Man to Man Part 28

Blenham eased himself in his saddle, drew his broad hat lower over his eyes; thus he partly hid the patch which he had worn since he came from the doctor's hands.

"I ain't on your land any more," he returned. "An' as for them steers--what's it to you, anyhow?"

Open defiance was one thing Steve had not looked for.

"Looking for more trouble yet, Blenham?" he asked briefly.

Blenham shrugged.

"I'm tendin' to business," he said slowly. "No, I'm not lookin' for trouble--yet. Since you want to know, I'm hazin' them cow-brutes the shortes' way off'n Number Ten an' on to the North Trail. I'm puttin'

'em on the trot to the Big Bend ranch where they happen to belong."

Steve lifted his brows, for the moment wondering. Blenham was not waiting for pitch dark to move these steers; he manifested no alarm at being discovered; now he calmly admitted that he was driving them to old man Packard's ranch where they belonged. It was possible that he was right.

In the few weeks that he had been back Steve had not had the time to know every head on his wide-scattered acreage; as the steers had trotted through the shadows and into the open his eyes had been less for them than for the coming of Blenham and he was not sure of the brands.

He felt that Terry's eyes, as Terry sat very still on her log, were steadily upon him.

"Blenham," he said curtly, "I don't know whose cattle those are. But I do know this much: If they are mine I am going to have them back; if they are not mine I am going to have them back just the same."

"How do you make that out?" demanded Blenham.

"I make out that neither you nor any other man has any business driving stock off my range without consulting me first."

"They're Big Bend cows," muttered Blenham. "The ol' man's orders----"

"Curse the old man's orders!" Steve's voice rang out angrily. "If he can't be decent to me, can't he at least let me alone? Need he send you here to do business with me? If you want orders, Blenham, you just take these from me: Ride back to the old man on Big Bend ranch and tell him that what stock is on my ranch I keep here until he can prove it is his! Understand? If he can prove that these steers belong to him--and I don't believe he can and you can tell him that, too--why then, let him send me the money to pay for their pasturage and he can have them.

And in the meantime, Mr. Blenham, get out and be d.a.m.ned to you!"

For the moment Steve lost all thought of Terry sitting very still so close to him, his mind filled with his grandfather and his grandfather's chosen tool. So when he thought that he heard the suspicion of a stifled giggle, a highly amused and vastly delighted little giggle, he was for the instant of the opinion that Blenham was laughing at him.

But the intruder was all seriousness. He sat motionless, his glance stony, his thought veiled, his one good eye giving no more hint of his purpose than did the patch over the other eye. In the end he shrugged.

"My orders," he said finally, "was simply to haze them steers back to the Big Bend. The ol' man didn't say nothin' about startin' anything if you got unreasonable." Again he shrugged elaborately. "I'll come again if he says so," he concluded and, jabbing his spurs viciously into his horse's flanks, his sole sign of irritation, Blenham rode away through the woods.

"He let go too easy," murmured Terry. "He's got a card in the hole yet."

Her eyes followed the departing rider, she pursed her lips after him.

Steve turned and looked down upon her.

"I hope you don't mind if I trespa.s.s to the extent of riding after those steers?" he offered. "I want to drive them back and at the same time I don't mind making sure that Blenham is still on his way."

Terry regarded him long and searchingly.

"Go ahead," she said at last. And, as though an explanation were necessary, she continued: "There's just one animal I hate worse than I do a Packard! For once the fence is down between you and Temple land, Steve Packard."

"Let's keep it down!" he said impulsively. "You and I----"

"No, thanks!" Terry rose swiftly to her feet, balancing on her log, reminding him oddly of a bright bird about to take flight. "You just remember that there's just one animal I hate _almost_ as much as I do Blenham; and that that's a Packard."

And so she jumped down from the log and left him.

CHAPTER XVI

TERRY DEFIES BLENHAM

Blenham must have ridden late into the night. For at a very early hour the next morning he was at the Big Bend ranch fifty miles to the north and reporting to his employer. Early as it was, the old man had breakfasted, and now the wide black hat far back on his head, the spurs on his big boots, bespoke his readiness to be riding.

At times he stood stock-still, his hands on his hips, staring down at Blenham's lesser stature; at other times and in a deep, thoughtful silence he strode back and forth in the great barn-like library, his spurs jingling.

"Why, burn it, man," he exploded once during the fore part of the interview, "the boy is a Packard! I'm proud of him. We're going to make a real man out of Stephen yet. Haven't I said the words a dozen times: 'Break a fool an' make a man!' I'm tellin' you, the las'

Packard to be spoiled by havin' too much easy money has lived an' died.

All we got to do with Stephen is put him on foot; set him down in the good ol'-fas.h.i.+oned dirt where he's got to work for what he gets, an'

he'll come through. Same as I did. Yessir!"

Blenham waited for his signal to continue his report, and when he got it, a look and a nod, he resumed, face, voice, and eye alike expressionless of any personal interest in the matter.

"You know them nine big steers as strayed from here some time ago? I tol' you about 'em two or three weeks ago? Well, I found 'em like I said I would, all nine of 'em, an' on Ranch Number Ten."

"It's quite a way for cattle to stray," said the old man sharply.

Blenham shrugged carelessly.

"Oh, I dunno," he returned lightly. "I've knowed 'em to go fu'ther than that. Well, I made a pa.s.s to haze 'em on back this way an' young Packard blocks my play."

The old man's eye brightened.

"What did he say?" he asked eagerly.

"He said," said Blenham, picking at his hat-band, "as how if the stock was yours which he didn't believe he'd hold 'em until you sent over enough coin to pay for their feed. He said as how, if you couldn't be decent you better anyhow leave him alone. He said h.e.l.l with both of us."

"He did?" cried old Packard. "He said that, Blenham?"

"He did," answered Blenham with a quick, curious, sidewise glance.

Packard's big hand was lifted and came down mightily upon his thigh as, suddenly released, the old man's voice boomed out in a great peal of laughter.

"Ho!" he cried, shouting out the words to be heard far out across the open meadow. "Say to h.e.l.l with me, does he? Holds my stock for pasture money, does he? Defies me to do my worst, him a young, penniless whippersnapper, me a millionaire an' a man-breaker! Why, curse it, he's a man already, Blenham! He's a Packard to his backbone, I tell you! By the Lord, I've a notion to jump into my car and go get the boy!"

A troubled shadow came and went swiftly across Blenham's face, not to be seen by the old man who was staring out of his window. All of the craft there was in the ranch foreman rose to the surface.

"Yes," he agreed quietly, "he's got the makin's in him. He ain't scared of the devil himself, which is one right good earmark. He's independent, which is another good sign. Why, when I runs across him an' that Temple girl out in the woods----"

"What's that!" snapped the old man, though he had heard well enough.

"Do you mean to tell me----"