The Settling of the Sage

  XIII

  The first warm days of spring had drawn the frost from the ground.Billie rode beside Harris down the lane to the lower field. A tinycabin stood completed on every filing. Two men were digging post holesacross the valley below the edge of the last fall's plowing and themule teams were steadily breaking out another strip.

  "Almost a year," she said, referring to the commencement of the newwork.

  "Just a year to-day," Harris corrected, and he was thinking of the dayhe had first met the Three Bar girl. "This is our anniversary, sortof."

  She nodded as she caught his meaning.

  "The anniversary of our partnership," she said. "You're good on dates.We've pulled together pretty well, considering our start."

  "It was a rocky trail for the first few days," he confessed. "But allthe time I was hoping it would get smoothed out."

  "You told me there were millions of miles of sage just outside," sherecollected. "And millions of cows--and girls."

  "Later I told you something else," he said. "And I've been meaning itever since. The road to the outside is closed. If I was to start nowI'd lose the way."

  She pointed down the valley as a drove of horses moved toward themunder the guidance of a dozen men. The hands would start breaking outthe remuda the following day. The spring work was on.

  "Off to a running start on another year," he said. "And sure to holdour lead." They drew aside as the remuda thundered past and on towardthe corrals. "From to-day on out, you and I'll be a busy pair," heprophesied.

  His prediction proved true. The Three Bar was a beehive of activityand it seemed that the hours between dawn and dark were all too shortfor the amount of work Harris wished to crowd into them.

  The cowhands were breaking out the horses in the corrals while theacreage of plowed land in the lower fields steadily increased.

  The heaviest cedar posts were tamped in place for the outer fence and asix-wire barrier held range cows back from the bottoms which would soonbe in growing crops. It crossed the flats below the lower filings andfollowed the road that held to one side of the valley clear to theThree Bar lane. On the far side it mounted the bench that flanked thebottoms and followed the crest of it, tying into the home corrals.Lighter three-wire fences marked the homestead lines within.

  The day that Evans led the men out on the calf round-up, the mule teamsmade their first trip across the plowed land with the drill.

  Harris and the girl sat their horses and watched the initial trip. Thefields were being seeded to alfalfa and oats so that the faster growinggrain might shade and protect the tender shoots of hay. Before thegrain ripened it would be cut green for hay, cured and stacked.

  When the seeding was completed Billie worked with Harris and togetherthey ran a level over the seeded ground, marking out the laterals ongrade across the fields from points where they would tap the main feedditches and carry water to the crops.

  Russ and Tiny followed the lines of stakes which marked their readingsof the level, throwing a plow furrow each way. A second pair ofhomesteaders followed behind them, their mules dragging a pointedsteel-shod ditcher which forced out the loosened earth.

  A concrete head gate was installed at a feasible take-out point on theCrazy Loop. Then all hands worked on a main feed ditch which wouldcarry sufficient volume of water to cover every filing. Lead ditchestapped the main artery at frequent intervals, each one of capacity tocarry a head of water to irrigate one forty. These in turn featheredout into the tiny laterals across the meadow.

  Early rains had moistened the fields and they were faintly green withtiny shoots of oats. These thickened into a rank velvety carpet whilethe homesteaders were hauling a hundred loads of rocks to form a crudedam across the stream below the take-out. The water was graduallyraised till it ran almost flush with the top of the head gate. Thegates were lifted and the diverted waters sped smoothly down the newchannel to carry life to a portion of the sagebrush desert.

  A few days would find the cowhands back from the round-up. Thehomesteaders must make one more trip to the railroad to freight in thestacker and the two buck-sweeps to be used in putting up the hay. Thistrip was delayed only till the round-up crew was back from the rangefor a week of leisure and could act as guards while the others wereaway.

  As the tangible results of the work became more apparent Harris'svigilance increased. There was now more than plowed ground to work on;crops to be trampled at a time when they would not lift again to permitof mowing; fences to be wrecked so that range stock might have freeaccess to the fields. A single night could upset the work of manymonths. But as he stood with Billie at the mouth of the lane heallowed none of his thoughts to be reflected in his speech.

