Essential Western Novels - Volume 4. Max Brand

me again," said Butts, "but you're sure goin' to be sorry for it."

      "Not if I know it," replied Marvel.

      "Goodbye, Mr. Marvel," called Miss Pruell, who had come out onto the veranda. "I hope you have a pleasant trip."

      "I'm expecting to," replied Bruce.

      Butts drove down to the stable; and Marvel went in and led Baldy out, taking him up close to the side of the off horse.

      "What you doin' there?" demanded Butts.

      "I'm goin' to tie him up here where you can't get funny and lose him," replied Marvel.

      "You know too damned much for a tenderfoot," said Butts.

      "He'll travel better up here anyway," said Marvel, "besides removin' all temptation from your soul."

      After he had tied Baldy's halter rope to the ring in the snaffle bit of the off horse, he came back and climbed into the buckboard and Butts started the team toward town.

      At first Baldy was inclined to make things awkward; and Butts indulged in much grumbling and profanity, but after awhile the horse settled down to the gait of his fellows and thereafter travelled easily.

      From the ranch stable to the little town sprawling along the railroad, two and a half hours away, neither man spoke, except that at the end of the journey Marvel told Butts to leave him and his stuff off at the hotel; for the next eastbound train did not leave until early in the morning.

      The westbound train on which Butts expected his passengers was late—how late the station agent could not tell. All he knew was that it was held up by a wrecked freight train, and that it might be several hours before the track was cleared.

      Marvel got a room in the hotel and took Baldy to the livery stable.

      The proprietor of the livery was a bleary eyed, red nosed individual, who appeared much interested in Marvel's clothes.

      "I reckon you be one of Cory Blaine's dudes," he said.

      "Do you?" inquired Marvel politely.

      "Your horse?" asked the proprietor.

      "Yes. You haven't got a saddle and bridle you want to sell, have you?"

      "I've got an outfit I've been holdin' for a board bill for more'n a year now," replied the proprietor. He took the halter rope from Marvel and led Baldy into a stall.

      "What you feedin'?" asked Marvel.

      "I got some good alfalfa hay."

      "Nothing else?" asked Bruce.

      "What you want for this cayuse? T-bone steaks?"

      "I seen some oat hay stacked in the shed when I come in," said Marvel. "Give him that."

      "You're sure particular."

      "Just like you would be with one of your horses," said Bruce. "I know a horseman when I see him, and I'll bet yours get nothing but the best."

      The bleary eyed one swelled perceptibly. "You're dead right, young feller," he said.

      "And where's your grain?" demanded Marvel.

      "Grain?"

      "Sure. You can't never make me think a man like you don't grain his horses. Oh, I see. It's in that bin back there. You fork him in some of that oat hay, and I'll get the grain;" and he started toward the end of the barn where the grain bin stood.

      The proprietor hesitated; then he shook his head and went outside to fork the hay into Baldy's manger. When he returned Bruce had already measured out a generous ration of oats for his horse.

      "Now let me see that outfit," he said.

      Ten minutes later he had purchased an old but serviceable saddle, to the pommel of which was tied a forty foot hemp rope, had also acquired a bridle of sorts, and was on his way back to his hotel room.

      ––––––––

      XIV

      KIDNAPPED

      AS Cory Blaine, with Kay and Bud, rode away from the ranch house ahead of the others, they bore to the southwest through a low pass that took them out of the main valley in which the ranch lay.

      At the horn of his saddle, Bud carried a sack filled with paper cut into small pieces; and some of this he dropped occasionally as Blaine instructed him to do so.

      "You might as well ride on ahead, Bud," said Cory. "Follow that old, dry spring trail for about five miles and then cut across to the left, back into the valley. Drop a little paper when you enter a main trail; and then you don't have to drop no more, as long as the trail is plain, until you leave it. After you leave a trail, ride about fifty yards before you drop any more paper. That'll make 'em hunt around a bit to pick up your trail again. After you get into the valley, keep out of sight as much as possible. Use washes and high brush to hide yourself, and keep on up the valley quite a bit before you cross. I don't care if you go as far as Mill Creek. We're goin' to give 'em a ride today that they'll remember."

      "If I go that roundabout way to Mill Creek," said Bud, "it'll be nigh on to forty miles before we get back to the ranch."

      "I don't believe some of us can stand it," said Kay.

      "They'll have somethin' to talk about for the rest of their lives," said Cory, "and that's what most of 'em are out here for. It won't kill 'em."

      "Bert Adams won't never sit down again," said Bud.

      "That's his funeral," said Blaine. "You mosey along now, Bud; and we'll follow. You got the best horse in the outfit, and there aint no use of our tryin' to keep up with you."

      "All right," said Bud. "So long," and he rode away.

      Blaine held his horse to a walk until Bud was out of sight. He did not talk to the girl, who followed behind him along the narrow trail, but presently she spoke to him.

      "You're off the trail, Cory," she said. "This isn't the main trail, and Bud hasn't dropped any paper."

      "Oh, that's all right," said Cory. "I know where Bud's ridin' and this is an easier way. It's a short cut."

      "I don't see how it can be a short cut," said the girl, "when it's bearing off to the west, while Mill Creek is southeast of us."

      "Well, it aint shorter in distance, Kay," he said; "but it's a whole lot easier, and we'll make better time. The trail Bud's on gets mighty rough a bit farther up, and we'll dodge all that and may even beat him into the valley."

      They dropped down into a gully and crossed a low ridge, beyond which lay a barren and forbidding gulch, carved from the red soil by the rains of ages.

      It did not look like an easier way to Kay; but she had confidence in Blaine's knowledge of the country and was content to follow where he led.

      A steep and precarious cattle trail led down into the bottom of the gulch, where they were entirely hidden from view in the winding bed of a dry wash.

      "What a lonely place," said Kay.

      Blaine made no reply. He was unusually quiet and preoccupied.

      Despite herself, the girl felt nervous. She wished now that she had insisted upon continuing on with Bud; and then she noticed for the first time that Cory carried no gun, as was habitually his custom.

      "You forgot your gun," she said.

      "That's right," he replied, "I did. I was so busy this morning I must o' plumb forgot it."

      "I don't like this place, Cory," she said after another silence. "I wish you'd take me out of it."

      They were crossing the mouth of another deep wash that entered that in which they were