Part 2

“Uh-huh, I sure am. Now, I know what I want to do, Windy.”

“You’ll get killed sure as thunder.”

“Thanks, Windy.”

“I wouldn’t advise it,” says Bowers. “I sure wouldn’t.”

“Which entirely makes up my mind,” grins Hashknife. “Why don’t you rise to object, Sleepy?”

“Go ahead,” says I. “Ventilation won’t hurt yuh none, I reckon.”

Hashknife went. About noon the next day he saddles his bronc, refuses to let us go with him, and rides away.

“You ain’t got a lick of sense, Hashknife!” yells Windy.

“I know it,” says Hashknife. “This is a job that takes brains, so I’m leavin’ the brains behind me to keep safe.”

“Now, what did he mean, Sleepy?” asks Windy.

“I dunno. The longer I lives with that blamed hatchet-faced cross between a danged fool and a heavenly angel, the less I _sabe_ his _wau-wau_. Mebbe he wants to commit suicide, but I’m bettin’ money that he ain’t.”

It was about two hours before we seen him come into sight. He pokes into the ranch, takes his saddle off and comes up to the porch, dragging the saddle with him.

“Well, yuh got back, I see,” grins Windy.

“Yuh got good eyesight, Windy. Awful hot today. Got a blister on my heel, too.”

“Well, did yuh bring any messages from the Bar 20, Hashknife?” I asks.

“Uh-huh--two. Long distance, as yuh might say.”

“Meanin’ what?” inquires Windy. Hashknife pulls his saddle over to him and yanks it around. Then he points to a long jagged rip in the fork, where a bullet plowed its way. Then he points to a jagged hole, drilled plumb through the right side of the cantle.

“Read ’em for youselves,” says he, grinning. “The first one busted into the fork and the next one just grazed my boot as I flipped off the saddle.”

“Where?” asks Windy.

“Just across the Cow Crick. I reckon it’s Cow Crick. I’m just goin’ up the far bank, when I gets reminded that I ain’t wanted. I humps out of the saddle before the next message arrives. I sure comes close to gettin’ peeled. I lit low down behind the bank and my bronc went across the crick into some willers. I sure tried to spot that bushwhacker, but he was too far away. A magpie gave him away by flyin’ over his location and then doin’ a upward twist, but there wasn’t much between him and me, and the danged fool shoots too close for comfort. Then I had to chase that fool bronc for half a mile before I got my hands on him, and I got a blister on my heel--dang the luck!”

“You ought to cuss your luck,” says Windy. “You’re lucky to be alive.”

“Must be a big blister,” complains Hashknife. “Got my feet wet, too.”

“I hope you’re satisfied,” says I, and Hashknife nods.

“Uh-huh, I’m satisfied of one thing, Sleepy.”

“What’s that?”

“I dunno--yet. I’ve got to do somethin’ for that blister.”

Hashknife limps down to the bunk-house, dragging his saddle.

“What do yuh reckon he found out?” asks Windy. “Why is he satisfied?”

“Don’t ask me, Windy, and it won’t do yuh no good to ask him. A clam is a howling hyena beside that jasper, when he wants to keep still about his thoughts.”

Then he wants to see the place they calls the Devil’s Dooryard; so Windy guides us to that place. It sure looks like it might ’a’ been. Once on a time it was a volcano which busted out the side of the mountain and it sure made a barren spot out of a piece of country about two miles wide and three miles long.

Man, that must ’a’ been a hot place at one time. There ain’t a danged thing growing there. She’s just a humped-up mass of pillars, boulders and jagged rocks, kind of red and yaller and melted-like. The floor of it is solid rock, where the lava spewed over the side of the mountain. This rock is kinda like glass, having been heated so blamed hot.

We rides up one side of it, almost to the top, but she’s all alike. It ain’t no place to ride a horse on account of the sharp rocks. At the top is just one high cliff of the same rocks, sticking two or three hundred feet high into the air. The whole divide is one series of cliffs. We rides back to the foot of it and sits down to rest in the shade of a pillar.

