Dude Ranch (7 page)

Grinning, and breathing hard with excitement, she sat upright in the saddle and pulled gently on the reins. Stewball was ready to stop. Smoothly, he slowed his pace until he was walking. He held his head high.

“That what you wanted to show us how to do?” Stevie asked Eli.

He regarded her carefully. “Something like that,” he agreed.

“Well, to tell you the truth, I don’t know about me, but I’m pretty sure Stewball can handle it.”

“I’m pretty sure he can,” Eli agreed, grinning in spite of himself.

The two dismounted and waited for Lisa, Carole, and Kate to catch up to them.

“I never saw anything like it!” Kate said, sliding down off Spot. “Stewball’s amazing!”

“Yep,” Eli said.

“A
RE YOU SURE
he’s coming back?” Carole asked Stevie the next morning. The four girls were in their bathrobes, standing barefoot on the porch of their bunkhouse. It was still dark, the first hints of dawn on the eastern horizon.

“Of course not,” Stevie said. “But you don’t want to miss it if he does, do you? After all, there may be a treasure, or maybe we’ll learn some kind of ritual thing. I read once where some Native Americans, when they get to be about our age, spend weeks at a time in the wilderness. Maybe that’s what this guy’s doing.”

“I read that book, too,” Lisa said. “It took place more than a hundred years ago—and it was fiction.”

“Well, maybe, but how about the idea of treasure?
You know, something hidden from marauding settlers for centuries.

“I like
that
one,” Lisa said. “But I don’t believe it.”

“Neither do I,” Stevie admitted. Then, while her mind raced through other exciting possibilities, she heard the hoofbeats she’d been waiting for. “There,” she said. “He’s coming.”

All four girls filed down off the porch and began making their way toward the roadway with the help of the dim light of the gray dawn.

Although the girls tried to stay in the shadows, they weren’t hidden to the dog. He began barking excitedly. He romped over to the foursome and began wagging his tail joyously while he sniffed at Stevie. She knew then for sure that it was the same dog she’d met in town the day of the “bank robbery.” They patted him and watched his tail swish.

“Who’s there?” the rider asked.

“I’m Kate Devine,” Kate said, stepping out of the shadows. “I live here with my parents. This is our ranch. Who are you?”

“I’m Christine Lonetree,” the rider said, sitting easily on the bare back of her horse. “This is my dog, Tomahawk, and my horse, Arrow.”

Christine???
Stevie said to herself. It wasn’t a boy at all. It was a Native American girl and she was about their age!

“Are you an
Indian?
” Lisa asked. The awe was clear in her voice.

“Sure,” Christine answered, laughing gently. “You a paleface?” She dismounted and held Arrow’s rein loosely.

“Oh,” Lisa said, embarrassed. “I didn’t mean it that way.…”

“I know,” Christine said. “People never do. Say, what are you doing up at this hour? I thought all dudes were asleep at least until lunchtime.”

“Actually, we were waiting for you,” Stevie confessed. “I saw you yesterday morning and the day before. I was curious.”

“So that’s why Tomahawk barked,” Christine said. “I was wondering.”

“He knew me already,” Stevie explained. “We met in town the other day. He was at the bank robbery. Were you there, too?”

“Watching the McClanahan gang try to steal the payroll?” Christine said, laughing. “No, I was just running an errand at the jewelry store. Tomahawk got lost in the crowd.”

“Does he always come when you whistle?” Stevie asked.

“Always,” Christine said.

“How come you go out for a ride so early in the morning?” Stevie asked.

“I like it. You have a problem with it?” she challenged.

“No, you can ride whenever you want,” Stevie said quickly. “We just wondered if there was some special reason why it had to be so early.”

“Yeah, like if it’s some sort of ritual,” Lisa added.

“You know, to protect the spirits of your ancestors,” Carole said.

“Or the treasure hidden from the marauding settlers,” Stevie said.

“Give me a break,” Christine said. “I ride at this hour because I
like
to ride at this hour. So does my horse. And it’s cooler at this time of day—in case you
dudes
hadn’t noticed it.”

“You don’t have to get so upset,” Stevie said. “We were just wondering.”

“Well, wonder about somebody else,” Christine said. “I’m not some kind of freak who does rain dances in the moonlight or sprinkles mustard seeds on sacred hunting grounds.”

She remounted her horse and turned to leave the girls.

Stevie had a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach. She realized that their dumb guesses about Christine’s dawn riding had really hurt the girl’s feelings, and she hadn’t meant to do that at all.

“Hey, I’m sorry,” Stevie said. “We didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. We were just curious—”

“Well, go be curious about whether the clothes you’re wearing are fancy enough or if your hat is eight or ten gallons or whether you can talk the wrangler into taking care of your horse for you!”

With that, Christine turned Arrow back the way she had come. The horse picked up a trot and then a lope. As she rode away, the long, familiar whistle trailed behind her.

Tomahawk, who had been sitting at Stevie’s feet, stood up and ran after Christine.

The girls remained still and watched while the young girl, her horse, and her dog crossed the open land toward the darker horizon to the west, returning home.

“What a funny girl,” Lisa remarked. “I guess we hurt her feelings.”

“And I guess she hurt ours,” Stevie grumbled. “She sure has a lot of dumb ideas about dudes.”

“And I guess we had a lot of dumb ideas about Native Americans,” Carole reminded her.

“I guess the dumbest idea was getting up at that hour to meet him—I mean her,” Stevie said.

