Man to Man Part 41

Calves, cows, steers, and horses, he knew to the head just what Terry numbered them. And in the round-up, going over his figures carefully, he had found that wearing the Temple brand there were six steers more than there should be. A matter of some five or six hundred dollars.

Were it only the financial end of it Steve would have thought little of the matter. But, going over the herd animal by animal, he made a discovery which shocked him. He found six big steers in the lot which wore fairly recently burned Temple brands--crudely scrawled over the brands of the Big Bend ranch, old man Packard's favorite outfit in the north.

It was impossible to know just how long ago a searing-hot iron had altered the range indication of owners.h.i.+p; Steve could merely stare and wonder and finally hazard a guess. Temple had been hard-driven; he had succ.u.mbed to temptation and opportunity as he had to whiskey and many other things. Seeing life obliquely he had no doubt told himself that he was squaring accounts. So, in the end, Steve was inclined to believe.

Just what to do he did not know. It seemed best to him to bide his time, to keep his eyes open, to hope for the way out of an embarra.s.sing situation. He would willingly have made rest.i.tution himself, to save Terry from knowing and to save her name from the smudge which old man Packard would eagerly put upon it were he offered the opportunity. And right here was the trouble; he did not care to let his grandfather know what had happened.

While striving with this matter the other was brought to his attention.

Also at the time of the round-up Barbee reported a black-and-white steer missing, the prize of the beef herd, said Barbee. Strayed into some far out-of-the-way canon, perhaps. But as the days went by other cattle, finally totalling a score, were reported missing. And Steve remembered how one evening he and Terry from a log had watched Blenham driving off a string of steers.

"My beloved grandfather has no love for the courts of law," mused Steve many a time. "And he knows that in that I am like him. So to his way of thinking it's just Packard eat Packard and the rest of the world 'Hands Off.' And so he is going the limit. Well, I guess that's as good a way as any other."

The day came when Steve put his cattle into Drop Off Valley. The herds, his and Terry's, were counted twice, once as they filed through the gate of the round-up corrals, again as they were turned into the upland range. Two hundred and thirty-four head.

"Two hundred and thirty-four head where I defy Blenham or the devil himself to steal a single one of them," said Steve positively.

For though there were no fences here nature had raised sufficient barriers in the way of the sheer Drop Off Chasm cutting across the southern end of the plateau and in rocky, uninviting and all but impa.s.sable mountain peaks on north and east and a section of the western boundary.

It seemed the simplest matter in the world here with but ordinary diligence and vigilance on the part of his cowboys to make good Steve's vow. Therefore, with Barbee in charge of the men here and under instructions to keep the eyes of trusted night riders always open, Steve thought to have heard the last of cattle losses.

The steers were to be counted every day if Barbee thought necessary; so much Steve had said coolly, merely for the emphasis of the words.

Barbee had looked at him curiously, making no rejoinder and going about his business with a puzzled look on his face.

A week later Barbee reported to Steve down at Ranch Number Ten.

"Five steers gone," he said succinctly, his eyes hard and expectant, challenging his employer's.

"Gone?" repeated Steve. "Where? And when?"

"I don't know," replied Barbee. "I missed 'em four days ago. I wouldn't believe they'd gone for good. I didn't see how they could of gone. I've looked for 'em ever since; I've rode into an' out of every canon an' pa.s.s; I've been everywhere they could go. But--they're gone.

Five big steers."

For a moment their eyes, Steve's as hard as Barbee's, held steady and unwinking in a deeply probing gaze.

"Barbee," said Steve after a little, "remember the night Blenham tried to bribe you with a thousand-dollar bill?"

Barbee flushed and nodded.

"I get you," he said quietly. "Think he's bought me up, maybe?"

"I don't know what to think. But this much is clear; If you are on the level it's up to you to see that I don't lose any more stock. And it's also up to you to find where those five steers went. And get them back. Every single hoof of them."

