Paradise Bend

by William Patterson White

CHAPTER XIII

THE DANCE

A week later, while the outfit was eating supper, Swing Tunstall burst yelling into the bunkhouse. He flung his hat on the floor and thudded into his seat.

"Dance!" he whooped, hammering on the table with his knife and fork. "Dance! Big dance! Down at the Bend. Next week. Saturday night. They're a-goin' to have it in the hotel. Hooray!"

"Pass him the beans, quick!" shouted Doubleday. "Get him to eatin' before the roof pulls loose. When djuh say it was, Swing?"

"Saturday night, next week. Butter, butter, who's got the grease? An' the canned cow. That's the stuffy. Say, that's gonna be a reg'lar elephant of a dance, that is. They's a new girl in town—I seen her. She's stayin' at Mis' Mace's, an' she's as pretty as a royal flush. Miss Kate Saltoun her name is, an' she's from the Bar S down on the Lazy River."

"We'll all go," announced Doubleday.

"You bet we will," said Giant Morton. "Swing, where's that necktie o' mine yuh borried last week?—yes, the red one. You know the one I mean. You wanted it so's yuh could make a hit with that hash-slinger at the hotel. Can't fool me, yuh old tarrapin. Where is it?"

"I'll git it for yuh later," gurgled Tunstall, his mouth full. "I don't guess I lost it. Ca'm yoreself. Giant, ca'm yoreself. What's a necktie?"

"Don't guess yuh've lost it! Well, I like that! I paid a dollar six bits for that necktie down at the Chicago Store. There ain't another like it in the territory. Ragsdale said so himself. You gimme that necktie or I'll pizen yore bronc."

"Goin' to de Bend to-morrow?" inquired Telescope of Loudon, when they were riding the range the day before the dance.

"I don't guess so. I don't feel just like dancin'. Don't enjoy it like I used to. Gettin' old, I guess."

"I'm goin', but not to de dance een de hotel. I'm goin' to de dance hall, un I weel play de pokair, too. Ah, I weel have de good tam. W'y not you come wit' me?"

"Maybe I will. See how I feel to-morrow. I'm goin' to pull my freight next week sometime. Got an engagement in Farewell in five weeks or so, an' I want to find the little hoss before then."

"We'll fin' heem, you un me. I am ready any tam you say."

That evening Scotty Mackenzie halted Loudon on his way to the bunkhouse.

"Goin' to the dance, Tom?" queried Scotty.

"I'm goin' to the Bend, but no dance in mine."

"Say, you make me sick! Dorothy'll be at that dance, an' yuh'll hurt her feelin's if yuh don't go. She'll think yuh don't want to dance with her or somethin'."

"I can't help what she thinks, can I? I don't have to go to that dance."

"Yuh don't have to, o' course not, but yuh got to think o' other folks. Why, only day before yesterday when I was at the Bend she was askin' after yuh, an' I told her yuh'd shore see her at the dance."

"Yuh did, did yuh? All right, I'm goin' to the Bend to-morrow with the rest o' the boys, but I've got a little poker game in mind. The dance is barred, Scotty."

"Oh, all right. Have it yore own way. I'm only tryin' to help yuh out. Say, Tom, y'ain't still thinkin' o' goin' away, are yuh? Yuh can have that bay like I said, an' another pony, too, if yuh like. Yuh see, I want yuh to stay here at the Flyin' M. I'm hard up for men now, an'——"

"Say," interrupted Loudon, on whom a great light had suddenly dawned, "say, is that why yo're so anxious to have me go see Miss Burr, huh? So I'll fall in love with her, an' stay here, huh? Is that it?"

"Why, Tom, o' course not," denied Scotty, indignantly. "I wasn't thinkin' o' such a thing."

"I ain't none so shore, Scotty. It sounds just like yuh."

"Well, it ain't like me nohow. Yo're wrong, Tom, all wrong as usual. Suit yoreself about the dance, suit yoreself. I got nothin' more to say. Here's a letter come for yuh to-day."

Scotty handed the letter to Loudon and departed, offended dignity in the set of his shoulders. The pose was assumed, and Loudon knew it. When next they met, Scotty would reopen his favourite issue as usual.

"Now how did he guess it?" wondered Scotty, gloomily, kicking the pebbles on his way to the office. "How did he guess the truth, I'd like to know? An' he's goin' away after all! The best man in the outfit! I got to do somethin', that's a cinch."

Poor Scotty! So must Machiavelli have felt when one of his dearest schemes was upset by some clever Florentine.

