Before long he returned, riding a fresh horse.
"McIntyre says to bring that maverick over to the camp, and we'll kill her there," he reported.
No sooner said than done. Vicente and Joe pushed their horses into the bunch of cattle and before long had cut out the unbranded heifer, which was very fat, and were driving her back to the camp. A little later the herd Jack was driving mingled with the main herd, and he also turned toward camp; but before he got there he heard a shot, and as he rode into the camp he could see two of the boys dressing the young cow.
[CHAPTER X]
THE FENCELESS LAND
The next day Jack was ordered to travel with the herd in company with Jack Mason and Rube. Mason was a man who had not been long in this part of the country. He was not a pilgrim, for he had been born among the mountains of the West, and had spent all his life in the fenceless country. As a very young man he had worked his way up to the north, and for several years had lived on or near the Blackfeet Reservation, and Hugh knew him well. When he found him in the round-up camp Hugh had spoken of him to Jack in high terms.
"He's harum-scarum," he had said, "but he's a good prairie man, and I don't think he's afraid of anything that wears hair or feathers. He does not always believe in obeying laws that he does not approve of, and I've heard he has been in trouble once or twice on that account; but he's a square man, and a man that it's safe for you to know, and to tie to under ordinary conditions. Sometimes, however, he goes off half-cocked, and when he does that I shouldn't want you to tie to him. He's a man that's growing better every day, but he needs experience and balance, and I don't believe there's any way for Jack Mason to get that, except by living in the world and finding out for himself a whole lot of things that he don't know yet.
"There's another thing about Mason," Hugh went on; "he's terrible stout, quick with his hands, and quite a wrestler. I mind the only time I ever saw him wrestle. The fellow that tackled him got a handful. It was at the Blackfeet Agency. A big husky chap came over from Canada and went around blowing about how good he could wrestle. He threw the blacksmith, who was pretty stout, and a big Indian that was persuaded to try him, and after he had done that he talked louder than ever. He was an Englishman that had been in the mounted police. Finally somebody who had seen Mason in a scuffle told the man that he couldn't throw Mason, and the Englishman wanted to bet he could, and at last got all worked up about it. Mason kept refusing and dodging and putting off, until the Englishman was about crazy to make a match, and at last Mason said he would go him. They put up five dollars a side to wrestle on the flat out in front of the stockade. When they got hold of each other, the Englishman started in to throw Mason quick, but however hard he tried, he didn't seem to stir him out of his tracks. But suddenly, while they were all watching and wondering what was going to happen, Mason give a kind of a twist and threw the Englishman over his head, and he lit on his back three or four steps away, with the wind all knocked out of him. It took five or ten minutes to bring him to, and then he was only just able to walk, and had to be helped back into the stockade. He didn't talk much about wrestling after that, and left in the course of two or three days.