“This place is sure well named,” opines Hashknife. “I reckon it was too hot for the devil, so he moved to his present location. This is where that Bar 20 puncher got shot, eh?”

“That’s what they say,” nods Windy. “It’s about five miles to the Bar 20 from here. I reckon he just hung on and let his bronc take him home.”

“Do yuh reckon he lied?” asks Hashknife.

“No, I don’t. Barrin’ the fact that he works for the Bar 20, Baldy ain’t such a bad _hombre_. I worked with him on the Seven Bar Seven Horse outfit, and he ain’t the kind that would lie thataway. Likely he just got it in his mind, don’t yuh know? Kinda knowin’ he was on the Circle Dot Range, and then gettin’ shot thataway, he might ’a’ imagined somebody yelled at him.”

“I reckon somebody yelled at him,” says Hashknife.

“Yuh think he--uh--told the truth?” asks Windy.

“I dunno. Mebbe they did and mebbe they didn’t. If they did, the Circle Dot has got it on the Bar 20, ’cause nobody yelled at me, that’s a cinch.”

“I reckon they keeps close watch on us,” opines Windy.

* * * * *

We rides back to the ranch and the next morning we went to Sundown City. As we rides in past the little depot, the agent yells at us and we goes over. He’s got a telegram for us, which reads:

WILL ARRIVE WEDNESDAY. HANG ON UNTIL I GET THERE.

Signed M. J. HALEY.

“Holy henhawks!” explodes Windy. “He’s comin’! Hang on until I get there! That sounds like old Mike’s voice. Betcha forty dollars he’s a go-getter.”

“That’s tomorrow,” says Hashknife. “What’s the nearest station down the line, Windy?”

“Kelly’s Fork. It’s about six miles, but a train don’t stop there unless she’s flagged.”

“We’ll flag her,” says Hashknife. “We’re going to surprise some of these wise jaspers. _Sabe?_ If we waits for him to come here, everybody will see him, don’t yuh see? That’ll make four of us, Windy, and if this here Haley is hard-boiled we can stand off the Bar 20 or any other cow-stealin’ outfit.”

“Yeah, that’s a hy-iu scheme, Hashknife. We’ll just do that little thing. Train is due along there about noon.”

There’s a lot of Bar 20 broncs at the tie-rack, and Hashknife wants to go over and see what the owners look like, but me and Windy points out the error of his ways and tells him that we’ve got to be intact to meet the new owner of the Circle Dot.

“I reckon it’s right,” admits Hashknife, “but I feels that I’m bein’ hoodled out of town. I’d swap lead with all that bunch, Windy--if they can’t shoot any straighter than they did at you.”

“That _hombre_ that bushwhacked you shot straight enough,” says I.

“Nope. He would have hit me both times.”

“Maybe he didn’t want to hit yuh.”

“Never thought of that, Sleepy. Huh! He’s a wonder at missin’, if he didn’t.”

The next day we rides to Kelly’s Fork, and takes a saddled horse for our new boss to ride back. We flagged the train and I’m betting that half of the passengers thought it was a hold-up. The conductor howls like blazes when he finds why we stopped him, but Hashknife says:

“Shucks, you ought to be glad we only want a passenger. We’ll go with yuh.”

The conductor cusses a little more, but swings on to the coach with us and we all pilgrims down the aisle, the conductor calling:

“M. J. Haley! M. J. Haley! M. J. Haley! Is M. J. Haley on board?”

We went through two cars before we gets a response. A tired-looking girl takes the conductor by the sleeve and stops him. He says to her:

“Excuse me, ma’am, but I haven’t time to talk to you now. M. J. Haley! M. J. Haley! Is M. J. Haley on board?”

“I am M. J. Haley,” says the lady. “Is--is somebody looking for me?”

“M. J. Haley?” grunts Windy. “Nun-not M. J. Huh--Haley of the Circle Dot?”

“Yes,” says she, “from San Francisco.”

“Well, get off!” snaps the conductor. “I can’t hold this train all day.”

I grabs her valise, and we staggers down the aisle and swings to the ground.

