Part 19 (1/2)

”Pan, I'll be doggoned if we didn't see a million broomies today,”

burst out Blinky.

”No. Now, Blink, talk sense,” remonstrated Pan. ”You mean you saw a thousand?”

”Wal, sh.o.r.e a million is stretchin' it some,” acknowledged the cowboy.

”But ten thousand wouldn't be nothin'. We tracked some of our hosses twenty miles an' more over heah, farther'n we'd been yet. An' climbed a high ridge we looked down into the purtiest valley I ever seen.

Twice as big as Hot Springs Valley. Gee, it lay there gray an' green with hosses as thick as greasewood bushes on the desert. Thet valley hasn't been drove yet. It's purty rough gettin' up to where you can see. An' there's lots of hosses closer to town. Thet accounts.”

”Blinky, is this talk of yours a leaf out of Lying Juan's book?” asked Pan incredulously. ”It's too good to be true.”

”Pan, I'll swear it on a stack of Bibles,” protested Blinky. ”Ask Gus.

He seen them.”

”For onct Blinky ain't out of his haid,” corroborated Hans. ”Never saw so many wild hosses. An' if we can find a way to ketch some of them we'll be rich.”

”Boys, you told me you'd been trapping horses at the water holes,” said Pan.

”Sh.o.r.e, we've been moons.h.i.+nin' them,” replied Blinky. ”We build a corral round a water hole. Make a wide gate we can shut quick. Then we lay out on moonlight nights waitin' for 'em to come in to drink.

We've done purty darn good at it, too.”

”That's fun, but it's a two-bit way to catch wild horses,” rejoined Pan.

”Wal, they're all doin' it thet way. Hardman's outfit, an' a couple more besides us. I figgered myself it was purty slow, but no better way come to me. Do you know one?”

”Do I? Well, I should smile. I know more than one that'll beat your moons.h.i.+ning. Back on the prairie where it's all wide and bare there's no chance for a small outfit. But this is high country, valleys, canyons, cedars. Boys, we can make one big stake before the other outfits get on to us.”

”By gosh, one's enough for us,” declared Blinky. ”Then we can shake this gold-claim country where they steal your empty tin cans an' broken shovels.”

”One haul will do me, too,” agreed Pan. ”Then Arizona for me.”

”Ah-uh!... Pan, how aboot this gurl?”

Briefly then Pan told his story, and the situation as it looked to him at the moment. The response of these cowboys was what he had expected.

He knew them. Warmhearted, simple, elemental, they responded in different ways, but with the same fire. Gus Hans looked his champions.h.i.+p while Blinky raved and swore.

”Then you're both with me?” asked Pan, tersely. ”Mind, it's no fair deal, my getting your support here for helping you with a wild horse drive.”

”Fair, h.e.l.l!” returned Blinky, forcibly. ”It ain't like you to insult cowboys.”

”I'm begging your pardon,” replied Pan, hastily. ”But we'd never been pardners and I hesitated to draw you into a sc.r.a.p that'll almost sure go to gun throwing.”

”Wal, we're your pardners now, an' d.a.m.n proud of it, Panhandle Smith.”

Silently and grimly they all shook hands on it. Not half a dozen times in his range life had Pan been party to a compact like that.

”This Blake fellar, now,” began Blinky, as he lighted another cigarette. ”What's your idea of gettin' him out?”