At the time when the sheep were half-way to the river-bank there was another movement back at the camp where the cattle had been left. Men there working on schedule started the cattle-drive. But this drive was not at any diverging angle. It led straight forward to the pits and sharpened stakes of the cowmen’s defenses.
Presently the outposts of the force by the ford heard a distant rumbling of the earth. These men on their horses—for they had not been in camp at the time of the flashlight—rode slowly forward and waited. But not long. Nearer and nearer came the sound until there was no more 283 doubt that an animal-drive was headed in their direction.
Slowly they retreated to the camp and gave the warning. Immediately the fire was extinguished, and the punchers, still cursing over their misfortune, loaded every available weapon, breathing a hot and complete vengeance against the men that had outwitted them. Much to their chagrin they now recognized that Skidmore was but a clever member of the enemy, for if he had not been they felt that he would not have accomplished such a speedy and well-planned escape.
Now, as the sheepmen drove their animals nearer and nearer to the pits, they urged them faster until the unhappy creatures, besides themselves at the weird occurrences of a night of terror, were at a headlong gallop.
Suddenly one of the punchers heard that unmistakable accompaniment of running steers and the clashing of horns as the animals with lowered heads charged the works.
“They’re cows!” he yelled. “Don’t shoot!”
But it was too late. The maddened cattle were already at the first pits, plunging in with terrified bellows, or being transfixed on the stakes by the onrush of those behind. The pits were 284 not more than ten feet deep, and only served to check the herd until they were full. Then those following trampled over their dying companions and charged the trenches where the cowboys lay.
“Fire!” yelled Bissell, who was in command, and the guns of nearly seventy men poured a leaden hail of death into the forefront of the heedless cattle.
Larkin’s men by this time had drawn off to see that the havoc ran its course, and when they heard the desperate volleys they turned and rode southwest along the river-bank to the point where the sheep expected to cross.
The cattle, which had been driven in a rather narrow column, continued to come on endlessly. The leaders dropped in windrows, but the followers leaped over them only to fall a little farther on.