Left alone, Loudon tore open the letter. It ran:

Dere frend lowden Id uv rote sooner only Ive been sick fele bad stil sene things fur a weak but I can rite now anyhow. Wel, after you an Mackenzy lef in the afternoon Block an the uther fellar rid in. I noed the uther fellar what stole yore hoss cause he looked just like you sed hed look but the hoss he was ridin wasnt yore hoss he was sumbuddy elses hoss I dunno whoos yet. Wen I sene Block an him I had it all fixed up with the marshul to arest the uther fellar but the hoss wasnt yourn it was a bawlface pinto so the marshal couldnt arest him without a warant. Block an him rode away on the trail to Farewel. Block tride to find out bout you an Scotty and that drummer told him how you an Scotty had rid back to the Bend. Wel, I knoked the drummer down an stepped on his face an throwed him into the waterin-troff an kiked him three times roun the house. I'm lookin out for yore hoss wen I see him I'll let you noe hopin this fines you like it leeves me yore frien Dave Sinclair.

Dave Sinclair was the landlord of the hotel in Rocket. Loudon re-read the letter and swore whole-heartedly. To miss Rufe Cutting by a few hours! Riding a bald-faced pinto, was he? What had he done with Ranger? Loudon went to the bunkhouse in a brown study.

Scotty alone of the Flying M outfit elected to remain at the ranch the night of the dance. All the others raced into town before sunset. At the ford of the Dogsoldier they met the Seven Lazy Seven boys from beyond the Government Hills. Doubleday greeted Dawson, the Seven Lazy Seven foreman, with a long wolf-howl. Whooping and yelling, the riders squattered across the creek and poured into Paradise Bend, the wild-eyed ponies rocketing like jack-rabbits.

It was an expansive evening in the Bend. The corrals were full of ponies bearing on their hips the brands of the Two Bar, TVU, Double Diamond K, Wagonwheel, and half-a-dozen other ranches. In the hotel corral where the Flying M outfit unsaddled, Loudon saw horses belonging to the Barred O and the T up-and-down, which ranches were a score of miles southwest of Rocket.

The men of the various outfits circulated rapidly from saloon to saloon. By midnight many would be drunk. But there were several hours before midnight.

Loudon and Telescope left their comrades lining up at the hotel bar and gravitated to the Three Card. Here they found Jim Mace and Marshal Dan Smith, who hailed them both with marked cordiality. They drank together, and Jim Mace suggested a little game. Telescope's eyes began to gleam, and Loudon perceived that his friend was lost to him for that evening. Loudon was in no mood for poker, so the three prevailed upon a gentleman from the Barred O to make a fourth, and retired to an empty table in the corner of the room. Loudon remained standing at the bar, regarding the rows of bottles on the shelves and gloomily pondering the exigencies of life.

"Cards no good," he reflected. "Dancin' the same. Nothin' goes good no more. Even licker don't taste like it used to. Guess I better have another an' make shore."

He had another. After a time he felt better, and decided to look in at the dance. From the open windows of the hotel issued sounds of revelry—the shuffle and pound of boot-leather and the inspiring strains of the "Arkansaw Traveller" played by two fiddlers sitting on a table.

Loudon, his hat pulled forward, leaned his chest against a windowsill and peered over the fat shoulders of Mrs. Ragsdale and a freighter's wife, who were enjoying the festivities with such zest that the chairs they sat in were on the point of collapse.

Kate Saltoun and Dorothy Burr were dancing in the same set. Dawson of the Seven Lazy Seven was Kate's partner, and Pete O'Leary swung Dorothy. Loudon was struck by the fact that Kate was not smiling. Her movements, likewise, lacked a certain springiness which was one of her salient characteristics.

"Somebody must 'a' stepped on her toe," decided Loudon. "Bet she don't dance with Dawson again."

She didn't. Marshal Dan Smith, perspiring and painfully conscious of a hard shirt and a forest-fire necktie, was her next partner. Loudon wondered why he had not hitherto perceived the marked resemblance between Dan Smith and a jack-rabbit. He found himself speculating on Kate's reasons for breaking her engagement. As he looked at Kate, her extreme beauty, contrasted with that of the other girls in the room, was striking.

"Kate is certainly a heap good-looker."

Mrs. Ragsdale and the freighter's wife turned sharply and stared open-mouthed at Loudon. Not till then did that young man realize that he had voiced aloud his estimate of Kate Saltoun. He fled hurriedly, his skin prickling all over, and dived into the kindly darkness behind the corral.

"Now I have done it!" he mourned, bitterly, squatting on the ground. "Those old tongue-wagglers heard me, an' they'll tell her. I seen it in their faces. What'll she think o' me. Luck! There ain't no such thing. If all the rocks was tobacco an' all the grass cigarette-papers, I'd be there without a match."

