Cattle-Ranch to College Part 21

He was really a terror; could dance on his ear, And sling a man farther than that stump--to here!

A man heard of Ike; grinned and bet his whole pile His sorrel would shake him before one could smile.

So the crowd they came round and they staked all they had, While Ike, sorter innocent, said: "Is he _bad_?"

And durin' their laugh--for the sorrel, you see, Had eat up two ropes and was tryin' for me--

Ike patted his neck--"Nice pony," says he, And was into the saddle as quick as a flea.

That sorrel he jumped and he twisted and bucked, And the man laughed, expectin' that Ike would be chucked.

But soon the cayuse was fair swimmin' in sweat While Ike, looking bored, rolled a neat cigarette.

And then from range to range he hunted a cayuse That could even _in-ter-est_ him, but it wasn't any use.

So he got quite melancholic, wondering why such an earth, Where the horses "had no sperrits," should have given himself birth.

CHAPTER XIV.

A MIGRATION.

All that summer John tended the work stock, keeping them together on good feeding ground during the short night and driving them into camp soon after daylight.

Much of this work was very pleasant; the two herders, Curran and John, met regularly and many were the long talks and interchanges of experiences they enjoyed.

The rainless summer nights were cool enough to be refreshing and yet warm enough to make the time spent in the open air delightful. But when rain came all this was changed. The horses became nervous and restless and required constant watchfulness and continual riding, regardless of treacherous foothold and hidden, water-filled prospect holes. The long, yellow "slicker" or oilskin coat, being cut deep in the back and hanging over the rider's legs to his spurred heels, served but poorly to keep out the driving rain, and by morning he was fairly soaked. Arriving in camp with his dripping charges, he would dismount stiffly, and after a half-cold breakfast crawl into a damp bed under an oozing tent.

John, however, learned to take things as they came, good or ill, gathering valuable experience from right and left. Curran was a horseman of long standing, and gave the fast-maturing boy a great many points that served him in good stead later in life. He taught him how to detect any uneasiness in the stock that might grow into fright and start a stampede; how to check this by voice and by constant active presence; and, above all, by force of example he showed that only through quick thought and unhesitating exposure of himself to danger could harm to his charges be averted. By nature courageous, almost to recklessness, John learned these lessons unconsciously.

And so the summer pa.s.sed--herding horses at night, sleeping and panning gold by day. By the latter operation he was able to add, on an average, fifty cents a day to his hardly princely income of seven dollars a week.

As the warm season drew to a close, the night wrangler's work became more of a hardship and less a pleasure; only by dint of constant exercise and a roaring fire was the life made endurable. The night's work over, horse and rider would come in stiff with cold and not infrequently wet as well.

"Well, kid, the outfit breaks camp this week," said cook to John one cold, wet morning in November as he slid off his patient beast. "Here's your coffee; keep it out of the wet."

"Can't break any too soon for me," said John, sipping the steaming beverage and clinging tightly to the tin cup with both hands for the sake of the warmth it contained.

"Must be pretty tough this time o' year," said cook sympathetically.

"More coffee?"

"You bet," answered the other. "I couldn't stand it if I wasn't all-fired tough. I'll have to be tough if I go range-ridin' this winter."

Curran put this thought into his head, where it had been growing until it became a resolve.

"So you're goin' range-ridin', eh, kid?"

John nodded and asked the cook where he was going.

"Well, I'll tell yer," he said, stopping to wipe his hands on the flour bag that served for an ap.r.o.n, "I'm goin' straight back East where my folks live; soon's I get back to town I'm goin' to buy a railroad ticket East and go right off."

"Good enough," said John confidently, but rather sceptical at heart, for he knew of many men whose good resolutions melted under the direful influence of the first gla.s.s of whiskey that went down their throats.

"Well, I'm off to bed," he concluded, making for the bed that Frank had vacated but a little while before. He knew he needed all the rest he could get. The following morning, as he came near the collection of tents with the horses, he heard Murphy shouting: "Rustle round now, boys; get the cook outfit loaded, the tents down, and your beds rolled up--quick. We'll be in town by noon."

The work was taken up with such a will that John barely got his share of coffee, bacon, beans, and bread before the cook's stores were stowed away ready for travelling.

It was a very different crowd that now set out for the town, and yet it was the same lot of men. Nine months' heavy, open-air work had dispelled weakness and brought strength, had replaced bad temper with cheerfulness, and had, moreover, filled pockets with Uncle Sam's good coin.

Frank and John, his chum, again sat on the sc.r.a.per that trailed behind a wagon, not now for fear of contact with ill-tempered, almost desperate men, but for the sake of comparative quiet and to escape the practical jokes that none in the wagon could avoid.

"Well," said Frank, "would you rather wrestle dishes in Helena or wrangle horses in the open?"

"I'd rather wrangle than wrestle," said John, taking the cue with a laugh, "weather or no; and I'd like to go out again soon."

On reaching town the men parted company, each to seek the pleasure that most attracted him. John at once hunted up Tom Malloy, who was still prosperous and evidently glad to see him.

"Well, kid, how did you get along?" he said, in his old, familiar, kindly way. The boy first paid him for the saddle he had borrowed, to which he had become accustomed and attached, and then told in detail of his experiences.

"Do you want to get back to pot-wrestling?" asked Molloy at length.

"No; not on your life!" and John told him of his liking for work in the open and his distaste for town life.

"Right you are, kid," said Tom encouragingly, "the town's no place for you, or for me, either," he added rather sadly. "I'll be done up some day"--a prophecy which proved but too true.

John and Frank took lodgings together, and for a time did nothing but travel round the town, noting the changes that had been made since they had been away and taking in such cheap amus.e.m.e.nt as the place offered.

It was on one of these jaunts round the streets that John met his friend the cook, blear-eyed, slouchy, and dirty, the bold mustache he was usually so proud of drooping dismally.

"Why, cook, I thought you were in the East by this time," said the ex-wrangler, remembering the solemn resolution confided to him a few days before.

"No, I just stopped for one drink and that settled it," confessed the other. "Haven't a quarter to buy a dinner with now."

John took him to a restaurant and fed him.

This was the first of a series of encounters with ex-campmates. The first feeling was one of wonder and disgust that the demon of drink could make such short work of a man; and then came the fear that the constant drafts upon him would use up his small savings.

"Frank," he said one day, "I've got to get out of this or I'll be stone broke; do you know of any fellow that will take me on a range?"

"Why, what's the matter?"

"Oh," said John, "this gang takes me for the treasurer of an inebriates'

home, I guess, and will soon scoop every cent I've got."

"That's it, eh?" returned Bridges. "Well, I'll go down the Missouri with you. I'm pretty well acquainted a hundred and fifty miles or so below, and I know where I can go range-ridin' for a big cattleman any time."

"If you think you can work me in, I'll go," exclaimed the younger. "I'll buy that sorrel cayuse from Murphy. I can get him for fifteen, I guess, and we'll go to-morrow-that is, if you can work me in." This last was spoken rather dubiously, but Frank a.s.sured him that he would fix it somehow, and the compact was sealed.