The Max Brand Megapack (390 page)

He roved swiftly across the hollows; he sneaked up to every commanding rise as though he feared the guns of men might be just beyond the crest and these tactics continued until they came in view of the small row of black figures riding against the sunset. The grey halted at once, rearing and snorting, for the sight brought again that hateful smell of blood but her leader moved quietly after the cowpunchers; he was taking the man-trail!

It was arduous work, frisking from one point of vantage to another, never knowing when the Great Enemy might turn. They could make death speak from the distance of half a mile; under shelter of the hills they might even double back to close range; they might be luring him by the pretense that he was unseen.

In such maneuvers the mare was a dangerous encumbrance, for though she had fallen into the spirit of the thing at once and never uttered even the faintest whinny yet it would be far easier for the men to hear and see two than to detect one. Alcatraz strove to drive her back, sometimes whirling with teeth bared and rushing at her, sometimes half-rearing as though to strike. But on such occasions she merely stopped and regarded him with eyes of mild amazement. She knew perfectly that he would never touched her with tooth or hoof; she also knew that this was dangerous folly—this badgering of terrible man, but since Alcatraz was not wise enough to follow her she must even follow him in spite of his folly.

She stayed half a dozen lengths in the rear, trembling with excitement, for now they passed the verge of the desert and now they entered a man-made road bordered with shining fences of men; what retreat was there if men closed in from the front and the rear? Yet she went on with dainty and uneasy steps. As for Alcatraz, he had pressed up boldly, close to the riders, for now the twilight grew thick and it was hard to make out the glimmering forms before him. Twice he paused; twice he went on. There was no real purpose in this following. He dared not come too close, and yet he hoped to harm them. He continued, wrung by a confusion of dreads and desires.

He was beset with signs of man even in the darkness. Over the well-watered fields of the ranch he heard the lowing of cattle and now and again the chorus of the sheep in a nearby pasture land was reawakened when the bell of the leader tinkled. They were all hateful sounds to Alcatraz, and every step he made seemed to consign him the more definitely to the power of the Great Enemy.

In spite of his boldness he lost sight of the riders among the deeper shadows of the ranch buildings, and he stopped again to consider. The grey mare came beside him and begged him back with a call softer than a whisper, but he merely raised his head the higher and stared at the huge outlines of the sheds and barns. To Alcatraz every one of them was a fortress filled with danger that might leap up at him. Yet he must not turn back after having come all this distance, surely. He went on. The road opened into an unfenced semicircle with corrals on every side and from one of these enclosures a horse neighed, and there was a brief sound of many trampling feet. Some of his own kind were playing there; Alcatraz forgot his hatred a little, forgot man. He went straight to the corral and put his head over the top bar.

Snorting softly, curious and frightened at once, six beautiful animals came towards him. He was one of their kind, so they came close; the scent of the wilderness was already on him, and they shrank away. Surely some sinister genius had directed Alcatraz to the one most valuable point of attack on all the ranch, for these were the six brood mares for whose purchase Marianne Jordan had cleaned out her bank account. The stallion did not know, of course. He did not even recognize them as his competitors in the race. All he felt was that there was something charmingly remembered, something half familiar about them. The boldest came near and he touched noses, whereat she whirled with a little squeal and lashed out at him; but her heels were carefully aimed wide of the mark and Alcatraz merely tossed his nose; plainly she was a flirt. He pressed a little closer to the fence and urged friendliness with a conversational whinny. They were not averse, coming towards him with eyes that glimmered in the darkness, retreating often and coming on again, until he had touched noses with them all. It was extremely pleasant to Alcatraz and hardly less so because the grey mare came and shouldered him rudely.

Then a voice spoke from the barn which opened off the corral: “What’s all that damned nonsense with the mares yonder?”

Alcatraz crouched for flight. Another voice answered: “They’ll mill around every night for a while till they get used to the new place. That’s the way with them crazy hot-bloods. No hoss-sense.”

The voices departed. The shrinking of the stallion had made the mares wince away in turn, but they came back now and resumed the conversation where it had been broken off. He was careful to introduce himself to each one. He was greatly tempted to jump the fence and talk to them at closer hand but he knew that it was great folly to risk his neck in a group of mares before he had made out whether or not they were amiable. If they were cross-tempered he might be kicked to death before he could escape.