From the hotel drifted thinly the lilt of "Buffalo Girls." A bevy of convivial beings in the street were bawling "The Days of Forty-Nine." Across the discordant riot of sound cut the sudden clipping drum of a galloping pony.

"Injuns!" shouted a voice. "Injuns!"

Loudon sprang up and dashed around the corral. In the flare of light from the hotel doorway a dusty man sat a dustier horse. The man was hatless, his dark hair was matted with dirt and sweat, and his eyes were wild.

"Injuns!" cried the dusty man. "Injuns on Hatchet Creek! I want help!"

In thirty seconds there was a fair-sized group surrounding the horseman. In a minute and a half the group had become a crowd. Up bustled Marshal Dan Smith followed by Telescope Laguerre, Jim Mace, and the gentleman from the Barred O. Loudon, first on the scene, was jammed against the rider's stirrup.

"Gents," the dusty man was saying, "my three pardners are a-standin' off the war-whoops in a shack over by Johnson's Peak on Hatchet Creek. There's more'n a hundred o' them feather-dusters an' they'll have my pardners' hair if yuh don't come a-runnin'."

"Johnson's Peak!" exclaimed Jim Mace. "That's fifty mile away!"

"All o' that," assented the dusty man, wearily, without turning his head. "For God's sake, gents, do somethin', can't yuh? An' gimme a fresh hoss."

Already three quarters of his hearers were streaking homeward for their Winchesters and saddles. The men from the ranches were the last to move away. No need for them to hurry. The few who had brought rifles to the Bend had left them with their saddles at the various corrals.

Within half an hour the dusty man, mounted on one of the marshal's ponies, was heading a posse composed of every available man in Paradise Bend. Only the marshal and two men who were sick remained behind.

The posse, a column of black and bobbing shapes in the starlight, loped steadily. Many of the ponies had travelled twenty and thirty miles that day, and there were fifty more to pass under their hoofs. The average cow-horse is a hardy brute and can perform miracles of work when called upon. Secure in this knowledge, the riders fully intended to ride out their mounts to the last gasp.

Doubleday and Dawson rode stirrup to stirrup with the man from Hatchet Creek. Tailing these three were Loudon, Telescope Laguerre, the Barred O puncher, and Jim Mace.

"How'd yuh get through, stranger?" queried Doubleday.

"I dunno," said the dusty man. "I jus' did. I had to. It was make or break. Them war-whoops chased me quite a spell."

"You was lucky," observed Dawson.

"Yo're whistlin' I was. We was all lucky when it comes to that. We was at the shack eatin' dinner when they jumped us. S'pose we'd been down the creek where our claims is at, huh?"

"Yo're hair would shore be decoratin' a Injun bridle," admitted Dawson. "But I didn't know there was gold on Hatchet Creek."

"We got four claims," said the dusty man, shortly.

"Gettin' much?"

"We ain't millionaires yet."

"No, I guess not," whispered Jim Mace to Loudon. "I'll gamble that gravel don't assay a nickel a ton. Been all through them hills, I have. I know Hatchet like I do the Dogsoldier. There's no gold there."

"This prospector party says different," muttered Loudon.

"You'll see," sniffed Jim Mace. "Gold on the Hatchet! He's loco! You'll see."

"It's a good thing, stranger," Dawson was saying, "yuh hit the Bend when we was havin' a dance. There ain't more'n fifty or sixty men a-livin' reg'lar in the place."

"Well," said the dusty man, "I did think o' headin' for Fort Yardley. But them feather-dusters was in between, so it was the Bend or nothin'. Oh, I knowed I was takin' chances, what with no ranches in between, an' the little hoss liable to go lame on me an' all. It's a long ride, gents. Say, seems like we're a-crawlin' an' a-crawlin' an' gittin' nowheres."

"We're a-gittin' some'ers right lively," corrected Doubleday. "If yore pardners have plenty o' cartridges they'll be a-holdin' out all right when we git there. Don't yuh fret none, stranger."

"I ain't—only—only—well, gents, there was a roarin' passel o' them Injuns."

"Shore, shore, but we'll strike the Hatchet near Tepee Mountain 'round sun-up, an' from Tepee to Johnson's Peak ain't more'n twenty miles—less, if anythin'."

In the keen light of dawn the pyramidal bulk of Tepee Mountain loomed not six miles ahead. When the sun rose the posse had skirted its base and was riding along the bank of Hatchet Creek.