“No,” Carole said pensively. “I think it was worth it. I just wish it had gone differently.”

The girls turned and retreated to their bunkhouse. The sun had reached the eastern mountaintops and the sky was brightening. In the darkness of the west, a few pale stars were still visible as a reminder of the night gone by. In the east, the streaks of daylight reminded the girls of the challenge of the day that lay before them.

“Hey, we’re going on a roundup today!” Stevie howled with excitement.

“Yippie ki yi yay!” Lisa exclaimed.

“
Don’t
let Eli hear you saying that!” Stevie said.

“Only dumb dudes say it, huh?” Lisa said.

Kate nodded, trying to look serious. “The kind that wear eight-gallon hats and get wranglers to take care of their horses for them.”

“Okay, then, how about tallyho?” Lisa suggested.

“
Much
better,” Kate said, giggling.

The girls decided to set aside their uncomfortable memories of their meeting with Christine Lonetree and concentrate on the fun they just knew they were going to have on the long-awaited roundup.

I
T TOOK THE
riders more than half a day to reach the most distant point of their ride. The group was comprised of nine people. There were two wranglers, Eli and Jeff. Then there were the four girls, one of the older couples who were staying at the ranch, and Frank Devine. Stevie suspected that Eli and Jeff could probably manage the roundup all by themselves, but she was still glad to be along. After all, there was an awful lot to learn.

As Eli had predicted, they’d seen a number of strays on their way out. The strays were grazing in the green pastures near the creeks or hanging out under the shade trees. The girls had even spotted a very young calf with its mother. It was cute as could be, with long knobby-kneed legs.

“Kind of reminds me of Samson,” Carole remarked.

“All baby animals remind you of Samson,” Stevie teased. “But then, all baby animals are cute, just like Samson is.”

“Did you ever see a baby rhinoceros?” Lisa asked. The girls told her they hadn’t. “Only a mother could love it,” she told her friends. “It wouldn’t remind you of Samson at all.”

“All right, but that calf there
did
remind me of Samson,” Carole said.

“Hey, the dog seems excited,” Stevie observed. Eli’s dog began circling playfully, alertly. It was as if it could tell that the fun was about to begin. “What’s over the hill?”

“I have this picture of spotting the pretty rust-and-white markings on the animals as they graze,” Carole remarked.

“And
I
thought we’d hear the gentle lowing,” Lisa added.

“You’ll hear the lowing when we start driving them,” Kate said. “But there’s nothing gentle about it. These animals make a real racket! The cows moo to call to their calves. They don’t want to be separated.”

Eli and Jeff were leading the riders. Their horses picked up speed as they approached the herd, sniffing the dusty air as if anticipating the familiar smell of cattle.

The Saddle Club members all sped up their horses as well. Stevie thought she could feel Stewball’s excitement. His breath quickened. His stride lengthened. His ears perked straight up and then twitched alertly.

The horses carried their riders to the crest of a gentle hill. Stevie was expecting to spot their quarry as soon as they reached the top, but it was farther than she thought. The cattle were beyond the
next
hill. But they were there. She could feel her own heart beat a little faster with the excitement.

Sometimes, in old cowboy movies, she’d seen eager cowboys come galloping up to a herd of cattle to get them moving, but Eli had made it clear that nobody,
but nobody
, was to gallop up to the herd. What could happen was about the most dangerous thing there was. If the cattle were startled by a galloping horse, they could stampede. A stampede might seem like a neat piece of action on a movie screen, but in real life it could be very dangerous. The frightened cattle would run any way they could, without thinking about it at all. Stampeding cattle ran over each other; they ran into horses; they could even run off cliffs.

Eli’s horse slowed to a very gentle walk as they rounded the next hill.

There, in a little valley formed by small hills and fed by a fresh stream, more than a hundred head of cattle were grazing contentedly. A few of them lifted their
heads from the grass to eye the riders, but they quickly returned their attention to the grass in front of them.

“Oh, look!” Lisa said. The girls gazed where she pointed. There, at the edge of the herd, was a small group, grazing a little distance apart from the others. There were about seven very young calves, and their mothers.

“I guess that’s the day-care center,” Carole quipped.

As Eli had instructed them, all of the riders circled to the far side of the herd. Then, at Eli’s signal, they began walking slowly and easily, interrupting the lazy grazing of the cattle. As the riders passed the cattle, they lifted their heads from the grass and began walking away from the horses. As soon as a few started moving, the rest quickly joined them, first walking very slowly, and then picking up their pace. As Kate had predicted, the loud mooing began almost immediately.

Eli wanted the herd to return the same way the riders had come. He and Jeff moved back and forth on horseback, almost effortlessly, keeping the cattle going in the right direction. In contrast to the easy pace of the horses, Eli’s dog moved quickly, dodging to the left and to the right, growling occasionally at a steer who might, for a moment, think he ought to head in some other direction.

Kate’s father had circled to the near side of the pack, leading the herd. “Once a steer decides he wants to
follow something, almost nothing will make him change his mind,” Eli had told the girls earlier. “The trick is to get him to want to follow a horse.”

The cattle were following Frank docilely.

The herd began moving a little more quickly once the leaders had rounded the first hill and they could see open land in front of them. The girls’ horses automatically kept pace with the cattle. Stevie, knowing that Stewball could outrun any steer in the herd (and any other horse, as well), wasn’t concerned about being left behind. But she was still relieved that the herd seemed to have reached a steady pace.