The Long Shadow Read online

  CHAPTER V.

  _The Man From Michigan._

  "How old is she, Billy boy, Billy boy, How old is she, charming Billy? Twice six, twice seven, Forty-nine and eleven-- She's a young thing, and cannot leave her mother."

  "C'm-awn, yuh lazy old skate! Think I want to sleep out to-night, whentown's so clost?" Charming Billy yanked his pack-pony awake and intoa shuffling trot over the trail, resettled his hat on his head, saggedhis shoulders again and went back to crooning his ditty.

  "Can she make a punkin pie, Billy boy, Billy boy, Can she make a punkin pie, charming Billy? She can make a punkin pie Quick's a cat can wink her eye--"

  Out ahead, where the trail wound aimlessly around a low sand ridgeflecked with scrubby sage half buried in gray snowbanks, a horsewhinnied inquiringly; Barney, his own red-roan, perked his ears towardthe sound and sent shrill answer. In that land and at that seasontravelers were never so numerous as to be met with indifference, andBilly felt a slight thrill of expectation. All day--or as much of itas was left after his late sleeping and later breakfast--he had riddenwithout meeting a soul; now he unconsciously pressed lightly with hisspurs to meet the comer.

  Around the first bend they went, and the trail was blank before them."Thought it sounded close," Billy muttered, "but with the wind whereit is and the air like this, sound travels farther. I wonder--"

  Past the point before them poked a black head, followed slowly bya shambling horse whose dragging hoofs proclaimed his weariness andutter lack of ambition. The rider, Billy decided after one sharpglance, he had never seen before in his life--and nothing lost by it,either, he finished mentally when he came closer.

  If the riders had not willed it so the horses would mutually haveagreed to stop when they met; that being the way of range horses aftercarrying speech-hungry men for a season or two. If men meet out therein the land of far horizons and do not stop for a word or two, it isgenerally because there is bad feeling between them; and horses learnquickly the ways of their masters.

  "Hello," greeted Billy tentatively, eying the other measuringlybecause he was a stranger. "Pretty soft going, ain't it?" He referredto the half-thawed trail.

  "Ye-es," hesitated the other, glancing diffidently down at the trailand then up at the neighboring line of disconsolate, low hills."Ye-es, it is." His eyes came back and met Billy's deprecatingly,almost like those of a woman who feels that her youth and her charmhave slipped behind her and who does not quite know whether she maystill be worthy your attention. "Are you acquainted with this--thispart of the country?"

  "Well," Billy had got out his smoking material, from force of thehabit with which a range-rider seizes every opportunity for a smoke,and singled meditatively a leaf. "Well, I kinda know it by sight, allright." And in his voice lurked a pride of knowledge inexplicable toone who has not known and loved the range-land. "I guess you'd havesome trouble finding a square foot of it that I ain't been over," headded, mildly boastful.

  If one might judge anything from a face as blank as that of a chinadoll, both the pride and the boastfulness were quite lost upon thestranger. Only his eyes were wistfully melancholy.

  "My name is Alexander P. Dill," he informed Billy quite unnecessarily."I was going to the Murton place. They told me it was only ten milesfrom town and it seems as though I must have taken the wrong road,somehow. Could you tell me about where it would be from here?"

  Charming Billy's cupped hands hid his mouth, but his eyes laughed."Roads ain't so plenty around here that you've any call to take onethat don't belong to yuh," he reproved, when his cigarette was goingwell. "If Hardup's the place yuh started from, and if they headed yahright when they turned yuh loose, you've covered about eighteen milesand bent 'em into a beautiful quarter-circle--and how yuh ever wentand done it undeliberate gets _me_. You are now seven miles fromHardup and sixteen miles, more or less, from Murton's." He stopped towatch the effect of his information.

  Alexander P. Dill was a long man--an exceedingly long man, as Billyhad already observed--and now he drooped so that he reminded Billyof shutting up a telescope. His mouth drooped, also, like that of adisappointed child, and his eyes took to themselves more melancholy."I must have taken the wrong road," he repeated ineffectually.

  "Yes," Billy agreed gravely, "I guess yuh must of; it does kinda lookthat way." There was no reason why he should feel anything more than apassing amusement at this wandering length of humanity, but Billyfelt an unaccountable stirring of pity and a feeling of indulgentresponsibility for the man.

  "Could you--direct me to the right road?"

