"No, I won't do it," rapped out Henry Lee. "But I'll tell you what I will do," he went on, as the gang lopped down despondently. "You boys have got your time checks. All right, you go up town and cash them in, and if you can pay your saloon debts and get out of town sober, I'll take you on. But if any man takes a drink, or brings out a bottle, he'll never ride for Henry Lee again—I've lost enough horses through drunken punchers. Brig, I'll leave you in charge of the outfit."
He swung up on his horse as he spoke, and Dixie rode away after him, followed by the admiring gaze of all hands and the cook. Henry Lee was a good boss, but the average Texas cow-puncher is not weak-kneed enough to court the favor of any man. Once he is fired, he takes his money and spends it philosophically; but in this case Dixie May had intervened, and rather than lose their chance with her the whole gang had taken lessons in humility.
"She's all right," observed Happy Jack, wagging his head and smiling as he watched her off. "She wraps him around her little finger."
"Wonder how she come to be down here?" inquired a new hand; and Jack answered him, with a laugh.
"Ridin' herd on the old man, of course!" he said.
"Sure!" grumbled Hardy Atkins. "The old lady is up there, too. That's the one thing I got ag'inst Henry Lee—he's been a booze-fighter and quit. That's what makes him so doggoned onreasonable!"
"They say John B. Gough and Sam Jones was reformed drunks, too," commented Poker Bill sagely; but there was one member present who did not take even a philosophical interest in the discussion. It was Brigham Clark, the new straw-boss. Through a chain of circumstances a little hard to trace, he had refrained from his customary periodical, and, behold, of a sudden he was elevated above all his fellows, and placed in a position of authority.
"Well," he broke in sharply, "it's gittin' dark—who's goin' to relieve that horse wrangler? Bill? Buck? Well, I'll put you on the first guard, anyhow—only way to save you from yorese'ves!"
"Aw, listen to the big fat stiff!" commented Buck Buchanan, who felt the need of a nap; but Brig paid no attention to his remarks.
"You boys bring them in to the pen fer a drink," he ordered, with pompous circumstance, "and hold them out on yon flat. Who wants to stand second guard? Jim? Hank?" He craned his neck about as Hardy Atkins had done the night before; and Hardy, who had been thinking about other things, sat up with a sudden scowl.