Western Classics - Andy Adams Edition (19 Books in One Volume). Andy Adams
of cattle. He had never witnessed such a procession of his kind before. When the leaders had reached the river, the rear was just coming over the brow of the hill, for the column was fully a mile in length. The line-back steer classed them as strangers, probably bound for the Frio, for that was the remotest country in his knowledge. As he slowly approached the herd, which was then crowding into the river, he noticed that they were nearly all two-year-olds like himself. Why not accompany them? His resolution to leave the Nueces valley was still uppermost in his mind. But when he attempted to join in, a dark-skinned man on a horse chased him away, cursing him in Spanish as he ran. Then he thought they must be exclusive, and wondered where they came from.
But when the line-back steer once resolved to do anything, the determination became a consuming desire. He threw the very intensity of his existence into his resolution of the morning. He would leave the Nueces valley with those cattle — or alone, it mattered not. So after they had watered and grazed out from the river, he followed at a respectful distance. Once again he tried to enter the herd, but an outrider cut him off. The man was well mounted, and running his horse up to him he took up his tail, wrapped the brush around the pommel of his saddle, and by a dexterous turn of his horse threw him until he spun like a top. The horseman laughed. The ground was sandy, and while the throwing frightened him, never for an instant did it shake his determination.
So after darkness had fallen and the men had bedded their cattle for the night, he slipped through the guard on night-herd and lay down among the others. He complimented himself on his craftiness, but never dreamed that this was a trail herd, bound for some other country three hundred miles beyond his native Texas. The company was congenial; it numbered thirty-five hundred two-year-old steers like himself, and strangely no one ever noticed him until long after they had crossed the Frio. Then a swing man one day called his foreman's attention to a stray, line-backed, bar-circle-bar steer in the herd. The foreman only gave him a passing glance, saying, "Let him alone; we may get a jug of whiskey for him if some trail cutter don't claim him before we cross Red River."
Now Red River was the northern boundary of his native State, and though he was unconscious of his destination, he was delighted with his new life and its constant change of scene. He also rejoiced that every hour carried him farther and farther from the Nueces valley, where he had suffered so much physical pain and humiliation. So for several months he traveled northward with the herd. He swam rivers and grazed in contentment across flowery prairies, mesas and broken country. Yet it mattered nothing to him where he was going, for his every need was satisfied. These men with the herd were friendly to him, for they anticipated his wants by choosing the best grazing, so arranging matters that he reached water daily, and selecting a dry bed ground for him at night. And when strange copper-colored men with feathers in their hair rode along beside the herd he felt no fear.
The provincial ideas of his youth underwent a complete change within the first month of trail life. When he swam Red River with the leaders of the herd, he not only bade farewell to his native soil, but burned all bridges behind him. To the line-back steer, existence on the Nueces had been very simple. But now his views were broadening. Was not he a unit of millions of his kind, all forging forward like brigades of a king's army to possess themselves of some unconquered country? These men with whom he was associated were the vikings of the Plain. The Red Man was conquered, and, daily, the skulls of the buffalo, his predecessors, stared vacantly into his face.
By the middle of summer they reached their destination, for the cattle were contracted to a cowman in the Cherokee Strip, Indian Territory. The day of delivery had arrived. The herd was driven into a pasture where they met another outfit of horsemen similar to their own. The cattle were strung out and counted. The men agreed on the numbers. But watchful eyes scanned every brand as they passed in review, and the men in the receiving outfit called the attention of their employer to the fact that there were several strays in the herd not in the road brand. One of these strays was a line-back, bar-circle-bar, two-year-old steer. There were also others; when fifteen of them had been cut out and the buyer asked the trail foreman if he was willing to include them in the bill of sale, the latter smilingly replied: "Not on your life, Captain. You can't keep them out of a herd. Down in my country we call strays like them poker steers."
And so there were turned loose in the Coldwater Pool, one of the large pastures in the Strip, fifteen strays. That night, in a dug-out on that range, the home outfit of cowboys played poker until nearly morning. There were seven men in the camp entitled to share in this flotsam on their range, the extra steer falling to the foreman. Mentally they had a list of the brands, and before the game opened the strays were divided among the participants. An animal was represented by ten beans. At the beginning the boys played cautiously, counting every card at its true worth in a hazard of chance. But as the game wore on and the more fortunate ones saw their chips increase, the weaker ones were gradually forced out. At midnight but five players remained in the game. By three in the morning the foreman lost his last bean, and ordered the men into their blankets, saying they must be in their saddles by dawn, riding the fences, scattering and locating the new cattle. As the men yawningly arose to obey, Dick Larkin defiantly said to the winners, "I've just got ten beans left, and I'll cut high card with any man to see who takes mine or I take one of his poker steers."
"My father was killed in the battle of the Wilderness," replied Tex, "and I'm as game a breed as you are. I'll match your beans and pit you my bar-circle-bar steer."
"My sire was born in Ireland and is living yet," retorted Bold
Richard. "Cut the cards, young fellow."
"The proposition is yours — cut first yourself."
The other players languidly returned to the table. Larkin cut a five spot of clubs and was in the act of tearing it in two, when Tex turned the tray of spades. Thus, on the turn of a low card, the line-back steer passed into the questionable possession of Dick Larkin. The Cherokee Strip wrought magic in a Texas steer. One or two winters in its rigorous climate transformed the gaunt long-horn into a marketable beef. The line-back steer met the rigors of the first winter and by June was as glossy as a gentleman's silk tile. But at that spring round-up there was a special inspector from Texas, and no sooner did his eye fall upon the bar-circle-bar steer than he opened his book and showed the brand and his authority to claim him. When Dick Larkin asked to see his credentials, the inspector not only produced them, but gave the owner's name and the county in which the brand was a matter of record. There was no going back on that, and the Texas man took the line-back steer. But the round-up stayed all night in the Pool pasture, and Larkin made it his business to get on second guard in night-herding the cut. He had previously assisted in bedding down the cattle for the night, and made it a point to see that the poker three-year-old lay down on the outer edge of the bed ground. The next morning the line-back steer was on his chosen range in the south end of the pasture. How he escaped was never known; there are ways and ways in a cow country.
At daybreak the round-up moved into the next pasture, the wagons, cut and saddle horses following. The special inspector was kept so busy for the next week that he never had time to look over the winter drift and strays, which now numbered nearly two thousand cattle. When the work ended the inspector missed the line-back steer. He said nothing, however, but exercised caution enough to take what cattle he had gathered up into Kansas for pasturage.
When the men who had gone that year on the round-up on the western division returned, there was a man from Reece's camp in the Strip, east on Black Bear, who asked permission to leave about a dozen cattle in the Pool. He was alone, and, saying he would bring another man with him during the shipping season, he went his way. But when Reece's men came back after their winter drift during the beef-gathering season, Bold Richard Larkin bantered the one who had left the cattle for a poker game, pitting the line-back three-year-old against a white poker cow then in the Pool pasture and belonging to the man from Black Bear. It was a short but spirited game. At its end the bar-circle-bar steer went home with Reece's man. There was a protective code of honor among rustlers, and Larkin gave the new owner the history of the steer. He told him that the brand was of record in McMullen County, Texas, warned him of special inspectors, and gave him other necessary information.
The men from the Coldwater Pool, who went on the eastern division of the round-up next spring, came back and reported having seen a certain line-back poker steer,