  It was two hours before dark and the perspective toward the east wasalready foreshortened. Two jackrabbits hopped into the lane and moveddown toward the meadow. The homesteaders had turned their hands toanother job. Tiny and Russ, shod with rubber boots, were leaning ontheir long-handled shovels in the forty nearest the house. Beyond themthe other irrigators were spreading the water over the growing crops.

  Billie Warren half-closed her eyes and viewed the broad expanse ofrippling green in the bottoms. How many times she had stood here inthe past with old Cal Warren while he visioned this very picture whichnow unrolled before her eyes in reality; the transformation of theThree Bar flat from a desert waste to a scene of abundant fertilityunder the reclaiming touch of water.

  It was a quiet picture of farm life if one looked only upon theblooming fields and took no account of the raw, barren foothills thatflanked them,--the gaunt, towering range behind. She found itdifficult to link the scene before her with the deviltry of a fewmonths past. The killing of Bangs and Rile Foster's consequent grimretaliation; the raid on Three Bar bulls and the stampede of her trailherd; all those seemed part of some life so long in the past as to formno part of her present.

  The continued immunity had had its effect, regardless of her earliersuspicions. She still realized the possibility of further raids butthey had been so long delayed that the prospect had ceased to impressher as imminent. Tiny and Russ changed their head of water. As theyshifted positions she noted that each carried some tool beside hisirrigator's shovel. No man in the field ever strayed far from therifle which was part of his equipment. But even this was an evidenceof vigilance which had met her eye every day for months and had ceasedto impress.

  They walked to the near edge of the field and Harris stooped to partthe knee-deep grain, pointing to the slender stems of alfalfa withtheir delicate leaves.

  "We have a record stand of young hay," he said. "It's thick allthrough--every place I've looked." He straightened up and laughed."And I expect I've looked at every acre. I've been right interested inthose little shoots. It's deep-rooted now. The worst is past. Idon't see that anything that could happen now would kill it out. Nextyear we'll put up a thousand tons of hay."

  He dropped a hand on her shoulder and stood looking down at her.

  "Billie, don't you think it's about time you were finding out whatJudge Colton wants?" he asked. "He's been right insistent on yourgoing back to confer with him."

  The girl shook her head positively. Two months before Judge Colton hadwritten that he must advise with her on matters of importance andsuggested that she come on at once. Harris had urged her to go andalmost daily referred to it.

  "I can't go now," she said. "Not till I've seen one whole seasonthrough. When the first Three Bar crop is cut and in the stack I'llgo. All other business must wait till then. You two can't drive meaway till after I see that first crop in the stack."

  "If you'd go now you'd likely get back before we're through cutting,"he urged. "And the Judge has written twice in the last two weeks."

  Before she could answer this a horseman appeared on the valley road.The furthest irrigator, merely a speck in the distance, exchangedshovel for rifle and crossed to the fence. The rider, as if expectingsome such move, pulled up his hor
se and approached at a walk.

  Harris saw the two confer. The horseman handed some object to theother and urged his horse on toward the house. He was one of thesheriff's deputies. He grinned as he tapped his empty holster.

  "One of your watchdogs lifted my gun," he said. He handed Harris anote.

  After reading it Harris looked at his watch and snapped it shut,glanced at the sinking sun and turned to the girl.

  "I have to make a little jaunt," he explained.

  "Alden wants to see me. I'll take Waddles along. As we go down I'llsend Russ or Tiny up to cook for the rest."

  The deputy turned his horse into the corral and five minutes laterHarris and Waddles rode away. Waddles was mounted on Creamer, the bigbuckskin.

  "We'll have to step right along," Harris said. "It's forty miles."

  They held the horses to a stiff swinging trot that devoured the mileswithout seeming to tire their mounts. For four hours they headed southand a little east, never slackening their pace except to breathe thehorses on some steep ascent. The buckskin and the paint-horse had lostthe first snap of their trot and it was evident that they would soonbegin to lag. Another hour and they had slowed down perceptibly.

  The two men dismounted and tied the horses to the brush in a shelteredcoulee, then started across a broad flat on foot. Out in the center aspot showed darker than the rest,--the old cabin where Carpenter hadelected to start up for himself after being discharged from the ThreeBar.

