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Show Vm3 " HAR.OLD CHANNING WIRE HBji wouldn't need to argue with the agent about condition. All his contract con-tract stated anyway was numbers and an average weight of five hundred hun-dred pounds when this beef was dressed. Even a greenhorn could see the animals would do that. From the flat top of a mesa north of the river, flanking the herd and shaping it again, he looked back and; could see the far-off arrowheads arrow-heads of other herds coming down the divide. The Open A must be among them. Let them come. A yelling commotion turned him. He was up high enough now to see all the mesa toward its rim of hills. Hundreds of canvas tepees dotted it. A swarm of mounted bucks had started a race toward him, riding cream-colored ponies and decked out in gaudy blanket shirts for this special occasion. Women Wom-en and children were running afoot behind them, the squaws' dresses flapping in a dangerous way for cattle. cat-tle. He called across to Quarternight and they ran their horses forward to turn that danger of a stampede. The bucks veered off at his waving signal. The women stopped. He judged there were a thousand Indians In-dians in this camp. Riding back to the point again, he was thankful he didn't have to see this beef issued. Hunting down wild animals was a different matter, mat-ter, but these longhorns had become almost as tame as pets. He saw the stockade a little later, a huge square fenced with poles and wire on the flat mesa top. And soon after that an army ambulance came up from the east in the direction of Ogallala. The town was out of sight below the river bluff. An escort of yellow-legs trotted beside the slick varnished three-seated outfit. They swung off out of his dust, until one of the troopers came toward him and he recognized Captain Wing. "There was another telegram in town for you," Wing said. "Thought you might want it." He nodded, turned the gray envelope enve-lope in his hand and waited till Wing rode off. He ripped it open. It was like her other. Ten words: "Arriving Ogallala on Cannon Ball nine p. m. August thirty-one. Love." He slapped the settling dust from it and read it again, staring at the last. She might be only filling the allotted space. And yet she never did waste her words. He felt a quick warm stir run through his blood and tried to hold that feeling down. But tonight she would be here. This was August thirty-first. There were those afternoon hours to pass, the dusty job of parting out the ranch stuff from the herd and after that feeding the beef long-horns long-horns in a thin line through the stockade gate. He sat his horse on one side, counting, while the post commandant and the Indian agent watched from the other. He could see their eyes sweat and knew they lost their count early. In the end they took his word. Long before train time he was pacing the loose cinders of the depot yard. At last the train arrived. This was the Cannon Ball going through to Salt Lake City. He had halted near the station, back in its shadow, and even when he saw her he didn't move. He hardly knew her. She was standing stand-ing in a sleeper's vestibule behind the conductor. Everything she had on was new: a small hat like twisted twist-ed ropes of dark velvet wound around her head and a light brown suit, buttoned and small at the waist and reaching below her. shoe tops. It turned her into a woman more than everl He remembered they had come through Kansas City and Omaha. They had long stops. She was looking out past the conductor's con-ductor's shoulder and came down like that, her eyes searching the depot de-pot where a little group of men had gathered now. Even then he waited, until the conductor handed out her bag and she stood there holding hold-ing it herself, and he knew she was alone. lie had to steel himself, walking toward her, feeling a shakiness in a way that nothing had ever shaken him before. She saw him, and all of her face seemed to catch the station's light, glowing and warm before a shadow fell. He couldn't speak in that moment until he managed, man-aged, "I'll take your bag. Here." He shifted it into his left hand and took her arm. There were men watching, expecting expect-ing something they didn't see. Beyond Be-yond the depot he avoided the town's street and walked into the dim lane. In a moment the Cannon Ball snorted snort-ed behind them and after that banged' past, showering down sparks. She put up one hand to cover her new hat. Then in the sliding light of car windows he saw her face turned up to him, strained for a question he had not asked. He did when the night was silent again. "Where's Clay?" "In Chicago, I suppose," she said, "by this time. He went with a train-load train-load of feeders for the stockyards. He has a job." "I see." "No, Lew. No, you don't. He isn't coming back." He felt as if something had stabbed through him, pinning him rigid. He shook his head. "Give me time. I thought you'd be married mar-ried ..." "I know." Her voice came up to him quietly. "We forgot one strong thing about Clay. His pride. We both did." A rail fence ran along the track's right of way. She leaned against it. "There's so much to tell. Is Steve all right?" "Yes," he said. "I'm keeping him out of town." "You needn't I know all about it now." She' pulled the little hat off and held it, looking down at it in her hand. "You remember there was an Open A rider wounded in the hospital with Clay and Ed Splann? I nursed them all the besl I could." Her voice dropped. "He died. But I'd made things easy foi him, and when he found I was Steve's sister he told me. Steve didn't kill Sheriff Rayburn. That man did. The doctor wrote a confession con-fession for him and witnessed it. I've got it here." Out of the dark the calls and sounds of Ogallala's night life rose and died away. She seemed to listen. lis-ten. In the silence again she said, "A girl can't marry a