The investigations brought entirely favorable returns. They were very young, these Coles horses, and hence their curiosity was far stronger than their timidity. Before long every one of the six necks was stretched across the top-rail and when Alcatraz turned his back on them they whinnied uneasily to call him back.

If that were the case, why did they not jump? He went back and showed them how simple it was if they really wanted to escape and come out with him into the wind and under the free stars of the mountains. Such a fence was nothing to that powerful jumper. He walked calmly to it, reared, and sailed over. That sent the mares scampering wildly, here and there about the corral, and though they came back again after a time, they seemed to have learned nothing. When he jumped out again not one of them followed.

Alcatraz stood off and eyed them in disgust. When he was a yearling, he felt, he had known more than those big, stupid, beautiful creatures. But plainly they wanted to get out with him. A wild horse is to the tame what the adventurous traveller is to the quiet man who builds a home, and from the grey mare and Alcatraz the six were learning many things. The scent of the open desert was on them, the sweat of hard running had dried on their hides, their heads were recklessly proud; and this tall stallion jumped the fence as though there had never been men who made laws which well-trained horses must not transgress. Plainly he wanted them to come out. They were very willing to go for a romp but they knew nothing about jumping, as yet, and all they could do was to show their eagerness to be out for a run by milling up and down the fence.

If that were the case, there were other ways of opening corrals and Alcatraz knew them all. He tried the fence with his shoulder, leaning all his weight. More than once he had smashed time-rotted fences in this manner, but he found that these posts were new and well tamped and the boards were strongly nailed. He gave up that effort and went about looking for a gate. Gates were not hard to find. A gate is that part of a fence under which many tracks and many scents go; it is also a section which swings a little and rattles annoyingly in a wind. Upon the top board of that section there is sure to be thick scent of man where his hands have fallen. Alcatraz found the gate. Under the weight of his shoulder it creaked but did not give. He took the top rail in his teeth, while the mares stood back, wondering, in a high-headed semi-circle and the grey kept nudging at his flank, saying very plainly: “Enough of this nonsense. These gangling creatures, all legs and foolishness, are not of our kind, O my master. Let us be gone!” But Alcatraz heeded her not. He shook the gate back and forth.

There are three kinds of fastenings for corral gates. One of them squeaks and strains when it is pulled against. It is made of wire that leaves a bitter taste of iron and rust in the mouth when it is touched. Wire is often very difficult but with teeth and prehensile upper lip it may usually be worked up high, and finally it will fall over the top of one of the posts with a rattle, and then the gate is open. Another kind of fastening rattles very much when the gate is shaken. This means that a loose board unites gates and post, running in a slot, and the only way to handle such a gate is to take the loose board by the end and draw it back as far as possible. Then the gate always swings open of its own accord. There is a third kind of fastening. Manuel Cordova used it. It consists of a padlock and chain and where this is found one had better leave the cursed thing untried for it will never be broken or removed.

By the first shake of the gate and the corresponding rattle Alcatraz knew that the sliding board fastened it. He sniffed for it and found it very easily, for always the latch-board is the one heaviest with the man-scent. He found it and worked it easily back. It caught on a nail. He tugged again, and as he tugged he quivered at the sound of a human voice and shrank as though the familiar whip of Cordova had cut him.

“They’re a little restless to-night, but aren’t they dears, Shorty?” queried Marianne.

“Kind of dear,” said the cowpuncher, “but maybe they’re worth the price.” For all his surliness, however, Shorty was her best ally.

“Wait till you see Lady Mary begin to—but isn’t that a horse beyond the corral? A grey horse? I think it is, but it can’t be.”

“Why not?”

“There isn’t a grey horse on the ranch, and—oh!”

For the gate of the corral creaked and then swung wide. They could not see Alcatraz, for the bay mares stood between.

“Don’t move, don’t speak!” whispered the girl. “It’s that stupid Lucas man. I told Lew Hervey that he was too careless to take care of the mares; and the first thing he’s done is to leave the gate unlatched. I’ll steal around and—”

At the first sound of the voice the grey mare had drifted deeper into the safety of the night; Alcatraz with a careful effort pulled open the gate; and the wind, aiding him, blew it wide, and now the soft whinny of invitation to the mares cut into the words of Marianne. She went around the corral bending low, skulking in her run; for once the mares got out the gate they might bolt like crazy things and come to harm in the murderous barbed-wire fences. Shorty was hurrying around on the other side.