  When within a hundred yards of the cabin a horse, tied to a hitch postin front, neighed shrilly and Harris laid a restraining hand onWaddles's arm. They knelt in the brush as the door opened and a manstood silhouetted against the light. After a space of two minutesCarp's voice reached them.

  "Not a sound anywheres," he said. "Likely some horses drifting past."He went inside and closed the door. The two men circled the cabin andcame up from the rear. A window stood opened some eight inches fromthe bottom. Through the holes in the ragged flour sack that served asa curtain Harris secured a view of the inside. Carp and Slade satfacing across a little table in the center of the room.

  "I want to clean up and go," Carp was saying. "This damn Harris put meon the black list."

  "You've been on it for three months," Slade said. "Nothing hashappened yet. But don't let me keep you from pulling out any time youlike."

  "But I've got a settlement to make," Carp insisted. "Let's get thatfixed up."

  "Settlement?" Slade asked. "Settlement with who?"

  Carpenter leaned across the table and tapped it to emphasize hisremarks.

  "Listen. Morrow gave me a bill of sale from you calling for a hundredhead of Three Bar she-stock, rebranded Triangle on the hip."

  Slade nodded shortly.

  "I gave Morrow that for two years' back pay when he quit. He couldsell out to you if he liked."

  "And now I want to sell out," Carp said. "And be gone from here."

  "How many head have you got?" Slade asked.

  "Three hundred head," Carp stated.

  "You've increased right fast," Slade remarked. "I'd think you'd wantto stay where you was doing so well. How much do you want?"

  "Five dollars straight through," Carp said.

  "Cheap enough," Slade answered. "If only a man was in the market." Helooked straight at Carp and the man's eyes slipped away from Slade'ssteady gaze. "But I'm not buying. Likely Morrow will buy you out."

  "Morrow ought to be here now," Carp stated. "He's coming to-night."

  "Then I'd better go," Slade said. "I don't like Morrow's ways."

  The thud of horse's hoofs sounded from close at hand. The two menoutside lay flat in the shadow of the house. A shrill whistle, twicerepeated, called Carp to his feet and he crossed to the door to answerit. Morrow dismounted and came to the door. He nodded briefly toSlade, hesitating on the sill as if surprised to find him there. Carplost no time in stating his proposition. He spoke jerkily.

  "I want to get out," he said. "I'll sell for five dollars a head."

  Morrow held up a hand to silence him.

  "I'll likely buy--but I never talk business in a crowd." He crossedthe room and sat with his back to the window. "There's plenty of time."

  "I take it I'm the crowd," Slade remarked. "So I'll step out."

  Morrow stiffened suddenly in his chair as a cold ring was pressedagainst the back of his neck through the crack of the window. At thesame instant Carp had tilted back and raised one knee. The gun thatrested on his leg was peeping over the table at Slade.

  "Steady!" he ordered. "Sit tight!"

  The window was thrown up to its full height by Waddles and the curtainsnatched away from the gun which Harris held against Morrow's neck.Carp's apparent nervousness had vanished. He flipped back his vest andrevealed a marshal's badge.

  "I'd as soon take you along feet first as any way," he said. "So ifyou feel like acting up you can start any time now."

  Slade's eyes came back from the two men at the window and rested on thebadge.

  "So that's it," he said with evident relief. "A real arrest--when Ifigured it was an old-fashioned murder you had planned. What do youwant with me?"

  Waddles had reached down and removed Morrow's gun.

  "A number of things," Carpenter said. "Obstructing the homestead lawsfor one."

  Slade shook his head and smiled.

  "You've got the wrong party," he said. "You can't prove anything onme."

  "I don't count on that," Carp said. "You've covered up right well. Weknow you work through Morrow but can't prove a word. We've got enoughto hang him; but I expect maybe you'll get off."

  There was a scrape of feet outside the door and the sheriff entered andtook possession of Slade's gun as Harris and Waddles moved round fromthe window and went inside.

  "I'm a few minutes late," Alden said. "I wasn't right sure how close Iwas to the house so I left my horse too far back."

  "Here's your prisoners," Carp said. "Captured and delivered as agreed.I haven't anything on Slade myself but if you want him he's yours."

  "What do you want with me?" Slade demanded a second time.

  "I'm picking you up on complaint make by the Three Bar," Alden said."I'll have to take you along."

