Part 8

He gaped, then squeezed the mighty muscles of Big John’s shoulder and laughed. All this fuss about a cow--one forlorn dun cow. The puncher grinned in his turn, shuffling his feet; for they knew and understood each other, these two, having been associated for eighteen years. That is why Bockus received the strange explanation he did when he called to protest against the delay in delivering Molly.

“It’s just this way,” the cattleman observed, slipping an elastic band about his tally-book. “If I let you have that cow for thirty, I lose precisely nine hundred and thirty-seven dollars. No; Molly stays.”

“Nine hundred and--Why, man, you’re crazy! How’s that?”

“Ask those strikers of mine,” came the answer, accompanied by a chuckle. “Great weather, isn’t it? How is veal selling to-day?”

“But look a-here, Vance, let me have the calf, anyway. You owe me that much,” the fat Bockus protested.

“All right. Send out for him, though,” said the cattleman.

It happened that Bockus despatched a youth with a pair of mules hitched to a wagon, for the calf. He was a wily urchin, and a glance satisfied him that Molly’s son could be taken from her only by craft. Accordingly he loafed all of one forenoon in the horse pasture with his wagon close at hand, and when the unsuspecting Jersey strayed off some hundreds of yards to secure better grazing, he made a sudden descent upon the white-face, locked his fingers about its nose so that the calf could not utter a sound, threw and tied him, then heaved the outraged victim into the wagon and made off. Molly returned shortly, and missing the apple of her eye, set out on a search of the immediate vicinity. In the distance a wagon raised the dust of the Blackwater trail, going rapidly. The boy did not feel any too secure even with a fence between them, and lashed his mules, shrilling oaths at the gawky beasts.

The cow brought up at the fence, every sense on the alert to detect the presence of the calf in the fast-disappearing vehicle. Some subtle intuition told Molly he was there, and she retreated a few steps. Then, with a crash, she went through the four strands of wire, and, with a long gash in her left shoulder dripping blood, started after them at a swinging trot.

Brother Ducey was conducting an open-air revival service among the mining population of Blackwater. He was a powerful exhorter, was the brother, and, as most of his congregation were women, with a sprinkling of men who would presently go on the night shift six hundred feet into the bowels of the earth, his picture of a lurid, living perdition had them swaying and rocking on the benches. Their groans and lamentations rolled up the street.

“You’re all a-going to hell!” he shouted. “Your feet are on the hot bricks now. Hell is--” And, again-- “Hell--”

Brother Ducey broke off and glared wrathfully at an imp of a boy who drove a clanking wagon at top speed completely around the meeting-place, making for the slaughter-house beyond.

Then Molly arrived and took no such devious route. She went straight through the congregation, overturning the mourners’ bench, and, unable to differentiate between friends and foes, headed for the rostrum. Brother Ducey waved his arms wildly and squalled “Shoo!” But, as Molly would not “shoo,” he scaled a tree with the speed of a lizard, from which vantage-point he besought somebody to shoot the animal.

The Jersey did not pause to trifle with these hysterical worshipers. Her business was to find her baby, and she was almost up with him. In truth, the cow was an awesome sight as she charged anew after the wagon, the blood trailing from her shoulder, froth flaking her muzzle. Evidently the butcher’s assistant found her so.

“I can’t beat her to the gate!” he gasped, with a glance backward.

Whereupon he wheeled again and galloped his team in front of Bockus’ store. There he abandoned them, springing through the door just as Molly swept down the road. The calf bawled a greeting and the Jersey began to circle the wagon, occasionally prodding at the mules just to be on the safe side in the event of their having had anything to do with this theft. They kicked at her in return, but did not offer to run away.

“Somebody rope her! Somebody rope her!” Bockus cried, dancing up and down in his shop. “No, don’t shoot. Them locoed Tumbling K’s will wipe out the town if you do.”

Alas, there was nobody in Blackwater competent to do it. They were a peaceful, industrious mining folk, and a cow was a dubious thing to them, to be handled respectfully in the best of moods. And an enraged animal like Molly! Blackwater suspended business, shut up shop, and hid indoors or took refuge on the roof.

