Hidden Water. Coolidge Dane
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Название: Hidden Water
Автор: Coolidge Dane
Издательство: Public Domain
Жанр: Зарубежная классика
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He circled rapidly about the herd and, riding out into the runway where the cattle were sifted, the beef steers being jumped across the open into the hold-up herd and the cows and calves turned back, he held up his hand for the work to stop. Then by signals he sent the galloping horsemen back to the edge of the herd and beckoned for old Bill Johnson.
For a few minutes he sat quietly on his horse, waiting for the harassed cattle to stop their milling. Then breaking into a song such as cowboys sing at night he rode slowly in among them, threading about at random, while old Bill Johnson on his ancient mare did likewise, his tangled beard swaying idly in the breeze. On the border of the herd they edged in as if by accident upon a fat steer and walked him amiably forth into the open. Another followed out of natural perversity, and when both were nicely started toward the beef cut the two men drifted back once more into the herd. There was no running, no shouting, no gallant show of horsemanship, but somehow the right steers wandered over into the beef cut and stayed there. As if by magic spell the outlaws and “snakes” became good, and with no breaks for the hills the labor of an afternoon was accomplished in the space of two dull and uneventful hours.
“That’s the way to cut cattle!” announced Creede, as they turned the discard toward the hills. “Ain’t it, Bill?”
He turned to Johnson who, sitting astride a flea-bitten gray mare that seemed to be in a perpetual doze, looked more like an Apache squaw than a boss cowboy. The old man’s clothes were even more ragged than when Hardy had seen him at Bender, his copper-riveted hat was further reinforced by a buckskin thong around the rim, and his knees were short-stirruped almost up to his elbows by the puny little boy’s saddle that he rode, but his fiery eyes were as quick and piercing as ever.
“Shore thing,” he said, straightening up jauntily in his saddle, “that’s my way! Be’n doin’ it fer years, while you boys was killin’ horses, but it takes Jeff hyar to see the p’int. Be gentle, boys, be gentle with um–you don’t gain nawthin’ fer all yer hard ridin’.”
He cut off a chew of tobacco and tucked it carefully away in his cheek.
“Jeff hyar,” he continued, as the bunch of cowboys began to josh and laugh among themselves, “he comes by his savvy right–his paw was a smart man before him, and mighty clever to his friends, to boot. Many’s the time I hev took little Jeffie down the river and learned him tracks and beaver signs when he wasn’t knee-high to a grasshopper–hain’t I, Jeff? And when I tell him to be gentle with them cows he knows I’m right. I jest want you boys to take notice when you go down into the Pocket to-morrer what kin be done by kindness; and the first man that hollers or puts a rope on my gentle stock, I’ll sure make him hard to ketch.
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