And now the dusty man began to display signs of a great nervousness. He fidgeted in his saddle, examined and tried the lever action of his rifle, and gloomily repeated many times that he believed the posse would arrive too late. As they passed above a cut bank, the dusty man, riding near the edge, dropped his Winchester. The piece slipped over the edge and splashed into the water fifteen feet below. Swearing, the dusty man rode back to where the bank was lower and dismounted.

"Don't wait for me!" he shouted, wading upstream. "I'll catch up."

The posse rode onward. Some of the horses were staggering with fatigue. All of them were jaded and dripping with sweat. Suddenly Telescope Laguerre rode from the line and vaulted out of his saddle. He landed on his hands and knees and remained in that position, his head thrust forward, his eyes blazing with excitement.

"What's eatin' Telescope?" demanded Doubleday.

"Tom! Tom! Come here! Queeck!" shouted the half-breed.

"Say!" snorted Doubleday. "What is this, anyway? Do you fellers know there's some Injuns up here a piece?"

But Loudon had joined Telescope and neither of the two gave the slightest heed to the outraged Doubleday.

"Look!" exclaimed Laguerre, as the tail of the column passed. "Look! Yore hoss she come out o' de wood here! See!"

"My hoss! You mean Ranger?" Loudon stared, thunderstruck, at the hoofmarks of two horses.

"Yore hoss, Ranger! Ah, once I see de hoss-track I know heem again! Las' tam you shoe de hoss you shoe heem all 'roun'. Dees ees hees track. No man was ride heem. She was de led hoss. Feller ride odder hoss. See! Dey come out de wood un go dees way."

Telescope waved a hand over the way they had come.

"How old are the tracks?" queried Loudon, breathlessly.

"Mabbeso four day. No use follow dem. We lose 'em on de hard groun'."

"Telescope, I got an idea somethin's wrong. I dunno what, but these tracks comin' in here thisaway, an' that fellah with the Injun story—I guess now they hitch somehow. I tell yuh I dunno how"—as Telescope opened his mouth to speak—"an' I may be wrong, but I'm goin' back after that party from Hatchet Creek."

Loudon swung into his saddle and spurred his mount. The animal responded gamely, but a pitifully slow lope was the best speed it could shake out of its weary legs. Laguerre's pony was in worse case. The short halt had stiffened his knees slightly and he stumbled at every other step. The two men lolloped jerkily downstream. Rounding a sharp bend, they came in sight of the cut bank where the dusty stranger had dropped his gun. Neither man nor horse was visible.

"By gar!" exclaimed Laguerre. "By gar!"

Just then his horse stumbled for the last time, fell on its knees, and rolled over on its side. Laguerre flung himself clear and bounced to his feet. The pony struggled up, but Laguerre did not remount. He dragged his rifle from the scabbard and ran forward on foot to rejoin his comrade. Loudon was leaning over the saddlehorn examining the spot where the dusty man had left his horse.

"Ground's kind o' hard," said Loudon, "but it looks like he'd headed for that flat."

"He go dere all right!" exclaimed Laguerre, excitedly. "Come on, Tom!"

Running awkwardly, for cow-country boots are not fashioned for rapid locomotion, Laguerre led the way toward a broad meadow fifty yards away. Once in the meadow the trail was easier to follow. The meadow was at least a quarter-mile wide, and woods bordered it on three sides.

The trail led straight across it, and on into the forest. The trees did not grow thickly, and Laguerre, his eyes on the ground, threaded his way in and out between the trunks at an ankle-straining trot. He had excellent wind, had Telescope Laguerre. Loudon was forced to employ spurs and quirt in order to keep up with him.

Four hundred yards deep in the forest they saw ahead an opening in the trees. A minute later they charged into a large meadow. In the middle of the meadow was an ancient shack, doorless, the roof fallen in, flanked by a corral which gave evidence of having been recently repaired.

"Somethin' movin' in that corral," said Loudon, and dragged out his gun.

Then, in half a watch-tick, a man on a chestnut horse flashed across the open space between the corral and the shack. Loudon and Laguerre swung to one side, but the man did not immediately reappear on the other side of the shack. A few steps farther and they saw him. He was riding directly away from them and was within fifty yards of the forest.

The fugitive was a long two hundred yards distant, but they recognized his back without any difficulty. He was the dusty man from Hatchet Creek, and his horse was Loudon's Ranger.

"Look out for the hoss!" cried Loudon, as Laguerre flung up his rifle.

The rifle cracked spitefully once and again. The rider, with a derisive yell, disappeared among the trees. Laguerre dropped his rifle-butt, and began to utter strange and awful oaths in a polyglot of French and English. Loudon sheathed his six-shooter, kicked his feet out of the stirrups, and calmly rolled a cigarette.

"No use a-cussin', Telescope," he observed. "He's done gone."