  Slade turned on Harris.

  "What charge?" he asked.

  "Killing twelve Three Bar bulls on the last day of August," Harrisstated.

  "I was out with the ranger," Slade said. "Back in the hills. You knowthat yourself. That charge won't stick."

  "Then maybe it was the second of May," Harris returned. "I sort offorget."

  Slade suddenly grasped the significance of this arrest.

  "How many of you fellows are pussy-footing round out here?" he inquiredof Carp.

  "I don't mind confessing that several of the boys are riding for you,"Carp informed. "But while we've cinched Morrow we haven't been able totrace it back to you. I even got put on the black list, thinking youmight do business with me direct after that--knowing my word wouldn'tstand against yours. But not you! You've covered your tracks."

  Carp spoke softly, as if to himself, detailing his failure to gatherconclusive evidence against Slade.

  "I even run your rebrand on fifty or so Three Bar cows. You knew therewasn't a dollar changed hands when Morrow gave me that paper whichlicensed me to rustle my own she-stock. We can't even prove that youdidn't owe him two years' back pay and square up by giving him thatbill of sale. There's never a check of yours made out to Morrow that'sgone through the bank. The boys who staged the stampede drew down alump sum from Morrow for the job. We know who was financing theraid--can't be proved. The idea in my starting up was to run yourrebrand on any number of Three Bar cows. Later Morrow would buy meout--acting for you; can't be proved. Oh, you're in the clear, allright."

  Slade broke in upon the monologue. This recitation of his probableimmunity from conviction on every count, far from reassuring him,served to confirm his original suspicion as
to the reason for thisarrest without witnesses. If the sheriff had wanted him he had but tosend word for Slade to come in. He threw out one last line and theanswer convinced him beyond all doubt.

  "Then a lawyer will have me out in an hour," he predicted.

  "A lawyer could," Alden said. "If you saw one. But we've decided notto let you have access to legal advice for the first few days."

  Slade turned on Carpenter.

  "This sort of thing is against the law," he said. "You're a UnitedStates marshal. How can you go in on a kidnapping deal?"

  "I'm not in on it," Carp shrugged. "The sheriff asked me to arrest youat the first opportunity. I've turned you over to him. The rest ishis affair. Besides, like I was mentioning, they can't prove a thingon you. As soon as they're convinced of that they'll turn you loose."

  The sheriff nodded gravely.

  "The very day I'm satisfied Harris can't prove his charges I'll throwopen the doors. You'll be a free man that minute."

  A vision of the near future swept across Slade's mind. If he should belocked up for three months and discharged for lack of evidence it wouldwreck him as surely as the rumors of the last few months had cut Lang'smen off from the rest of the world. Squatters had filed on everyavailable site throughout his range and now waited to see if the ThreeBar would win its fight. If the news should be spread that he waslocked up these nesters would rush in. On his release he would findthem everywhere. With marshals scattered through the ranks of his ownmen, intent on upholding the homestead laws, he would be helpless todrive them out. The pictures of the different valleys suitable forranch sites, scattered here and there over his extensive range,traveled through his mind in kaleidoscopic procession--and he visioneda squatter outfit established on every one. If they locked him up atthis time he was lost.

  He nodded slowly.

  "Well, I guess you've got me," he said. "I don't see that it willamount to much, anyway. Sooner or later you'll let me out." He raisedhis arms high above his head and stretched. Under cover of this casualmove he swiftly raised one foot.

  Slade planted his boot on the edge of the light table and gave atremendous shove. The far edge caught the sheriff across the legs andoverthrew him. The lantern crashed to the floor and at the sameinstant Morrow aimed a sidewise, sweeping kick at Carpenter's ankles.As the marshal went down his head struck the corner post of a bunk andhe did not rise.

  With a single sweep Morrow caught the back of his chair and swung itabove his head for the spot which Waddles had occupied at the instantthe light went out. The weapon splintered in his hands as it found itsmark, and as the big man struck the dirt floor Morrow leaped for thedim light which indicated the open door.

  A huge paw clamped on one ankle and a back-handed wrench sent himflying across the room to the far wall. With a sweep of the other handWaddles slammed the door with a bang that jarred the cabin.

