CHAPTER XXI
"HEART AND HAND"
"Come in, Bowers." Kate looked up from the market report she was readingas her trusted lieutenant scraped his feet on the soap box which didduty as a step to the tongue of the sheep wagon.
After a final glance at the report, during which Bowers eyed the mailsack with interest, she folded the sheet and turned to him inquiringly.
"I wisht you'd order some turpentine--'bout two quarts of it," he said.
"What do you want with so much?" She reached for a pad and pencil tomake a note.
"Ticks. I never seen the beat of 'em. I bet I picked a thousand off mea'ready this season. They ain't satisfied with grabbin' me from asagebrush as I go by, but when they gits wind of me they trails me upand jumps me. All the herders is complainin'."
"How's the new herder doing?"
Bowers's face clouded. "Dibert's havin' trouble with Neifkins'sherder--says the feller does most of his herdin' in the wagon, and therewould a been a 'mix' a dozen times if he hadn't been with his sheepevery minute. Dibert says it looks to him like the feller's doin' it onpurpose."
"I don't know but what I'd rather have it that way than for them to betoo friendly. More 'mixes' come from herders visiting than any othercause, and I wouldn't run that band through the chutes for three hundreddollars. It would take that much fat off of them, to say nothing of thebother. Who is Neifkins's herder?"
"I ain't seen him. Dibert says he's an o'nery looker."
"Next time you go over, notify him that he's to herd lines closer. If hekeeps on crowding, I'll take a dog and set his sheep back where theybelong so they won't forget it. You can tell him. You think Dibert's allright, do you?"
"Well," Bowers replied judicially, "he's one of these fellers that wouldfight like hell fer his sheep one day, and the next, if you brought himprunes instead of the aprycots he'd ordered, he'd turn 'em loose to thecoyotes to git hunks with you. He's all right, only he's crazy."
Kate shrugged a shoulder.
"Is there much water-hemlock in the gulch this summer?"
"Quite a bit of it--it's spreadin'. Neifkins has lost several sheepa'ready by poison, but it's careless herdin'."
"I should own that section," Kate commented. "It's public land. I couldhave it put up at auction and buy it in, but I suppose they'd run theprice up on me just to make me pay for it. How are Svenson's lambsdoing?"
"They're so fat they can't play--and Woods's got twenty-five hundred ofthe best wethers that ever blatted!"
Kate's eyes sparkled.
"I'm going to be a real Sheep Queen, Bowers, if wool and mutton keepclimbing. The price of wool is the highest in its history."
Bowers looked at her in mute admiration. He was always loyal, but whenshe was sociable and friendly like this he adored her. Alas, however,the times when she was so were yearly growing rarer.
Kate went on tentatively:
"I think I'll 'cut' for a hard winter. You know my motto, 'Better besure than sorry.'"
"I wouldn't be surprised if 'twan't a humdinger--last winter was soopen. I think we'd be safer if we ship everything that's fat enough."
Bowers always said "we" when he spoke of the Outfit, though he was stillonly a camptender working for wages.
Kate relied upon him to keep her informed of the details of thebusiness, which she had less time than formerly to look afterpersonally. His judgment was sometimes at fault, but she trusted hishonesty implicitly and, though she gave him little of her confidence, itwas so much more than she gave to any other person that he was flatteredby it.
"Guess what that Boston woolbuyer is offering me?" She tapped a letter.
"No idee."
"Twenty-six cents."
Bowers whistled.
"Gosh a'mighty! You're goin' to take it, ain't you?"
"I'll get a quarter more, if I hold out for it."
His face fell a little.
"I'll get it!" Her voice had a metallic quality. "It's a fine longstaple, and clean. If he won't, some one else will give it to me."
The sheep woman had the reputation now of being difficult to deal with,of haggling over fractions, and it was of this that Bowers was thinking.To others he would never admit that she was anything but perfect, thoughto himself he acknowledged the hardening process that was going on inher. He saw the growth of the driving ambition which made herindifferent to everything that did not tend to her personal interest.
Outside of himself and Teeters, Kate took no interest whatever inindividuals. There was no human note in her intercourse with those whoworked for her. She cared for results only, and showed it.
They resented her appraising eyes, her cold censure when they blundered,her indifference to them as human beings, and they revenged themselvesin the many ways that lie in a herder's power if he cares to do so.
