Frank, it's you, is it? I'm terrible glad to see you. How are you?" Mr. Baker's greeting was cordial. "Who's your friend? What's his name?" he added, noticing John for the first time.
He was introduced, and the warm grasp of the hand that John got from the old ranchman won him at once.
"Mrs. Baker will bubble over when she sees you, Frank. Tie your horses and come in."
A long hitching rail ran along the front of the shack, and to this Frank and John made their horses fast.
Mrs. Baker's greeting was even more cordial than her husband's, and the youngster looked on at the display of affection rather wistfully. Nor was he ignored in the general greetings.
"You're just the fellow I want to see, Frank," said the cheerful, kindly, buxom, albeit gray-haired ranchman's wife. "Mr. B.'s getting kinder old to be chasing round the ranch looking after cattle and the range-riders, and I want you to see to all that so I can keep Mr. Baker at home. Will you do it?" She looked from her husband to Frank and back again.
"I'm looking for a job, and so's my friend Worth here. If you'll take us both I'll be glad to stay," and Frank began to enlarge on John's virtues, and told how they had shared the same bed. He characterized him as a "plumb good feller."
"Of course he can get to work," said the couple together.
"Got a saddle?" asked the old man.
"Yes, I've got a good outfit," answered the boy.
"Well, you can go range-ridin'." The ranchman spoke in a tone that was not to be gainsaid—it amounted to a command. John understood vaguely that range-riding was something like horse-wrangling, only the job he was now about to undertake would last during the day and night too.
The following day the boy was sent forth to his new work. It was cold, and the gray November sky had a look of snow in it; the air, too, felt snowy. In the ranch house all was warm and comfortable: a great fire of cottonwood logs was blazing in the open fireplace, a few pictures and examples of needle-work—the evidences of a woman's hand—were interspersed with mannish things: rifles in rough wooden racks, antlers of deer and prong-horns, bridles decorated with silver hung here and there on nails, and a long wooden peg, driven into the whitewashed logs, supported a richly carved saddle, Mr. Baker's own.
From this cheer and comfort John went into exile, to last several months—the cold, bitter, winter months of the Northwest.
With the instructions of Mr. Baker and the warnings of Frank ringing in his ears, he started off for the shack he was to share with an old, experienced cow-puncher throughout the winter. The eight miles were soon covered, and he drew up before the little log shack which was to be his winter home. A little box of a cabin it was, perhaps twelve by fifteen feet, built solidly of logs and backed up against a low bank for the shelter it afforded. He dismounted and entered; a single small window lightened the gloom somewhat and enabled him to see the familiar rough bunks on either side, one for each occupant; a rough deal table supported on one side by the wall and on the other by two legs; a frying-pan, a coffee pot, and a few tin cups—none over-clean—hung near the fireplace; these completed the decorations and furniture of the range-riders' shack. It was one of several placed at varying distances from the home ranch.
After tying his horse and bringing in the few belongings he possessed, he sat down on the empty bunk and waited for Barney Madden, his mate, whom he had never seen. He wondered what kind of a fellow he was.