“Must be a mistake,” opines Windy, scratching his head. “We was lookin’ for a man named M. J. Haley.”

“A lawyer, a Mr. Winters, sent me,” says she. “I am Mary Jane Haley.”

“Well, I hope to die,” gasps Windy. “I hope to die.”

“If yuh don’t shut your mouth you’ll get your tonsils sunburnt,” says Hashknife.

“Well, I’ll be everlastin’ly teetotally jiggered!” grunts Windy. “Whatcha know about that? Was Mike Haley a kin of yours, miss?”

“He was my father’s brother, I believe,” says she, and I can see her eyes laughing at Windy’s funny expression.

“Uh,” says Windy, kinda vacant-like. “Yes’m.”

“Will you take me out to the farm?” she asks.

“Farm?” says Windy, and then looks at Hashknife, whose face is serious. Then Windy looks at her and half-nods his head.

“Yeah--oh sure. Uh-huh, but we don’t call ’em farms, ma’am. We can take yuh out there--in fact, we came after yuh, but----”

Windy glances at her clothes and then looks at Hashknife, who shakes his head and says:

“Yuh see ma’am, we looked for a man person, who natcherally don’t wear skirts, and we ain’t got nothin’ but a saddle-horse and no extra pants and--Sleepy, fer ----’s sake get in on this explanation, will yuh? Standin’ there like a grinnin’ hyener.”

“I think I understand,” says she.

“Bless yuh for that, ma’am,” says Hashknife, wiping his brow. “That ---- Sleepy makes me sore sometimes. Oh, he talks a plenty when he ought to keep still.”

M. J. Haley sees the funny side of things and we all laughs together.

“I’ve got a idea,” says Hashknife. “Mebbe that little store over there has overalls, Windy.”

“I would wear them,” says Mary Jane, and Hashknife grins like a fool and says--

“Come on ma’am; if he’s got ’em we’ll get ’em, and if he ain’t got no back room for yuh to dress in I’ll make him come out in the street.”

He had ’em all right. I dunno how Mary Jane got into ’em, but she did. I let her ride my bronc, ’cause the one we brings for M. J. Haley wasn’t no ladies’ saddle-animal. Yuh can mostly always sometimes tell about a feller, if yuh see him on a high-minded bronc, and we wanted M. J. Haley to measure right up to us.

Mary Jane never rode a horse before, but she was game. I knowed danged well that them overalls ached a heap by the time we hit the Circle Dot, but she don’t chirp a bit over discomfort.

Sing Lee has swamped out Mike’s bood-wah for her and we lets her move right in. She ain’t been in there long when Bowers comes poking up the main road. He naturally comes over to see us.

“Blubber has likely lost another cow,” says Windy, but Blubber didn’t speak of lost cows. He rides up to us and says--

“Did he come?”

“Who?” asks Windy.

“The new feller who is goin’ to boss this outfit.”

“There ain’t no feller goin’ to boss this outfit,” states Windy.

“Zasso? Huh. Station agent says that yuh got a telegraft from M. J. Haley who says he’s comin’ today. Train comes in, but nobody gets off. Some of the Bar 20 was down there to see what he looks like.”

“Was they disappointed?” asks Hashknife.

“Natcherally. I comes up to see why he didn’t come. The sheriff was wonderin’ who he was, and I thought maybe you’d--uh----”

“Did yuh?” says Hashknife. “Your thoughts are like your talk, Bowers--kinda suckin’ mud. What’s it any of the sheriff’s business?”

“I dunno. Say, Baldy Willis died this mornin’.”

“----!” says Windy, soft-like. “Poor old Baldy.”

