Читать книгу By Blow and Kiss - Boyd Cable - Страница 7

In the morning the sun was up before Ess was, and she came from her tent to find the sheep out of sight over the horizon, and the plains empty and silent. Two or three of the men had just finished their breakfast, and were mounting to ride on and overtake the mob, and Blazes told her he had been feeding them in relays for the past three hours. Ess found him in the full flight of one of his outbursts of rage.

“I’m sick o’ the ’ole thing,” he declared, “expeck a man to cook chops, and bile gallons o’ tea, an’ wood as scarce as snowballs in ’ell – beg pardon, Miss – ” and he subsided as suddenly as a pricked toy balloon.

“Go on, Blazes,” she said cheerfully; “you once told me it did you good to work your tempers off, you know. Don’t mind me.”

“Ah,” he said, solemnly shaking his head. “But a temper’s no good to me if I can’t swear. An’ ’ere’s your breakfast, Miss.”

“What are you going to do this morning?” she asked.

“Drive right through to the Ridge,” he said. “There’s no water this side of it, so I can’t do anything.”

“And will the men have to go on all day without tea?” she said.

“They will so,” he said, “an’ all night too, if they don’t get the sheep to the ’ills. It’s tough, in that dust an’ all, but wot’s to be done for it?”

“Couldn’t we carry some water from here,” she suggested, “and at least make tea somewhere on the road for them?”

“Nothing to carry it in,” he said; “a pail or two, and a keresone tin bucket, an’ we’d spill most of it in the cart.”

“Let me take them in the buggy,” she said eagerly. “I could drive slowly, and the plain is level and smooth enough. You could fasten my horse behind, or to your cart.”

Blazes seemed inclined to grumble at the suggestion, but she cut short his objections. “Do let me, Blazes – please,” she said earnestly; “I know it will mean work for you boiling the water, but I would so like you to – won’t you, please?”

“Right you are, Miss,” he said, suddenly cheerful. “And won’t it be a surprise to the boys when they comes up to us and we sings out ‘Tea-oh’? They won’t ’arf jump for it wi’ their tongues hangin’ out.”

So the buckets and tins were filled to the brim and carefully loaded on the buggy, and they drove quietly off. They passed wide out on the plain, clear of the moving sheep that were strung out for long dusty miles. At a point which Blazes reckoned the men would reach by noon they swung in to the line of the march, which by now was running along close to the hills.

“Why don’t they let the sheep up on the hills here,” Ess asked, “instead of taking them so much further?”

“Too steep, an’ bare o’ feed, an’ not a drop o’ water for miles,” said Blazes. “They’d only do a perish there. The only chance is to get them to the valley to the Ridge. It’s easier going for ’em there, and it leads into some gullies, where they’ll scrape up a mouthful o’ feed an’ a chance o’ a drink. But we’ll get some sticks for the fire off the ’ills ’ere.”

They halted and lifted down the precious water, and Blazes had to confess that not nearly as much of it had been spilt as he had expected. They gathered firewood, Ess insisting on helping, and got all ready to boil up the buckets as soon as the men began to come within reach.

But it was a couple of hours after Blazes had expected before the first of the mob went drifting past. Their heads were hanging, and they were moving at a snail’s pace, in spite of the efforts of the men and the dogs. The mob was split into several lots, each with two or three men, and dogs driving.

The first of these men came eagerly across at the hail from Blazes. “Tea,” said one, smacking his lips; “my oath, this is good.”

“Thank Miss Ess ’ere for it,” Blazes said; “it’s ’er notion to cart the water along.”

“Luck to you, Miss,” said the man, “an’ may you never need a drink as bad’s I do now.”

Blazes went through the same formula to each of the men who came up – “Thank ’er – it’s ’er notion,” and the men thanked her with rough but eloquent speech, or with even more eloquent silence, and eyes that glistened at her over the steaming tea.

They were gone as soon as they could swallow their tea, and the next men were just as hurried in their movements.

