The Flockmaster of Poison Creek Page 13

  CHAPTER XIII

  A FIGHT ALMOST LOST

  Dad Frazer was not overly friendly toward the young man from Omaha whohad come out to learn the sheep business under the threat of penaltiesand the promise of high rewards. He growled around about himcontinually when he and Mackenzie met, which was not very often, owingto their being several miles apart. Tim had stationed Dad and his bigband of sheep between Mackenzie and Joan, leaving the schoolmaster tohold the frontier. No matter for old man Reid's keenness to have hisson suffer some of the dangers which he had faced in his day, Timseemed to be holding the youth back out of harm's way, taking no riskson losing a good thing for the family.

  Reid had been on the range about two weeks, but Mackenzie had not seena great deal of him, owing to Tim's plan of keeping him out of thedisputed territory, especially at night. That the young man did notcare much for the company or instruction of Dad Frazer was plain.Twice he had asked Mackenzie to use his influence with Tim to bringabout a change from the old man's camp to his. In Mackenzie's silenceand severity the young man found something that he could notpenetrate, a story that he could not read. Perhaps it was with a viewto finding out what school Mackenzie had been seasoned in that Reidbent himself to win his friendship.

  Dad Frazer came over the hills to Mackenzie's range that afternoon, tostretch his legs, he said, although Mackenzie knew it was to stretchhis tongue, caring nothing for the miles that lay between. He had leftReid in charge of his flock, the young man being favored by Tim to theextent of allowing him a horse, the same as he did Joan.

  "I'm glad he takes to you," said Dad. "I don't like him; he's got agraveyard in his eyes."

  "I don't think he ever pulled a gun on anybody in his life, Dad,"Mackenzie returned, in mild amazement.

  "I don't mean that kind of a graveyard; I mean a graveyard where heburied the boy in him long before his time. He's too sharp for hisyears; he's seen too much of the kind of life a young feller's betteroff for to hear about from a distance and never touch. I tell you,John, he ain't no good."

  "He's an agreeable kind of a chap, anyhow; he's got a line of talklike a saddle salesman."

  "Yes, and I never did have no use for a talkin' man. Nothin' to 'em;they don't stand the gaff."

  In spite of his friendly defense of young Reid, Mackenzie felt thatDad had read him aright. There was something of subtle knowledge, anedge of guile showing through his easy nature and desire to please,that was like acid on the teeth. Reid had the faculty of makinghimself agreeable, and he was an apt and willing hand, but back ofthis ingenuous appearance there seemed to be something elusive andshadowy, a thing which he tried to keep hidden by nimble maneuvers,but which would show at times for all his care.

  Mackenzie did not dislike the youth, but he found it impossible towarm up to him as one man might to another in a place where humancompanionship is a luxury. When Reid sat with a cigarette in his thinlips--it was a wide mouth, worldly hard--hazy in abstraction andsmoke, there came a glaze over the clearness of his eyes, a look ofdead harshness, a cast of cunning. In such moments his true natureseemed to express itself unconsciously, and Dad Frazer, simple as hewas in many ways, was worldly man enough to penetrate the smoke, andsound the apprentice sheepman to his soul.

  Reid seemed to draw a good deal of amusement out of his situationunder Tim Sullivan. He was dependent on the flockmaster for hisclothing and keep, even tobacco and papers for his cigarettes. If heknew anything about the arrangement between his father and Sullivan inregard to Joan, he did not mention it. That he knew it, Mackenziefully believed, for Tim Sullivan was not the man to keep the rewardsequestered.

  Whether Reid looked toward Joan as adequate compensation for threeyears' exile in the sheeplands, there was no telling. Perhaps he didnot think much of her in comparison with the exotic plants of theatmosphere he had left; more than likely there was a girl in thebackground somewhere, around whom some of the old man's anxiety tosave the lad revolved. Mackenzie hoped to the deepest cranny of hisheart that it was so.

  "He seems to get a good deal of humor out of working here for hisboard and tobacco," Mackenzie said.

  "Yes, he blatters a good deal about it," said Dad. "'I'll takeanother biscuit on Tim Sullivan,' he says, and 'here goes anothersmoke on Tim.' I don't see where he's got any call to make a joke outof eatin' another man's bread."

