The Coming of Cassidy - Clarence E. Mulford (books to read to be successful TXT) 📗

right to beat him to a pleasing pulp when he gets sober enough to feel it. At present he reclines ungracefully within.”

“You mean you got a drunk guide, in there?” demanded Bill angrily.

“He feels the yearning right away,” observed George. “We’ll have to take turns thrashing Bacchus, I fear.”

“How long’s he been that way?” demanded Bill.

“I haven’t known him long enough to answer that,” responded Tom. “I doubt if he were ever really sober. He is a peripatetic distillery and I believe he lived on blotters even as a child. The first day”

“hour,” inserted George.

“he became anxious about the condition of the rear axle and examined it so frequently that by night he had slipped back into the Stone Age 4ie was ossified and petrified. He could neither see, eat nor talk. Strange creatures peopled his imagination. He shot at one before we could get his gun away from him, and it was our best skillet. How the devil he could hit it is more than I know. At this moment he may be fleeing from green tigers.”

“Beg pardon,” murmured George. “At this moment I have my foot on his large, unwashed face.”

“Why, George! You’ll hurt him!” gasped Mollie.

“No such luck. He’s beyond feeling.”

“But you will! It isn’t right to—”

“Don’t bother your head about him, Sis,” interrupted Tom, savagely.

“Sure,” grinned George. “Save your sympathy until he gets sober. He’ll need some then.”

“Now, George, there is no use of having an argument,” she retorted, turning to face him. And as she turned Bill took quick advantage. One finger slipped around his scalp and ended in a jerky, lifting motion that was horribly suggestive. His other hand and arm swept back and around, the gesture taking in the hills; and at the same time he nodded emphatically toward the rear of the wagon, where Jimmy was slowly going. Across the faces of the brothers there flashed in quick succession mystification, apprehensive doubt, fear and again doubt. But a sudden backward jerk of Bill’s head made them glance at the ruined ‘dobe and the doubt melted into fear, and remained. George was the first to reply and he spoke to his sister. “As long as you fear for his facial beauty, Sis, I’ll look for a better place for my foot,” and he disappeared behind the drooping canvas. Jimmy’s words were powerful, if terse, and George returned to the seat a very thoughtful man. He took instant advantage of his sister’s conversation with Bill and whispered hurriedly into his brother’s ear. A faint furrow showed momentarily on

Tom’s forehead, but swiftly disappeared, and he calmly filled his pipe as he replied. “Oh, he’ll sober up,” he said. “We poured the last of it out. And I have a great deal of confidence in these two gentlemen.”

Bill smiled as he answered Mollie’s question. “Yes, we did have a bad fire,” he said. “It plumb burned us out, ma’am.”

“But how did it happen?” she insisted.

“Yes, yes; how did it happen I mean it happened like this, ma’am,” he floundered. “You see, I that is, we we had some trouble, ma’am.”

“So I surmised,” she pleasantly replied. “I presume it was a fire, was it not?”

Bill squirmed at the sarcasm and hesitated, but he was saved by Jimmy, who turned the corner of the wagon and swung into the breach with promptness and assurance. “We fired a Greaser yesterday,” he explained. “An’ last night th’ Greaser slipped back an’ fired us. He got away, this time, ma’am; but we’re shore comin’ back for him, all right.”

“But isn’t he far away by this time?” she asked in surprise.

“Greasers, ma’am, is funny animals. I could tell you lots of funny things about ‘em, if I had time. This particular coyote is nervy an’ graspin’. I reckon he was a heap disappointed when he found we got out alive, an’ I reckon he’s in these hills waitin’ for us to go to Logan for supplies. When we do he’ll round up th’ cows an’ run ‘em off. Savvy? I means, understand?” he hurriedly explained.

“But why don’t you hunt him now?”

Jimmy shook his head hopelessly. “You just don’t understand Greasers, ma’am,” he asserted, and looked around. “Does she?” he demanded.

There was a chorus of negatives, and he continued. “You see, he’s plannin’ to steal our cows.”

“That’s what he’s doin’,” cheerfully assented Bill.

“I believe you said that before,” smiled Mollie.

“Ha, ha!” laughed Bill. “He shore did!”

“Yes, I did!” snapped Jimmy, glaring at him.

“Then, for goodness’ sake, are you going away and let him do it?” demanded Mollie.

Jimmy grinned easily, and drawled effectively. “We’re aimin’ to stop him, ma’am. You see,” he half whispered, whereat Bill leaned forward eagerly to learn the facts. “He won’t show hisself an’ we can’t track him in th’ hills without gettin’ picked off at long range. It would be us that’d have to do th’ movin’, an’ that ain’t healthy in rough country. So we starts to Logan, but circles back an’ gets him when he’s plumb wrapped up in them cows he’s honin’ for.”

“That’s it,” asserted Bill, promptly and proudly. Jimmy was the smoothest liar he had ever listened to. “An’ th’ plan is all Jimmy’s, too,” he enthused, truthfully.

“Doubtless it is quite brilliant,” she responded, “but I certainly wish I were that ‘Greaser’!”

“Sis!” exploded George, “I’m surprised!”

“Very well; you may remain so, if you wish. But will someone tell me this: How can these gentlemen take us to Logan if they are going only part way and then returning after that dense, but lucky, ‘Greaser’?”

