The Cowboy MEGAPACK ®. Owen Wister

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СКАЧАТЬ only sell to men who know how to treat hossflesh,” Music remarked. “If Stick Wiley and Keno Strudder have got any strange ideas, they’ll have to ride fast and shoot straight. I’m leavin’ here right soon.”

      “Wish I could go with you,” Stubby called as the horse raiser walked away.

      For a year now Stubby had been hinting that he’d like to quit gathering wood and tending animals in the Saltville wagon yard. The boy’s mind was set on becoming a wild horse hunter and cutting bronc trainer like Music Stevens, who owned a valley back in the mountains. The kid was attending school in winter and keeping house for his uncle, who had charge of the Saltville stage-coaches and stock. Stubby was better off where he was, Music figured.

      Crossing the busy wagon yard, where ranchers, drummers and emigrants slept, ate and gossiped while in town, Music unfastened the padlock on a small shed and went in to check his saddle and equipment. From his warbag he drew an oiled .45 and thumbed fresh loads into the six-gun’s cylinder from a new box of cartridges. He was taking no chances with those two hard-eyed strangers in the neighborhood.

      Music was a stocky individual, with sky-blue eyes and an easy smile. He favored the color of tan in his frontier pants, shirt and skin vest—just as he favored buckskin coloring in brood mares and stallions. His light tan cayuses brought top money. He had just sold four quarter horses for a thousand dollars, which stake he had deposited in the Saltville Bank. He expected to get as much for the remaining four buckskins in War Cry, a prosperous mesa town some two hundred miles across the Black Rock Desert.

      Before leaving Saltville, however, Music wanted to say good-by to a taffy-haired emigrant girl he had met about the campfire last night. He brushed his hair and out of the shed.

      As he started across the wagon yard, heading for the big Conestoga wagons in the far corner, Music was hailed by a gruff voice. Turning, he saw “Stick” Wiley and “Keno” Strudder coming out of their bunk quarters. As Stubby had told him, both were wearing tied-down guns. There was a swagger to their gait as they came up.

      “What you want for them buckskins, Music?” asked the black-shirted gunman, Keno Strudder.

      “I’m not sellin’,” Music replied stiffly. “Meanin’ what?” the tall, thin Stick Wiley asked quickly. “Don’t you think we got enough cash?”

      Music’s eyes chilled. “Mebbe you’ve got enough dinero to buy good bosses, but I ain’t got any to sell right now.”

      Keno Strudder chuckled harshly. “Yuh mean some rancher has ordered them four hammerheads already? We could raise the ante. Then you won’t have to herd ’em through the desert.”

      “Never said I was takin’ ’em anywheres,” Music replied, studying the pair shrewdly. “They’re not for sale.”

      “Yuh takin’ ’em back to your outfit?” Stick Wiley asked.

      “Excuse me,” Music said, turning away. “I’ve got an engagement.”

      He felt their hard eyes upon his back as he rounded the first big canvas-topped wagon. Then the sight of Marian Ellis sitting in the shade of her father’s Conestoga made him forget the gunmen. Her sunbonnet was beside her and her lemon-colored hair was in two long plaits down her back. She was as pretty as a calendar as she sewed on a pink calico dress.

      Her blue eyes lifted at Music’s approach.

      “I was thinking about you,” she said. “We all enjoyed your playing last night.”

      Music flushed deeply. His name had come from his skill with a violin, which instrument Wherever he went, somebody was always cracking out a fiddle for him. Men said that Music Stevens could make even the devil weep or dance when the bow was scraped across the strings.

      “Thanks heaps,” Music said. He squatted down on his heels in front of this girl for whom he’d outdone himself last night. “Reckon I’ve got to say good-by for a spell. But if you’ll tell me where you’re headin’, then I might be passin’ there sometime. If you’d like to see me again—I mean, listen to some more fiddlin’—then I’ll stop off.”

      “Oh, yes!” she exclaimed. “I’ll be so glad—I mean, it would be wonderful to hear you play again. Father is dickering for some land down in the mesa country. I think it’s near a town called War Cry.”

      A frown stole across Music’s brow. “That’s a long hard trek across the Black Rock Desert,” he said. “Tell him I said to take plenty of water.”

      She laughed at his warning. “We have a man to guide us,” she said.

      “Who?”

      “Mr. Strudder. The bald gentleman who wears a black hat and black shirt.”

      Music bit his lips.

      “When are you leavin’?” he asked quietly.

      “Tomorrow morning,” she said.

      “Couldn’t you delay your trip until after tonight?”

      “Reckon not.”

      Music got up from his heels. “But don’t tell anybody—I might see you sooner’n expected.”

      He left her blushing prettily.

      Music was plenty worried, for he knew that Keno Strudder was not a professional wagon guide nor a scout. Nor was the man a puncher. Both Keno and Stick Wiley were men who either hired out their guns or dealt in shady jobs that meant big profits. They certainly wouldn’t waste their time guiding a couple of emigrant wagons across the Black Rock Desert for a few dollars. They were up to something that augured ill.

      At the corral, Music saddles his own buckskin bronc, a deep-chested animal with a cream mane and tale, then he herded his other four buckskin horses out of the wagon yard and into the rutted main street of Saltville. He had no difficulty with the broncs, for they were well-trained to the drive. Music could swing them right or left with a wave of his arm and by spurring his own bronc up the flank of the four.

      Turning into a side alley, Music sent his cavvy scampering out of town through a back pasture. This he crossed to reach a trail that led off toward the mountains, where his valley ranch lay. He was consciously avoiding the direction of the Black Rock Desert, for he didn’t doubt but that Stick and Keno were watching him from some hidden point.

      Five miles from town, he halted on the bank of a stream and broke out several canvas waterbags, which he filled and tied one to the back of each buckskin. This drink would have to last them until the next morning. The first water-hole in the desert was sixty miles away. It was better to travel in the moonlight, when it was cool and a man could check his pocket compass by the North Star. There were magnetic lodes here and there that swerved the needle.

      * * * *

      Just at dusk, Music Stevens slipped into the volcanic wasteland, letting his bronc trot easily, with the other buckskins trailing. He rode with his compass in band, ever westward.

      The desert had obtained its name from the great piles of black lava rock that reared out of the sand and gravel. There was a dearth of cacti. Prickly pear and mesquite grew only in the bottom of deep cuts, which had to be constantly skirted.

      It was hard travel. Music changed from trot СКАЧАТЬ