Part 12 (1/2)
The eyes of the two men met fairly. Both smiled.
”Then I reckon you an' Tucson are lovin' one another about as well as me an' Leviatt,” observed Ferguson.
”There ain't a turruble lot of difference,” agreed Rope.
”An' so Tucson's likin' you a heap,” drawled Ferguson absently. He gravely contemplated the puncher. ”I expect you was a long ways off yesterday when Leviatt an' Tucson come in from up the crick?” he asked.
”Not a turruble ways off,” returned Rope. ”I happened to have this end an' they pa.s.sed right close to me. They clean forgot to speak.”
”Well, now,” said Ferguson. ”That was sure careless of them. But I reckon they was busy at somethin' when they pa.s.sed. In that case they wouldn't have time to speak. I've heard tell that some folks can't do more'n one thing at a time.”
Rope laughed. ”They was puttin' in a heap of their time tryin' to make me believe they didn't see me,” he returned. ”Otherwise they wasn't doin' anything.”
”Shucks!” declared Ferguson heavily. ”I reckon them men wouldn't go out of their way to drive a poor little dogie in off the range.
They're that hard hearted.”
”Correct,” agreed Rope. ”You ain't missin' them none there.”
Ferguson smiled, urging his pony about. ”I'm figgerin' on gettin' back to the Two Diamond,” he said. He rode a few feet and then halted, looking back over his shoulder. ”You ain't givin' Tucson no chancst to say you drawed first?” he warned.
Rope laughed grimly. ”If there's any shootin' goin' on,” he replied, ”Tucson ain't goin' to say nothin' after it's over.”
”Well, so-long,” said Ferguson, urging his pony forward. He heard Rope's answer, and then rode on, deeply concerned over his discovery.
Leviatt and Tucson had ridden up the river the day before. They had returned empty handed. And so another link had been added to the chain of mystery. Where was the dogie?
CHAPTER XI
A TOUCH OF LOCAL COLOR
A few months before her first meeting with Ferguson, Mary Radford had come West with the avowed purpose of ”absorbing enough local color for a Western novel.” Friends in the East had encouraged her; an uncle (her only remaining relative, beside her brother) had a.s.sisted her. So she had come.
The uncle (under whose care she had been since the death of her mother, ten years before) had sent her to a medical college, determined to make her a finished physician. But Destiny had stepped in. Quite by accident Miss Radford had discovered that she could write, and the uncle's hope that she might one day grace the medical profession had gone glimmering--completely buried under a ma.s.s of experimental ma.n.u.script.
He professed to have still a ray of hope until after several of the magazines had accepted Mary's work. Then hope died and was succeeded by silent acquiescence and patient resignation. Having a knowledge of human nature far beyond that possessed by the average person, the uncle had realized that if Mary's inclination led to literature it was worse than useless to attempt to interest her in any other profession.
Therefore, when she had announced her intention of going West he had interposed no objection; on the contrary had urged her to the venture.
What might have been his att.i.tude had not Ben Radford been already in the West is problematical. Very seldom do we decide a thing until it confronts us.
Mary Radford had been surprised at the West. From Ben's cabin in the flat she had made her first communion with this new world that she had wors.h.i.+pped at first sight. It was as though she had stepped out of an old world into one that was just experiencing the dawn of creation's first morning. At least so it had seemed to her on the morning she had first stepped outside her brother's cabin to view her first sunrise.
She had breathed the sweet, moisture-laden breezes that had seemed to almost steal over the flat where she had stood watching the shadows yield to the coming sun. The somber hills had become slowly outlined; the snow caps of the distant mountain peaks glinted with the brilliant shafts that struck them and reflected into the dark recesses below.
Nature was king here and showed its power in a mysterious, though convincing manner.
In the evening there would come a change. Through rifts in the mountains descended the sun, spreading an effulgent expanse of yellow light--like burnished gold. In the shadows were reflected numerous colors, all quietly blended, making contrasts of perfect harmony.
There were the sinuous b.u.t.tes that bordered the opposite sh.o.r.e of the river--solemn sentinels guarding the beauty and purity of this virgin land. Near her were sloping hills, dotted with th.o.r.n.y cactus and other p.r.i.c.kly plants, and now rose a bald rock spire with its suggestion of grim lonesomeness. In the southern and eastern distances were the plains, silent, vast, unending. It seemed she had come to dwell in a land deserted by some cyclopean race. Its magnificent, unchanging beauty had enthralled her.
She had not lacked company. She found that the Two Diamond punchers were eager to gain her friends.h.i.+p. Marvelous excuses were invented for their appearance at the cabin in the flat. She thought that Ben's friends.h.i.+p was valued above that of all other persons in the surrounding country.