“I should ‘a’ told you, ma’am,” replied Jimmy, “that th’ Logan-Sharpsville trail is about half way. We’ll put you on it an’ turn back.”

The strain was telling on Bill and he raised his arm. “Sorry to cut off this interestin’ conversation, but I reckon we better move. Jimmy, tie that wolf-hound to th’ axle it won’t make him drunk an’ then go ahead an’ pick a new trail to Logan. Keep north of th’ other, an’ stay down from skylines. I’ll foller back a ways. Get a-goin’,” and he was obeyed.

Jimmy rode a quarter of a mile in advance, unjustly escaping the remarks that Mollie was directing at him, her brothers, Bill, the dog and the situation in general. A backward glance as he left the wagon apprised him that the dangers of scouting were to be taken thankfully. He rode carelessly up the side of a hill and glanced over the top, ducked quickly and backed down with undignified haste. He fervently endorsed Bill’s wisdom in taking a different route to Logan, for the Apaches certainly would strike the other trail and follow hard; and to have run into them would have been disastrous. He approached the wagon leisurely, swept off his sombrero and grinned. “Reckon you could hit any game?” he inquired. The brothers nodded glumly. “Well, get yore guns handy.” There was really no need for the order. “There’s lots of it, an’ fresh meat’ll come in good. Don’t shoot till I says so,” he warned, earnestly.

“O. K., Hawkeye,” replied Tom coolly.

“We’ll wait for the whites of their eyes, a la Bunker Hill,” replied George, uneasily, “before we wipe out the game of this large section of God’s accusing and forgotten wilderness. Any big game loose?”

Jimmy nodded emphatically. “You bet! I just saw a bunch of copperhead snakes that’d give you chills.” The tones were very suggestive and George stroked his rifle nervously and felt little drops of cold water trickle from his armpits. Mollie instinctively drew her skirts tighter around her and placed her feet on the edge of the wagon box under the seat. “They can’t climb into the wagon, can they?” she asked apprehensively.

“Oh, no, ma’am,” reassured Jimmy. “Anyhow, th’ dog will keep them away.” He turned to the brothers. “I ain’t shore about th’ way, so I’m goin’ to see Bill. Wait till I come back,” and he was gone. Tom gripped the reins more firmly and waited. Nothing short of an earthquake would move that wagon until he had been told to drive on. George searched the surrounding country with anxious eyes while his sister gazed fascinatedly at the ground close to the wagon. She suddenly had remembered that the dog was tied.

Bill drummed past, waving his arm, and swept out of sight around a bend, the wagon lurching and rocking after him. Out of the little valley and across a rocky plateau, down into an arroyo and up its steep, further bank went the wagon at an angle that forced a scream from Mollie. The dog, having broken loose, ran with it, eyeing it suspiciously from time to time. Jeff Purdy, the oblivious guide, slid swiftly from the front of the wagon box and stopped suddenly with a thump against the tailboard. George, playing rear guard, managed to hold on and then with a sigh of relief sat upon the guide and jammed his feet against the corners of the box.

“So he went back for his friend to find the way!” gasped Mollie in jerks. “What a pity he did it. I could do better myself. I’m being jolted into a thousand pieces!” Her hair, loosening more with each jolt, uncoiled and streamed behind her in a glorious flame of gold. Suddenly the wagon stopped so quickly that she gasped in dismay and almost left the seat. Then she screamed and jumped for the dashboard. But it was only Mr. Purdy sliding back again.

Before them was the perpendicular wall of a mesa and another lay several hundred yards away. Bill, careful of where he walked, led the horses past a bowlder until the seat was even with it. “Step on nothing but rock,” he quietly ordered, and had lifted Mollie in his arms before she knew it. Despite her protests he swiftly carried her to the wall and then slowly up its scored face to a ledge that lay half way to the top. Back of the ledge was a horizontal fissure that was almost screened from the sight of anyone below. Gaining the cave, he lowered her gently to the floor and stood up. “Do not move,” he ordered.

Her face was crimson, streaked with white lahes of anger and her eyes snapped. “What does this mean?” she demanded.

He looked at her a moment, considering. “Ma’am, I wasn’t goin’ to tell you till I had to. But it don’t make no difference now. It’s Injuns, close after us. Don’t show yoreself.”

She regarded him calmly. “I beg your pardon if I had only known is there great danger?”

He nodded. “If you show yoreself. There’s allus danger with Injuns, ma’am.”

She pushed the hair back from her face. “My brothers? Are they coming up?”

Her courage set him afire with rage for the Apaches, but he replied calmly. “Yes. Mebby th’ Injuns won’t know yo’re here, Ma’am. Me an’ Jimmy’ll try to lead ‘em past. Just lay low an’ don’t make no noise.”

Her eyes glowed suddenly as she realized what he would try to do. “But yourself, and Jimmy? Wouldn’t it be better to stay up here?”

“Yo’re a thoroughbred, ma’am,” he replied in a low voice. “Me an’ Jimmy has staked our lives more ‘n onct out of pure devilment, with nothin’ to gain. I reckon we got a reason this time, th’ best we ever had. I’m most proud, ma’am, to play my cards as I get them.” He bent swiftly and touched her head, and was gone.

Meeting the brothers as they toiled up with supplies, he gave them a few terse orders and went on. Taking a handful of sand from behind a bowlder and scattering it with judicious care, he climbed to the wagon seat and waited, glancing back at the