On the Cowboy's Trail: Western Boxed-Set. Coolidge Dane

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СКАЧАТЬ the creek, piling up its debris in a solid dam that stretched from bank to bank, while from its lower side a great sluiceway of yellow water spilled down into the broad bed of the Alamo.

      Above the dam, where the cañon boxed in between perpendicular walls, there lay a great lagoon, a lake that rose minute by minute as if seeking to override its dam, yet held back by the torrent of sand and water that Hidden Water threw across its path. For an hour they fought each other, the Alamo striving vainly to claim its ancient bed, Hidden Water piling higher its hurtling barrier; then a louder roar reverberated through the valley and a great wall of dancing water swept down the cañon and surged into the placid lake. On its breast it bore brush and sticks, and trees that waved their trunks in the air like the arms of some devouring monster as they swooped down upon the dam. At last the belated waters from above had come, the outpourings of a hundred mountain creeks that had belched forth into the Alamo like summer cloudbursts. The forefront of the mighty storm-crest lapped over the presumptuous barrier in one hissing, high-flung waterfall; then with a final roar the dam went out and, as the bowlders groaned and rumbled beneath the flood, the Alamo overleapt them and thundered on.

      A sudden sea of yellow water spread out over the lower valley, trees bent and crashed beneath the weight of drift, the pasture fence ducked under and was gone. Still irked by its narrow bed the Alamo swung away from the rock-bound bench where the ranch house stood and, uprooting everything before it, ploughed a new channel to the river. As it swirled past, Hardy beheld a tangled wreckage of cottonwoods and sycamores, their tops killed by the drought, hurried away on this overplus of waters; the bare limbs of palo verdes, felled by his own axe; and sun-dried skeletons of cattle, light as cork, dancing and bobbing as they drifted past the ranch.

      The drought was broken, and as the rain poured down it washed away all token of the past. Henceforward there would be no sign to move the uneasy spirit; no ghastly relic, hinting that God had once forgotten them; only the water-scarred gulches and cañons, and the ricks of driftwood, piled high along the valleys in memory of the flood. All day the rain sluiced down, and the Alamo went wild in its might, throwing a huge dam across the broad bed of the river itself. But when at last in the dead of night the storm-crest of the Salagua burst forth, raging from its long jostling against chasm walls, a boom like a thunder of cannon echoed from all the high cliffs by Hidden Water; and the warring waters, bellowing and tumbling in their titanic fury, joined together in a long, mad race to the sea.

      So ended the great flood; and in the morning the sun rose up clean and smiling, making a diamond of every dew-drop. Then once more the cattle gathered about the house, waiting to be fed, and Hardy went out as before to cut sahuaros. On the second day the creek went down and the cattle from the other bank came across, lowing for their share. But on the third day, when the sprouts began to show on the twining stick-cactus, the great herd that had dogged his steps for months left the bitter sahuaros and scattered across the mesa like children on a picnic, nipping eagerly at every shoot.

      In a week the flowers were up and every bush was radiant with new growth. The grass crept out in level places, and the flats in the valley turned green, but the broad expanse of Bronco Mesa still lay half-barren from paucity of seeds. Where the earth had been torn up and trampled by the sheep the flood had seized upon both soil and seed and carried them away, leaving nothing but gravel and broken rocks; the sheep-trails had turned to trenches, the washes to gulches, the gulches to ravines; the whole mesa was criss-crossed with tiny gullies where the water had hurried away –– but every tree and bush was in its glory, clothed from top to bottom in flaunting green. Within a week the cattle were back on their old ranges, all that were left from famine and drought. Some there were that died in the midst of plenty, too weak to regain their strength; others fell sick from overeating and lost their hard-earned lives; mothers remembered calves that were lost and bellowed mournfully among the hills. But as rain followed rain and the grass matured a great peace settled down upon the land; the cows grew round-bellied and sleepy-eyed, the bulls began to roar along the ridges, and the Four Peaks cattlemen rode forth from their mountain valleys to see how their neighbors had fared.

      They were a hard-looking bunch of men when they gathered at the Dos S Ranch to plan for the fall rodéo. Heat and the long drought had lined their faces deep, their hands were worn and crabbed from months of cutting brush, and upon them all was the sense of bitter defeat. There would be no branding in the pens that Fall –– the spring calves were all dead; nor was there any use in gathering beef steers that were sure to run short weight; there was nothing to do, in fact, but count up their losses and organize against the sheep. It had been a hard Summer, but it had taught them that they must stand together or they were lost. There was no one now who talked of waiting for Forest Reserves, or of diplomacy and peace –– every man was for war, and war from the jump –– and Jefferson Creede took the lead.

      “Fellers,” he said, after each man had had his say, “there’s only one way to stop them sheep, and that is to stop the first band. Never mind the man –– dam’ a herder, you can buy one for twenty dollars a month –– git the sheep! Now suppose we stompede the first bunch that comes on our range and scatter ’em to hell –– that’s fif-teen thousand dol-lars gone! God A’mighty, boys, think of losin’ that much real money when you’re on the make like Jim Swope! W’y, Jim would go crazy, he’d throw a fit –– and, more than that, fellers,” he added, sinking his voice to a confidential whisper, “he’d go round.

      “Well, now, what ye goin’ to do?” he continued, a crafty gleam coming into his eye. “Are we goin’ to foller some cow’s tail around until they jump us again? Are we goin’ to leave Rufe here, to patrol a hundred miles of range lone-handed? Not on your life –– not me! We’re goin’ to ride this range by day’s works, fellers, and the first bunch of sheep we find we’re goin’ to scatter ’em like shootin’ stars –– and if any man sees Jasp Swope I’ll jest ask him to let me know. Is it a go? All right –– and I’ll tell you how we’ll do.

      “There’s only three places that the sheep can get in on us: along the Alamo, over the Juate, or around between the Peaks. Well, the whole caboodle of us will camp up on the Alamo somewhere, and we’ll jest naturally ride them three ridges night and day. I’m goin’ to ask one of you fellers to ride away up north and foller them sheepmen down, so they can’t come a circumbendibus on us again. I’m goin’ to give ’em fair warnin’ to keep off of our upper range, and then the first wool-pullin’ sheep-herder that sneaks in on Bronco Mesa is goin’ to git the scare of his life –– and the coyotes is goin’ to git his sheep.

      “That’s the only way to stop ’em! W’y, Jim Swope would run sheep on his mother’s grave if it wasn’t for the five dollars fine. All right, then, we’ll jest fine Mr. Swope fifteen thousand dollars for comin’ in on our range, and see if he won’t go around. There’s only one thing that I ask of you fellers –– when the time comes, for God’s sake stick together!”

      The time came in late October, when the sheep were on The Rolls. In orderly battalions they drifted past, herd after herd, until there were ten in sight. If any sheepman resented the silent sentinels that rode along the rim he made no demonstration of the fact –– and yet, for some reason every herd sooner or later wandered around until it fetched up against the dead line. There were fuzzy chollas farther out that got caught in the long wool and hurt the shearers’ hands; it was better to camp along the Alamo, where there was water for their stock –– so the simple-minded herders said, trying to carry off their bluff; but when Creede scowled upon them they looked away sheepishly. The padron had ordered it –– they could say no more.

      “Muy bien,” said the overbearing Grande, “and where is your padron?”

      “Quien sabe!” replied the herders, hiking up their shoulders and showing the palms of their hands, and “Who knows” it was to the end. There was wise counsel in the camp of the sheepmen; they never had trouble if they could avoid it, and then only СКАЧАТЬ