They gave away to the dry-farmers in the vicinity the supplies andhalves of mutton she furnished them. In the lambing season they left thelambs whose mothers refused to own them to die when a little extraeffort would have saved them. When stragglers split off from the herdthey made no great attempt to recover them. They shot at coyotes andwildcats when it was convenient, but did not go out of their way to huntthem.
She was just but not generous. She never had spared herself, and she didnot spare her herders. "Hard as nails" was the verdict in general. Inher presence they were taciturn to sullenness; among themselves theycriticised her constantly, exaggerating her faults and taking delight inrecounting her failures. She was too familiar with every detail of thebusiness for her men to dare to neglect her interests too flagrantly,but they had learned to a nicety how high their percentage of lossesmight run without getting their "time" for it.
Bowers knew of this silent hostility, which was so unnecessary, but hedared not speak of it. He could only deny that she had faults and resentit with violence when the criticisms become too objectionable.
If Kate had known of the antagonism, it would have made nodifference--she would rather have taken the losses it entailed than toconciliate. She would have argued that if she was harsh, imperious, itwas her privilege--she had earned it.
Life for Kate had resolved itself into an unromantic routine--likeextracting the last penny for her wool that was possible, shipping onfavorable markets, acquiring advantageous leases, discharging incapableherders and hiring others, eliminating waste and unnecessaryexpenditures, studying range conditions against hard winters.
"Any mail for the herders?" Bowers asked, innocently, since she showedno disposition to give him her confidence farther.
He watched her intently as she sorted the mail, tossing him a paperfinally from which he removed the wrapper with a certain eagerness. Hepeered into it with a secrecy that attracted her attention, and, lookingat it hard, Kate recognized it as the publication of a matrimonialagency.
"Bowers, you surprise me!" She regarded him quizzically.
Bowers started guiltily.
"Aw--it's one they sent me," he said disparagingly--"jest a samplecopy."
"Bowers, I think you're lying," she accused him good-humoredly. "Tell methe truth--didn't you send for it?"
He squirmed and colored.
"I did write to 'em--out of cur'osity."
"Don't forget that married men are not hired into this Outfit," shereminded him, smiling. "I'd be sorry to lose you."
"Gosh a'mighty!" he protested vigorously. "I ain't no use fer women!"
The subject seemed to interest him, however, for he continued withanimation:
"They's always somethin' about 'em I don't like when I git to know 'em.I've knowed several real well--six or eight, altogether, countin' twothat run restauraws and one that done my warshin'. I got a kind o'cur'osity about 'em, but I don't take no personal interest in 'em.Why--Gosh--a'mighty--"
Bowers nearly kicked the stove over in his embarrassed denial.
Kate looked after him speculatively as he made his escape in a reliefthat was rather obvious. His protests had been too vehement to beconvincin
g. Was he growing discontented? Didn't her friendship satisfyhim any longer?
There was something of the patient trust of a sheepdog in Bowers'sfidelity. "The queen can do no wrong," was his attitude. Kate was soaccustomed to his devotion and admiration that it gave her a twinge tothink of sharing it.
She called after him as he was leaving:
"If you meet that freighter, tell him for me he'll get his check if hegets in again as early as he did last trip. I won't have a horse leftwith a sound pair of shoulders."
"And I fergot to tell you that somebody's 'salted' over in Burnt Basin,"he answered, turning back. "There's a hunerd head o' cattle eatin' offthe feed there. We'll need that, later."
"Tsch! tsch!" Kate frowned her annoyance at the information.
"Be sure and warn Neifkins's herder as soon as you can get around toit," she reminded him.
"You bet!" Bowers responded cheerfully, and went on.
Yes, she certainly would miss Bowers if anything happened that he lefther, she thought as she turned inside to her market report and herletters.
It was days, however, before Bowers found the opportunity to go toDibert's camp with supplies and incidentally warn Neifkins's herder, ifhe was still crowding. Now as he jolted towards the fluttering rag,thrust in a pile of rocks to mark the location of Dibert's sheep-wagon,his thoughts, for once, were not of sheep or anything pertaining tothem. He was, forsooth, composing for the matrimonial paper anadvertisement which should be sufficiently attractive to draw a fewanswers without making himself in any way liable. He thought he mightwith safety say that he was a single gentleman, crowding forty,interested in the sheep industry, who would be pleased to correspondwith a plump blonde of about thirty. He would not go so far as to saythat his object was matrimony, since, of course, it was not, and thedeclaration might somehow prove incriminating. The Denver _Post_ wasfull of suits for breach of promise and it behooved him to be wary.