  "We've got 'em trapped," the big voice exulted. "We've got 'em sewedin a sack."

  Harris made one long reach and swung the butt of his gun for Slade'shead as the table went down but Slade, with the same motion, vaultedthe prostrate sheriff. The force of the blow threw Harris off hisbalance and as he tripped and reeled to his knees Slade's boot heelscored a glancing blow on his skull and floored him. He regained hisfeet, gripping a fragment of the chair Morrow had smashed overWaddles's head, and struck at a dim form which loomed against the vaguelight of the window.

  The shape closed with him and he went down in a corner with Slade.Slade struck him twice in the face, writhed away and gained his feet,back-slashing at Harris's head with his spurs. Harris caught ahand-hold in the long fur of the other's chaps, wrapped both arms roundSlade above the knees and dragged him back. His hand found Slade'sthroat and he squeezed down on it as the man raised both knees andthrust them against his stomach to break the hold. Slade's arm swept acircle on the floor in search of the gun Harris had dropped but he wasjerked a foot from the floor and Harris jammed his head against the logwall,--jammed again and Slade crumpled into a limp heap. Harris heldhim there, unwilling to take a chance lest the other might be feigningunconsciousness. But Slade was out of the fight.

  The sheriff struggled to his feet as Waddles tossed Morrow back fromthe door and slammed it shut. He closed with Morrow but the man eludedhim. He dared not shoot with friends and enemies struggling all aboutthe black pit of the little room.

  Morrow leaped one way, then the opposite, as the sheriff groped forhim. Alden turned toward a rattle at the stove as he heard Slade'shead crunch against the wall under Harris's savage thrust.

  "Down him!" Waddles roared. "Tear him down! Tear him down! I'mholding the door."

  From the corner by the stove an iron pot hurtled across the room forthe sound of the voice and crashed against the wall a foot from hishead. A second kettle struck Alden in the chest and he went down.Waddles saw the light vanish from the window, then reappear. Morrowhad made a headlong dive through the little opening.

  Waddles swung back the door and sprang outside as Morrow vaulted to thesaddle. The big man lunged and tackled both horse and man as a grizzlywould seek to batter down his prey.

  The frightened horse struck at him, numbing one leg with the blow of aniron-shod forefoot, then reared and wheeled away from the thing whichsprang at him, but Waddles retained his grip in the animal's mane, hisother hand clamped on Morrow's ankle.

  The rider leaned and struck him in the head. The crazed horse shookWaddles off but as he fell the other man fell with him, dragged fromthe saddle by the jerk of one mighty hand. They rolled apart andMorrow leaped to his feet but Waddles had wrenched the leg alreadynumbed by the striking horse and it buckled under him and let him backto the ground as he put his weight on it. He reached for his gun. Aform loomed above him, a heavy rock upraised in both hands. The gunbarked just as a downward sweep of the arms started the rock for hishead. Morrow pitched down across him and Waddles swept him aside witha single thrust.

  He rose and stirred the limp shape with his toe as the sheriff reachedhis side.

  "Dead bird!" Waddles announced and turned to limp back to the cabin.

  A match flared inside as Harris lighted the lantern. Carpenter stirredand sat up, moving one hand along the gash in his scalp. The sheriffstooped and snapped a pair of handcuffs on Slade's wrists. Theysplashed water on his face and he opened his eyes. He regarded thesteel bracelets at his wrists as he was helped to his feet and turnedto Harris.

  "Don't forget that I'll kill you for this," he said. It was a simplestatement, made without heat or bluster, and aside from this one remarkhe failed to speak a syllable until the sheriff rode away with him.

  The sheriff waved the lantern outside the door and before he lowered ittwo deputies rode up, leading his horse.

  "We started at that shot," one of them announced in explanation oftheir prompt arrival.

  Alden motioned Slade to his horse and helped him up.

  "Shoot him out of the saddle if he makes a break," he ordered briefly.

  "Now you can move against those men I've sworn out complaints for,"Harris said to Alden. "Public sentiment has turned against them tosuch an extent that they won't get any help--and there won't be any tofill their places, once we've cleaned them up. Deputize the wholeThree Bar crew when you're ready to start."

  The sheriff nodded and led the way with the two deputies riding closebehind, one riding on either side of Slade.