The Phantom Herd Read online

  THE PHANTOM HERD

  BY B. M. BOWER

  Author of Chip of the Flying-U, The Flying-U's Last Stand,The Gringos, etc.

  1916

  FOREWORD

  For the accuracy of certain parts of this story which deal mostintimately with the business of making motion pictures, I am indebted toBuck Connor. whose name is a sufficient guarantee that all technicalpoints are correct. His criticism, advice and other assistance have beeninvaluable, and I take this opportunity of expressing my appreciation andthanks for the help he has given me.

  B.M.BOWER.

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER

  I THE INDIANS MUST GO

  II "WHERE THE CATTLE ROAMED IN THOUSANDS, A-MANY A HERD AND BRAND..."

  III AND THEY SIGH FOR THE DAYS THAT ARE GONE

  IV THE LITTLE DOCTOR PROTESTS

  V A BUNCH OF ONE-REELERS FROM BENTLY BROWN

  VI VILLAINS ALL AND PROUD OF IT

  VII BENTLY BROWN DOES NOT APPRECIATE COMEDY

  VIII "THERE'S GOT TO BE A LINE DRAWN SOMEWHERES"

  IX LEAVE IT TO THE BUNCH

  X UNEXPECTED GUESTS FOR APPLEHEAD

  XI JUST A FEW UNFORESEEN OBSTACLES

  XII "I THINK YOU NEED INDIAN GIRL FOR PICTURE"

  XIII "PAM. BLEAK MESA--CATTLE DRIFTING BEFORE WIND--"

  XIV "PLUMB SPOILED, D'YUH MEAN?"

  XV A LETTER FROM CHIEF BIG TURKEY

  XVI "THE CHANCES IS SLIM AND GITTIN' SLIMMER"

  XVII THE STORM

  XVIII A FEW OF THE MINOR DIFFICULTIES

  XIX WHEREIN LUCK MAKES A SPEECH

  XX "SHE'S SHAPING UP LIKE A BANK ROLL"

  CHAPTER ONE

  THE INDIANS MUST GO

  Luck Lindsay had convoyed his thirty-five actor-Indians to theirreservation at Pine Ridge, and had turned them over to the agent in goodcondition and a fine humor and nice new hair hatbands and other fixings;while their pockets were heavy with dollars that you may be sure wouldnot he spent very wisely. He had shaken hands with the braves, and hadpromised to let them know when there was another job in sight, and tospeak a good word for them to other motion-picture companies who mightwant to hire real Indians. He had smiled at the fat old squaws who hadwaddled docilely in and out of the scenes and teetered tirelessly roundand round in their queer native dances in the hot sun at his behest, whenLuck wanted several rehearsals of "atmosphere" scenes before turning thecamera on them.

  They hated to go back to the tame life of the reservation and tostringing beads and sewing buckskin with sinew, and to gossiping amongthemselves of things their heavy-lidded black eyes had looked upon withsuch seeming apathy. They had given Luck an elaborately beaded buckskinvest that would photograph beautifully, and three pairs of heavy, beadedmoccasins which he most solemnly assured them he would wear in his nextpicture. The smoke-smell of their tepee fires and perfumes still clungheavily to the Indian-tanned buckskin, so that Luck carried away withhim an aroma indescribable and unmistakable to any one who has eversmelled it.

  Just when he was leaving, a shy, big-eyed girl of ten had slid out fromthe shelter of her mother's poppy-patterned skirt, had proffered threestrings of beads, and had fled. Luck had smiled his smile again--a smileof white, even teeth and so much good will that you immediately felt thathe was your friend--and called her back to him. Luck was chief; and hiscommands were to be obeyed, instantly and implicitly; that much he hadimpressed deeply upon the least of these. While the squaws grinned andmurmured Indian words to one another, the big-eye girl returnedreluctantly; and Luck, dropping a hand to his coat pocket while he smiledreassurance, emptied that pocket of gum for her. His smile had lingeredafter he turned away; for like flies to an open syrup can the papooseshad gathered around the girl.

  Well, that job was done, and done well. Every one was satisfied save Luckhimself. He swung up to the back of the Indian pony that would carry himthrough the Bad Lands to the railroad, and turned for a last look. Thebucks stood hip-shot and with their arms folded, watching him gravely.The squaws pushed straggling locks from their eyes that they might watchhim also. The papooses were chewing gum and staring at him solemnly. OldMrs. Ghost-Dog, she of the ponderous form and plaid blanket that Luck hadused with such good effect in the foreground of his atmosphere scenes,lifted up her voice suddenly, and wailed after him in high-keyed lamentthat she would see his face no more; and Luck felt a sudden contractionof the throat while he waved his hand to them and rode away.