It was this haste and hurry that struck Ess as the dominating tone of the whole picture. In spite of the slow dragging of the tired sheep, the lazily floating dust clouds, the weary, staggering, halting pace of the march, at the back of it all Ess could see the fierce unflagging energy, the remorseless cruel driving haste. It was plain in the whistle and crack of the stockwhips, the yelping rush and snap of the dogs, even in the little spurts the sheep were roused to as whip or dog came on them.

Scottie and Steve came over to the fire at a hard canter and flung themselves from their horses.

“What’s this, lass?” said Scottie, “acting the cook, eh?”

“Acting the good Samaritan,” said Steve. “I don’t know if angels are supposed to serve out hot tea, but if so, you and Blazes can put in an application for an outfit of wings right away.”

“Thank ’er,” murmured Blazes. “It’s ’er notion.”

The two men gulped the tea down. They were caked with red dust from head to toe, the sweat was smearing and streaking their faces, their eyes were red rimmed, and their lips dry and cracking, and bodily weariness was plain in every line of their figures. But they swallowed the scalding tea and leaped for their horses again as if their lives hung on the passing moments.

Then the boss flashed up to them out of the smother and dust of the rear guard.

“They tell me you’ve tea, Miss Lincoln,” he cried. “May I – ah, thank you,” as she handed up a pannikin to him where he sat in his sulky.

“How are they going, Mr. Sinclair?” asked Ess.

“Slowly, slowly,” he said; “they’re beginning to lie down to it, and it’s harder each time to get them on their feet and moving again. But I’ve hopes yet – I’ve hopes yet.”

“Will you get them in to-night, do you think?”

“To-night – or never,” he said grimly. “Another day will finish them clean out. We might save the skins of some of them, but I’m staking on getting them through. Thank you for the tea, my dear. It freshens a man up – freshens a man up,” and he settled himself back in his seat, and clucked to the trotters, and was off to the rear of the drive again.

It was here, as the rear trailed past, that Ess saw the full extent of the battle between the tired sheep and the tireless men. At different points along the column she had noticed some of the sheep, where the men or dogs had drawn off a little, lie down to rest. She had seen the men have to come right up to them and push them, and the dogs leap and bark in their faces, before they would struggle to their feet again. She had even seen the men stoop and lift them and push them forward, and at times when the brute simply dropped again the man might lift it and carry it clear of the line, and leave it lying to gather up a few more ounces of strength from its rest.

And here in the rear were the weakest and slowest of all the mob, the ones that had given in, or dragged behind, and dropped back from one bunch to the other till they came to the men of the rear-guard. Most of these were on foot. One or two horsemen still rode from flank to flank swinging their whips, but the others were wading into the blocked masses and pushing them into motion, running out to lift the ones that had been left lying on the wayside, back again to urge on the harrying dogs, up and down, back and forth, shouting, stooping, lifting, and pushing.

And behind them again came the two carts and the sweating butchers. The sheep that were too far gone to offer any chance of picking up strength for another effort were killed swiftly. They were slain in bunches of half a dozen to a score, and before the whistling breath was out of the last one the skin was being stripped and torn from the first. The men were coated with the red dust, and splashed and spotted with the deeper red. Their boots and legs were soaking despite the dust, their arms dripped red from the elbow, and their hands were almost too wet and slippery to hold the blunted knives. They worked doggedly, and with swift machine-like motions, slashing and ripping, heaving the carcase over, wrenching and tearing the skin off the quivering flesh. The cart drove up, the skins were hastily flung on, the men wiped their hands a couple of times across the wool of the last, drew a hand across a streaming brow, and ran to the next group that lay huddled awaiting their coming.

Blazes carried the last of the tea to these men. They would not leave their work even to walk the few score yards to the fire, and when the tea was brought to them they set the pannikins beside them to cool instead of waiting to sip at them, and went on with their stab, slash, rip, with the sweat dripping off their chins and noses, and their faces grimed with a horrible mask of blood, and sweat, and dust.