“I try to be as careful as I can,” sez The; “but I own up I allus feel a bit nervous till I get back to my bunk.”
“The best plan is for one of us to wait where the path leads down into the ravine each night at eleven,” sez the Friar. “We could go at ten and wait until twelve. If we went any closer, the dogs might get scent of us.”
We agreed ’at this would be the best plan; and after this, two of us made it a point to spend a couple of hours waitin’ there, while the rest stayed at the look-out ready to hustle down if the’ was any excitement; but nothin’ happened and we got purty fidgetty.
“Tank,” sez I one afternoon, “let’s ride over to Skelty’s. The’s generally some Cross-branders there, and perhaps we can find a little amusement.”
We reached there about seven, and ordered supper. There were five Cross-branders there already, eatin’ and drinkin’; and one of ’em was the tall feller by the name o’ Dixon. I nodded to him when I sat down and he nodded back. It’s funny the way a man feels when he goes into an unfriendly place to measure an’ be measured. It’s not like fear, that is, not like panicky fear; but still I suppose it’s something like what a jack-rabbit feels when the hounds are strung out after him. He knows well enough what’ll happen if he can’t run fast enough—but then he takes a heap of exhilaration in the thought that he most certainly can run fast enough.
All those fellers knew something o’ me an’ ol’ Tank; while Dixon was the only one we knew, the rest bein’ mostly young chaps who had taken on with Ty durin’ the last few years; but as most o’ Ty’s men were trailed out o’ some other state by a posse, it was a safe bet that they had more or less rattler blood in ’em. They were all on friendly terms with the girls, and the girls called ’em by name, whenever they couldn’t think up some other term ’at suited their taste better. One o’ these young fellers still had a boy’s eyes; but most o’ their eyes were purty hard an’ chilly.
I never did set any store on havin’ a strange woman call me “dear”; and neither did ol’ Tank. With his eye runnin’ wild, and his mussed-up features, the term dear fitted him about as snug as false bangs an’ face-powder would; but one o’ these young hussies came over an’ stood behind his chair, and sez: “Why hello, dearie, where have you been all the time?”
“I’ve been over teachin’ my grandchildren how to play the pianer,” sez Tank. “Have you got any pork an’ beans?”
Most any girl knows ’at most any man’ll stand for most anything; so this one grabbed hold o’ Tank’s hair and gave it a pull; but she savvied ’at he didn’t have any love for her, so she brought in his grub, threw it down in front of him, and went back to soft-soapin’ the feller with a boy’s eyes. He was still young enough to feel flattered by it, and truth to tell, she wasn’t a bad lookin’ girl, except that she drenched a feller so constant with her feminine charms that she washed away any hankerin’s for ’em he might have had to begin with.
Any healthy woman has all the allurement she can possibly need, if she’ll just take care of it. I like to see a hoss full o’ fire, and I like to see a woman full of enticement; but I like to see both the fire an’ the enticement kept under good control, and not made to show out unnecessary.