The Dude Wrangler (9 page)

The "dudes" were at target practice with 22's and six-shooters, having been persuaded finally not to use Mr. Canby's range as a background. They now all walked with a swagger and seldom went to their meals without their weapons.

Pinkey blurted out suddenly:

"I wisht I'd died when I was little!"

"What's the matter?"

"Oh, nothin'."

It was plain that he wished to be interrogated further, but Wallie, who was thinking of Helene Spenceley and her indifference to him, was in no mood to listen to other people's troubles.

After another period of reflection Pinkey asked abruptly:

"Do you believe in signs?"

To which Wallie replied absently:

"Can't say I do. Why?"

"If there's anything in signs I ought to be turrible jealous-the way my eyebrows grow together."

"Aren't you?" indifferently.

"Me-jealous? Nobody could make me jealous, especially a worman."

"You're lucky!" Wallie spoke with unnecessary emphasis. "It's an uncomfortable sensation."

Pinkey shifted uneasily and picked a bit of bark off the corral pole.

"Don't it look kinda funny that Miss Eyester would take any in'trist in Old Man Penrose? A girl like her wouldn't care nothin' about his money, would she?"

Wallie looked dour as he answered:

"You never can tell-maybe." He had been asking himself the same question about Miss Spenceley, whom he had seen rather frequently of late with Canby.

"Guess I'll quirl me a brownie and git into the feathers," glumly. "I thought I'd go into town in the mornin', I want to do me some buyin'."

Wallie nodded, and Pinkey added as he unhooked his heels:

"You want to ride herd pretty clost on Aunt Lizzie. She's bound and determined to go outside the fence huntin' moss-agates. The cattle are liable to hook her. Canby throwed them long-horns in there on purpose."

"I'm sure of it," Wallie said, grimly. "Yes, I'll watch Aunt Lizzie. But she isn't worse than Appel, who was over there catching grasshoppers because he said they were fatter."

"Dudes is aggravatin'," Pinkey admitted. "But," philosophically, "they're our meal-tickets, so we got to swaller 'em."

As Wallie watched his partner go up the path to the bunk-house he wondered vaguely what purchase he had to make that was so important as to induce him to make a special trip to Prouty. But since Pinkey had not chosen to tell him and Wallie had a talent for minding his own business, he dismissed it; besides, he had more vital things to think about at that moment.

It had hurt him that Helene Spenceley had not been over. Obviously he had taken too much for granted, for he had thought that when she saw he was in earnest once more and in a fair way to make a success of his second venture, things would be different between them. He had imagined she would express her approval in some way, but she seemed to take it all as a matter of course. She was the most difficult woman to impress that he ever had known, but, curiously, the less she was impressed the more eager he was to impress her. Yet her casualness only spurred him to further effort and strengthened his determination to make her realize that there was a great deal in him worth while and that some day he would stand for something in the community.

But somehow he did not seem to make much progress, and now he asked himself grumpily why in the dickens he couldn't have fallen in love with Mattie Gaskett, who followed him like his shadow and had her own income, with wonderful prospects.

He scuffed at the bark on the corral pole with his foot and thought sourly of the rot he had read about love begetting love. He had not noticed it. It more often begot laughter, and his case was an instance of it. Helene Spenceley laughed at him-he was sure of it-and fool that he was-imbecile-it did not seem to make any difference. There was just one girl for him and always would be-he was like that and it was a misfortune.

In time, very likely, he would be a hermit, or a "sour-ball" like Canby; he would sit at dances looking like a bull-elk that's been whipped out of the herd, and the girls would giggle at him.

Wallie's mood was undoubtedly pessimistic, and, finally, he trudged up the path to bed, hoping he would awaken in a more cheerful humour-which he did-because he dreamed that with Helene Spenceley beside him he was burning up the road in a machine of a splendour "to put Canby's eye out."

The next morning Pinkey was gone when they gathered at the breakfast table. Miss Eyester looked downcast because he had failed to tell her of his intention, while Mrs. Stott declared that it was very inconsiderate for him to go without mentioning it, since he had promised to match embroidery cotton for her and she could not go on with her dresser-scarf until she had some apple-green to put the leaves in with.

The morning passed without incident, except that Mr. Budlong was astonished when Wallie told him that his new high-power rifle was scattering bullets among Mr. Canby's herd of cattle more than a mile distant and that it was great good fortune he had not killed any of them. Otherwise Wallie was engaged as usual in answering questions and lengthening and shortening stirrups for ladies the length of whose legs seemed to change from day to day, making such alterations necessary.

Miss Gaskett "heeled" Wallie with flattering faithfulness and incidentally imparted the information that a friend from Zanesville, Ohio, Miss Mercy Lane was to join their party in Prouty when the date was definitely set for their tour of the Yellowstone.

"She's a dear, sweet girl whom I knew at boarding-school, and," archly, "you must tell me that you will not fall in love with her."

Wallie, who now thought of even "dear, sweet girls" in terms of dollars and cents, felt that he could safely promise.

It was a relief when the triangle jangled for dinner, and Wallie looked forward to the ride afterward, although it had its attendant irritations-chief of which was the propensity of J. Harry Stott to gallop ahead and then gallop back to see if the party was coming: rare sport for Mr. Stott, but less so for the buckskin. As soon as that sterling young fellow had discovered that he could ride at a gallop without falling off he lost no opportunity to do so, and his horse was already showing the result of it.

Boosting Aunt Lizzie Philbrick on and off her horse to enable her to pick flowers and examine rocks was a part of the routine, as was recovering Mrs. Budlong's hairpins when her hair came down and she lost her hat. Mr. Budlong, too, never failed to lag behind and become separated from the rest of the party, so that he had to be hunted. He persisted in riding in moccasins and said that his insteps "ached him" so that he could not keep up.

