"You'd better go to town an' see a doctor," drawled the "Cap." "An' while you're on your way stop at Hathaway's an' give him or Jim McCullen a letter fer me. I'll have it ready in a minute an' it'll save me sendin' a man over."
Without waiting for a reply from the tall cow-puncher, Captain Bill Henry stalked over to his bed, took from the roll a pad of paper, and was soon lost in the mysteries of letter-writing.
He was an awkwardly built man, but his whole appearance gave one the impression that he meant business—and he was crammed full of it. Seated astride his tarp-covered bed, with his back to the few straggling cow-punchers about the tents, he proceeded in a determined, business-like way to write the letter. Before he had finished the difficult operation some men rode up to the camp—the men who had been on herd, hungry for their supper, and two outsiders.
Around the mess-wagon, which had been backed into the cook-tent in the usual order, lounged a group of cowboys whose appetites had been satisfied and whose duties for the time being were over. Two of the men who had just come up on horseback joined these, while Captain Bill Henry, without looking around, continued his somewhat difficult task of composing a letter, which, when accomplished, he folded carefully.
"Hello! Where did you'ns drop from?" he drawled as he approached the newcomers. "I was just goin' to send word over to have your wagon join me at west fork o' Stony Creek. I'm too short o' men to work Stony Creek country, anyhow. Hathaway's reps all left me awhile back, an' Long Bill, he's leavin' to-day—got bit by a mad dog over here. Jackson's wagon an' the U Bar ain't goin' to join me till we git down in the Lonesome Prairie country, so I was just goin' to send a letter over to your place, for if he wants a good round-up on this range he'd better send over that extra wagon o' his'n. You'ns goin' right back?"
"I'm not," replied Carter. "But McCullen can take word over to the ranch. He's going the first thing in the morning."
"Cert. Got to go, anyway, an' I reckon my horse can pack your message to the boss if it ain't too heavy," said McCullen.
Old Jim McCullen had been Hathaway's right hand man as long as anyone could remember. He had put in many years as wagon-boss, and finally retired from active life to the quieter one at the home-ranch, where he drew the biggest pay of any man in Hathaway's employ, and practically managed all the details of the great cattle concern. He saw that the wagons were properly provisioned, manned, and started out in the spring, that the men who brought up the trail-herds were paid off; he attended to the haying, the small irrigating plant that had been started, and to all the innumerable details that go toward the smooth running of a large ranch. Now the "boss" had sent him on a mission whose import he understood perfectly—something altogether out of the line of his usual duties, but of greater importance than anything he had ever undertaken. He was going back to the ranch in the morning to tell Hathaway that his daughter was apparently all right. He and Carter had pitched their tent not far from where the round-up was camped, and had ridden over for some beef. One of the men cut them a liberal piece from a yearling that they had just butchered. Carter tied it upon the back of his saddle and rode off toward camp, while old Jim McCullen sat down, lighted a cigarette, and listened to the gossip of the round-up.
"Right smart lot o' dogs round them breeds down there," remarked Bill Henry, nodding his head toward Harris' ranch. "Long Bill, here, he's been unfortunate. Went up there a-courtin' one o' them pretty Harris girls last eyenin', an' blamed if she didn't go an' sick the dogs on him!"
McCullen sized up his bandaged hand. "Mighty bad-lookin' fist there," he chuckled. "Must 'a' bled some by the looks of that rag. When'd it happen?"