On the Cowboy's Trail: Western Boxed-Set. Coolidge Dane
Crittenden, providing always that he heard about it first. A bunch of mavericks without an owner was likely to get snapped up quick in those parts—John Upton might turn out to be the lucky man, but not if I. C. knew himself, and he thought he did.
It is a long day's ride from Lost Dog Cañon—dragging a pack-animal a man would get in about sundown—and as the days wore on Crittenden made it a point to ride so that he could cut the Carrizo trail between four and five. This was a desperate game that he was playing, for Pecos Dalhart was undoubtedly in an ugly mood; but a little nerve will carry a man a long way sometimes, and at a pinch Crit could shoot a gun himself. So it happened that on the day that Pecos rode to the edge of the bench and sat looking down doubtfully upon the distant Verde Crossing, he heard a horse pounding in on his right and finally made out Isaac Crittenden, in wild and unnecessary pursuit of a cow. At a suitable distance the cowman looked up, let his cow go, and ambled cautiously over toward his former agent. Holding his hands in sight to show that his intentions were pacific, he came in closer and at last motioned to Pecos to come away from the mesa rim.
"What's the matter with you?" he called, frantically repeating his signal. "D' you want to let Boone Morgan see you?"
"Boone Morgan?" repeated Pecos, reining in his horse. "Why—what—"
"Haven't you heard the news?" demanded Crittenden, hectoringly. "Boone Morgan took a hundred head of your Monkey-wrench critters down the Pinal trail, and every dam' one of 'em had been burnt over from a U. He was up here inquirin' for you a day or two ago."
Their eyes met and Pecos tried to pass it off in bravado, but Crit had him at a disadvantage. "The best thing you can do is drift," he observed, meaningly.
"Oh, I don't know," said Pecos, "I got a hundred head an' more of cows over in Lost Dog Cañon yet. What'll you—"
"They ain't worth a dam'," cut in Crittenden, harshly.
"No, I know they ain't," assented the cowboy, patiently, "not to me—but to a man with a big outfit they'd be worth about fifteen hundred dollars."
"Well, I don't want 'em," snapped Crit. "I got troubles enough, already, without hidin' out from Boone Morgan."
"I'll sell you that brand cheap," supplicated Pecos, but the cowman only showed his teeth in derision.
"Wouldn't take 'em as a gift," he said, shortly.
"Well, go to hell, then!" snarled the rustler, and jerking his horse around he started toward Verde Crossing.
"Hey, where you goin'?" called Crittenden, but Pecos did not reply. "You'll git into trouble," he persisted, following anxiously after him. "Say, do you want to break into jail?"
Pecos halted on the rim of the mesa, turned deliberately about and faced him.
"No," he said, "do you?"
"Why, what d' you mean?" demanded the cowman, leaving off his blustering and coming nearer.
"Well, if they throw me in I'll tell all I know," replied Pecos. "That's all. They may soak me for the Monkey-wrenches, but I'll sure git you on them Wine-glasses, so you better not try any funny business. What I'm lookin' for now is travellin' expenses—I'm not so stuck on this country that I couldn't be induced to leave it!"
"No-o," sneered the cowman, "I don't reckon you are. They ain't a man between Tonto and the Gila that don't know you for a rustler now. More 'n that, you've defied the officers of the law. No, Mr. Dalhart," he said, a cold glint coming into his eye, "I won't give you a dam' cent for your burnt-over cattle and if you take my advice you'll hit the high places for New Mexico."
"Well, I won't take it, then," replied Pecos, sullenly. "I'm goin' down to the Crossing to see Angy and—hey! there's the old boy now, flaggin' me from the store. Well, good-bye, old Cock Eye, don't worry about me none, I know my way around!" He favored his former employer with a flaunting gesture of farewell, leaned over to catch the forward jump of his horse, and went scampering down the slope and across the level, yipping playfully at every bound.