Reasoning that every occupation has drawbacks of some kind, Wallie bore these small annoyances with patience, though there were times when he confessed that The Happy Family of The Colonial were not altogether so charming and amiable as he had thought.

He never would have suspected, for instance, that J. Harry Stott, who in his own environment was a person of some little consequence, in another could appear a complete and unmitigated ass. Or that Mrs. Budlong had such a wolfish appetite, or that ten cents looked larger to Mr. Appel than a dollar did to Pink, or that Old Penrose was vain as a peacock about his looks. Still, Wallie consoled himself, everyone had his idiosyncrasies, and if they had not had these they might have had worse ones.

To-day there was the usual commotion over getting off, and then when Wallie was ready to boost Aunt Lizzie on her horse she was nowhere to be found. She was not in her tent, nor had she fallen over the embankment, and the fact that she set great store by her afternoon rides deepened the mystery.

Old Mr. Penrose, who had unslung his field-glasses, declared he saw something that might be the top of Aunt Lizzie's head moving above a small "draw" over on Canby's lease. Mr. Penrose, who had sought ranch life chiefly because he said he was sick of cities and mobs of people, when not riding now spent most of his time with his high-power glasses watching the road in the hope of seeing someone passing and he had come to be as excited when he saw a load of hay as if he had discovered a planet.

He passed the glasses to Wallie, who adjusted them and immediately nodded:

"That's somebody in the draw; it must be Aunt Lizzie."

There was no doubt about it when she came out and started walking slowly along the top, searching, as she went, for moss-agates. Wallie gave a sharp exclamation, for, in the moment that they watched her, a small herd of the Texas cattle came around a hill and also saw her. They stopped short, and looked at the strange figure. Then, like a band of curious antelope, they edged a little closer. It might be that they would not attack her, but, if they did, it was certain they would gore her to death unless someone was there to prevent it.

Leading his own horse and dragging Aunt Lizzie's stubborn white pony behind him, Wallie threw down the wire gate opening into the Canby lease and sprang into the saddle.

He kept his eyes fixed on the cattle as he rode toward Aunt Lizzie, making the best time he could, with her cayuse pulling back obstinately on the bridle, but, in any case, he could not have seen Helene Spenceley and Canby riding from the opposite direction, for they were still on the other side of a small ridge which hid them.

Helene had stopped at the Canby ranch for luncheon on her way to pay her long-deferred visit to her whilom acquaintances of The Colonial, and though Canby had not relished the thought that she was going there, he had asked to accompany her across the leases. Pleased that she had stopped without an invitation, he was more likable than ever she had seen him, and he made no pretense of concealing the fact that she could be mistress of the most pretentious house in the country if she chose to.

Helene could not well have been otherwise than impressed by its magnificence. She was aware that with Canby's money and her personal popularity she could make an enviable position for herself very easily, and she was nothing if not ambitious. The traits in Canby which so frequently antagonized her, his arrogance, his selfish egotism and disregard of others' rights and feelings, to-day were not in evidence. He was spontaneous, genial, boyish almost, and she never had felt so kindly disposed toward him nor so tolerant of his failings.

She looked at him speculatively now as he rode beside her and wondered if association would beget an affection that would do as well as love if supplemented by the many things he had to offer?

Her friendlier mood was not lost on Canby who was quick to take advantage of it. He leaned over and laid his hand on hers as it rested on the saddle horn.

"Your thoughts of me are kinder than usual, aren't they, Helene? You are less critical?" He spoke almost humbly.

She smiled at him as she admitted:

"Perhaps so."

"I wish you could think so of me always, because I should be very happy if-you--" His narrow, selfish face had a softness she never had seen in it as he paused while he groped for the exact words he wished in which to express himself.

There was no need for him to finish, for his meaning was unmistakable, and the colour rose in Helene's cheeks as she averted her eyes from his steady gaze and looked on past him.

Their horses had been climbing slowly and had now reached the top of the ridge which gave an uninterrupted view across the flat stretch which lay between them and the ranch that was such an eyesore to Canby.

As she took in the sweep of country her gaze concentrated upon the moving objects she saw in it. Puzzled at first, her look of perplexity was succeeded by one of consternation, then horror. With swift comprehension she grasped fully the meaning of a scene that was being enacted before her.

Her expression attracted Canby's attention even before she pointed and cried sharply:

"Look!"

Aunt Lizzie was still busy with her pebbles, a tiny, tragic figure she looked, in view of what was happening, as she walked along in leisurely fashion, stopping every step or two to pick up and examine a stone that attracted her attention.

The herd of long-horns had come closer, but one had drawn out from the others and was shaking its head as it trotted down upon her.

Wallie had long since abandoned the pony he was leading, and with all the speed his own was capable of, was doing his best to intercept the animal before it reached her. But he was still a long way off and even as Helene cried out the steer broke into a gallop.

Canby, too, instantly grasped the situation.

"If I only had a rifle!"

"Perhaps we can turn it! We'll have to make an awful run for it but we can try!"

They had already gathered the reins and were spurring their horses down the declivity.

Canby's thoroughbred leaped into the air as the steel pricked it and Helene was soon left behind. She saw that she could figure only as a spectator, so she slowed down and watched what followed in fascinated horror.

Canby was considerably farther off than Wallie, in the beginning, but the racing blood in the former's horse's veins responded gallantly to the urge of its rider. It stretched out and laid down to its work like a hare with the hounds behind it, quickly equalizing the distance.

Aunt Lizzie was poking at a rock with her toe when she looked up suddenly and saw her danger. The steer with a spread of horns like antlers and tapering to needle points was rushing down upon her, infuriated.