Bowers felt like a fox, at the adroit wording of the advertisement, andchuckled at his cunning. He would notify the postmaster in Prouty tohold out his mail for him and thus escape further "joshing" from Kate,who would be sure to observe letters addressed to him in femininewriting.
The matrimonial paper had proved to be in the nature of a debauch toBowers, who had worn it to tatters poring over its columns. The "petiteblondes" and "dashing brunettes" who enumerated their charms without anynoticeable lack of modesty furnished food for his imagination. Heselected brides, as the description pleased him, with the prodigalabandon of a sultan.
However, the idea of an advertisement of his own, dismissed promptly atfirst, grew upon him. The thought of getting something in the mailbesides a catalogue and the speeches of his congressman, of havingsomething actually to look forward to, appealed to him strongly themore he considered it. Bowers craved a little of the warmth of romancein his drab existence and this was the only way he knew of obtaining it.
Smiling at the brash act he contemplated, Bowers threw the brakemechanically as the front wheels of the wagon sank into a chuck-hole andthe jolt all but landed him on the broad rump of Old Peter.
As he raised his eyes he saw a sight charged with significance to onefamiliar with it.
Neifkins's sheep were coming down the side of the mountain like a woollyavalanche. In the shape of a wedge with a leader at the point of it,they were running with a definite purpose and as though all the dogs insheepdom were heeling them. The very thing against which he had come towarn the herders was about to happen--the band was making straight forDibert's sheep, which were still feeding peacefully on the hillside.
With an imprecation that was not flattering to either herder, Bowerswrapped the lines around the brake and leaped over the wheel to headthem if it were possible. But they seemed possessed by all the imps ofSatan, as they came on bleating, hurdling boulders, letting out anotherlink of speed at Bowers's frantic shoutings.
The leaders of the two bands were not fifty feet apart when Bowers,realizing he could not get between them, reached for a rock with a fainthope that he might hit what he aimed for. His prayer was answered, forthe ewe in the lead of Neifkins's band blinked and staggered as the rockbounced on her forehead. With a surprised bleat she turned and startedback up the mountain, the rest of the band following.
The perspiration was streaming from under Bowers's hat as his eyessearched the surrounding country. Not a sign of either herder! A cactusthorn that had penetrated his shoe leather did not improve Bowers'stemper. As he sat down to extract it, he considered whether it would beadvisable to pound Dibert to a jelly when he found him or wait untilthey got a herder to replace him.
The man's horse and saddle were missing in camp, Bowers discovered, soit was fairly safe to assume that he was over visiting Neifkins'sherder.
After Bowers had brought the supply wagon up and unloaded, he securedthe horses and started on foot up the mountain.
From the summit he could see the white canvas top of Neifkins's wagongleaming among the quaking asp well down the other slope of themountain. No one was visible, but as he got closer he saw Dibert's horsetied to the wheel. Bowers felt "hos-tile."
"What you doin' here?" he demanded unceremoniously, as Dibert, hearingthe rocks rattle, all but tumbled out of the wagon in his eagerness.
"I never was so tickled to see anybody in my life!" he cried.
"I'm about as pleased to see you as a stepmother welcomin' home thefirst wife's children," Bowers replied, eyeing him coldly. "You ain'tanswered my question."
The herder nodded towards the wagon:
"He's come down with somethin'. Clean off"--he touched his forehead--"Idassn't leave him."
Bowers immediately went into the wagon, where, after a look at the manmumbling on the bunk, he said laconically:
"Tick bite."
The brown blotches, flushed forehead, and burning eyes told their ownstory.
As Bowers continued to look at the sick man, with his unshaven face andmop of oily black hair, so long that it was beginning to curl, Dibertcommented:
"He ain't what you'd call pretty--I've no idee he has to keep a rockhandy to stone off the ladies."
But Bowers was searching his mind in the endeavor to recall where he hadseen those curious eyes with the muddy blue-gray iris. It came to him sosuddenly that he shouted it:
"I know him! It's the feller that blowed up my wagon! It's the--thatkilled Mary!"