“Uh-huh,” admits Bowers. “But it’s just like I said--he didn’t have no danged business on this range, nohow. When a feller has been warned to keep off----”

“Let your voice fall, Blubber,” says Windy. “You’ve talked enough. _Sabe?_ Me nor none of this outfit had anything to do with killin’ Baldy, and the next _hombre_ what insinuates that we did is goin’ kihootin’ to his God or beat me on the draw. That goes for you, the sheriff or any of that cow-stealin’ Bar 20 outfit. _Sabe?_”

“Honest to ---- I ain’t insinuatin’ nothin’” wails Bowers. “Whatcha ridin’ me fer? I’ve lost twenty-seven head of cows in the last week, and I ain’t----”

“Yo’re all packed, wired and billed for shipment--git off this ranch!” yowls Windy. “I don’t care if somebody steals all your cows! I hope they do. I hope you’re the last calf they slickears. I hope they slaps every brand in the State register on your hide and then adds a dewlap and notches your ears.”

“That ain’t no way to talk,” grumbles Blubber, tearful-like. “I try to git along and----”

“You better do somethin’ besides try to git along,” says Windy. “You just ‘get along,’ Bowers, and get along fast.”

Bowers swings his horse around and points toward home.

“What did he want?”

We turns and looks at Mary Jane, standing in the doorway.

“Aw-w, he’s a danged maul-headed prairie-dog, which has to chirp every time somebody lifts one of his dogies,” says Windy.

* * * * *

Mary Jane laughs and shakes her head.

“I don’t think I understand.”

“He means that this person ain’t such a much,” explains Hashknife, “and that he gets husky in the neck because somebody rustles his beef.”

“You might try saying it different,” says she, looking at me.

“Well,” says I, “this whippoorwill is about three jumps short of being half-witted and he----”

“No,” says Mary Jane, “that isn’t exactly clear either.”

“He ain’t got good sense, ma’am,” says Hashknife.

“The ---- I ain’t!” I snaps, ’cause it makes me mad.

“Back up--you’re in your own loop,” grins Hashknife; “I was speakin’ about Bowers, Sleepy,” and then he turns to Mary Jane.

“This person ain’t got good sense, ma’am. He thinks that somebody is stealin’ his cows and he comes over here to talk about it.”

“Oh, I see; who does he suspect?”

“Us, I reckon,” says Windy. “They think we killed Baldy Willis, too.”

“Yuh better tell her the whole sad tale, Windy,” says Hashknife. “Remember she ain’t wise to that layout here.”

“That’s right, Hashknife, I forgot I want to give her some of the old man’s things too.”

“Let’s go inside,” says Mary Jane. “It’s too hot out here.”

“You tell her, Windy,” says Hashknife. “Me and Sleepy will be down at the bunk-house.”

In about half an hour we hears a pistol-shot and we tumbles out of the bunk-house, heeled for trouble. There ain’t nobody in sight, but pretty soon Windy comes down to see us.

“Hear her shoot?” he asks. “Didja?”

“Her shoot?” parrots Hashknife.

“Uh-huh. Mary Jane Haley fired her first shot. Honest to gosh. Missed my ear by the breadth of a gnat’s whisker.”

“Shootin’ at you?”

“We-e-e-ll, kinda at me, Hashknife. I tells her the story of the Circle Dot and then I gives her old Mike’s effects, which included his old .45 Colt. She looks at the old gun, and says, ‘Do I have to carry a gun like that?’

“I says, ‘It’s a danged good gun, if it ain’t too hard to pull.’ I shows her what I means and she tries it. Dang the luck! I thought Mike emptied it into Blazer, but I reckon he only shot five times.”

“Scare her?” I asks.

“I dunno. I went under the sofy like a picket-pin when he sees a hawk. When I peeked out she’s still got the gun in her hand, and is kinda feelin’ of the spot over her heart. I loaded it for her, but made her leave it on the table until I got to the door.”

“We’ll teach her how to shoot,” says I.

“No you won’t,” objects Windy, “but we will have to teach her to point it at enemies instead of friends.”

“Here comes the sheriff,” says Hashknife. “Wonder what he wants?”

The sheriff rides in the gate and heads toward the house, so we moves up and meets him at the steps.

“Nice large afternoon,” says Hashknife, pleasant-like.

The sheriff gives a short nod and looks at the open door of the house. Then he turns to Windy, and says----

“I’d like to see M. J. Haley.”

“Yuh would?”

“I said I would.”

“What for?”