Pht-bang! a rifle spat from the distant wood. Loudon's horse gave a convulsive sidewise leap, dropped with a groan and rolled half over, pinning Loudon to the ground. Laguerre, flat on his stomach, was firing at the thinning smoke-cloud under the trees. But there were no more shots from the forest.

"Say, Telescope," called Loudon, "when yuh get plumb through would yuh mind pullin' this cayuse off o' my legs?"

Still cursing, Laguerre levered up the body of the dead pony with the barrel of his rifle, and Loudon wriggled free. He endeavoured to stand on his feet, but sat down abruptly.

"What's de matter?" inquired Laguerre. "Bullet hit you, too?"

"No," replied Loudon, gingerly feeling his right ankle, "my foot feels funny."

"Mabbeso de leg broke," suggested Laguerre. "Mabbeso dat feller she try anudder shot. Better you be behin' de log-house."

He picked up his rifle, helped Loudon to stand erect, and passed an arm around his waist. So, hopping on one foot, Loudon reached the shelter of the shack wall. Laguerre eased him to the ground and skipped nimbly down past the corral.

"Mabbeso I geet dat feller," he called over his shoulder. "Be back soon."

Laguerre returned in five minutes.

"Dat feller she geet clean away," he said, disconsolately. "Nevair touch heem. By gar! Eef I not have run so hard, I shoot better. Geet heem shore den."

"Pull my boot off, will yuh, Telescope?" requested Loudon, extending his leg.

Laguerre pulled. Loudon gritted his teeth. The pain was sharp, nauseating.

"It's no good," said Loudon, thickly. "Got to cut the boot off."

Laguerre whipped out his knife and slit the leather from instep to top. Gently he removed the boot. Loudon peeled off the sock. The ankle was badly swollen.

"Wiggle de toe," commanded Laguerre.

Loudon wriggled his toes and was able to move his ankle slightly, not without a deal of pain, however. He noted with thankfulness that the pain was continuous, and not stabbing as it is when a bone is involved.

"Bone's all right," he observed, cheerfully. "Only a sprain, I guess."

"Dat ees good," said Laguerre. "I geet de odder hoss."

He strode to the dead horse and stripped off saddle and bridle.

"Say," said Loudon, "I can do that while yo're goin' for the hoss. We'll have to leave 'em here, anyway."

"No, not dees treep, my frien'," Laguerre said, carrying saddle and bridle toward the corral. "Dat feller she leave Dan Smeet's hoss on de odder side de corral. Hoss she pretty tire', but she carry you all right."

On his hands and knees Loudon crawled to the corral and peered between the bars. The corral was a large one. Till recently the grass had grown thickly within it. But that grass had been nibbled to the roots, and the marks of shod hoofs were everywhere. From a spring near the shack a small stream ran through one corner of the corral.

"Slick," said Loudon. "Couldn't have been better, could it?"

"No eet could not," agreed Laguerre. "She feex up dees ole corral fine. Dat Ranger hoss she been here mabbeso four day. She have de grass. She have de watair. She all ready fresh w'en dat feller she come. Un how can we follow wit' de tire' pony? Oh, she have eet figure all out. For w'y? Can you tell me dat, Tom?"

"I dunno. It shore is too many for me."

He painfully made his way to the spring, drank, and then soaked his sprained ankle in the icy stream till Laguerre came to help him into the saddle.

On the bank of the Hatchet they found Laguerre's pony lying where it had fallen. The animal was not dead. It was sound asleep.

"Hear dat?" said Laguerre, late in the afternoon.

Loudon listened. From afar off came a buzzing murmur. It grew louder and louder.

"The boys are some het up," observed Loudon.

The posse straggled into view. The boys were "het up." They were all talking at once. Evidently they had been talking for some time, and they were full of their subject. At sight of Loudon and his bootless leg the clamour stilled.

"Hit bad, Tom?" called Doubleday.

"Hoss fell on me," explained Loudon. "Yuh don't have to say nothin', Doubleday," he added, as the foreman dismounted beside him. "I know just what happened."

"Oh, yuh do, do yuh?" snorted Doubleday, wrathfully. "I might 'a' knowed there was somethin' up when that gent an' you fellers didn't catch up. An' us ridin' our heads off from hell to breakfast! Why, we'd be combin' this country yet only we met some o' the cavalry from Fort Yardley an' they said there ain't been an Injun off the reservation for a month. They shore give us the laugh. ——! That's his hoss! Did yuh get him?"

"We did not. The fellah got away nice as yuh please on my hoss Ranger—yep, the hoss Rufe Cutting stole in the Bend. Gimme the makin's, somebody, an' I'll tell yuh what happened."