Ten minutes later he had saddled and was riding out of town. As he cleared it, he chanted a verse wherein the tumbleweed rebuked the sluggish pumpkin for sticking to its garden patch as Thanksgiving day approached.
“You can lay right there and wait
To be turned into pies and tarts,
But me, I’ll jump the fence right now
And head for other parts.”
“Freel’s bringing me in feet first, like he’d planned, could be easy explained,” Carver reflected. “But a live active prisoner is different. The last thing in this world he’d want is to book me for trial. I couldn’t force myself on him as a captive. Next time I meet Freel out in company I’ll surrender and insist that he puts me under arrest.”
IV
The cook wagon lumbered down Cabin Creek toward the Salt Fork of the Arkansas. A dozen hands, riding in couplets, straggled irregularly behind. The bed wagon followed and the horse wrangler brought up the rear with the remuda which numbered some two hundred head of horses, including the string of extra mounts for each round-up hand who rode with the Half Diamond H wagon.
A rider waited on the far bank of the Salt Fork with his string of extra horses and the men speculated idly as to whether he represented Crowfoot or the Coldstream Pool, it being the custom to exchange “reps” to ride with neighboring wagons. The horseman proved to be Bart Lassiter, repping for Crowfoot. Carver’s intimation as to Crowfoot’s methods and their possible connection with the X I L trail herd, dropped on the occasion of his last visit with Molly Lassiter, had borne fruit. The Half Diamond H crew had been full-handed but the girl had induced Bart to ride with their wagon as Crowfoot’s rep instead of accompanying his half-brothers to the X I L.
Lassiter threw his extra mounts in with the remuda and joined Carver, who opened up on him without parley.