The Wrong Woman (7 page)

For some time she had been ignoring the troubles of her left foot, the instep
of which felt as if some one had been heaping coals of fire on it. It was such a
relief to step out of the hot grip of leather into the well-fitting water that
she loitered a while in the current; then it occurred to her that here was the
place to stop for dinner. With her slicker spread out on the bank she sat down
and had lunch, holding her feet in the water while she ate. Being done she sat a
while longer, and when the sun had dried her feet she put on the shoes again,
lacing them carefully with particular regard to the ailing instep. Then she
folded the slicker.

As she straightened up and turned to go, she beheld a Texas steer of the
longhorn variety only a short distance away. He had been grazing toward her, and
as she arose he threw up his head. At sight of himhe seemed to be all hornsshe
turned and made straightway for the other side of the stream. She splashed
through it as fast as she could go; and being back where she came from, she
turned upstream and ran. She kept on till she came to a particularly wide piece
of marsh grass. Here, with a good bog between herself and the appalling pair of
horns, she came to a stop. Her shoes were now heavy with mud and water.

Janet can hardly be called a coward for acting as she did. A Texas longhorn
of the old school was enough to move anybody,better calculated to do so than
either the elk or deer.

Consider the stag raising his antlers in the forest aisle. Held to the spot
by this display of headgear you contemplate it in all its branches,main-beam,
brow-tine, bes-tine, royal and surroyal,they are all beautifully named. To run
is only second thought. No particular horn seems aimed at you. Between so many
there may be room for escape.

But think of the Texas steer! To right and left of him is one long tapering
tine. Each of them, naked as a tusk, has a peculiar twist which suggests that it
is perfectly scientific. Immediately you are impressed with the idea of running.

He is a pitchfork on four legs. And so is his wife. With other beasts of horn
and antler, it is only the male who is thus favored; he has them to fight out
his differences over the ladies; and also, no doubt, to make a grand impression.
But Mrs. Longhorn has them as well as he and is quite able to take care of
herself. And so, meeting either of them in their native state, you are inclined
to regard the horizon as one vast bull-ring. Janet was not at all cowardly when
she arose and went.

Having reached a safer place, she turned her attention to the stream again;
and as she was now confronted by the bog, she had to find a crossing somewhere
else. Naturally she did not turn her steps downstream again.

The steer had grown small in the distance by the time she came to a place
where the black bottom looked safe. She stepped in and got to the other side
without difficulty.

For quite a while now, Janet's journey might best be described by saying that
she walked. The scenery was grass. Evidently she had missed the road. Still,
though the fence was not yet in sight, she did not give up hope; a wire fence
does not become visible at a very great distance. Her wet shoes were very
annoying. The imprisoned water inwardly sucked and squirted at every step, and
made queer sounds. Unable to endure it longer she sat down and took them off,
and while they were draining, upside down, she removed the stockings and wrung
them out. Although she did not get them thoroughly dry, the walking was somewhat
natural again at least.

Her shadow became long and stretched out indefinitely beside her. The sun
came down from above and appeared in its own form; then quickly it sank. She
kept steadily on. She knew it could not be far now to the fence; and once she
was on the road she would feel safer. But while she walked the gray of evening
came on; then somewhere in the distance a coyote barked. Her courage began to
depart, as the dusk deepened; it seemed to her as if all the loneliness in the
world had come home to roost. It was no use to watch for the fence now; it would
apprise her of its presence when she came to it. Regardless of the possibility
of running into its iron barbs, she walked faster; at times she ran. A star came
out faintly. It was night.

The swish-swish of her feet in the grass, the rustle of her skirts, became
prominent sounds. She missed the company of her watch; she wound it up and got
it to ticking; anything to ward off the solitude. The thought of camping out she
did not like to entertain; but thoughts are unavoidable. Once she stood quite
still to make a little trial of it, but her pause was not long; she soon got her
feet to going again. She missed the sound of trees, the breezes playing upon
them. If there had only been something,she knew not what,it would have seemed
more world-like. There was an absence of everything familiar.

To stop and rest was now out of the question. It were better to walk and keep
thinking of the road. That would be human ground. So she thought of the road and
tried to keep her mind flowing in its channel. How far might it be now? How
long?

In the midst of this suspense she sighted a light aheada camp-fire. It was
somewhat to the left of her present course. Steadily it drew nearer, straight
aheadher footsteps had bent toward it. When she was beginning to distinguish
the play of the flames, it sank from sight; but presently it appeared again,
more plainly. Now a lantern was moving about behind a pair of legs. She could
see just the legs, scissors-like, cutting off the light at each step. The
lantern stopped and burned steadily; then another appeared. Then another.

The open side of a shed became visible, a block of deeper darkness which made
the night seem lighter. Janet, scarce knowing her intentions, kept going towards
it. The lantern which first stopped now turned red and began ascending. It was a
coyote lantern. It was going up to the top of its pole. A sheep
baaed
with the suddenness of a bagpipe.

Janet halted. She had now gone dangerously near. The fire invited her to
come; but many things warned her away. What to do she did not know.

To her dismay, the problem very quickly took itself out of her hands. The
dog, alive to his duty, came out at her with alarming threats. A short distance
from her he circled around her to make his attack from the rear, as Scotch dogs
wisely do. Janet screamed and ran forward, though not so willingly as a sheep.
As the dog desisted, in obedience to a sharp command from his master, she halted
again. One of the lanterns was suddenly lifted, and being held up to give a
wider light it shone full on the face of the man. It was the countenance of Mr.
Stephen Brown.