  Well, now he must go on to the next job, which he hoped would be morepleasant than this one had been. Luck hated to give up those Indians. Heliked them, and they liked him,--though that was not the point. He haddone good work with them. When he directed the scenes, those Indians didjust what he wanted, and just the way he wanted it done; Luck was too olda director not to know the full value of such workers.

  But the Acme Film Company, caught with the rest of the world in thepressure of hard times, wanted to economize. The manager had pointed outto Luck, during the course of an evening's discussion, that these Indianswere luxuries in the making of pictures, and must be taken off thepayroll for the good of the dividends. The manager had contended thatwhite men and women, properly made up, could play the part of Indianswhere Indians were needed; whereas Indians could never be made to playthe part of white men and women. Therefore, since white men and womenwere absolutely necessary. Why keep a bunch of Indians around eating upprofits? The manager had sense on his side, of course. Other companieswere making Indian pictures occasionally with not a real Indian withinmiles of the camera, but Luck Lindsay groaned inwardly, and cursed thenecessity of economizing. For Luck had one idol, and that idol wasrealism. When the scenario called for twenty or thirty Indians, Luckwanted _Indians_,--real, smoke-tanned, blanketed bucks and squaws andpapooses; not made-up whites who looked like animated signs for cigarstores and acted like,--well, never mind what Luck said they acted like.

  "I can take the Injuns back," he conceded, "and worry along somehowwithout them. But if you want me to put on any more Western stuff, you'llhave to let me weed out some of these Main Street cowboys that Clementswished on to me, and go out in the sagebrush and round up some thatain't all hair hatbands and high-heeled boots and bluff. I've got to havesome whites to fill the foreground, if I give up the Injuns; or else Iquit Western stuff altogether. I've been stalling along and keeping thebest of the bucks in the foreground, and letting these said riders lopein and out of scenes and pile off and go to shooting soon as the camerapicks them up, but with the Injuns gone, the whites won't get by.

  "Maybe you have noticed that when there was any real riding, I've had theInjuns do it. And do you think I've been driving that stagecoachhell-bent from here to beyond because I'd no other way to kill time?Wasn't another darned man in the outfit I'd trust, that's why. If I takethe Indians back, I've got to have some real boys." Luck's voice wasplaintive, and a little bit desperate.

  "Well, dammit, _have_ your real boys! I never said you shouldn't. Weedout the company to suit yourself. You'll have to take the Injuns back;nobody else can handle the touch-me-not devils. You can lay off thecompany if you want to, and while you're up there pick up a bunch ofcowboys to suit you. You're making good, Luck; don't take it that I'mcriticizing anything you've done or the way you did it. You've beenturning out the best Western stuff that goes on the screen; anybody knowsthat. That isn't the point. We just simply can't afford to keep thoseIndians any longer without retrenching on something else that's a lotmore vital. You know what they cost as well as I do; you know whatpresent conditions are. Figure it out for yourself."

  "I don't have to," Luck retorted in a worried tone. "I know what we're upagainst. I
know we ought to give them up--but I sure hate to do it!Lor-_dee_, but I can do things with that bunch! Remember Red Brother?"Luck was off on his hobby, the making of Indian pictures. "Remember thepanoram effect I got on that massacre of the wagon train? Remember thecouncil-of-war scene, and the close-up of Young-Dog-Howls-At-The-Moonmaking his plea for the lives of the prisoners? And the war dance withradium flares in the camp fires to give the light-effect? That film's inbig demand yet, they tell me. I'll never be able to put over stuff likethat with made-up actors, Martinson. You know I can't."

  "I don't know; you're only just beginning to hit your gait, Luck," themanager soothed. "You have turned out some big stuff,--some awful bigstuff; but at that you're just beginning to find yourself. Now, listen.You can have your 'real boys' you're always crying for. I can see whatyou mean when you pan these fellows you call Main Street cowboys. Whatyou better do is this: Close down the company for two weeks, say. Keep onthe ones you want, and let the rest out. And take these Injuns home, andthen get out after your riders. Numbers and salaries we'll leave to you.Go as far as you like; it's a cinch you'll get what you want if you'reallowed to go after it."

  So here was Luck, arriving in due time at the railroad. He said good-byto Young-Dog-Howls-At-The-Moon who had ridden with him, and whose kinglybearing and clean-cut features and impressive pantomime made him apopular screen-Indian, and sat down upon a baggage truck to smoke acigarette while he waited for the westbound train.

