The Greatest Works of B. M. Bower - 51 Titles in One Volume (Illustrated Edition). B. M. Bower
the entrance to the head of the arena there were evidences in plenty of the work going on; piles of planks to investigate. It was a huge place. The farther side was more open than where he had been quartered, and here were other great piles of planks and posts. The corrals for the cattle and the wild horses would be here, he supposed. The rooms were not so many on this side, and none of them were locked. Dressing rooms, most of them were. But here the light was a little stronger because of the sunlight that streamed in through the windows. There was no trace of any one, though; deserted as an old tomb, and not much more cheerful.
He went back and climbed one of the main stairways to the very top, where he could look down on the arena and all the vast emptiness of the seats. Field Museum and the green slope before it lay smiling in the sun, and beyond the lake shone like a mirror reflecting the sky; but for these he had only a glance. He was wondering who had sneaked past him in the night, who had picked the lock on the kitchen door and helped himself to eggs and bread and coffee, and had been so careful to lock the door behind him again.
Chicago was a tough place, he had been told. But still, this empty stadium surely offered no inducement to violence; later, when the big show was on, perhaps—but surely not now when it would take a truck to haul off anything movable.
"Aw, heck!" the Kid muttered at last as he turned to go down. "A thousand men could keep out of sight here if they wanted to, and I could walk the heels off my boots for all the good it would do me." And he went down the stairs and back to his horses. He was out in the arena, loping them easily around the track when trucks came clucking in and the carpenters appeared and began to throw planks down with hollow smacking sounds. Presently the hammers began pecking away and men went here and there on mysterious errands that seemed very important. And now that the outside world—or a small part of it—had flowed into the big silent coliseum, the presence of one unknown did not seem so important after all.
But he kept his horses picketed out in the center of the arena that day and practiced the intricate details of his rope-spinning tricks such as turning back somersaults within the whirling loop, standing on his head, rolling over and over on the ground and jumping in and out without once letting the spinning rope fall. The eyes of the workmen turned often his way and lingered, watching and making comments, but the Kid never thought of that.
Norm stopped in his hurried walk across the end of the arena and looked on while the Kid performed one difficult feat, then grinned and passed on, waving a hand when he saw the Kid glance his way. The Kid let his loop fall to the ground while he stared after the other. Should he overtake him and tell him about that sly nocturnal meal? While he widened his loop again he debated the question with himself. Maybe he ought to—but Norm had enough on his mind without being asked to bother about some one who did no more than help himself to food.
"Aw, it's just some bum, probably," the Kid decided, as he hopped inside the spinning loop again for another stunt which he had invented that summer. Chicago was full of hoboes, naturally. Some one had sneaked into the stadium to get out of the wet. He would probably manage to sneak out with the workmen, and that would be the end of it. But he must be clever at picking locks.
When his arm ached from the exercise the Kid inquired about stores, and went out and brought all the provisions he could carry in his arms, and what he did not need that day he left down in the pile of hay where he could be sure it was there in the morning.
That night he slept soundly as if he lay safe at the Flying U or in his frat house in Laramie, his last waking thought a half formed plan for the morrow. He must find out where he could get the horses reshod, the serviceable road shoes exchanged for the light racing plates that would give them more speed.
In the morning he found the same telltale sign of eating in the kitchen; but now a whole loaf was missing, and a pound of cheese he had forgotten to carry back with him after supper. So the fellow had not gone, after all; he was somewhere around and he must expect to stay for awhile, since he had thoughtfully provided himself with a lunch.
Once more the Kid made the round of the stadium, and this time he took off his boots and wore a pair of buckskin moccasins he had with him. It didn't help him any. He might as well have gone clumping up and down the corridors. Not so much as a mouse did he see.
He would have spoken to Norm about it that day, but he did not see him at all; nor Pete. From a truck driver he learned where he could have his horses shod, and with careful directions for finding the shop he started early for the place, glad of an excuse for leaving and taking his horses with him, even if it were only for a couple of hours. As a matter of fact it took five, but the job was well done and he was glad to have it over and to get his precious ponies back safe, away from the swift-flowing rivers of trucks, taxies and street cars that made the South Side a bedlam.
Another night with his horses, another morning when he unlocked the door of the big kitchen and found that some one had eaten and gone; another silent search of the huge place, fruitless as the first. The mystery would have irritated the Kid past endurance, had other things not crowded in upon his attention and taken his time.
The big rodeo—it was getting closer and closer, and the thrill of it pressed deeper and deeper into the heart of the Kid. They were building the high, wire fence all around the arena. There came a day when the Kid must swing open a big gate just before the main entrance to the arena, so that he could lead his ponies in to the field. Every morning now he worked them out in the relay, hampered for lack of a helper, it is true, but putting the ponies through their paces and teaching them more and more carefully that they must stand until he was up. Every day he practiced roping, and now as the horses rested from the long journey, he used them as much as he could in his stunts. The carpenters came to the point of betting upon him—rashly, since they did not know what rivals he would have; but it pleased the Kid to have them praise him and his horses, made him feel a little more at home, a little more sure of himself.
One morning he woke to hear the hollow plaint of cattle lowing, and the shouts of men. Scrambling into his clothes and running down the passage, out through the big gate and across the arena toward the clamor, he was in time to see them go crowding down the echoing way to the stout corrals just finished the day before. High-shouldered, lean-flanked longhorns from the Brazos, these were. A tingle of excitement stirred the Kid's pulse at sight of them. He had no intention of taking part in the riskier sports this year—bulldogging, bronk-riding, steer-riding—because he had too much at stake, needed money too badly. He meant to save his energy, concentrate on the roping, fancy and relay riding, and be the more certain of winning. He did not believe that a fellow should "spread himself" and try to compete in everything. That was one of his pet theories which he meant to try out in his team. But now he itched to tackle one of those husky brutes, just to see if he couldn't twist it down in about fifteen or twenty seconds.
Then the wild horses came; bucking bronks, outlaws culled from every contest in the country. Devils in horseflesh these were, showing the whites of their eyes as they flung up heads to glare at these strange gray walls that enclosed them; snorting, rearing, plunging down the passageway to their quarters. Wily, some of them, meek as plough horses until a man was in the saddle, then fighting demons, wanting only the chance to crush and kill. These, too, challenged the Kid's imagination. He wanted to top a few of the meanest, show them who was boss!
Soon there came trooping in the herd of saddle horses, down the passage where the Kid's footsteps had echoed so hollowly. Clatter enough now as the horses were brought to their places before the long mangers which had been built against the front wall in the past two days. The Kid's little corral of hay bales was gone, swelling the pile that grew higher against the far wall as the trucks came clucking in with their loads. Stardust, Blazes and Sunup stood decorously now at the far end of the manger, in the place where the Kid decided they would be least disturbed as the other horses came and went.
Clean-limbed running horses for the relay race; roping horses—the Kid studied them one by one, jealous for his own. Two or three looked speedy enough to worry him a little if he did not know how well his own string was trained. Speed counted, of course. But behavior at the station where the saddle was changed counted quite as much. The Kid turned away from the inspection not much troubled; he had faith in his own string.
Tanned riders from the plains