Читать книгу Dark Horse - B.M. Bower - Страница 4

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THINKING uneasily of cloudbursts, Big Medicine almost trotted the two-mile stretch to the hill that spelled safety. Up the soapy incline he toiled, slipping and sweating and swearing but somehow never falling or stopping until he reached the top. He wished he had thought to take off his spurs before he started—but hell, a feller can't think of everything at once. He wished he had worn his old boots; these new ones made of his heels a flaming agony. But there was a new schoolma'am boarding at Meeker's, and a feller hated to ride in run-over boots.

While he trudged those weary miles, he sent furtive glances this way and that beneath the streaming brim of his big hat. If there were only some cut-bank with an over-hang—if there was a tree or a clump of bushes, even, he would lay the fellow down under shelter and go on after a rig to haul him in to the ranch. But there was no cut-bank, no tree, no clump of bushes on that level prairie.

Anyway, the boys shore would have to hand it to him for nerve, packing a long-geared son-of-a-gun like this feller all the way in from Dry Gulch. He'd bet there wasn't another one in the bunch that would have sand enough to tackle it, even. A growing pride in his strength and big-heartedness steadied his feet as they squashed along the rutted trail.

After that it suddenly occurred to him that a rescue party would probably ride into sight over the next ridge. The minute Cheater showed up at the ranch with an empty saddle the boys would pile onto their cayuses and start right out. They'd think he was struck by lightning or something. By cripes, they shore would bug their eyes out when they saw him walking in with a man on his back, unconcerned as if he was packing a stick of dry wood to the fire. It pleased him to picture the look on the faces of the Flying U boys when they came galloping out to find him. It pleased him to invent careless phrases, telling of his prodigious deed. "Oh, jest a feller struck by lightnin' over in Dry Gulch. Hawse broke back on me—had to hoof it home."

But as he plodded mile after mile and no bobbing horsemen showed on the blurred horizon, his pale, frog eyes hardened perceptibly. By cripes, them lazy hounds had time enough to meet him with an ox team. Time enough to push a wheelbarrow to Dry Gulch, by cripes! Damn a bunch of selfish boneheads that'd set in the bunk-house and let a feller lay out on the range and rot, for all they knew or cared! He'd show 'em up, by cripes! He wouldn't say a word; just the bare fact of what he was man enough to do would show 'em up for what they was. Yellow-livered skunks—there wouldn't be a damn' one that could look him in the eye. He'd ride 'em to a fare-you-well for this.

The thunder and lightning slowly drew off, muttering, to the high canyons of the Bear Paws. When he reached the brow of the hill that formed the north wall of Flying U Coulee, the storm had diminished to a steady drizzle, deepening the murky gloom of early evening. As he toiled up from the willow-fringed creek, the sight of Cheater standing tail to the storm beside the stable made him grind his teeth in wrath beyond even his extensive vocabulary. One sweeping glare showed him other horses sheltered in the dry strip on the corral side of the stable. Not a saddle missing under the shed; everybody inside, dry and warm—and be damned to them! The light in the bunk-house window, shining yellow through the rain-washed dusk, taunted him like a leering face, but he was too near the end of his strength to do more than grunt at this final insult. With a rocking, sidewise gait he staggered up the path to the cabin, his failing energy gathering itself for one savage kick upon the closed door.

"Hey! Cut that out!" yelled a voice he recognized as Cal Emmett's.

"Say, wipe the mud off your feet! We scrubbed the floor to-day," admonished another.

Big Medicine bellowed anathema as he let go the dangling ankle of his load and threw open the door. The Happy Family, humped around a poker game, looked up with casual glances that steadied to a surprised interest. Pink straddled backward over a bench and came forward, his eyes big with questions, though he said nothing.

"Who's that?" blurted Slim unguardedly.

"Somebody hurt?" Weary swept in his cards and rose, recklessly scattering the piled matches.

"Hully gee!" Cal Emmett exclaimed, kicking over a chair in his haste to come forward.

"Git outa my way!" panted Big Medicine, tottering toward his bunk in a far corner. "By cripes, I wouldn't ast none of yuh to go to no trouble—you kin go to hell instid!" He turned himself about, leaned awkwardly to one side and let his limp burden slide to the blankets. With a great sigh born of exhaustion, he stooped creakily and lifted the lax legs to the bed. While the Happy Family stood huddled and staring, he shucked himself out of his slicker and flopped upon the opposite bunk, where he lay on the flat of his back, glaring contemptuously up at them.

"Don't do nothin' to save that pore feller's life," he implored with heavy sarcasm. "Gwan back and set down on yer damn' haunches an' let 'im die!"

Pink and Weary were already at the bunk, feeling the inert figure. Pink straightened from his ineffectual pawing and stared down at Big Medicine.

"What's the matter with him, Bud? There ain't any blood nor any broken bones on 'im—what is this; a frame-up?"

"Here, take a look at him, Mig." Weary stepped aside to make room for the Native Son, who had a certain deftness in ministering to the injured. "Darned if I can see anything wrong with him. Might be pickled, from the looks—only he lacks the breath of a drunk man."