From time to time Molly abandoned the wagon temporarily to seek revenge where it might be given to her. In this way she made forays over half the town, and put Bill Terry, the postmaster, through a new plate-glass window that Tom Zeigler had imported at enormous expense. Tom swore that Vance would have to pay for it.

“Send for one of them fool cowboys!” Bockus screamed, after an hour of this.

His boy stole forth on an emaciated pony, and, eluding the cow by a burst of speed, brought Blackwater’s prayerful appeal to the Tumbling K headquarters.

We rode in and roped Molly. Then certain of us did some trafficking with Bockus, Big John laying down the terms, with the result that the cord around the calf’s legs was loosed and he was restored to his mother.

All the blind savagery was departed from Molly now. She sauntered over to a patch of grass and began to eat, with the calf at her heels, and the stare she turned on the citizens of Blackwater was noncommittal, even kindly.

Her departure took on something of the character of a pageant. Brother Ducey was induced to make an oration--or he could not be restrained--at any rate, Brother Ducey delivered a speech setting forth the extraordinary qualities of the cow. It was really a remarkable tribute, but all the notice Molly took was to flick one ear as she masticated a bunch of grass.

“And, brethern and sisters, what does this brave creature teach us? Hey?” he demanded, in conclusion.

“I dunno,” mumbled a gentleman at whom he was staring, in a hopeless tone.

“I ask you-all ag’in, what she done taught us when she come a-seeking of her young in the very heart of our meetin’? Why, it’s plain as the mole on Lon Rainey’s face,” cried Brother Ducey. “I forgive her a-chasing of me up that cottonwood,--it’s a right good thing it was so handy,--and Miz Ducey kin sew the pants. But what did this noble animal show? Jist what I was praying of you-all to reveal, brethern and sisters. She showed love and devotion, and a generous sacrifice for somebody else besides her own self. That’s what she done showed. You-all do likewise. Brother Perry will now pass the hat.”

We took Molly back to the Tumbling K and turned her into the horse pasture. She came peaceably enough, six of us acting as escort of honor. She is there now, followed everywhere she goes by a husky red calf with a white face. Molly is firmly persuaded that he is her son and the pride of the range.

VII THE BABY AND THE PUMA

The wagon jolted and whined over rough ground, winding among giant pines. Off to the right followed a tawny shape, flitting from blotch of shadow to screening bush, blending with the blurred outlines of tree and rock. The moon was hidden and Brother Schoonover drove with circumspection, lest his ark and all his possessions be wrecked in the wilderness.

“Doggone that moon. It ain’t never working when you need it right bad,” cried Brother Schoonover, cracking his whip. “That limb was like to blind me. Stead-ay, Glossy. Now, girl--now.”

The puma crouched flat on hearing the voice. Then the wagon drew out of sight beyond a tope of trees and he sprang to the shelter of a mesquite. There he peered again at the nester’s outfit going down the valley through the dark. It labored heavily; Brother Schoonover’s tones reached him, raised in sharp rebuke of the mare; and presently he slunk in pursuit.

Don’t imagine that Bowallopus--such was he dubbed from that night of adventure--was stalking prey. Nothing was farther removed from his purpose. He was dreadfully afraid, but curiosity overrode fear! Time and again he halted to abandon the game and go about the serious things of life, but could not. The wagon and its inmates had him fast.

Bowallopus was not even hungry, but he trailed along in rear. Perhaps there lurked a sneaking hope far back in that hard skull of his that something might transpire toward the further easement of his stomach, but it never for a moment dulled his caution.

The nester whistled at the mare and urged her forward, and twice the harsh scream of the brakes stayed Bowallopus rigid in his tracks. It should not be held against Brother Schoonover that he forgot on three occasions the Biblical limitations as regards profane words, because the night was deceptive and he was far from water. All he had on earth was with him there in the wagon, and he could descry no suitable place to camp. The family spring-bed was slung from ropes off the floor under the arched canvas top, and on it his wife slept. Curled warmly in the hollow of her arm was the baby. Sometimes the lurchings of their home rolled him quite away from her side, to return him on the rebound. He slept placidly, being a seasoned traveler.