"Well, the blank-blanked fool!" exclaimed Crittenden, slapping his leg viciously with his quirt at this sudden wrecking of his hopes. "Well, dam' 'im, for a proper eejit!" He ground his teeth in vexation. "W'y, the crazy dum-head!" he groaned, as the cloud of dust receded. "Boone Morgan is shore to come back to the Crossing to-night and catch 'im in the store! Him and that booze-fightin' Angy—I got to git rid of him—but what in the world am I goin' to do?"
From his station on the edge of the mesa he could see the dust to the east where his cowboys were bringing the day's beef-cut down to the river and then, far up toward the northern pass, a couple of horsemen jogging down the Tonto trail. Boone Morgan rode a bay horse, and one of these was solid color, but the other rode an animal that showed a patch of white—looked kind of familiar, too. He watched them until they showed up clear against a clay-bank and then, making sure that the man on the bay was Morgan, he spurred across the flat to the store. Whatever happened, he must be sure to get Pecos out of town, for Upton had been talking Wine-glass to Morgan, and they might summon him for a witness.
There was a sound of clanking glasses inside the door as Crittenden rode up, and the voice of Angevine Thorne, flamboyantly proclaiming a toast.
"Then here's to the revolution," he ended up, "and a pleasant journey to you, Cumrad, wherever you go!"
They drank, and Crit, sitting outside on his horse, slapped his thigh and laughed silently. "A pleasant journey," eh? Well, let it go at that and he would put up the whiskey.
"You'll be sure and write me often," continued Angy, caressingly, "and I'll send your Voice of Reason to you, so you can keep up with the times."
"All right, Pardner," answered Pecos, "but say, give Marcelina my best and tell her I'll be back in the spring. Tell 'er something real nice for me, Angy, will you? Aw, to hell with the cows; it'll be her I come back for! Gittin' a little too warm for me right now, but I'll be here when she comes home in the spring. Well, let's take another drink to the sweetest little girl that ever lived and then I'll be on my way!" The glasses clicked again and as Angy began another peroration Old Crit pulled his horse around with an oath and started up the road. So that was why he had been turned down by Marcelina—Pecos was making love to her while he was gone! And he'd be back in the springtime, eh? Well, not if there was room in the county jail and Boone Morgan would take him down! Hot with his new-made scheme for revenge he spurred his horse to a gallop and was just swinging around the first turn in the trail when he fetched up face to face with Morgan and John Upton!
The world is full of hatred in a thousand forms but there is none more bitter than that between two men who have seen a former friendship turn to gall and wormwood. So bitter was the enmity between Upton and Old Crit that it needed but the time and occasion to break out into a war. Short, freckle-faced, and red-headed, with a week's growth of stubby beard and a clear green eye, John Upton was not a man that one would pick for an enemy, and the single swift move that he made toward his pistol expressed his general sentiments plainer than any words. As for Crittenden, his emotions were too badly mixed to lead to action, but the one-eyed glare which he conferred upon his cow-stealing rival convinced Boone Morgan at a glance that Old Crit was dangerous.
"I'd like to have a word with you, Mr. Crittenden," he said, taking command on the instant, "and since Mr. Upton is interested in this matter I have asked him to come along down. We won't discuss the business I have in hand until we get to town, but now that I've got you two gentlemen together I'd like to ask you to be a little more careful about your branding. My deputies reported to me that on the last round-up calves were found bearing a different iron from their mothers and that mavericks were branded on sight, anywhere on the open range. The law provides, as you know, that no cow-brute can be branded anywhere except in a corral or at a round-up and no man has the right to brand any maverick, orejano, leppy, or sleeper except in the presence and with the consent of witnesses. There have been certain irregularities up here in the past, as is to be expected in a new country, but I want to tell you right now that in the future I'm going to hold you cowmen to the law. I was elected and sworn in to uphold the peace and dignity of Geronimo County, so if you have any little