Raiders of Spanish Peaks Page 15

  “Where do they all come from?” asked Harriet, in amaze. “This lonely wilderness! So many young men!”

  “Wal, I reckon they come from all over,” Nelson had replied. “An’ some of them air rustlers an’ hawse-thieves, Miss Hallie.”

  “Oh no! … Nelson, how can you say such things?” exclaimed Harriet, almost indignant. “They seem not at all different from our own riders.”

  “Wal, yu hit it plumb center. They shore ain’t any different atall from ours,” drawled Nelson, his light eyes, with their unfathomable clearness, making Harriet uneasy. “An’ I suppose yu even have a good word for Luke Arlidge?”

  Nelson’s dry tone had added to Harriet’s embarrassment. She blushed, and that always annoyed her. No one else at the ranch had the power to bring the blood to her cheeks. It infuriated Harriet, and like a woman she sought to wound in return.

  “Oh, Mr. Arlidge? Yes, I can say a good word for him. It seems he has parted with that disagreeableness he showed when we arrived. He’s entertaining. Father likes him. And you know he doesn’t want either Arlidge or Allen to be our enemies. And—we girls think Mr. Arlidge quite handsome—in a sort of bold and flashy way.”

  “Shore. Luke has a bold, flashy look all right. He’d look fine danglin’ from a rope.” And after that cool, inscrutable, almost insolent reply Nelson had turned on his heel, leaving Harriet repulsed and angry.

  No one had to tell Harriet—as her sisters persisted in doing—that Arlidge visited Spanish Peaks Ranch to see her. He made that plain enough. And it annoyed rather than pleased Harriet. How silly that she should give Nelson a contrary impression! Women were complex and unfair. It troubled her a little that she might hurt Nelson’s feelings—he to whom they owed so much. But she could not help it. On the two occasions of Arlidge’s visits, however, Harriet saw to it that he never got a moment alone with her.

  Then there were many other lesser grievances or annoyances that helped to swell the total. One was a real dismay over Lonesome Mulhall’s abject worship of Lenta. Harriet liked the boy. He was far from good, she supposed, but he was so many other contrasting things that it was impossible not to love him, almost. Lenta did not love him, that was certain, though she led him a dance no poor range-rider had ever endured before. Lonesome had constituted himself a champion of the Lindsays, even of Neale, who rubbed him the wrong way. His loyalty was beautiful, and in that way he resembled Nelson. But he was an unhappy wretch and persisted in confiding his woes to Harriet.

  Another matter, inconsiderable yet perplexing, was the disappearance of innumerable articles of no particular value to anyone except the girls, that had been noted increasingly during the last few weeks. Some of these had been lost, of course, in transit, and some, no doubt, had been mislaid, but Harriet began to suspect others had been pilfered. She did not know whom to suspect, however, unless one of the several Mexican lads who lived below and were always hanging about the ranch.

  A slow step and a tinkle of spurs interrupted Harriet’s pondering. She recognized them with a little start and stir of lethargic nerves. Following a tap on the open door, she called, vaguely ashamed of her deceit: “Who is it? Come in.”

  Nelson entered. She had not seen him for three days, the lack of which now occurred blankly to her. Dust trailed off his riding-garb. He brought the dry odors of the range with him.

  “Wal, howdy, Miss Hallie. Did yu reckon I was daid?” he said.

  “No, hardly that,” she replied, laughing. “Sit down, Nelson. You look tired.”

  “Shore am. Rode in from Castle Haid this mawnin’.”

  “Castle Head? I remember Arlidge speaking of that place. Far off our range, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. It’s on what Arlidge an’ Allen call their range. Right about heah,” replied Nelson, and reached over to put a finger on the crudely drawn map above Harriet’s desk.

  “What were you doing way over there?”

  “Wal, Ted lost his favorite hawse an’ was trackin’ him.”

  “That fiery little pinto. Did you find him?”

  “Shore, we found him all right.”

  “Strayed?”

  “Wal, we didn’t notice much strayin’,” drawled Nelson, which reply seemed to be one of his evasive ones.

  “I suppose Ted is pleased,” went on Harriet. “He lets Florence ride that pony. She has been complaining. It appears there are not many horses she can ride.”