  "Maybe he's never eaten any man's bread outside of the family before,Dad."

  "I reckon he wouldn't have to be doin' it now if he'd 'a' been decent.Oh well, maybe he ain't so bad."

  This day Dad was maneuvering around to unload the apprentice onMackenzie for good. He worked up to it gradually, as if feeling hisway with his good foot ahead, careful not to be too sudden and plungeinto a hole.

  "I don't like a feller around that talks so much," Dad complained."When he's around a man ain't got no time to think and plan and layhis projec's for what he's a goin' to do. All I can do to put a wordin edgeways once in a while."

  It appeared plain enough that Dad's sore spot was this very inabilityto land as many words as he thought he had a right to. That is thecomplaint of any talkative person. If you are a good listener, with a_yes_ and a _no_ now and then, a talkative man will tell your friendsyou are the most interesting conversationalist he ever met.

  "I don't mind him," Mackenzie said, knowing very well that Dad wouldsoon be so hungry for somebody to unload his words upon that he wouldbe talking to the sheep. "Ship him over to me when you're tired ofhim; I'll work some of the wind out of him inside of a week."

  "I'll send him this evenin'," said Dad, eager in his relief,brightening like an uncovered coal. "Them dogs Joan give you'sbreakin' in to the sound of your voice wonderful, ain't they?"

  "They're getting used to me slowly."

  "Funny about dogs a woman's been runnin' sheep with. Mighty unusualthey'll take up with a man after that. I used to be married to aIndian woman up on the Big Wind that was some hummer trainin'sheep-dogs. That woman could sell 'em for a hundred dollars apiece asfast as she could raise 'em and train 'em up, and them dad-splashedcollies they'd purt' near all come back home after she'd sold 'em.Say, I've knowed them dogs to come back a hundred and eighty mile!"

  "That must have been a valuable woman to have around a man's camp.Where is she now, if I'm not too curious?"

  "She was a good woman, one of the best women I ever had." Dad rubbedhis chin, eyes reflectively on the ground, stood silent a spell thatwas pretty long for him. "I hated like snakes to lose that woman--hername was Little Handful Of Rabbit Hair On A Rock. Ye-es. She was ahummer on sheep-dogs, all right. She took a swig too many out of myjug one day and tripped over a stick and tumbled into the hog-scaldin'tank."

  "What a miserable end!" said Mackenzie, shocked by the old man'sindifferent way of telling it.

  "Oh, it didn't hurt her much," said Dad. "Scalded one side of her tillshe peeled off and turned white. I couldn't stand her after that. Youknow a man don't want to be goin' around with no pinto woman, John."Dad looked up with a gesture of depreciation, a queer look of apologyin his weather-beaten face. "She was a Crow," he added, as if thatexplained much that he had not told.

  "Dark, huh?"

  "Black; nearly as black as a nigger."

  "Little Handful, and so forth, must have thought you gave her a prettyhard deal, anyhow, Dad."

  "I never called her by her full name," Dad reflected, passing over themoral question that Mackenzie raised. "I shortened her down to Rabbit.I sure wish I had a couple of them sheep-dogs of her'n to give you inplace of them you lost. Joan's a good little girl, but she can't traina dog like Rabbit."

  "Rabbit's still up there on the Big Wind waiting for you, is she?"

  "She'll wait a long time! I'm done with Indians. Joan comin' overtoday?"

  "Tomorrow."

  "I don't guess you'll have her to bother with much longer--her andthat Reid boy they'll be hitchin' up one of these days from all thesigns. He skirmishes off over that way nearly every day. Looks to melike Tim laid it out t
hat way, givin' him a horse to ride and leavin'me and you to hoof it. It'd suit Tim, all right; I've heard old Reid'sa millionaire."

  "I guess it would," Mackenzie said, trying to keep his voice fromsounding as cold as his heart felt that moment.

  "Yes, I think they'll hitch. Well, I'd like to see Joan land a betterman than him. I don't like a man that can draw a blinder over his eyeslike a frog."

  Mackenzie smiled at the aptness of Dad's comparison. It was, indeed,as if Reid interposed a film like a frog when he plunged from oneelement into another, so to speak; when he left the sheeplands in histhoughts and went back to the haunts and the companions lately known.

