IV
“I ain’t noways aimin’ tuh be hollerin’,” explained old Hank, spraying a sage bush with tobacco juice. “I jest want that you boys should know what kind of a skunk yo’re workin’ fer and how he’s throwed the hooks to me.”
Tad and Shorty, riding on either side of the cattle-man, nodded.
“Two years ago, come July fourth, my son, Pete, gits into a jam over a hoss that Black Jack is abusin’ on the street in Alder Gulch. Black Jack pulls a gun. He’s tanked up on Injun whisky and onery as ——, sabe? He hates the Pete boy anyhow, and comes a rearin’ when Pete tells him tuh quit beatin’ the hoss over the head.
“His bullet ketches Pete in the thigh and Pete limbers up his six-gun as he’s a fallin’. Black Jack goes down with a .45 slug in his gun arm and the fight is over.
“But the Black Jack gent and Luther Fox is playin’ of a deep game and they sets out tuh bust us. They has Pete throwed in jail and tried fer attempt tuh murder. They’s a dozen LF pole cats that swears on the witness stand that Pete starts the fight and shoots fust. Pete, not havin’ ary witness, is railroaded.
“Trials is expensive, boys. Pete’s law sharp bleeds me fer all I kin scrape up. The price uh cattle is lower’n a rattler’s belly and I’m bad crowded tuh git the coin. I borrys ten thousand dollars from the bank and gives my note, never thinkin’ they’d sell the note tuh Luther Fox. I ain’t wise tuh them throat-cuttin’ tricks that’s called good business by some.
“That fall finds me busted and in debt. I’m doin’ business with Fox’s bank, buyin’ grub from Fox’s store and the pore specimens uh cowpunchers that’s workin’ fer me is drawin’ double wages from Fox and stealin’ me blind. Up till then, Pete has bin runnin’ the round-up and takin’ care uh that end. He’s made me and Ma take it easy like, sendin’ us to Californy and Florida fer the winters and a babyin’ us scan’lous thataway. Now we’re throwed up ag’in’ it onct more and we pitches in tuh do our dangdest.
“The day Pete is sentenced to twenty-five years at Deer Lodge, Ma takes the train fer Helena tuh see the governor and I comes back and starts the fall round-up with as sorry a crew as ever rode a good hoss tuh death. My range covers the country between the lone cottonwood and the Missouri River. Some eighty thousand acres and she’s supposed tuh be fair stocked. Gents, it sounds scary when I tell it, and yuh kin believe it er not, but we works that range and we don’t gather five hundred head uh steers. Somebody’s beat us to it, understand, and I’m cleaned out complete!