CHAPTER XXXV

IN THE BEGINNING

THE Del Sol men with their new-found friend turned back to bid a temporary farewell to Jesse Chisholm and his wagon train, departing thereafter for the herd, which had been held some miles below. The Eastern man sat his horse somewhat strangely to the eyes of the Texans; but no matter what the speed, he ceased not joltingly to sound the praises of his community.

“Every time he come down in the saddle he says, ‘Aberlene! Aberlene! Kerchunk! Aberlene!’” explained Len Hersey to his fellows.

When they came into view of the great herd, held closely by the riders, Nabours pulled up with the enthusiasm of the natural drover.

“Look at ’em!” he exclaimed, waving a hand. “If that ain’t a perty sight I don’t know what is!”

“Great glory!” exclaimed the Abilene man. “I didn’t know there were that many cattle in the world! Sir, my fortune is made! Where’d you get them all?”

“In Texas we don’t ast no man that. I told you we done raise them cows by hand, every one of them.”

The Abilene man gave a deep sigh.

“You don’t know what that means!” said he. “The first herd up from Texas!” He babbled, speaking of revolutions, epochs, swift changes.

One by one he met the wild crew of the Del Sol men, who wore a garb and spoke a language unfamiliar to himself. Praying for trail herds from the South, the Northern men never really visualized the new personnel which was pushing north from the lower range. Indeed at that time of the American civilization there had been but little actual interchange of population between the North and the South. The natural expansion of the republic had been westward. As to the old cruel line of Mason and Dixon, it never fully was broken down by the Civil war. But here was the first break—the penetration of a peaceful, natural commerce, here on the Western plains. Through that opening, in the years immediately to come, flowed values greater than those of barter and trade in horned kine. A manly understanding passed back and forth, and out of that a tacit union, a concord in all young strong impulses. That union of North and South built the West overnight. The world has never seen a better country.

That empire gave us our first and only true American tradition—the tradition of the West. Great as that American tradition is, grotesque as we have rendered it, far as we have carried from dignity and truth the tradition of the West, “the Range” still is a word to conjure with to-day, and will be to-morrow. Here, then, was the very beginning of that great tradition. It was no more than a generation ago.

“My Lord!” repeated the Northern man. “Just look at them! I guess that’s all the cattle in the world.”

“No, I don’t reckon so,” replied Nabours. “We got sever’l left down in Texas. Come along; you must meet the owner of them all.”

They approached Taisie Lockhart’s camp where the giant carts—things of wonder to the stockyards man—stood gaunt and grim in the twilight. Taisie was superintending the preparation of the evening meal, her women busy at the fire. At first the Northern man took her to be one of the young riders of the herd. She stood straight and free of self-consciousness as any of the men; as brown of face and hand, much like them in apparel. She wore the universal checked trousers, stuffed into her boots. But the boots apparently had been made by loving hands, so neat were they, so sewed with countless little seams. And at their tops, in red, was the Lone Star of Texas.

Taisie’s cotton shirt, a man’s shirt, was open at the neck. Above the high-water mark of the ardent sun, protected by her hat brim, flowed back the mass of her bright hair, which for sake of comfort she wore now, as customarily, in a great queue wrapped with thong, as though she were some Indian woman. True, she might have been the forerunning arbiter of woman’s ways of costume fifty years later in the West; but Taisie Lockhart’s dress was not done in any imitation or any affectation. She had chosen it for two reasons—firstly, because she was broke; secondly, because it was convenient.

“Miss Lockhart,” remarked Jim Nabours in the formula which he best knew, “shake hands with Mr. ——. What did you tell me your name was?”

“McCoyne—Joe McCoyne, of Abilene, ma’am. I’m pleased to meet you.” Which also was in conformance with ineradicable formula.

Taisie held out her hand in silence, with her usual straight glance.

“You didn’t expect to see me down here from Abilene, did you, Miss Lockhart?” began the stockyards man.

“Why, no sir; are we almost there?”

“Right there. It ain’t much over two hundred mile. I knew there’d be a herd up this year. I was telling your foreman that I met a Mr. McMasters, Daniel McMasters, a while back, over around Baxter Springs. He said he was going down to Central Texas. You don’t happen to know him?”

The swift blood surged up to Taisie’s forehead.

“Why, yes; he rode with us for a time.”

But the Northern man was all for business. He cleared his throat.

“Miss Lockhart,” said he, “I’ve been offering your man twelve dollars a head straight through. I’d contract for them at that right here.”

Taisie Lockhart gave a sudden gasp. Twelve dollars a head meant riches! But she turned toward her trail boss, who had emitted an ominous cough, audible a quarter of a mile, and began now to wink so portentously that even the blind must have given him attention. She hesitated, her eyes dubious. The stranger laughed.

“I see you’ve got to talk it over together.”

But his zeal for Abilene overcame even his own disposition to do a turn in personal trade. Besides, the personality of this young woman produced its usual effect, on him as on most men.

“I want to buy your cattle, Miss Lockhart,” said he, “and maybe I will; but let’s not talk price any more down here. This is the first herd to come to Abilene, and I’m going to see that you get the best price possible, so when you carry the news back to Texas that’ll bring more herds up next year. I don’t want to rob as young and fine-looking a woman as you are; and besides that, the first one to come up the trail.”

“And the last!” said Jim Nabours conclusively. “You don’t know what I’ve been through!”

The stranger smiled humorously, his eyes once more turning to the young girl, of unmistakably gentle breeding. “In a way, you don’t belong here,” said he.

“Come an’ git it!” came the supper call of Buck, the negro cook, now rising at his fireside.

The men not engaged on the herd straggled in toward the fire. The distant crooning of the hands at the bed ground came through the twilight. The stockman threw back his shoulders, drew a deep breath.

“I been having a little fever and ague, ma’am,” said he; “but come to think of it, it’s quit. I’d rather be here than any place else in the world.”

“We have quinine,” said Taisie Lockhart, “and coffee and boiled beef, and some very good bread that Milly has made. Won’t you please sit down with us?”

They all sat upon the ground around the little fire, children, contented. The world still was young.