It was now the third week since school had closed, and today the boys were riding to Eagles, a railroad station twelve miles from the X Bar X, to meet Mr. Manley, who had stipulated that they must bring his own special mount, General, for him to ride back. Of course they could have made the trip in an auto, but Mr. Manley always said he preferred “hoss flesh to flivvers.�
“Shucks! I don’t see the use of having an auto trail to Eagles when dad rides General all the time,� Teddy half grumbled as he sank his chin deeper into his neckerchief. “This is too blame dusty!�
In the memory of some at the X Bar X, there had been a time when this road, winding up the mountain, had been just a trail, hardly wide enough for two horses abreast. But the auto had since invaded the West, and had widened the path into a dusty highway. In the opinion of Roy and Teddy Manley, it was a change for the worse.
“Stop beefing,� challenged Roy, grinning. “Here! Take a look at that and be thankful you’re allowed to live in the country!�
The two boys had come to a turn in the road almost at the top of the mountain. The horses stood, champing their bits, on a small plateau. The road wound itself about the elevation on either side, stretching out like a long, brown ribbon. To the left, where the highway made its sharpest curve, was a small slope, and beyond this the mountain seemed to have been shorn off with a giant axe, making a sheer drop of some three hundred feet.
Often and often the boys traveled this road, yet each time they reached Bitter Cliff, as it was called, and looked off over that vast stretch of country, they halted, fascinated anew by the beauty of the scene before them.
Down below, the whole range was spread out in a clear-cut panorama. Far in the rear rose the ranch buildings of X Bar X; the mess-house, where Sing Lung, the cook, invented the sometimes strange but always very palatable combinations of food; the high-fenced corral, now almost empty, for the cattle were out on the grazing ground; the ranch house—the home of Roy and Teddy; the “bronco-peeler’sâ€� bunkhouse; and the Rocky Run River, like a streak of dull silver, flowing placidly through a border of cottonwoods and willows about half a mile from the ranch house.
To the west, like another section of some great map, lay 8 X 8 ranch, owned by Peter Ball, an old friend and neighbor of Bardwell Manley.
“She’s sure some view!� exclaimed Teddy, with a long, indrawn sigh of peace and satisfaction. “Some view! Just as good as that picture of the Great Open Spaces we’ve got hanging up in the school auditorium.�
“Huh! Comparing this to a picture!� Roy snorted. “Why, man, this is real! As good as a picture! Huh!