Tales from the X-bar Horse Camp: The Blue-Roan «Outlaw» and Other Stories. Barnes Will Croft
head. Away goes Mr. Blue into the thick timber, draggin' that new Heiser Ed got up in Denver over the rocks and through the trees, like as if it want but a picket pin at the end of a stake rope.
"When Ed hit the sod, his Winchester drops out of the scabbard, an' he grabs it up an' sets there on the ground a pumpin' lead after the blue as fast as he could pull the trigger. He never stopped the steer at all, an' when we were trailin' him up, we found the saddle where the rope had dragged between two rocks. The saddle got hung up, but the steer was a runnin' so hard that he jist busted the rope and kept on a goin' an' I reckin is a goin' yet."
"Imagine Ed's shots hit the steer, Windy?" inquired one interested listener.
"Reckon not," was the reply, "but one of them hit the saddle and made a hole clean through the tree, which didn't help matters much with the boss, I'm here to tell you. You'd orter heerd Ed talk when he sees that there new hull of his all skinned up an' a hole shot plumb through the fork." And Windy grinned at the memory of it.
Not long after this adventure, the blue-roan stood on a high ridge overlooking a valley. Out in that valley was the salt ground where great chinks of pure white rocksalt were placed, not only to satisfy the cravings of the salt-loving brutes, but to coax them out of the cedars into the open where the wilder ones could be captured.
The roan was salt-hungry and, after a careful survey of the surroundings, started down the trail for the salt grounds. Away off to the left, and quite out of his sight, half a dozen cowboys were driving a bunch of cattle down a draw between two ridges. One of them rode up on top of the ridge to take a look over the country. Some distance below him, and well out into the valley, was a single animal. It took but a short look to satisfy the rider that it was the blue-roan. The boy was riding his best rope-horse that morning and, with a wave of his hat to his comrades, he loosened the reins on old "Greyback" and tore off down the valley toward the steer.
He had not gone fifty yards before the roan saw he was pursued, and wheeling out of the trail in which he was traveling struck back towards the sheltering trees on a long swinging trot.
A couple of miles' hard run, and the boy rode his horse out of a deep wash, to see, across another valley, the blue-roan hurrying majestically up the ridge, the sheltering trees but a few hundred yards away. He spurred his horse down the rocky side of the ridge, across a flat at the bottom, and up the steep side opposite, reaching the top just as the blue was passing. His horse was winded, but the boy "took a long chance" and drove after the animal with his rope down ready for a throw. For an instant the steer hesitated, then plunged off the ridge, down the steep side, just as the boy's rope dropped over his horns. It was a fearful risk to rope a steer such as this, with a badly winded horse; but tenfold more dangerous to do it just as the great animal was starting down the steep slope. The boy knew his only hope was to keep the steer from tightening the rope, for if that happened, no horse on earth could hold the weight of the brute at the end of it, plunging down hill as they were.
"Turn the rope loose," you say? Oh no; he wasn't that kind of a cow puncher. Come what might, he meant to hang onto that steer to the bitter end.
Half way down the hill was a lone piñon tree about twenty feet high, and true to his nature the steer headed for it. The rider realized his danger and tried to keep from straddling it with his rope, but, just as the roan reached the tree, instead of passing it on the same side with the horse, he dodged around it. This brought the horse and man on one side, the steer on the other; between them a fifty foot "Tom Horn" rope fastened firmly; one end to a twelve hundred-pound steer, the other, to a saddle cinched to a thousand-pound horse.
The tremendous force of the pull, when the rope drew up on the tree, uprooted it. This prevented the rope from breaking, but there was sufficient jerk upon it to bring both horse and steer to the ground in a struggling heap.
The man who was "riding for a fall," with both feet out of the stirrups, in anticipation of just such a wreck, flew off into space, landing in a pile of rocks twenty-five feet away by actual measurement. The horse fell with his head under him in such a way that his neck was instantly broken.
When the other men who were following reached the scene, they found the man just regaining his senses, badly cut about the head, but otherwise unhurt. The blue, in falling, had landed flat on his back, his hind feet down the steep hill, both his long horns buried to the very skull in the ground. Thus he was absolutely helpless and unable to regain his feet, no matter how hard he struggled. To "hog-tie" him in this position, was the work of but a moment, and at last the blue-roan outlaw was a captive.
It was no trouble to roll him down the steep hillside to the level ground below, and inside of half an hour the rest of the men arrived on the scene with the bunch of cattle they had been driving.
In the bunch was a large steer which they roped and dragged up to where the outlaw lay, and, in cowboy parlance "dumped" him on top of the outlaw. They then proceeded to "neck" the two steers together with a short rope they cut for the purpose. Having done this to their satisfaction they untied the hogging ropes and allowed the steers to gain their feet. As this was done the bunch of cattle they had driven up was carefully crowded around the two animals. After a few minutes of pulling and fighting the outlaw sulkily allowed himself to be dragged along by his unwilling mate, with the rest of the cattle, and was eventually landed safely in the main herd.
Great was the rejoicing in camp that night over the capture, and the guards about the herd were cautioned not to let the two escape under any circumstances.
At the end of the week the herd had been worked down to the river for shipping. As the country was open and the herd easily handled the "twins," as the boys called them, came apart when the old rope wore out and were not necked up again.
That night one of the men, who had a family in town, hired a town kid to take his place on herd, while he went up and spent the night at home. As the boy rode his guard around the edge of the herd which lay quietly in the cool night air, he found a big blue steer standing at the very edge of the bunch looking off toward the mountains in a dreamy, meditative mood. Kidlike, he could not withstand the temptation to play the "smarty," so, instead of passing him by or gently turning him into the herd, the boy took off his hat and swung it into the steer's face.
It was a distinct challenge to the old warrior, and he rose to the occasion. Gathering himself for one mighty plunge he struck the pony the boy was riding with his powerful head, knocking him flat. Away he dashed over horse and rider, while the herd broke into a mad stampede which carried them five miles in the opposite direction before they could be "milled" into a bunch and held up again. Two men were left with them, the rest returning to camp.
Daylight showed the blue-roan missing, and the wagon boss swore a solemn oath that, if ever again he was captured, he would be necked and also have his head tied down to a foot until he was safely inside the stockyards.
Four weeks later a party of cattle men, gathering steers in the mountains, ran across the blue outlaw, right on the brink of a deep, rough cañon. He was seen, with the aid of a glass, across a bend in the cañon lying under the rim rock in fancied security. Near him were several other steers, and it was determined to make the attempt to capture the lot.
Carefully driving their bunch of gentle steers as close to the place where the outlaw was lying as they could, with the thought that, if he ran up the trail, he would see the steers and possibly go to them and stop; three men rode into the cañon some distance below and started up the trail toward where he was lying.
The instant the blue-roan saw the horsemen he jumped to his feet, hesitated a moment, and instead of taking the smooth trail out, dove down the steep, rocky sides of the cañon where neither horse nor man could follow.
Surefooted as he was, he misjudged his agility and strength, and plunged into a mass of loose rock, which gave him no foothold. The walls of the cañon were frightfully steep and in the loose rock, sliding, slipping, and rolling, he was swiftly hurried towards the edge of a cliff two hundred feet high, over which he dropped to death and destruction. Tons of loose rock followed him to the bottom, making a roar like a thousand cannons. It was the end of the road for the blue-roan.
When the men climbed down the trail to see just what had happened they found him dead and half buried in the mass of fallen rock.
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