  "If Joan had a little more meat on her she wouldn't be a bad looker,"said Dad. "Well, when a man's young he likes 'em slim, and when he'sold he wants 'em fat. It'd be a calamity if a man was to marry askinny girl like Joan and she was to stay skinny all his life."

  "I don't think she's exactly skinny, Dad."

  "No, I don't reckon you could count her ribs. But you put fifty poundsmore on that girl and see how she'd look!"

  "I can't imagine it," said Mackenzie, not friendly to the notion atall.

  As Dad went back to unburden himself of his unwelcome companion,Mackenzie could not suppress the thought that a good many unworthynotions hatched beneath that dignified white hair. But surely Dadmight be excused by a more stringent moralist than the schoolmasterfor abandoning poor Rabbit after her complexion had suffered in thehog-scalding vat.

  Toward sundown Earl Reid came riding over, his winning smile as easyon his face as he was in the saddle. The days were doing him good, allaround, toughening his face, taking the poolroom pastiness out of it,putting a bracer in his back. Mackenzie noted the improvement asreadily as it could be seen in some quick-growing plant.

  Mackenzie was living a very primitive and satisfactory life under afew yards of tent canvas since the loss of his wagon. He stretched itover such bushes as came handy, storing his food beneath it when heslept, save on such nights as threatened showers. Reid applauded thisarrangement. He was tired of Dad Frazer's wagon, and the greasy bunkin it.

  "I've been wild to stretch out in a blanket with my feet to a littlefire," he said, with a flash of the eagerness belonging to the boyhoodburied away too soon, as Dad had remarked. "Dad wouldn't let me doit--fussed at me three days because I sneaked out on him one night andlaid under the wagon."

  "Dad didn't want a skunk to bite you, I guess. He felt a heavyresponsibility on your account."

  "Old snoozer!" said Reid.

  Reid was uncommonly handy as a camp-cook, far better in that respectthan Mackenzie, who gladly turned the kitchen duties over to him andlet him have his way. After supper they sat talking, the lusty moonlifting a wondering face over the hills in genial placidity as ifsure, after all its ages, of giving the world a surprise at last.

  "Joan told me to bring you word she'd be over in the morning insteadof tomorrow afternoon," said Reid.

  "Thanks."

  Reid smoked in reflective silence, his thin face clear in themoonlight.

  "Some girl," said he. "I don't see why she wants to go to all thistrouble to get a little education. That stuff's all bunk. I wish I hadthe coin in my jeans right now the old man spent on me, pourin'stuff into me that went right on through like smoke through ahandkerchief."

  "I don't think it would be that way with Joan," Mackenzie said, hopingReid would drop the discussion there, and not go into the arrangementfor the future, which was a matter altogether detestable in theschoolmaster's thoughts.

  Reid did not pursue his speculations on Joan, whether through delicacyor indifference Mackenzie could not tell. He branched off into talk ofother things, through which the craving for the life he had left cameout in strong expressions of dissatisfaction with the range. Hecomplained against the penance his father had set, looking ahead withconsternation to the three years he must spend in those solitudes.

  "But I'm goin' to stick," he said, an unmistakable determination inhis tone. "I'll show him they're making as good men now as they didwhen he was a kid." He laughed, a raucous, short laugh, an old man'slaugh, which choked in a cigarette cough and made a mockery of mirth."I'll toughen up out here and have better wind for the big finish whenI sit in on the old man's money."

  No, Joan was not cast for any important part in young Reid's futuredrama, Mackenzie understood. As if his thoughts had penetrated to theyoung man's heart, making fatuous any further attempt at concealmentof his true sentiments, Reid spoke.

  "They've sewed me up in a sack with Joan--I guess you know about it?"

  "Tim was telling me."

  "A guy could do worse."

  With this comforting reflection Reid stretched himself on his blanketand went to sleep. Mackenzie was not slow in following his example,for it had been a hard day with the sheep, with much leg work onaccount of the new dogs showing a wolfish shyness of their new mastermost exasperating at times. Mackenzie's last thought was that Reidwould take a great deal of labor off his legs by using the horse inattending the sheep.

