The Greatest Works of B. M. Bower - 51 Titles in One Volume (Illustrated Edition). B. M. Bower
up very high, at that," he jeered, giving her a patronizing smile because her hatcrown did not rise above his shoulder.
"Oh, I haven't a doubt you'll go a lot higher when you get on a bucking horse!"
"That," he told her loftily, "remains to be seen."
"Oh, I expect to see it, all right! I shall come every day just to see how high they throw you!"
"Don't strain your eyes looking to see me thrown! Here's the office where your father told you to wait for him."
"Why, I haven't seen—"
"Sorry, Miss Harlan. I'm busy right now. You want to save your energy, anyway, for the rodeo. You'll need it." If she thought he was going to lead her around all afternoon, just for the fun of hearing her razz him!
"Good-by, Montana Kid," she said sweetly. "See you in the funny papers—riding a bronk!"
"Have a good laugh," cried the Kid, and lifted his hat with jaunty unconcern as he walked briskly away and left her to bark her own knuckles knocking until some one opened the door.
"Darn her picture!" he muttered furiously to himself the next minute. "Now I've got to go borrow fifty dollars and enter the bronk riding. Darn lucky thing she forgot to razz me about bulldogging!"
For that, as you know, is the way of youth.
Chapter X. Rodeo
"What yuh lookin' for, Kid?" A short, smiling-faced young man in an enormous hat and silver-conched, bat-wing chaps that made him look shorter than he really was, strolled over to where the Kid was frantically pawing through a big leather suitcase. "Want to git a move on yuh, Cowboy. The grand entry's goin' to start purty soon. Lost somethin'? Your nerve, maybe?" The short young man spread his legs a little, from sheer exuberance of spirits because of the expansive chaps and certain other resplendent details of his gala attire.
"I've lost a blue satin shirt," the Kid replied without looking up. "I know it was here the other day—"
"Say, you got it on!" chortled the short one. "I golly, yuh shore must be all up in the air, Cowboy—that blue satin shirt's on yore back!"
"I know, but I had six. I'm wearing blue, this contest. I ought to have five here, and there's only four. Some sneak thief has been through my grip and helped himself to a shirt. But he can't get away with it," the Kid added grimly, closing and locking the grip. "This particular shade of blue is not made up in factory shirts, as I happen to know. I chose the cloth myself, and had three dozen shirts made to order. I know where they are—all except the one missing out of my suitcase. So whoever took my shirt had better keep it off his back—"
"Hol-ee cats! Thirty-six sky-blue-pink satin shirts!" The short cowboy leaned against a concrete pillar and fanned himself with his hat. "Who are you, fer gosh sake? The Prince of Wales?"
The Kid grinned in spite of his perturbation.
"No. Five of us fellows took a notion to dress alike, and this queer shade of blue is the color we chose for shirts. We got enough cloth for six apiece, and that's all we could find like it. The other boys aren't here, so if you see a shirt the color of this one I've got on, Shorty, and I'm not inside it, just grab the guy, will you, and hold him till I get there!"
"Yeah. Oh, shore!" Shorty spoke with elaborate sarcasm. "Say, most of us guys is tickled to git one satin shirt, Boy, let alone six. You better go git a locker for such valuables as them. Got yer hoss ready? You better be steppin', now I'm tellin' yuh. We all gotta ride down to the Injun camp and start from there. Some uh the boys is already down there. An' say-ay, there's a million people banked up all around the stadium, and the stream is still runnin' bank full at the gates! I been in every contest worth goin' to, and I never seen so many folks, honest. See yuh later, Chief Many Blue Shirts. I gotta go. There's a little girl entered for the relay that shore takes my eye, Cowboy! If my hoss don't step right alongside hers in the grand entry, it'll be the sorriest show you ever seen!" Shorty tilted his hat a little farther over his left eyebrow and started off, silver conchos glittering on his wide-winged chaps. Ten feet down the hay-littered space behind the saddle horses the Kid saw him stop and spread his arms to head off some one coming full tilt from the main passage.
"Whoa, there! Not so fast, young 'n! Yore paw an' maw 'll shore paddle yore pants if yuh don't git back outa here. Somebuddy'll be steppin' on yuh, shore!"
"Aw, fer the cryin'-out-loud! Lemme past, you drugstore cowboy! I guess I know what I'm doin'," a clear, boyish voice cried indignantly.
The Kid had just completed hiding his suitcase under a haypile as some slight protection against further depredations. He whirled and started incredulously toward the voice, gave a gasp and swooped down on Boy, who had just kicked and wriggled himself free of Shorty's detaining grasp. Boy rushed and grabbed the Kid's arm, laughing hysterically.
"Hello, I knew I'd find you some place around; how's the horses?" The words fairly overlapped each other in the relief Boy's tone betrayed. "Gosh, ain't this a big place, Kid? I bet I've been a whole solid hour lookin' for you in here. I been walkin' miles. Then I seen a big tall man that looked like Tex Austin's picture, and I asked him where Montana Kid was liable to be, and he said he was liable to be anywhere but to look down in here, so I did. And say, Kid, Weary and Pink and Mig's here and Andy Green, and they're goin' to take movin'-pitchers and Mig said maybe I can be in 'em. I never told 'em I bet you was here—I guess they'll just about fall over when they see you! But I knew you was here, all right. I knew here was right where you'd aim for when you left the ranch. But I never said a word to anybody. I just let 'm talk. Gosh! I nearly busted myself trying not to laugh when they wondered where you was. Your folks thinks you went down to Walt Myers' place in Wyoming, but I guess the Old Man kinda s'specks something, 'cause I seen a funny look in his face once er twice—"
Bewilderedly the Kid shook him into a gasping suspension of speech.
"Now let's get a line of things," he said in an unsteady voice. "How in heck did you get here, Boy? That's what I want to know."
"Why, with the folks, a course. Uncle J. G. said he was a comin' to Chicago, and the folks thought he was woozy, and he kep' on saying he was comin' to the rodeo, and he wanted to see the boys make movin'-pitchers here, and so your dad got my dad to look after the ranch, and him and your mother and the Old Man got ready to come, and then I was bound I was comin' too, and I made such a fuss they had to let me. And they're right up here in the grandstand, right about over our heads, I guess, but they don't know you're—"
"Just a minute, Boy!" The Kid lunged forward after a flicker of blue which showed for a minute down toward the entrance. "Walt! Hey, Walt!" He whistled a peculiar, shrill note or two, and three blue-shirted figures detached themselves from the troubled stream of men and saddled horses and made for him. Speechless, almost in tears, the Kid pummeled them in savage joy. They had come, after all! He had asked every man he saw who hailed from Wyoming, and no one had known anything about Walt Myers and his crowd—except that they had contested in Cheyenne with no great success. He had given up hope of their coming, and here they were, just in time for the grand entry! To the Kid, their timely arrival bore all the earmarks of a miracle.
"Now you can tend station for me in the relay!" he cried, when incoherencies had merged into clear thought and speech. "I got a couple of fellows lined up, but you know the ponies and they know you, and I'll feel a lot easier. What you entered for? Say, where's Dudley?"
"Dud broke his leg in Cheyenne," Walt told him rapidly, wanting to say a great deal in a very short time. "We came on in Beck's car, and the darn thing kept falling apart—just got in this morning. Beck's entered for bareback riding, steer riding and the wild-horse race. I'm roping, bulldogging and riding bronks. Billy was going to relay, but we didn't get here in time to see about a relay string, so he's trick roping, riding bronks and steers, bareback and bulldogging. Couldn't find you, Kid, to see how you wanted us placed, so we had to line up best we could. Beck's entered for all but the bronk riding—we