That night Steve himself spent in Drop Off Valley, a rifle over his arm. He had ordered his men to carry guns, and if Blenham or another man were detected driving off his cattle, to shoot and to shoot to kill.

But the next day he returned to the home ranch. He trusted his cowboys--all but Barbee, and in Barbee's case he was not sure what to think--and it was only too clear to him that there were enough men there to cope with the situation without his interference. Two days later Barbee reported to him again.

The boy's face was haggard and drawn, his eyes burned sullenly.

"Six head more gone!" he announced defiantly. His look said plainly: "What are you going to say about it? They're gone."

"So you've turned cattle-thief, have you, Barbee?" was what Steve said.

A sickly flush stained Barbee's hollow cheeks.

"No!" he snapped hotly. "I ain't. But----"

He swung on his heel and started to the door. Steve called him back.

"What are you going to do, Barbee?"

"I'm goin' an' get Blenham," said Barbee between his teeth. "I been wantin' him a long time. Now this is his work an' he makes it look like it's mine. I'm goin' an' get him."

"If it is Blenham," Steve offered coldly, "and if you are playing square with me, how does it happen that he can get away with a thing like this? Right under your nose--and you not know? It sounds-- You know how it sounds, Barbee."

"I don't know how he does it," growled Barbee. "I don't know how a man could run off a string of cows like that in them mountains an' not leave no tracks. Why, there ain't half-a-dozen places where they could be drove out'n the valley an' through the cliffs, an' I been watchin'

every one of them places myself all night an' keepin' the other boys ridin' until they're saddle-weary. An'--an' six head more gone----"

"You're either a clever little actor, Mr. Barbee," muttered Steve sharply, "or you are straight, and I'm hanged if I know which. Just leave Blenham alone for a while; go back to your job."

Barbee, his spurs dragging disconsolately, went out. Steve saw how the boy's shoulders slumped and again asked himself if Barbee were acting or if Blenham were simply too sharp for him? In the end he decided that he had better move his headquarters to Drop Off Valley.

That same day there came a cowboy riding from the Big Bend ranch bringing a brief note from Steve's grandfather. It ran:

DEAR STEPHEN: Better not go too far, my boy. Eye for an eye is first-cla.s.s gospel. And there ain't no game yet I ever been bluffed out on. Guess you understand.

PACKARD.

Steve didn't altogether understand but the messenger could add nothing save that the old man was chuckling with Blenham when he gave the message. Steve, in no mood to hear of his grandfather's high good humor, tore the letter to bits, distributed them upon the afternoon wind and told the lean cowboy that he could tell Grandfather Packard and Blenham to go straight to everlasting blazes. The cowboy laughed and rode away.

Steve, riding slowly through the lengthening shadows falling through the pines of the mountain slopes before one comes to Drop Off Valley, was overtaken by Terry Temple riding furiously. Terry's horse was dripping with sweat; Terry's face was troubled; there was a look almost of terror in her eyes.

"Steve Packard," she cried out as she came abreast of him and they stared into each other's eyes in the dusk under the big trees. "Tell me everything you know about those stolen steers! Everything."

So she knew, too? Yet he had cautioned Barbee not to talk and to instruct the other boys to keep their mouths shut until such time as they could understand this hand being played in the dark.

"Who told you?" he asked quickly.

"I saw them!" she told him, her spirit s.h.i.+ning like fire in her eyes.

"The whole six of them. I knew they were not our cattle. I saw how the brands had been worked, clumsily worked. Oh, my G.o.d, Steve Packard, what does it mean?"

Now it flashed upon him. Terry was not speaking of the cattle lost from the upland valley; she referred to those half-dozen big steers roaming on the Temple ranch whose brands had been crudely altered from the sign of the Big Bend outfit to the sign of her father's. Slowly the red blood of shame, shame for her, crept up into his cheeks, dusky under his tan.

"Terry," he began lamely.

But she halted him with the word, her ear catching the subtle note of sympathy, her hand upflung, her temper flaring out that he, of all men, should think shame of her blood.