Windy says this kinda soft-like and the sheriff squints at him for several seconds before he says----

“Baldy Willis died.”

“Yeah, we heard about it,” says Hashknife. “What’s M. J. Haley got to do with Baldy Willis’ demise?”

“Baldy was shot on the Circle Dot Range,” says the sheriff, meaning-like. “He didn’t have no business on this range, I reckon, but--I want to see the owner of this outfit. _Sabe?_ He’s responsible, or I’ll hold him responsible until I can put the deadwood on the guilty man.”

“Snag Thorn send yuh?” asks Hashknife.

“He did not! He told me to keep out of this, but I’m the sheriff, and----”

“Bein’ sheriff means quite a lot to you, don’t it?” asks Hashknife. “You’d just be plumb miserable if yuh wasn’t sheriff, wouldn’t yuh, Allen?”

“I didn’t come here to listen to you yappin’,” says he. “I want the man who owns this here ranch. _Sabe?_”

“Were you looking for some one?”

We all turns and looks at the door where Mary Jane is standing. The sheriff looks at her and then at us.

“There’s the owner of the Circle Dot,” says Hashknife. “Try to arrest her.”

The sheriff stares at her for a long time and then looks at us.

“Yuh figure she had anythin’ to do with the killin’ of Baldy?” asks Windy.

The sheriff sort of starts to reach up to his hat but his hand stops and rubs his chin. Then he turns his horse around and starts for the gate. He just says one word, and that is kinda like he was speakin’ to himself----

Mary Jane looks at us and then at Hack Allen, who is poking off down the road. Hashknife steps up beside her and then grins at us.

“The boss was sure heeled,” says he, and then he took her hand from the folds of her skirt, and I’m a liar if she didn’t have the .45 Colt. In the other hand she’s got a small bottle. Hashknife peers at the bottle and then kinda grins back of his hand.

“I--I--Mr. Woods said it needed oil, so I--” says she.

“Uh-huh,” says Hashknife, serious-like. “But yuh hadn’t ought to--uh--ma’am. I reckon a gun has feelin’s and mebbe--well, I’ve took that kinda stuff myself, and I sure mixed her plentiful with lemon juice, and even at that--uh----”

“I thought that oil was oil,” says she.

“Oh sure,” nods Hashknife. “It sure is, but--uh--that old six-shooter ain’t sick. _Sabe?_ I’ll get yuh some gun-oil.”

“Would yuh have shot at the sheriff?” asks Windy.

“It--it seems to be the thing around here,” says she, serious-like. Hashknife stares at her for a moment and then at us.

“Ma’am, I’m plumb glad you wasn’t a he. Some fellers are so danged timid.”

“I am,” says she. “I have never done anything more serious than to sell lace in a department store. The lawyer found me there and I had just got my week’s pay, and also a notice that my services were no longer required. The lawyer was lovely to me, and--he said that Mr. Hartley was a close friend of his.”

“Sure was close once,” nods Hashknife. “Old Whiskers with his hay-hook wasn’t far behind us either. I reckon there’s a heap of difference between the he-men out here and the ones in town. Cow-punchers are rough, ma’am, but they don’t mean half what they do or say. I hope you’ll excuse Windy and Sleepy if they makes bad breaks at times ---- knows I’ve done my dangest for ’em.”

* * * * *

“I knew a cowboy once,” says she. “I know now that he was a cowboy, but he didn’t say he was. It was in San Francisco a year ago. There were four of us--another girl, and two young men from the store and myself. We went slumming down to Chinatown and the Barbary Coast.

“We were up in a Chinese noodle-house when a number of young men came in; I think they were drunk. One of them tried to kiss me. The young man who was with me asked him to stop and another of the crowd knocked him down.

“The Chinese were frightened. Some of the other men grabbed Gladys, and--oh, it was awful! I saw one of the men hit a Chinaman with a chair and then one of them grabbed me and tried to pull me across the table, but just then a man came from somewhere.