  “Sorry to say Ted ain’t pleased atall,” corrected Nelson. “Yu see we found the hawse in a corral belongin’ to a man named Snook. Found it with yore field-glass from the top of Castle Haid.”

  “Nelson, what are you driving at?” queried Harriet, suddenly.

  “Miss Hallie, the hawse had been stolen,” said Nelson, mildly. “An’ I wouldn’t let Tracks go down after him, ’cause he’d have shore shot Snook.”

  Here it came again—that relentless and insistent feature of the dual nature of the range. She could not escape it, nor the heat suddenly engendered in her veins.

  “What will you do about it?” she demanded.

  “What would you?”

  “I’d go get the horse, without violence.”

  “How’d yu go about thet?”

  “I’d ask Snook for it, assuming that he had kindly put the lost horse in his corral.”

  “Wal, thet might work if it was backed up by a gun. But I reckon we’d better not let Tracks go after his hawse.”

  “Will you go?”

  “Yes, but not very soon. Yu see I’d rather wait until Snook gets rid of some of the brand-burnt cattle we seen over there.”

  “Brand burnt? You explained that to me once, Nelson. What brand has been burnt?”

  “Looked to me like the Peak Dot had been burned to a Triangle Cross…. Lend me yore pencil, Miss Hallie…. Like thet.”

  “Ah, I see. Very simple. So that is another way a rustler works?”

  “Yes. We know it, but we cain’t prove it, an’ even if we could prove it we couldn’t do nothin’ about it.”

  “What a damnable outrage!” ejaculated Harriet. “We’re to be robbed of our cattle without any redress whatever?”

  “Law will be some time comin’ to this range. I reckon yu’d better give up cattle-raisin’, except what few yu could run in the valley. Yu could let most of us riders go, an’ farm it for some years. Course thet would be losin’ money. But as losin’ stock is losin’ money just the same, I reckon it’d be better.”

  “Let most of you riders go!” echoed Harriet, and by that she meant him.

  “Shore. What else can yu do? I reckon it’d be foolish to waste money on riders when there’s no ridin’ for them to do. I’m shore I wouldn’t want to stay myself.”

  “Laramie!”

  The consternation in that word told Harriet vastly more than it told him. Nelson sat somber and downcast of eye.

  “You would not leave me—us?” she floundered.

  “Wal no, if yu put any store on my stayin’, Miss Hallie. But I’m plumb discouraged.”

  “You! … I didn’t think that possible.”

  “Wal, I’m only human, an’ it is so. I cain’t make my brag good cause yu won’t let me run the ranch the way I want to.”

  “I—I will reconsider,” replied Harriet, hurriedly. “What else have you to report?”

  “Nothin’ much. Lonesome picked up a couple of suspicious riders with the glass. Thet was yesterday mawnin’. He rode out an’ caught them meetin’ two of our own riders. But they seen him an’ all got off down the draw before he could recognize them.”

  “Our own riders!—That has a bad look, on the face of it. Could it be possible some of our men are in league with these rustlers?”

  “Wal, Miss Hallie, it’s so possible thet it’s a fact. I’ve had a hunch for some time. Don’t let it fret you. Common thing on the range.”

  “Oh, those fine gay boys! How could anyone suspect them of being thieves?”

  “Wal, I reckon stealin’ in the East is different from
what it is out heah. Most Westerners have done it, from a beef to a herd. It’s keepin’ on an’ bein’ found out that’s bad.”

  “Laramie Nelson!—Did you ever steal cattle?” cried Harriet, shocked.

  “Shore. A beef heah an’ there, when I was hungry, but I’m glad to say never no more.”

  “Oh, what am I going to do?” burst out Harriet. “Father is getting better. He’s so happy. He trusts you and me. He believes we are doing well…. It makes me sick. What will he say—how will it affect him—when he finds out we’re ruined?”

  “I’ve a hunch the old man will never bat an eye,” returned Nelson, and Harriet realized no greater compliment could be paid her father.

  “But what shall I do?” repeated Harriet, at her wit’s end. “What will become of us?”

