Tales from the X-bar Horse Camp: The Blue-Roan «Outlaw» and Other Stories. Barnes Will Croft
this time on, the blue-roan became a hater of men. The object on horseback was to him the source of all his suffering and pain – a thing to be avoided, and upon which to wreak vengeance some day, if possible.
The country in Arizona was very unlike the old range upon the staked plains in Texas, being rough and rocky, with none of those great grassy stretches they had been accustomed to back in their old home. There were trees here, too, a thing they had never known on their old range, and the cows buried themselves deep in the thickets of cedar and piñon. There they found many tanks or reservoirs of rain water, and unless the water gave out they seldom left their hiding places.
Here, the blue-roan calf and his mother made their home, until one day, when he was about a year old, he was accidentally separated from her and never saw her again. Two years of life in the thickets made him shy and wild as a deer; he learned to watch for objects upon horseback, which were his one great fear. Once in the winter before he lost his mother a trio of wolves followed them through the cedars for a whole day, sneaking up on them as closely as they dared, even nipping at their heels. His mother would turn upon them with a bellow of defiance and charge toward the tormentors, head down, returning quickly to the little bunch of friends that stood together, heads to the foe, their calves within the circle.
A two-year-old heifer, with more pluck than judgment, weak from a long winter of short grass and poor range, made a dart toward the wolves, and turning to join the circle of cows, stumbled and fell to her knees. In a moment the wolves were upon her. While they were busy over their feast, the other cattle slipped away from the fearsome place, and a new danger crept into the blue-roan's life.
Three years had passed. The blue-roan was beginning to be a noted character upon the range. He was broad of horn, and the great black Hashknife, outlined against the blue hide, could be seen for a long distance. The sight of a horseman, no matter how far away, was sufficient to send him plunging down the roughest mountainside, into the depths of the cedar brakes, and over rocks and lava flows, where no mounted man could follow. He was too fleet of foot for the older cows, and the roan soon found himself alone in his glory. He then became what is known to the cowboys of the western ranges as an "outlaw," an animal, either horse, bovine, or even human, that, deserted by all its friends, runs alone and has little to do with the rest of his kind; a "cimarron," the Mexicans call them. Such animals are seldom forced into the roundups that take place at regular intervals upon the ranges, and when caught by that dragnet, are very hard to hold in the herd long enough to get them to the stockyards and shipped out of the country.
The next spring, when it was time to start on the roundup, the wagon boss told the men to keep a sharp lookout for that blue-roan outlaw, and "get him or bust him," if the opportunity offered.
It fell to the lot of the boss and another man to run into the blue-roan a few days later. They were working down a grassy draw in a thick cedar country, when out from the trees on one side of it there burst a great blue animal with a grand spread of horns, and fleet as a deer. In an instant the two men had their ropes down and were after him in full pursuit. "Cut him off from the cedars!" shouted the boss to his partner, who happened to be closest to the cedars, and the boy spurred his pony toward the steer, which now was doing his best to gain the friendly shelter and protection of the trees.
It was but a short distance, and the steer had much the best of the race, but the boy had his pony alongside the animal before he could get his rope into shape for a throw. The steer, with the keen instinct of the hunted, crowded the pony over toward the trees and, just as the rider was ready to drop his rope over the animal's wide-spread horns, an overhanging branch caught the loop, jerking it from his grip. In a vain attempt to turn the steer from the trees into the open, he crowded his pony close up onto the huge bulk of the outlaw. The man's right knee was fairly touching the animal's shoulder, while he rapidly coiled his rope for another throw.
Following them came the boss, cursing his rope, a new "Maguey" which had fouled in his hands and was a mass of snarls and knots, which in his eager haste he only made worse instead of better. At this instant, the blue-roan turned suddenly. With a quick upward thrust of his head, he drove his nearest horn deep into the side of the pony, which was crowding him so closely, tearing a cruel gash in his side and throwing horse and rider into a confused, struggling heap on the ground.
In a moment the steer was lost in the trees, while the boss dropped off his horse to assist his companion, who was working hard to free himself from the body of the pony, which lay across his leg. The boy cleared himself from his saddle-rigging, and the pony struggled to his feet. It was very evident, however, that the animal was wounded to the death; so the boss, with tears in his eyes, drew his six-shooter and put the poor animal out of its misery.
From that day the "blue-roan outlaw" became a marked animal upon the range, and the story of how he killed "Curly Bill's" pony was told around many a campfire on the round-ups that summer.
Thus the roan outlaw added to his reputation and triumphs until his capture was the dearest hope of every cowpuncher upon that range. The word had gone out not to kill him unless absolutely necessary, but rather to capture him alive just for the satisfaction of the thing.
That fall, when the round-ups were working through the country in which he was known to be, every man was ambitious to be his captor. Around the campfires each night plans were laid for the job and stories told of his prowess and ability to escape from his hunters.
One fine morning, as the riders were working through a country covered densely with cedar and piñon trees, with occasional open glades and grassy valleys, the wagon boss and the man with him heard shouts off to their right. Pulling up their horses they waited to locate the sound, when suddenly from the thicket of trees along the valley there emerged two great animals, a black, and a blue-roan steer. It was the famous blue, together with a black, almost as much an outlaw as himself.
The wagon boss, who had just been lamenting the fact that he was riding a half-broken horse that day, was nearest to the blue, and professional etiquette, as well as eagerness to be the one to capture the noted steer, drove him straight at the big fellow. The pony he rode was a green one, but he had plenty of speed, and before the steer could reach the shelter of the cedars the rope, tied hard and fast to the horn of a new fifty-dollar saddle, was settling over the head of the outlaw. Unfortunately, however, the rope did not draw up close to the horns, or even on the neck, but slipped back against the mighty shoulders of the steer, giving him a pulling power on the rope that no cow-pony could meet. Then, to quote the words of the man with the boss, "things shore did begin to pop."
Knowing full well that if he crowded the animal too hard he would turn on him and probably kill another horse, the boss made a long throw and consequently had but little rope left in his hand with which to "play" his steer. The jerk that came, when the steer weighing twelve hundred pounds, and running slightly down hill, arrived at the end of the rope, tied to the saddle-horn, was something tremendous. As soon as the strain came on the cinches the pony threw down his head and began some of the most scientific and satisfactory bucking that was ever seen on the Hashknife range, which is compliment enough.
When the boys were gathered about the fire that evening "Windy Bob," who had been with the boss, related the affair.
"Ye see, fellers, me and Ed was a-driftin' down the wash, not expectin' anything pertickler, when out from the cedars busts the ole blue, and a mighty good mate for him.
"'The blue's mine, Windy,' ses Ed, and I, not hankerin' a bit fer the job, bein' as my shoulder I broke last fall won't stand much funny business, lets him have the big blue all right, and I takes after his mate; which was plenty big 'nuf fer me and the hoss I was a-ridin'.
"I made a good throw and, everything going first rate, had my steer on his side in half a minute, makin' a record throw and tie. Jist as I got my hoggin' rope onto his feet all safe I heered a big doin's up towards Ed's vicinity, and lookin' up seen his hoss jist a-pitchin' and a-sunfishin' like a good feller.
"Ed, he rides him fer about three or four jumps and then, as the saddle was a crawlin' up onto the pony's neck, from his cinches a-bein too loose, and it a-tippin' up behind like a old hen-turkey's tail, runnin' before the wind, Ed, he decides to unload right thar and not go any farther.
"The pony, he keeps up his cavortin' and the steer stripped the saddle right over