Just before descending a gulch to cross a dried creek-bed, Brother Schoonover drove slap against a large rock, being now far off any trails. The wagon careened to the point of overturning and the baby slid from his mother’s arms. Mrs. Schoonover had raised the canvas for purposes of ventilation--she suffered from an affection of the lungs--and he shot downward through the hole. Being utterly helpless, he was unhurt. He hit the ground lightly and the wheel missed him a full half-inch.

Of course the shock woke the baby, but he was so astonished for a minute that he could only hold his breath ready for what might befall. When he did let out a yell, the wagon was thumping over the stones, with the driver standing up to beat the mare, and the couple in it could not have heard a steam calliope ten yards off.

Bowallopus vanished when the brown bundle dropped. A hundred paces and he halted in a thicket, arrested by a gurgling treble cry. The puma had seen children before, playing near the shack of a Mexican woodchopper, and he knew that note of distress. Very cautiously he crept back and began to circle.

The felidae steal upon their prey noiselessly, treading on the soft elastic pads of the soles of the feet, without risk of betrayal from the rustle caused by non-retractile claws. When within a short distance, they crouch and spring, bounding many times their length upon their unsuspecting victims, which, borne down by the descending weight of the fierce foe, are at once fastened upon by the deadly grip of the well-armed jaw and by the united action of eighteen fully-extended piercing claws.

So says an old school book--or it may be an ancient natural history--and it is very illuminating and authoritative. But it happens that Bowallopus belonged to a class of felidae which does not prey upon man or the children of men, and he did none of these things. He waited until the groaning of the wagon died away, his head up, keen for sound or sight of danger. A puma relies more on his ears and eyes than on his nose to apprise him of enemy or victim. Then he went forward stealthily, moving in a wide semicircle.

The baby threshed about with his chubby arms and howled, whereat Bowallopus shrank back, hissing like an enraged gander, his tail lashing from side to side. Perhaps the threatening noise chilled the boy to silence; at any rate he broke off in his wail and lay quiet. The lion went nearer. He stood above the brown bundle, his muscles ready for combat or instant flight, and eyed it suspiciously. Much as a house cat would pick up a questionable bit of loot from the floor, Bowallopus seized the dress in his teeth and lifted the baby. Schoonover, Jr., waved a pudgy hand in lively terror and slapped the beast on the nose. Horribly surprised, Bowallopus dropped him and sprang back. Then he gathered himself to leap.

“Hi!” yelled Brother Schoonover.

The lion snarled as he turned to flee, but the nester had stopped in his run and was down on one knee. Bowallopus cleared the distance between him and some brush with a magnificent, sinuous jump, but as he went, a crashing sound smote his ears and sharp burning pains ripped along loins and back. Brother Schoonover had loaded his old smooth-bore with bird-shot that day to the end that he might pot a dog-rabbit or a brace of wild doves for supper, and Bowallopus received the entire charge.

Without paying the slightest heed to the fleeing puma, the nester threw down his weapon and clasped his son. Instantly the baby shrieked his loudest, and “God, he ain’t hurt a bit,” cried Brother Schoonover in a great voice. He was shaking like a cottonwood leaf and his fright impelled the child to further outcry, so contagious is fear. And now Mrs. Schoonover came running, unable to remain longer in the wagon with bone of her bone and flesh of her flesh lying helpless somewhere in the dark along the trail--she could see him dead. She prayed audibly as she ran.

“Give him to me,” she said, snatching the baby from his sire as though he had been much to blame.

“It weren’t my fault, Sally Jo,” he protested.

“You drive most awful reckless, Brother Schoonover,” returned his wife, and hugged her son closer.

“He ain’t hurt a mite. Just scared,” she announced, after a wondrous inspection by touch of hand. “Something done tore his dress.”