  A scream woke Mackenzie. He heaved up out of his sleep with confusionclouding his senses for the moment, the thought that he was on water,and the cry was that of one who drowned, persistent above hisstruggling reason. It was a choking cry, the utterance of a desperatesoul who sees life fleeing while he lifts his voice in the lastappeal. And between him and his companion Mackenzie saw the bulk of agiant-shouldered man, who bent with arm outstretched toward him, whosehand came in contact with his throat as he rose upright with the stareof confusion in his eyes.

  Mackenzie broke through this film of his numbing sleep, reaching forthe rifle that he had laid near his hand. It was gone, and across thetwo yards intervening he saw young Reid writhing in the grip of themonster who was strangling out his life.

  Mackenzie wrenched free from the great hand that closed about histhroat, tearing the mighty arm away with the strength of both his own.A moment, and he was involved in the most desperate struggle that hehad ever faced in his life.

  This interference gave Reid a new gulp of life. The three combatantswere on their feet now, not a word spoken, not a sound but the dullimpact of blows and the hard breathings of the two who fought thismonster of the sheeplands for their lives. Swan Carlson, Mackenziebelieved him to be, indulging his insane desire for strangling out thelives of men. He had approached so stealthily, with such wild cunning,that the dogs had given no alarm, and had taken the gun to insureagainst miscarriage or interruption in his horrible menu of death.

  A brief tangle of locked arms, swaying bodies, ribs all but crushed inthe embrace of those bestial arms, and Mackenzie was conscious that hewas fighting the battle alone. In the wild swirl of it he could notsee whether Reid had fallen or torn free. A little while, now in thepressure of those hairy, bare arms, now free for one gasping breath,fighting as man never fought in the sheeplands before that hour, andMackenzie felt himself snatched up bodily and thrown down fromuplifted arms with a force that must have ended all for him then butfor the interposition of a sage-clump that broke the fall.

  Instantly the silent monster was upon him. Mackenzie met him hand tohand, fighting the best fight that was in him, chilled with the beliefthat it was his last. But he could not come up from his knees, and inthis position his assailant bent over him, one hand on his forehead,the other at the back of his neck, a knee against his breast.

  Mackenzie tore at the great, stiff arms with his last desperate might,perhaps staying a little the pressure that in a moment more must snaphis spine. As the assassin tightened this terrible grip Mackenzie'sface was lifted toward the sky. Overhead was the moon, clear-edged,bright, in the dusk of the immensities beyond; behind the monster, whopaused that breath as in design to fill his victim's last moment witha hope that he soon would mock, Mackenzie saw young Reid.

  The youth was close upon the midnight strangler, stooping low. As theterrible pressure on forehead and neck cracked his spine like abreaking icicle, Mackenzie believed he shouted,
putting into his voiceall that he felt of desperate need of help. And he saw young Reidstrike, and felt the breaking wrench of the cruel hands relax, andfell down upon the ground like a dead man and knew no more.

  Reid was there with the lantern, putting water on Mackenzie's headwhen he again broke through the mists and followed the thread of hissoul back to his body. Reid was encouraging him to be steady, and totake it easy, assuring him that he never saw a man put up such a fightas the schoolmaster had all but lost.

  Mackenzie sat up presently, with throbbing head, a feeling of bulgingin his eyeballs, his neck stiff from the wrenching it had received.The great body of the man whom he had fought lay stretched in themoonlight, face to the ground. The camp butcher knife was sticking inhis back. Mackenzie got to his feet, a dizziness over him, but a senseof his obligation as clear as it ever was in any man.

  "I owe you one for that; I'll not forget it in a hurry," he said,giving Reid his hand.

  "No, we're even on it," Reid returned. "He'd 'a' broke my neck inanother second if you hadn't made that tackle. Who is he, do youknow?"

  "Turn him over," Mackenzie said.

  Reid withdrew the knife, sticking it into the ground with as littleconcern as if he had taken it from a butcher's block, and heaved thefellow over on his back. The moonlight revealed his dusty featuresclearly, but Mackenzie brought the lantern to make it doubly sure.

  "He's not the man I thought he was," said he. "I think this fellow'sname is Matt Hall. He's the sheep-killer you've heard about.Look--he's all over blood--there's wool on his shirt."

  "Matt Hall, huh?" said Reid. He wiped the butcher knife on the deadsheep-killer's shirt, making a little whistling, reflective soundthrough his teeth. "I'll have to scour that knife before we cut baconwith it in the morning," he said.