  “Wal, thet ain’t so hard to see, if yu go on like yu’ve begun,” replied Nelson, not without bitterness. “Neale will go the way of common clay on the range. Florence will coax Ted to make up with his rich folks an’ they’ll leave yu heah. Lenta will go on drivin’ the cow-punchers mad until one of them throws her on a hawse, an’ thet’ll be the end of her. Yore dad an’ maw will settle down to disillusion an’ sorrow…. An’ as for yu, Miss Hallie, wal, I reckon, considerin’ the queer nature of women, thet yu’ll marry the boldest an’ handsomest of the range-riders, Luke Arlidge.”

  “Don’t insult me,” flashed Harriet, furiously. “All the rest you predicted is horrid enough—without making me out such a—a shallow creature…. I wouldn’t marry Arlidge if he was the only man on earth. I—I wouldn’t give your little finger for the whole of him.”

  Harriet had not calculated upon the betraying power of temper. She had not meant to say so much; she had not really known she had felt that. But she could not be sorry when she saw his transfigured face.

  “I’m glad I riled yu, Miss Hallie,” he said, rising. “Shore I didn’t mean all thet—though I reckon I was scared yu might do the last. Please overlook it. I’ve been plumb down-hearted lately. Lonesome an’ Tracks have been ridin’ me about everythin’. An’—wal, never mind. Thanks for bracin’ me up. I’ll go back to my job an’ make it the best one in this heah country.”

  Nelson went out. Harriet heard his soft jangling step cross the court entrance, toward the room he shared with his two rider comrades. She stared after him, all her feelings held in abeyance. “Good heavens!” she whispered, with his radiant face, his suddenly intense and vibrant change, confronting her. “Is he in love with me?” Then she was shot through and through with a wholly new and tumultuous emotion that assumed instant domination over her consternation, regret, and revulsion.

  Harriet was in the throes of this onslaught when Lonesome shuffled up the steps to rap. When she bade him enter he laid his chaps, gloves, and sombrero on the doorstep.

  “Howdy, boss,” he said, with a gallant bow. “Did you hear the turrible racket as I come in?”

  “No, Lonesome, I didn’t hear a thing.”

  “Dog-gone! That’s queer. For she sure was noisy. But honest I don’t know whether it was hystericks or temper or just plain langhin’.”

  “She? Who?”

  “No one but your sweet little sister. I laid for her, Miss Hallie. You know you forbid her ridin’ with Chess Gaines. I know, ’cause Lenta told me. An’ I also know he’s not the kind for her to trifle with. I hate to talk against a rival. But Chess is no good. Laramie is goin’ to fire him soon as he finds somethin’ out. But Lenta! Do you think she cares—what Laramie thinks, or you, or me? Not much. That gurl don’t care a d—darn…. Chess bragged about goin’ to meet her out an’ I watched her an’ laid for them. I caught them, too. If you never seen a mad gurl you want to see Lenta. Gaines was ugly. But he didn’t have guts enough to throw his gun an’ that left the fight between me an’ her. I had to chase her a mile before I could grab her out of her saddle. Ride? Say, if she ever was a tenderfoot she’s got over it plumb. She screamed, scratched, bit, screeched, kicked, bawled, an’ finally tried bein’ sweet. But no good. A burnt child dreads the fire! I packed her back, roundabout, so none of the punchers would see us, an’ I never let her down till we got here. Then I wouldn’t let her have her hoss…. I’ve done my duty, boss, an’ that’s my report.”

  “I don’t know what to say,” admitted Harriet, blankly, when Lonesome’s rushing story ended.

  “Course I ruined any chance I ever had of winnin’ Lenta, if I ever had one,” went on Lonesome.

  “My poor boy! Certainly you never had one,” ejaculated Harriet, sorrowfully. This was almost too much.

  “I found that out, Miss Hallie, when I up an’ asked her to marry me, like a man, an’ not one of them huggin’, kissin’, dancin’, an’ so forth cow-punchers. Would you like to know what she said?”

  “Lonesome, I believe I would,” risked Harriet.

  “She was mad at somethin’ I did before. She called me a bow-legged little Lothario, whoever he is. ‘Marry you? she says, proud-like as a princess. ‘My Gawd! but you flatter yourself!’ … Then I says, ‘Lenta, I may be bow-legged from honest ridin’, an’ that name you called me, an’ a lot more, but I do love you true, an’ only you can save me from death on the lone prairee.’ An’ then she shrieked ——”

  “Lonesome, my deluded boy, that is about all I can bear this time,” interrupted Harriet, yearning to burst into both tears and mirth.