“A big ol’ line had him, Sally Jo,” the nester exclaimed. “I swan he was a monster. He went a-smashing up among the bushes and rocks.”

“You didn’t kill him? You done let him go and he most had eat our child?” shrilled Mrs. Schoonover.

“I reckon I done missed, Sally Jo. There, there, girl--it’s all right now. You cain’t hurt a line with birdshot. It won’t even tickle him. This here shot would bounce off’n a kitten’s hide, this here would.”

They went back to the wagon, Mrs. Schoonover carrying the baby. The nester opined that he had had enough of driving for one night and they would camp here.

“It’s hard on Glossy, but I’ll go find her water first thing in the morning”--he poked a finger playfully among his son’s ribs--“So that ol’ line was like to git you, boy? Ol’ Bowallopus was a-looking you over for a meal?”

Brother Schoonover hobbled the mare and they went to rest.

Bowallopus lay on a flat rock amid the lower ridges next day, sunning himself. He was not far from home and felt perfectly secure. In a gulch, washed out by floods numberless generations ago, was a large hole that led into a shallow cave. There was in front a sandstone ledge much to the beast’s liking, and here the puma resided, as a stinging odor proclaimed.

He was very handsome, was Bowallopus. On his side, he measured eight feet ten inches from the tip of his nose to tip of tail, and his weight could not have been less than two hundred and forty pounds. Just now the superb richness of his reddish brown coat was marred by unsightly clots in the region of his rump, and he was constantly reminded thereof by a gnawing and itching of innumerable tiny spots. The irritation meant that the wounds were healing, but Bowallopus’s temper was very bad nevertheless. He licked his sores tenderly and settled himself to bask in the glare, lids drooping.

Five miles away, Brother Schoonover was digging with might and main into the side of a low hill, for he had found a spring bubbling from the rock and was now engaged in fashioning a dugout for a home.

Bowallopus went up the valley early that evening, being minded to kill. And before darkness closed down he arrived at a butte about three miles from his lair.

The huge cat crawled warily to a ledge and composed himself to wait. At the other side of the butte vague figures were moving, and Bowallopus could hear plainly the crisp munching of grass. These were the range mares wearing the Anvil brand, and he had taken toll of their young many times before. In the position he had selected they could not wind him; and along the base of the butte ran a trail down which the mares went to drink.

The sun sank back of the mountains. A big roan stallion which ruled the band gave over eating and lay down to roll. Invigorated by this exercise, he whinnied joyously and started for the pool. One mare, with her colt, followed at his heels. The others began to close in, slowly, then in groups, until they were moving in loose array towards water. The leader picked the butte trail, paused to pull a tempting tuft, and rounded a bend. Then he snorted an alarm and swerved outward.

Bowallopus let him go--he was too formidable for attack--but the mare and her colt were below him. On the stallion’s warning he hurled himself downward, a yellow streak in the gloom, and bore the luckless colt to the ground. The crunch of its broken spine was drowned in the rumble of flying hoofs. Bowallopus gripped his prey by the neck and started homewards. Twice he was compelled to stop to obtain a fresh hold, but he dragged the carcass to the washout.

It happened that he made a foray early one evening to Wolf Creek in quest of a deer.

Sometimes, if he were exceedingly crafty, and wind and bough of tree were right, he could slay when a deer stole timidly to drink. Bowallopus went down the valley, alert and noiseless as was his wont. Suddenly he stiffened, the hairs on neck and back pringling.

Here was a fence. There could be no doubt of that. It was a very crude contrivance of one strand of wire, but he could see the posts standing in a ghostly, wavering line. Bowallopus walked along it, tensely expectant. In the distance a tiny light shone like a fallen star, and Bowallopus paused often to stare. This was the lantern in Brother Schoonover’s house. He had fenced a quarter-section, or had enclosed it sufficiently to conform with the law, and now occupied a one-roomed dugout constructed of logs and earth. The Brother was fully determined to prove up on this claim, and already indulged in dreams of how the place would look when green under Kaffir corn, and a red-roofed house on the hill back of them. He had longed all his life for a house with a red roof, for it could be descried so far and looked so cheery.

