"No, I can't rest," the Reverend replied to his query. "I believe I have lost one pen....
"By the way, brother, if these were your cattle how many head would you give just to get them to water tonight?"
"I'd give several," Curtis answered bitterly. "Yes, I'd give a good many and look at it as a good investment. Without water we're goin' to make lots of feed for buzzards an' coyotes, tryin' to make up that trail tomorrow!"
"A good many.... A good many," the clergyman muttered as Curtis rode on. "She is for peace, but when she speaks, they are for war," he paraphrased the Psalm.
"'They that war against thee shall be as nothing.'... An investment ... a good investment...."
He sat hunched on his bed for some time, whispering over and over.... "A good investment ... investment...."
Then suddenly he rose and pawed about him for a dried bough of cedar which he had cast aside to make his bed. With trembling fingers he sought a match, struck and applied it.
The flame licked up the tinder and burst into a brilliant torch. The bawling of the cattle cut off sharply. Whites of terrified eyes showed for an instant and then vanished as heads were quickly turned away.
The herd stirred, like a concentrated mass, body crowding body; it swayed forward, a rumbling of hoofs arose. And from the far side came the shrill yipping of horsemen as they broke into a gallop and sought to set the cattle milling.
Futile effort! Driven mad by thirst it would have required a much less conspicuous disturbance than that flare of fire to start the wild rush. With a roll of hoofs, a sickening, overwhelming sound, heads down, crowded together into a knitted body of frightened strength the bunch was in full stampede!