  "Well, I reckon I could," Billy told him doubtfully, "but it would bequite a contract under the circumstances. Anyway, your cayuse is toonear played; yuh better cut out your visit this time and come alongback to town with me. You're liable to do a lot more wandering aroundtill yuh find yourself plumb afoot." He did not know that he came nearusing the tone one takes toward a lost child.

  "Perhaps, seeing I've come out of my way, I might as well," Mr. Dilldecided hesitatingly. "That is, if you don't mind."

  "Oh, I don't mind at all," Charming Billy assured him airily. "Uhcourse, I own this trail, and the less it's tracked up right now inits present state the better, but you're welcome to use it--if you'reparticular to trod soft and don't step in the middle."

  Alexander P. Dill looked at him uncertainly, as if his sense of humorwere weak and not to be trusted off-hand; turned his tired horseawkwardly in a way that betrayed an unfamiliarity with "neck-reining,"and began to retrace his steps beside Charming Billy. His stirrupswere too short, so that his knees were drawn up uncomfortably, andBilly, glancing sidelong down at them, wondered how the man could ridelike that.

  "You wasn't raised right around here, I reckon," Billy began amiably,when they were well under way.

  "No--oh, no. I am from Michigan. I only came out West two weeks ago.I--I'm thinking some of raising wild cattle for the Eastern markets."Alexander P. Dill still had the wistful look in his eyes, which wereunenthusiastically blue--just enough of the blue to make their colordefinite.

  Charming Billy came near laughing, but some impulse kept himquiet-lipped and made his voice merely friendly. "Yes--this is apretty good place for that business," he observed quite seriously. "Alot uh people are doing that same thing."

  Mr. Dill warmed pitifully to the friendliness. "I was told that Mr.Murton wanted to sell his far---- ranch and cattle, and I was going tosee him about it. I would like to buy a place outright, you see, withthe cattle all branded, and--everything."

  Billy suddenly felt the instinct of the champion. "Well, somebody liedto yuh a lot, then," he replied warmly. "Don't yuh never go near oldMurton. In the first place, he ain't a cowman--he's a sheepman, on asmall scale so far as sheep go but on a sure-enough big scale whenyuh count his feelin's. He runs about twelve hundred woollies, and isabout as unpolite a cuss as I ever met up with. He'd uh roasted yuhbrown just for saying cattle at him--and if yuh let out inadvertantthat yuh took him for a cowman, the chances is he'd a took a shot atyuh. If yuh ask me, you was playin' big luck when yuh went and lostthe trail."

  "I can't see what would be their object in misinforming me on thesubject," Mr. Dill complained. "You don't suppose that they had anygrudge against Mr. Murton, do you?"

  Charming Billy eyed him aslant and was merciful. "I can't say, notknowing who they was that told yuh," he answered. "They're liable tohave a grudge agin' him, though; just about everybody has, that everbumped into him."

  It would appear that Mr. Dill needed time to think this over, for hesaid nothing more for a long while. Charming Billy half turned once ortwice to importune his pack-pony in language humorously querulous,but beyond that he kept silence, wondering what freakish impulse droveAlexander P. Dill to Montana "to raise wild cattle for the Easternmarkets." The very simplicity of his purpose and the unsophisticationof his outlook were irresistible and came near weaning Charming Billyfrom considering his own personal grievances.

 
For a grievance it was to be turned adrift from the Double-Crank--he,who had come to look upon the outfit almost with proprietorship; whofor years had said "my outfit" when speaking of it; who had setthe searing iron upon sucking calves and had watched them grow toyearlings, then to sleek four-year-olds; who had at last helped prodthem up the chutes into the cars at shipping time and had seen themtake the long trail to Chicago--the trail from which, for them, therewas no return; who had thrown his rope on kicking, striking "bronks";had worked, with the sweat streaming like tears down his cheeks, to"gentle" them; had, with much patience, taught them the feel of saddleand cinch and had ridden them with much stress until they accepted hismastery and became the dependable, wise old "cow-horses" of the range;who had followed, spring, summer and fall, the wide wandering of theDouble-Crank wagons, asking nothing better, secure in the knowledgethat he, Charming Billy Boyle, was conceded to be one of theDouble-Crank's "top-hands." It was bitter to be turned adrift--and forsuch a cause! Because he had fought a man who was something less thana man. It was bitter to feel that he had been condemned without ahearing. He had not dreamed that the Old Man would be capable of suchan action, even with the latest and least-valued comer; he felt thesting of it, the injustice and the ingratitude for all the years hehad given the Double-Crank. It seemed to him that he could never feelquite the same toward another outfit, or be content riding horseswhich bore some other brand.