man who won't have her, can she? That was it. Clay knew what had happened. He could have gone on with half ol me and wouldn't. It was his pride but more than that, I think. There were a lot of fine things in Clay after all." "There were," he said. "I know that now." She had been looking off past him. She brought her eyes up with a smile growing in them and her lips turned soft. "Do you see I have a new suit? I bought it in Omaha. thought it would be nice to wear . . . before we went on." Before they went on. In those words all of the future opened ahead of him," the little trail that was left to Wyoming and all of the years they would have. "You'll wear it," he said, "tomorrow," and brought her close in his hard arms. A wild fire was rising in him, burning clean , away a loneliness he would nevei know again. (THE END) ' LEW BURNET Is trail boss of the y Cross T herd, which Is being driven from Jv-as to the Indian agent at Ogallala. The year is 1875. TOM ARNOLD, owner, has been killed In a stampede. His will Dames Lew boss and owner nntil the :attle are sold, when STEVE and JOY are to receive their shares. After many Iimculties they reach Dodge City, where CLAY MANNING, Joy's Since, Is wounded wound-ed In a gunflght. Joy stays to nurse him, while the rest move on with the herd. When only 30 miles from OgaUala, the herd Is stopped by federal officers. An early frost ends the quarantine and Lew delivers the cattle Just within the contract con-tract date. Lew discovers why Steve uid Clay have been opposing him. CHAPTER XIX "Steve, when Joy and Clay are married, and we get rid of this herd, you and I'll backtrack the trouble you're in." "But you're going on." He shook his head. "No. We'll let Clay and Joy start the new ranch. I can see plenty of loopholes in Rayburn's killing. Those four can swear it against you now, but maybe may-be we can make them swallow their tongues. Ed Splann took liquor inside in-side the Indian Nations. I can get witnesses, Chief Spotted Horse for one. That throws them into the hands of the United States marshal right here in Ogallala. Gives me an ax to hold over their heads. And there's other ways to make a man give up the truth." He considered con-sidered that and didn't say what he saw. "We'll find out who killed Rayburn. I'd gamble it wasn't you." He grinned suddenly. "You can't hit the broad side of a barn when you're sober. That night you were drunk!" Again he put his arm across the slanted shoulders and pulled them up. "We'll work it out, Steve. Don't let it hound you any more." He lay that night In his bedroll smoking a last cigarette he needn't ride guard now with so many extra hands and there was a mingled bleakness and relief in what he felt. Something had filled in him that had long been empty. He was back on his old footing again with Steve. And Steve himself was finishing fin-ishing up this trail facing his troubles trou-bles in a way that Tom Arnold would be proud of. It was one thing the old man had wanted most in his life. That account was settled. But his own failure with Tom's fortune on the hoof was black. He couldn't be blamed for the quarantine, and yet when a man set out to deliver a herd he delivered it, come hell or high water. It was the pride of being be-ing a good trail boss. Fifteen thousand thou-sand dollars, maybe, for the hides and tallow sounded good in talk, but it wasn't much of a pay-off for the years that had gone into the herd. It wasn't ninety thousand and wouldn't be much for the new ranch. He finished his cigarette and rubbed it out against the ground. It seemed strange then that he didn't feel as low as he might. Over him the stars had never looked so clear and sharp. There was nothing going go-ing to spoil his sleep. He turned on his side and dropped off soundly . . . and the next thing a mule's trace chains were clanking clank-ing and dragging over him and a voice was yelling, "Whoa there! Whoa!" He bolted upright in his blankets and saw Charley Storms in the gray dawn, running and yanking yank-ing the chains over the row of beds. Then he saw John Quarternight rise more slowly next to him. Charley Char-ley Storms came back to yell, "Look, you lazy cowboys! Look!" He saw it then all the prairie lying ly-ing beyond as white as Quarter-night's Quarter-night's hair. Frost! The old man turned to him. "Lew," he said, "if that don't make you believe in God, nothing will." They could move now. Sixty days' time or one good frost would kill the Texas fever. The quarantine wouldn't hold. Dressed, he stepped out of his blankets onto a mat of grass as stiff as nails. In the dawn the prairie looked like snow. To the cook he said, "Pull up to tlv ridge before you stop for break-fW break-fW We're going to get a wiggle on or.irselves." With the herd shaped and walking fast in the cold air, waiting for the frost to melt before they grazed, he pointed up the ridge at eight o'clock. No one stopped them. On along the crest he could see the Northern cowmen breaking their dead-line camps, and as he passed the military street where the yellow-legs yellow-legs were rolling up their tents Captain Cap-tain Wing rode out. His brown face was polished from an early shave; he was looking pleased. "Well. Texan," he said, "you played in luck. The Cheyennes claimed we'd get an early frost this year. I'm going on to the post now, but I've detailed some of my men to escort you in the rest of the way, just in "ase of trouble." "That's mighty good of you. Cap," he said. "The cook's up there in front with beefsteaks for breakfast. ' You'd better stop." One last night's camp south of Ogallala, a dry one there was no water here and they crossed the river the next day at noon. For more than a mile the thirsty herd spread out in the wide bottom, drank and splashed themselves and romped on up ttie low bluffs beyond. They were fatter and better looking than when they had left the Little Comanche. That was good. He |