“Hold up. I guess we were all into this thing. Reckon you’re right. We ought to have had better sense. But it was Masters who shot the steer.”
“Did, did he?”
“Well, he saved these girls’ lives,” said Mrs. Burkett sharply. “Good thing one of you had sense enough. What were the rest of you doing?”
“Why, you see,” Lefty glanced sidewise at the colonel, “wasn’t another rope in the crowd ready for use. Feller that roped the brute had just used his’n, and the rest of us hadn’t got ours out a-tall. That’s the way it happened, Ma’am. We none of us saw the girls—unless Fayte did. He was facin’ the right way to see ’em— Did you, Fayte?” The inquiry was put with great innocence. Fayte answered it:
“You go to the devil! What difference does it make that Masters happened to be quickest on the draw? One or the other of us would have shot that steer, if he hadn’t.”
“Oh, Masters is quick on the draw,” grinned Lefty, “even when he draws from another feller’s holster—and gets a smack on the jaw for doing it.”
All the cowboys were grinning now. This thing of Pearse Masters being blamed—in any part—for Fayte’s reckless behavior, tickled their sense of humor.
“Lots of fuss about nothing,” Fayte muttered, and he scuffed negligently at the dead steer, which Jinnie and Tod were already investigating.
“All right,” Colonel Marchbanks raised his voice; he understood now where the fault lay. “If you boys want to rave around and kill cattle for fun—I suppose you’ve got the price. Evelyn—get those children out of the way here. You girls go back down the creek. We’ve had about enough picnic for one day. You can get ready to go home. Where’s Maybelle?”
“Right here. Been here all the time, Pa.” Maybelle’s arm was slipped suddenly around Hilda’s waist. She spoke innocently, but Hilda could feel her panting.