Before she had taken half a dozen steps the neigh of the stallion, deafeningly loud, brought her to a halt with her hands clasped. She saw the mares start under the alarm-call and rush for the gate; in a moment their hoofs were volleying down the road and the wail of Marianne went shrilling: “Lew Hervey! Lew Hervey! They’re gone!”

Lew Hervey, in the bunkhouse, pushed away his cards and rose with a curse. “That’s what comes of working for a woman,” he growled. “No peace. No rest. Work day and night. And if you ain’t kept working you’re just kept worried. It’s hell!”

He clumped to the door and cast it open.

“Well?” he called into the darkness.

“Every one out!” cried Marianne. “The mares have broken through the gate and stampeded!”

CHAPTER X

THE THIEF

They came with a rush, at that. The mares the girl prized so highly were, in the phrase of the cowpunchers, “high-headed fools” incapable of taking care of themselves. Running wild through the night, as likely as not they would cut themselves to pieces on the first barbed wired fence that blocked their way. With such a thought to urge them, Marianne’s hired men caught their fastest mounts and saddled like lightning. There was a play of ropes and curses in the big corral, the scuffle of leather as saddle after saddle flopped into place, and then a stream of dim riders darted through the corral gate.

All of this, dazed by the misfortune, Marianne waited to see, but as the first of the pursuers darted out of sight she turned and ran to the box stall where she kept her favorite pony, a nimble bay, inimitable on a mountain trail and with plenty of foot on the flat. But never did hurry waste so much precious time. The rush of her entrance in the dark startled the nervous horse, and she had to soothe it for a minute or more with a voice broken by excitement. After that, there was the saddling to be done and her fingers stumbled and stuttered over the straps so that when at last she led the bay out and swung up to the saddle there was no sound or sight of the cowpunchers. But a young moon was edging above the eastern mountains and by that light, now only an illusory haze, she hoped to gain sight of her men.

Down the road she jockeyed the mare at the top of her pace with the barbed wire running in three dim streaks of light on either side until at last she struck the edge of the desert. The moon was now well above the horizon and the sands rolled in dun levels and black hollows over which she could peer for a considerable distance. Still there was no sight of her cowpunchers and this was a matter of small wonder, for a ten minute start had sent them far away ahead of her.

It would never do to push ahead with a blind energy. Already the bay was beginning to feel the run, and Marianne reluctantly drew down to the long lope which is the favorite gait of the cowpony. At this pace she rocked on over mile after mile of desert through the moonhaze, but never a token of the cowpunchers came on her. Twice she was on the verge of turning back; twice she shook her head and urged the mare on again. Hour upon hour had slipped by her. Perhaps Hervey long since had given up the chase and turned towards the ranch. In the meantime, so much alike was all the ground she covered that she seemed to be riding on a treadmill but yet she could not return.

The moon floated higher and higher as the night grew old and at length there was a dim lightening in the east which foretold dawn, but Marianne kept on. If she lost the mares it would be very much like losing her last claim to the respect of her father. She could see him, in prospect, shrug his shoulders and roll another cigarette; above all she could see Lew Hervey smile with a suppressed wisdom. Both of them had, from the first, not only disapproved of the long price of the Coles horses, but of their long legs as well and their “damned high heads.” She had kept telling herself fiercely that before long, when the mares were used to mountain ways and trails, she would ride one of them against the pick of Hervey’s saddle ponies and at the end of a day he would know how much blood counts in horse flesh! But if that chance were lost to her with the mares themselves—she did not know where she could find the courage to go back and face the people at the ranch. Meantime the dawn grew slowly in the east but even when the mountains were huge and black against flaming colors of the horizon sky, there was no breaking of Marianne’s gloom. Now and then, hopelessly, she raised her field glasses and swept a segment of the compass. But it was an automatic act, and her own forecast of failure obscured her vision, until at last, saddle-racked, trembling with weariness and grief, she stopped the mare. She was beaten!