Part 14 (2/2)

There is a good deal left unsaid in a cow camp--so much, in fact, that a stranger never knows what is going on; and Brigham had been as silent as the rest while Bowles was taking his medicine. Even on the drive he was strangely quiet, chewing away soberly at his tobacco and looking out from under his hat with squinting and cynical eyes. They were friends now, as far as a tenderfoot can expect to have a friend, but Brigham said nothing about stringing the cattle, and asked no questions about gay New York--he had something on his mind. And when the time came he spoke it out.

”Say, stranger,” he said, still calling him by that cold name which marked him as a man apart, ”did you see Dixie Lee back in New York last winter?”

It was a bolt out of the blue sky; but Bowles was trained to evasions--he had lived in polite society and tried to keep friends with Truth.

”Miss Lee?” he repeated in tones of wonderment.

”W'y, sure,” answered Brigham; ”she was back there all winter.”

”So I hear,” observed Bowles; ”but there were about four million other people there too, Brig; so I can't say for sure. Why? What made you ask?”

”Oh--nothin',” mumbled Brig, playing with the rowel on his spur as he watched the cattle graze; ”only it seemed like, the way she spoke to you the other day, you'd mebbe met before. Some of the boys said they reckoned you knowed her back there--she talked so kinder friendly-like.”

A thrill went over Bowles at those kind words, but he hastened to cover up his tracks. Once let the boys know that he had followed her from the East, and there would be a dramatic end to all his hopes and dreams.

”I'll tell you, Brig,” he said, speaking confidentially; ”I did meet Miss Lee down at Chula Vista the morning she came home, and that probably gave them the idea. But, say, now--about that letter. She didn't even know my name--now, why should she do a thing like that? My name isn't Houghton, and she knew I couldn't take the letter. It's against the law! What was she trying to do--play a joke on me?”

He made his voice as boyish and pleading as possible; but it takes a good actor to deceive the simple-hearted, and Brigham only looked at him curiously.

”What did you say yore name was?” he inquired at last; and when Bowles told him he chewed upon it ruminatively. ”Some of the boys thought mebbe you was an English lord, or somethin',” he observed, glancing up quickly to see how Mr. Bowles would take it. ”Course I knowed you wasn't,” he admitted as Bowles wound up his protest; ”but you certainly ain't no puncher.”

Bowles could read the jealousy and distrust in his voice, and he saw it was time to speak up.

”Say, Brig,” he said, trying as far as possible to speak in the new vernacular, ”I've always been friendly to you, haven't I? I know I've tried to be, and I want to keep your friends.h.i.+p. Now, I don't care what Hardy Atkins and his gang think, because they're nothing to me anyway, but I want you to know that I am on the square. Of course, I'm under an a.s.sumed name, and I guess you've noticed I don't get any letters; but that's no crime, is it?”

There was a genuine ring to his appeal now, and Brigham was quick to answer it.

”Aw, that's all right, pardner,” he said. ”I don't care what you did.

Kinder hidin' out myself.”

”Well, but I want to tell you, anyway,” protested Bowles. ”A man's got to have a friend somewhere, and I know you won't give me away. I didn't commit any crime--it isn't the sheriff I'm afraid of--but there must have been somebody down in Chula Vista that was following me, because I came away from New York on a ticket that was signed Sam Houghton. That isn't my name, you understand--but I signed it for a blind. Then I left the train at Albuquerque and came quietly off down here. But it looks as if somebody is searching for me.”

”Umm!” murmured Brigham, nodding his head and squinting wisely. ”I got into a little racket down on the river one time, and the _sheriff_ was lookin' fer me. Made no difference--the feller got well anyhow--but you bet I was ridin' light fer a while.

”_I_'ll tell you what we'll do!” he cried, carried away by some sudden enthusiasm. ”I'm gittin' tired of this Teehanno outfit--let's call fer our time and hit the trail! Was you ever up in the White Mountains?

Well, pardner, we'll head fer them--that's the prettiest country in G.o.d's world! Deer and bear and wild turkeys everywhere--and fis.h.!.+ Say, them cricks is so full of trout they ain't hardly room fer the water.

The Apaches never eat 'em--nor turkeys neither, fer that matter--and all you have to have is a little flour and bacon, and a man can live like a king. They's some big cow outfits up there, too--Double Circles, an'

Wine Gla.s.s an' Cherrycow. Come on! What d'ye say? Let's quit! This ain't the only outfit in America!”

For the moment Bowles was almost carried away by this sudden rush of enthusiasm, and even after a second thought it still appealed to him strongly.

”Are there many bears up there?” he inquired, as if wavering upon a decision.

”Believe me!” observed Brigham, swaggering at the thought. ”And mountain lions, too! A man has to watch his horses in that country, or he'll find himself afoot.”

”And the Indians?”

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