The puma made the circuit of the place and watched and listened. Presently the light went out and all was still. He did not tarry long, being seized of a feeling of unrest. All heart for the hunt was gone from him and he struck northward, intent on putting distance between himself and this newest invader of his domain. While the dark was yet young, he scaled a pine tree--a tree bole was to the lion as greensward to the antelope--and sat comfortably on a thick limb. Once he tilted his nose and sent his screech vibrating to the topmost hills. It was a rending cry like the scream of a woman in mortal pain--no animal but a horse in its death agony can produce a sound more terrifying. After a while he descended and went northward once more; but there was no yowling from Bowallopus now. He had to find something to eat, and stealth alone could accomplish that end.

Yet he was back at the fence next night and on many nights succeeding. The dugout and its dwellers recurred again and again to tempt his curiosity, however far he raided. Bowallopus had no desire to forage there, but he simply could not keep away. And gradually the feeling of anxiety over their presence became a fixed dread, an obsession.

Brother Schoonover acquired a dog from a passing Mexican freighter and owned the mongrel for exactly seven days and six nights. Most of that period was spent by the canine back of the shack, tied to a post. Then he was released and ventured too far in the dusk, and Bowallopus gathered him in. When the nester found the remains he forgot all about the spirit of kindly charity for which he had been so strong in a two days’ debate with Brother Ducey in Texas, and railed against all created things save those man had domesticated.

After this episode Bowallopus absented himself from the vicinity of the Schoonover home for a space. He went up into the mountains, where he contrived to get considerable veal and young beef. Winter was coming upon the land and a calf did not hug his mother’s side so closely of a night, being grown and prideful.

In the sheen of a late November gloaming, he dropped from a jutting rock on the rim of The Hatter and padded along a burro trail. This was the way down the big mountain which the woodchoppers took; thence they drove their patient beasts of burden seventy long miles to town. Bowallopus slunk beside the well-worn path, one eye cocked for trouble. He was ferociously hungry; his stomach clamored for food; and at sight of a scurrying jackrabbit, a peculiar pulsating ache started back of his jowl.

Abruptly he drew back and flopped downward behind a thorny bush. Below, on the shoulder of The Hatter, clung a shack of boughs and sod. A man was even then hammering on its roof, while a woman passed him up bits of old tin. Half way between the puma and the hut, a small boy was toiling under a pile of fagots, tied over his back.

All this Bowallopus saw, but what interested him most was an object nearer at hand. Not twenty feet away a Mexican baby played in the dirt, crowing with delight over possession of a captive lizard. The child was perhaps two years old and much too naked for that time of year, but she was hearty and cared naught for that. Her brother had brought her up the trail, leaving her to amuse herself as best she might whilst he gathered firewood. Naturally he forgot all about the toddler, the job not being to his liking.

Bowallopus listened and watched and waited. The baby rolled in the dust. The man and woman were busily engaged and the boy had been sent to fetch a bucket of water. A bull-bat flew over the puma’s head. A hush crept over The Hatter.

It may be that he shut his eyes when he launched himself and struck, though she was so very, very little. There was no cry to betray--only the throaty snarls of the puma, now turned mankiller and more horribly afraid and fearfully daring than he had ever been in his life.

“A big ol’ mountain line done eat a Mexican baby up yonder,” Brother Schoonover reported to his wife.

“You keep buckshot in that gun, Brother Schoonover; do you hear? Oh, my li’l’ lamb! What if that wicked lion had eat you up?” Her son did not appear at all disturbed by the speculation, but thumped on her breast with his fists.

There was a tremendous to-do up and down the country for eighty leagues. The manager of the Anvil offered a hundred dollars reward for the murderer’s hide and the cowboys of the region blazed away at every bobcat that showed a hair within their line of vision. Even Richter’s sheep herders bestirred themselves to set traps, but all to no avail. And the victim being a native child, the killing soon ceased to be a live topic.