  "I suppose you are quite familiar with raising cattle under theseWestern conditions," Alexander P. Dill ventured, after a season ofmutual meditation.

  "Kinda," Billy confirmed briefly.

  "There seems to be a certain class-prejudice against strangers, outhere. I can't understand it and I can't seem to get away from it. Ibelieve those men deliberately misinformed me, for the sole reasonthat I am unfortunately a stranger and unfamiliar with the country.They do not seem to realize that this country must eventually be morefully developed, and that, in the very nature of things, strangersare sure to come and take advantage of the natural resources andaid materially in their development. I don't consider myself aninterloper; I came here with the intention of making this my futurehome, and of putting every dollar of capital that I possess into thiscountry; I wish I had more. I like the country; it isn't as if I camehere to take something away. I came to add my mite; to help build up,not to tear down. And I can't understand the attitude of men who wouldmaliciously--"

  "It's kinda got to be part uh the scenery to josh a pilgrim," Billytook the trouble to explain. "We don't mean any harm. I reckon you'llget along all right, once yuh get wised up."

  "Do you expect to be in town for any length of time?" Mr. Dill's voicewas wistful, as well as his eyes. "Somehow, you don't seem to adoptthat semi-hostile attitude, and I--I'm very glad for the opportunityof knowing you."

  Charming Billy made a rapid mental calculation of his presentfinancial resources and of past experience in the rate of depletion.

  "Well. I may last a week or so, and I might pull out to-morrow," hedecided candidly. "It all depends on the kinda luck I have."

  Mr. Dill looked at him inquiringly, but he made no remark that wouldbetray curiosity. "I have rented a room in a little house in thequietest part of town. The hotel isn't very clean and there is toomuch noise and drinking going on at night. I couldn't sleep there.I should be glad to have you share my room with me while you stay intown, if you will. It is clean and quiet."

  Charming Billy turned his head and looked at him queerly; at hissloping shoulders, melancholy face and round, wistful eyes, andfinally at the awkward, hunched-up knees of him. Billy did not mindnight noises and drinking--to be truthful, they were two of theallurements which had brought him townward--and whether a room wereclean or not troubled him little; he would not see much of it. Hisusual procedure while in town would, he suspected, seem very loose toAlexander P. Dill. It consisted chiefly of spending the nightswhere the noise clamored loudest and of sleeping during theday--sometimes--where was the most convenient spot to lay the lengthof him. He smiled whimsically at the contrast between them and theirhabits of living.

  "Much obliged," he said. "I expect to be some busy, but maybe I'lldrop in and bed down with yuh; once I hit town, it's hard to tell whatI may do."

  "I hope you'll feel perfectly free to come at any time and makeyourself at home," Mr. Dill urged lonesomely.

  "Sure. There's the old burg--I do plumb enjoy seeing the sun makinggold on a lot uh town windows, like that over there. It sure looksgood, when you've been living by your high lonesome and not seeing anywindow shine but your own little six-by-eight. Huh?"

  "I--I must admit I like better to see the sunset turn my own windowsto gold," observed Mr. Dill softly. "I haven't any, now; I sold theold farm when mother died. I was born and raised there. The woodspasture was west of the house, and every evening when I drove up thecows, and the sun was setting, the kitchen windows--"

  Alexander P. Dill stopped very abruptly, and Billy, stealing a glanceat his face, turned his own quickly away and gazed studiously at abald hilltop off to the left. So finely tuned was his sympathy thatfor one fleeting moment he saw a homely, hilly farm in Michigan, withrail fences and a squat old house with wide porch and hard-beaten pathfrom the kitchen door to the well and on to the stables; and down along slope that was topped with great old trees, Alexander P.Dill shambling contentedly, driving with a crooked stick threemild-mannered old cows. "The blamed chump--what did he go and pullout for?" he asked himself fretfully. Then aloud: "I'm going to havea heart-to-heart talk with the cook at the hotel, and if he don't giveus a real old round-up beefsteak, flopped over on the bare stovelids,there'll be things happen I'd hate to name over. He can sure do thebusiness, all right; he used to cook for the Double-Crank. And you,"he turned, elaborately cheerful, to Mr. Dill, "you are my guest."

  "Thank you," smiled Mr. Dill, recovering himself and never guessinghow strange was the last sentence to the lips of Charming Billy Boyle."I shall be very glad to be the guest of somebody--once more."

  "Yuh poor old devil, yuh sure drifted a long ways off your homerange," mused Billy. Out loud he only emphasized the arrangement with:

  "Sure thing!"