  “It sure is hard, lady, but don’t give up,” rejoined Lonesome, soothingly. “I’ll stick to you an’ so will Tracks—an’ Laramie, why, that cool, lazy, fire-eatin’ gun-slinger, who’s gone out to meet the worst of men an’ come back—why, he trembles at your step an’ he sees your face in the clouds an’ hears your voice in the wind. Don’t ever miss that, lady.”

  He left her and went whistling across the court.

  “Bless him!” murmured Harriet. Could that be true he dared to say of Laramie? Verily this Lonesome was Greatheart, Valiant, and Ananias all in one.

  Harriet reached for her little gold-mounted pencil which she had laid on the face of the ledger just before Lonesome had come in. It was gone. She looked everywhere, when she knew she had neither dropped nor mislaid the favorite little gift, of which she had always been duly careful. It had neither flown away nor grown legs. It had been moved. Suddenly she uttered an exclamation of dismay, self-reproach, and certainty, and a light dawned upon her. “Lonesome!—That nice lovable boy!—Oh!”

  Shocks were multiplying for Harriet, so she concluded that she might as well annex another. Wherefore she went out to search for Lenta, and came upon her lolling in her home-made hammock. The youngest of the Lindsays looked a tanned, freckled tomboy, with a vividly feminine color and outline. Harriet made the cool mental reservation that Laramie was not far from being right when he had claimed range-riders would not be any good until she was settled. Evidently this much-to-be-desired consummation was still far off.

  “Hello, Hal. I had a ripping ride,” said Lenta, lazily, with her wide-open baby eyes innocently penetrating.

  “So I heard. Lonesome told me,” replied Harriet.

  “Oh—that’s where he went, then. What did he say, Hallie?”

  “He talked a blue streak. I can’t recall the half of it. But—he rather intimated you preferred the society of other cow-punchers when it would be far better for you to confine yourself to him.”

  “Squealer! Darn him, anyhow. I’ll bet he made it worse without giving himself away.” Whereupon Lenta frankly launched into a story that held fairly close to Lonesome’s up to the time that he snatched her off her horse.

  “It was the chance he wanted, Hal, don’t you overlook that,” declared Lenta, resentfully. “He got me in his arms over the front of his saddle. I fought like the dickens, but he’s a giant. Finally he slid his left arm round my neck and under my left arm, which he held. As I was pressed tight against him I couldn’t do anything but kick. That scared his horse, and me too, so I quit. Then he began to kiss me, square on the mouth. I screamed, I raved, I swor
e. I called him every name I could think of—that is, when he didn’t have my lips shut with his. After a while I wilted. He took darn good care to ride me away around out of sight in the draws. He said some day he’d pack me off that way and make love to me scandalously. Finally I bluffed him by pretending hysterics. At that he didn’t stop kissing me right off—too good a chance, whether I went mad or not! but after a while he quit and let me off. That was just below the house.”

  “What became of your horse?” asked Harriet.

  “He tagged after us. He’s out there now with Lonesome’s. I was just working up spunk enough to ride back to the stables, so the darned thing wouldn’t look so bad.”

  “It does look bad,” replied Harriet, seriously.

  “I know it, dearest, just as well as you. But what’s a poor girl going to do? Let these rough-necked conceited jackass Westerners get the best of me, just because I’m a tenderfoot? Not by a darn sight!”

  “It looks to me that Lonesome, at least, did get the best of you.”

  “He did not! I certainly didn’t let him kiss me…. But, Hallie, I’d hate to give myself away to Lonesome—I do like him. Heaps. There’s something so droll about him. You never can tell whether he’s lying or not. He swears he loves me horribly. Asks me to marry him every day. That’s something in his favor, anyway. I notice not one of the others have done that. But Lonesome Mulhall thinks he’s a lady-killer. And I’ll fool him or die in the attempt.”

  “Lent, I believe he’s madly in love with you. That’s what worries me.”

  “Well, that wouldn’t worry me, if it were true. I’d be tickled to death. I’d drive him crazy.”

  “But, my dear, it seems to me that these young Westerners are not to be trifled with. Laramie Nelson hinted as much. And I feel it. I don’t want to scold you, Lenta, or find fault, but I do think you are making too free with them—you are going too far. What would mother say?”