On his eighth day Come-a-Seven started out to see something of the world. No great variety offered within his ken--a rolling expanse, green-gray, gashed by numerous brick-red gullies; hundreds of scraggy mesquite bushes and some prickly-pear; two or three regal cottonwoods on the bank of a creek, whose sandy bed was a third of a mile wide; beyond, a butte lifting from the earth like a monstrous mushroom. That was what he saw--that, and big blue blotches of shadows moving over the country like an army of specters. Piles of tumbled white clouds gave promise of rain at a later date.
Upon this the red-and-white gazed, his head moving from side to side in jerks, ears twitching, tail straight out as when he fed. He was trying to get up nerve to sally farther afield. As a starter and a spur to courage he curveted clumsily, but was brought up short by the sight of another calf of about his own age, standing not a dozen yards away, surveying him with the liveliest interest. Come-a-Seven tried to look hostile, even threatening, but his curiosity got the better of him, because the calf into whose face he glared had the merest stump of a tail.
Advancing a step, he intimated in his own peculiar, gruff calf-manner that the abbreviated member puzzled him. If Come-a-Seven had ever dodged a coyote, he would not have been so ignorant. The other evinced no resentment and they approached in amicable fashion, made a playful butt at each other and became fast friends. After that they would loaf about together in the hot summer days, making trouble for the other calves and stirring up bickerings and feuds.
None of them was of a serious nature. The nearest approach to a tragic ending happened when the red-and-white smashed, full tilt, into a six-months’-old half-brother, of whose relationship he was ignorant--not that this would have made any difference--and knocked him off the steep wall of a tank into the water. He had to run at that, for the other was a husky, ardent calf, and he was angry all through. When he scrambled out, he went hunting for the red-and-white, but by that time the offender was safely under his mother’s eye, which fact he flaunted brazenly.
Who ever saw a braver pair? Who so bold as the tailless one and Come-a-Seven when there was no possibility of danger? Then, at the first hint of trouble, up would go their tails and they would run to their mothers at their very best pace.
They were learning, too, for many things they saw carried lessons to their youthful perceptions. They were witnesses of the finish of a wild-cat, which a puncher roped out of a tree under which they had been taking a nap. They saw a companion die slowly from blackleg, and another practically eaten alive by the fearful screw-worm. For days, too, they avoided an old cow whose head was swelled to twice its natural size. The poor creature was the victim of a snake bite, but she survived.
“Ow-oo-yah! Ow-oo-yah! Ow-oo-yah! Ki-yi! Git up, cattle.”
A shrill whistle brought the red-and-white to his feet with a jerk just as the sun tinted the eastern sky to gray and gold and rose. He bellowed an inquiry to his mother, and for a second stood irresolute. A horseman came riding at top speed straight for them, hallooing with all his might and waving his hat. Whereupon the calf waited for no instructions. He let himself out for all he was worth.
The puncher rode at a hand-gallop behind and he did not drive too hard. Instead, he gave them a shove in the direction he desired they should travel, and, with a final shout, swung away to the right, where a bunch of six rose up with a snort and gave him a chase. He calculated that the cow would keep going and she did. Her slow march was marked by protests from her hopeful offspring. Observing that the rider was busy stirring up cattle in many directions, his baby mind could conceive of no good reason for plugging along in a line dead ahead because this individual had furnished the impetus for the start. So he grumbled much, but trotted along obediently, notwithstanding; and presently his own grievances were dissipated by the contemplation of what was happening around him. Every patch of brush in the country appeared to be turning out cows, calves and young steers, as a magician’s bag scatters paper roses. In several bunches he recognized acquaintances, but they were too concerned about the future to do more than give a hurried squall of recognition. An enormous procession was under way and they were marching in it, a part of it. Whither would it lead them?