The Ranch at the Wolverine

by B. M. Bower

CHAPTER XVI

"I'M GOING TO TAKE YOU OUT AND HANG YOU"

The trouble with a man like Buck Olney is that you can never be sure of his method, except that it will be underhand and calculated to eliminate as much as possible any risk to himself. Ward, casting back into his memory—he had known Buck Olney very well, once upon a time, and in his unsuspecting youth had counted him a friend—tried to guess how Buck would proceed when he went down to that corral and found how those brands had been retouched.

"He'll be running around in circles for awhile, all right," he deduced with an air of certainty. "Blotched brands he'd know was my work; and he could have put it on me, too, with a good yarn about trailing me so close I got cold feet. As it is—" Ward smoked two cigarettes and scowled at the scenery. As it was, he did not know just what Buck Olney would do, except— "If he makes a guess I did that, he'll know I'm wise to the whole plant. And he'll get me, sure, providing I stand with my back to him long enough!" Ward had his back to a high ledge, at that moment, so that he did not experience any impulse to look behind him.

"Buck don't want to drag me up before a jury," he reasoned further. "He'd a heap rather pack me in all wrapped up in a tarp, and say how he'd caught me with the goods, and I resisted arrest."

The assurance he felt as to what Buck Olney would do did not particularly frighten Ward, even if he did neglect to go to bed in his cabin during the next few days. That was common sense, born of his knowledge of the man he was dealing with. He went to the cabin warily, just often enough to give it an air of occupancy. He frequently sat upon some hilltop and watched a lazy thread of smoke weave upward from his rusty stovepipe, but he slept out under the stars rolled in his heavy blanket, and he never crossed a ridge if he could make his way through a hollow. It is not always cowardice which makes a man extremely careful not to fall into the hands of his enemy. There is a small matter of pride involved. Ward would have died almost any death rather than give Buck Olney the satisfaction of "getting" him. For a few days he was cautious as an Indian on the war trail, and then his patience frazzled out under the strain.

At sunrise one morning, after a night of shivering in his blanket, he hunched his shoulders in disgust of his caution. If Buck Olney wanted anything of him, he was certainly taking his time about coming after it. Ward rubbed his fingers over his stubbly jaw, and the uncomfortable prickling was the last small detail of discomfort that decided him. He was going to have a shave and a decent cup of coffee and eat off his own table, or know the reason why, he promised himself while he slapped the saddle on Rattler.

He was camped in a sheltered little hollow in the hills, where the grass was good and there was a spring. It was a mile and more to his claim, straight across the upland, and it was his habit to leave Rattler there and walk over to the ridge, where he could watch his claim; frequently, as I have said, he stole down before daylight and lighted a fire in the stove, just to make it look as if he lived there. There was a risk in that, of course, granting that the stock inspector was the kind to lie in wait for him.

Ward rode to the ridge, with his blanket rolled and tied behind the cantle. His frying-pan hung behind his leg, and his rifle lay across the saddle in front of him. He was going home boldly enough and recklessly enough, but he was by no means disposed to walk deliberately into a trap. He kept his eye peeled, as he would have expressed it. Also, he left Rattler just under the crest of the ridge, took off his spurs, and with his rifle in his hands went forward afoot, as he had done every time he had approached his cabin since the day he found the corral and the cattle in the canyon.