"His pulse is making good speed," Miguel announced. "I think he is having one fine siesta, no?"

"Siesta my foot!" Big Medicine heaved himself to an elbow. "Honest to grandma, the taxpayers uh this county had oughta build 'em an idiots' home. They's a bunch uh candidates on this ranch it's a sin to let run loose. Why don't yuh do something? That pore feller's been lightnin' struck, by cripes! Let 'im lay there and die, will yuh? Never lift a hand—"

"Lightning struck?" Weary looked blankly from one to another.

"There ain't been any lightning to amount to anything for a couple of hours," Cal Emmett pointed out. "Don't try any Andy Green stunt on us, Big Medicine."

"No, by golly," Slim cut in; "one liar's enough in this outfit."

Big Medicine let down his feet to the floor and sat glaring from one to another.

"Over in Dry Gulch you kin find his hawse," he snarled. "If you lazy hounds had of took the trouble to come and see what had went wrong, when Cheater came in without me, I wouldn't a had to pack that pore feller clear from Dry Gulch on m' damn' back. His hawse—"

"Pulled out and left him?" Weary prompted.

"Killed. Busted every bone in his body. You kin ride over there t'morra mornin' and take a look. There ain't a feller on the ranch that's man enough to do what I done, by cripes! Packed that pore pilgrim eight mile, by cripes—"

"How d'you know he's a pilgrim?" Pink demanded suspiciously. "He ain't dressed like a pilgrim."

"No, by cripes, but I seen how he set on a hawse 'fore that streak uh lightnin' come at 'em. All right," he snorted disgustedly, as he lay down again, "let 'im lay there an' die, then! I packed 'im in, by cripes; I ain't goin' to nurse 'im back to health!"

"Well," Weary yielded, "he sure don't look like a sick man to me, but we'll take your word for it, Big Medicine. Get his shoes off, boys—we better strip off these wet clothes and roll him in a hot blanket. Happy, you go up and see if the Old Man's got any brandy—the Little Doctor mighta left some in her medicine chest—and don't sample it on the way back!"

"Yeah, yuh might give me a jolt of it too," said Big Medicine, sitting up again with an eager look. "Shore is a fur piece from here to Dry Gulch—walkin' on foot with a back load like that there."

"Darned right," Weary agreed sympathetically. "Ain't every man could do it. Stick your foot up here and let me pull off them wet boots."

"Be darn careful, then," sighed Big Medicine. "I got blisters the size uh saddle blankets on both heels, by cripes!"

"Hully gee!" breathed Cal, sucking air through his teeth when the blisters were displayed to a sympathetic group of bent faces. "Anybody but you'd 'a' laid on his back and stuck his feet in the air and howled like a whipped pup. We never dreamed you'd get set afoot, Bud. Anybody in the darn outfit but you."

"The best a riders has accidents," Big Medicine stated loftily. "It was hard goin', all right—but it was his life er my feet, and any man that is a man woulda done the same, I reckon. I'd 'a' packed 'im twicet as fur if necessary."

"Yeah, that's you," Pink gave admiring testimony, eyeing the injured feet with something approaching awe. For a cowpuncher set afoot is the most pitiable sight on the range, and blistered heels are more dreaded than bullet wounds. "You oughta soak them heels in carbolic before you get lockjaw or something."

"Haw-haw-haw-w-w!" chortled Big Medicine, his spirits lifted amazingly by admiration and two fingers of excellent brandy. "I'm the toughest ole wolf that ever howled along the Pecos River, by cripes! And the biggest-hearted. I saved a feller's life and I'm proud of it. Give 'im a shot uh that there brandy, and then I'll have another little snort. By cripes, I earnt it!"

The Happy Family agreed with him. With fine loyalty they first inspected the brandy, just to make sure that it was fit for medicinal purposes, and administered it sparingly to Big Medicine and the stranger brought within their gate. They glowed with pride in Big Medicine's achievement, in the greatness of his heart and in his fortitude. They felt a warm benignity toward the pilgrim, lying there flushed and speechless—but unmistakably alive—in Big Medicine's bunk. Until long past midnight a light shone into the drizzle through the two square windows of the Flying U bunk-house. Snatches of song, laughter, the cheerful confusion of voices raised in facetious argument overrode the drumming of rain on the low roof.

In a word, the Happy Family were for the time being in complete accord with Big Medicine and his splendid role of Good Samaritan. When at last they laid themselves between their blankets, the brandy flask had been emptied to the last drained drop—for medicinal purposes only—and Big Medicine was still wearing the warped halo of a saint (if one might believe the Happy Family's sleep-drugged statements). The rescued stranger was a hero also. Though his lips had not once opened for speech and nothing was known of his identity, they were for the time being perfectly willing to accept Big Medicine's optimistic statements and let it go at that.

Warm-hearted heroes all, they slept in happy ignorance of what the morrow might hold for them. Which was just as well.