“He was wearing a big hat and I remember that he did not have any necktie or coat on, and he was smiling. He crashed into the crowd and tore his way to us girls, and then I saw his hand swinging a gun, and it hit a man on the head--then another!”

Mary Jane’s eyes were as big as saucers as she describes it.

“Then somebody fired a shot and I saw the blood trickle down his cheek where something had hurt him and he stopped hitting and began shooting. The booth was filled with smoke in a moment and the shots ceased. I heard him say----

“‘Ma’am, I reckon we better get out of here before the police and the undertaker comes.’

“I don’t know how we ever got out of there. I had to step over men who were lying on the floor and then I found myself in the open air, and Gladys was crying, and the man got a hack and took us home. I tried to thank him, but he just grinned, and then I--I grabbed him and kissed him! Honest I did. And as I ran into the house I heard him say----

“‘Well, I’ll be hornswoggled!’

“I have never seen him since then. I know I did not thank him enough, but if I ever see him again----”

“Yuh done quite a lot for him,” says Hashknife. “More than the lawyer done for me. Still, I reckon, he didn’t feel like kissin’ me. Did the police make any fuss over it?”

“We looked in the papers the next day, and it told about a fight in which three gangsters were killed and two more wounded. They were all wanted by the police, but it said nothing about the cowboy. If I ever see him again I want to thank him again.”

“Sure,” says Windy; “we all do. He sure done us a favor, too, ma’am.”

“I wish you would call me Mary Jane.”

“All right,” grins Hashknife, “but you’ve sure got to cut out misterin’ us, Mary Jane. We’re sort of ele-mental, as the poet would say. Hash, wind and sleep. Ain’t that elements? Haw! Haw! Haw!”

“Well,” says Mary Jane, grinning, “yuh might give me that gun-oil, so’s I can limber up this old six-gun.”

“Wel-l-l-come to our cow-camp!” explodes Windy. “That sounded just like old Mike, y’betcha. Mary Jane, if yuh wants anything out of the ordinary in cuss words I can loan yuh some that the old man used to patronize.”

“They’ll come to her,” grins Hashknife. “Wait till she gets mad.”

A little later here comes a tall gray-haired feller in a buckboard. He drives up to the bunk-house and speaks to Windy.

“Howdy, judge,” says Windy. “Meet Mister Hartley and Mister Stevens. Gents, this is Judge Waugh.”

We shakes hands all around and then the judge says:

“Windy, I came up here to have a talk with you. I suppose you heard about Pete Kelso getting shot.”

“When did this happen?” asks Windy.

“About noon or a little later--over by Cactus Cañon. Jimmy and Al Orr found him. Shot with a .45-70. Likely live, I guess.”

“----!” exploded Windy. “Why, we came that way--huh!”

“Jimmy and Al said they thought it was you. They said there was four in the bunch.”

“Cactus Cañon is on the Circle Dot Range, too,” says Windy, serious-like, and the judge nods.

“Yes.”

“We don’t know who done it, judge,” says Hashknife. “It’s a cinch that we didn’t. Somebody ripped my saddle all to pieces the other day, when I rides on to Bar 20 land.”

“Tell me about it.”

Hashknife gives him the details.

“I don’t know,” says the judge. “Of course there has been bad blood between these outfits for years. Each accuses the other of rustling, but neither has any evidence. This shooting is getting serious. Lost any stock lately, Windy?”

“I dunno. I do know that I seen seven cows with young calves down by the old salt springs, and the next day I finds seven bawlin’ cows and nary a calf. It ain’t reasonable to reckon that them cows all deserted their offsprings.”

“The Bar 20 is boiling,” states the judge. “Snag Thorn is keeping cool, but he’s cool just like his father used to be. The sheriff wanted to arrest all of you, but Snag told him to keep out of it and let him attend to you. They had quite a quarrel. I met Bowers as I came out, and he told me he lost some more cows and a couple of young horses. I guess Bowers is just about cleaned out.”

“Well,” says Hashknife, “we ain’t honin’ for trouble, but if they comes out here I reckon we’ll do like they do in Spain when it rains.”

“How’s that?” asks the judge.

“Let it rain.”