  Young-Dog-Howls-At-The-Moon he watched meditatively until that young manhad bobbed out of sight over a low hill, the pony Luck had riddentrailing after at the end of the lead-rope. Luck's face was sober, hiseyes tired and unsmiling. He had done that much of his task: he hadreturned the Indians, and automatically wiped a very large item ofexpense from the accounts of the Acme Film Company. He did not like todwell, however, on the cost to his own pride in his work.

  The next job, now that he was actually face to face with it, looked notso simple. He was in a country where, a few years before, his quest for"real boys"--as he affectionately termed the type nearest hisheart--would have been easy enough. But before the marching ranks offence posts and barbed wire, the real boys had scattered. A more or lessbeneficent government had not gathered them together, and held them apartfrom the changing conditions, as it had done with the Indians. The realboys had either left the country, or had sold their riding outfits andgone into business in the little towns scattered hereabouts, or else theyhad taken to farming the land where the big herds had grazed while thereal boys loafed on guard.

  Luck admitted to himself that in the past two years, even, conditions hadchanged amazingly. Land was fenced that had been free. Even thereservation was changed a little. He threw away that cigarette andlighted another, and turned aggrievedly upon a dried little man who cameup with the open expectation of using the truck upon which Luck wassitting uncomfortably. There was the squint of long looking against sunand wind at a far skyline in the dried little man's face. There was acertain bow in his legs, and there were various other signs which Luckread instinctively as he got up. He smiled his smile, and the driedlittle man grinned back companionably.

  "Say, old-timer, what's gone with all the cattle and all the punchers?"Luck demanded with a mild querulousness.

  The dried little man straightened from the truck handles and regardedLuck strangely.

  "My gorry, son, plumb hazed off'n this section the earth, I reckon.Farmers and punchers, they don't mix no better'n sheep and cattle. Why, Imind the time when--"

  The train was late, anyway, and the dried little man sat down on thetruck, and fumbled his cigarette book, and began to talk. Luck sat downbeside him and listened, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees anda cold cigarette in his fingers. It was not of this part of the countrythat the dried little man talked, but of Montana, over there to the west.Of northern Montana in the days when it was cowman's paradise; the dayswhen round-up wagons started out with the grass greening the hilltops,and swung from the Rockies to the Bear Paws and beyond in the wide arcthat would cover their range; of the days of the Cross L and the RockingR and the Lazy Eight,--every one of them brand names to glisten the eyesof old-time Montanans.

  "Where would you go to find them boys now?" the dried little manquestioned mournfully. "The Rocking R's gone into sheep, and the old boyshave all left. The Cross L moved up into Canada, Lord knows how they'remaking out; I don't. Only outfit in northern Montana I know that has hungtogether at all is the Flying U. Old man Whitmore, he's hangin' on by hiseyewinkers to what little range he can, and is going in forthoroughbreds. Most of his boys is with him yet, they tell me--"

  "What they doing? Still riding?" Luck let out a long breath and lightedhis cigarette. A little flare of hope had come into his eyes.

  "Riding--yes, what little there is to do. Ranching a little too, andkicking about changed times, same as I'm doing. Last time I saw thatoutfit they was riding, you bet!" The dried little man chuckled, "Thatwas in Great Falls, some time back. They was all in a contest, andpulling down the money, too. I was talking to old man Whitmore all oneevening. He was telling me--"

  From away out yonder behind a hill came the throaty call of the comingtrain. The dried little man jumped up, mumbled that it did beat all howtime went when yuh got to talking over old days, and hustled two trunksout of the baggage room. Luck got his grip out of the office, settledhimself into his coat, and took a last, long pull at the cigarette stubbefore he threw it away. It was not much of a clue that he had fallenupon by chance, but Luck was not one to wait until he was slapped in theface with a fact. He had intended swinging back through Arizona, where incertain parts cattle still were wild enough to bunch up at sight of a manafoot. His questioning of the dried little man had not been born of anyconcrete purpose, but of the range man's plaint in the abstract. Still--

  "Say, brother, what's the Flying U's home town?" he called after thedried little man with his amiable, Southern drawl.

  "Huh? Dry Lake. Yuh taking this train?"

  "So long--taking it for a ways, yes." Luck hurried down to where akinky-haired porter stood apathetically beside the steps of his coach.Dry Lake? He had never heard of the place, but he could find out from therailroad map or the conductor. He swung his grip into the waiting hand ofthe porter and went up the steps hurriedly. He meant to find out whereDry Lake was, and whether this train would take him there.