"Goodness gracious!" said Janet.

Rumor worketh in a thousand ways her wonders to perform.

On the day of Janet's runaway, Tuck Reedy, of Thornton, rode in at the
southeast gate and struck out in the direction of certain water-holes, his
mission being to look over some B.U.J. cattle which had recently been branded,
and see whether their burns had "peeled" properly.

In a good many cases he found that the blow-flies had worked havoc, so that,
working single-handed, he had a great deal to do; and by the time he had thrown
a number of lusty calves and treated their sides with his bottle of maggot
medicine, he had pretty well worn-out the day. Being done, he turned his
attention to a cow which had become deeply involved in a boggy water-hole. He
threw the rope over her horns and pulled with his pony this way and that, but
without success. Finally, when the sun was going down on failure, he resolved to
kill or cure. He gave the rope another turn round the horn of his saddle and
started up at imminent risk to her neck. Her legs were rooted in the tough muck
as if they were the fangs of a colossal tooth, but Tuck pulled it; and having
now rounded out an honest day's work, his fancy turned toward the fire of the
sheep-herding Pete Harding. Pete was a congenial spirit, even if he was not much
of a horseman, and he had a pack of cards with which he passed much time, trying
to beat himself at solitaire.

Tuck did not know that Pete Harding was not at present in charge of the
sheep. He eventually made the discovery by the light of Steve's fire; and he
made it at remarkably long range. Like others whose vision has been trained on
far-off cattle, he was very long-sighted; his eye could reach out and read the
half-obliterated brand on a distant cowa faculty which saves a horse many
steps, especially on a ranch where the cattle do not all belong to one owner.
Tuck, being one of this kind, was as yet afar off when he saw that there were
two persons at the fire. Closer approach making the fact vividly plain, he
pulled rein and came to a stop. Sure enough, it was a woman! She was sitting
there eating supper!

The extraordinary spectacle quite balked his comprehension. Having taken in
all visible details and circumstances, he very considerately turned his horse
and made himself "scarce."

On the following day, while everybody was waiting for the mail to be
distributed, Tuck was loitering up and down past the various groups on
Thornton's principal thoroughfare. Coming finally to where the subject of horse
was being discussed, he joined himself to this multitude of counselors; and
finding Hank Bullen among those present, he related his experience of the night
before. While the two speculated and conjectured, others became included in the
conversation, a process which requires a story to be several times repeated.

"Did you say this was yesterday?" asked Ed Curtis, who had just caught the
drift of it.

"Last night," said Tuck.

"You say she wore a white collar and cuffs and a black felt hat?"

"No; I did n't see what sort of a hat she had. She did n't have any hat on. I
said she had on a dark dress with white around the wrists and a wide white
collar turned down."

"I passed that girl on the road yesterday. She was going out that way. She
rode a sorrel with one stocking behind and a star."

"Why!" exclaimed Reedy, "that must 'a' been the horse I seen out on the
grass. He was a short-coupled sorrel with a stocking on his near hind leg, and
he had a star. I thought to myself that he looked corn-fed."

"That's hers. She wore a man's hat. It was turned up on one side with a big
breastpin. I noticed it wasn't any eight-dollar hat; she had to fix it that way
to stiffen the brim in front. It was a black hat."

"She must be intending to make a stay to turn him loose like that," remarked
Bill Whallen.

Further discussion yielding nothing but these same facts, the talk came round
to horse-lore again.

A while later, Whallen, having called for his mail and received none, stepped
out of the post-office and ran his eye along the row of horses at the
hitching-rack. At the end of the row was an extremely starved-looking animal;
and he was being stoutly defended by his owner, Al Todd, against the aspersions
of the drug clerk.

"All that horse needs," said Al Todd, "is a little something to eat. What do
you expect of a horse that is just out of the poor-house? There's a real horse.
Look at his framework. Look at them legs. Look at how he's ribbed up."

Whallen examined the horse's bones and teeth; then he stepped back and took a
general all-over view.

"What do you think of it?" asked the drug clerk.

"Is he for sale?" inquired Whallen, before answering.

"No, he ain't for sale," answered Todd. "This fellow thinks he ain't a nice
horse."

"Well," said Whallen, "a man can easy enough put meat on a horse. But he
can't put the bones in him."

"Nor the git-ap," added Todd.

"Does he know anything?" asked Whallen.

"That's just what he does," answered Todd. "I threw a steer with him
yesterday and he held it while I made a tie. A steer can't get any slack rope on
him. He surprised me."

"Who had him?" inquired Whallen.

"Don't know. I bought him up at the county-seat. He was one of them
uncalled-for kindlike that suit of clothes they sold me up in Chicago. And
Steve Brown says to me, 'I should say they were uncalled for, entirely uncalled
for.' They can't fool me on horses, though."

"Say!" said Whallen; "Ed Curtis got in from Belleview yesterday. When he was
coming along the road he met a girl on a sorrel. And last night Tuck Reedy"

And Whallen went on to tell about the strange case of Steve Brown and the
woman.

"Was he sure that was Steve Brown?" the drug clerk questioned.

"Reedy could n't say it was Brown for certain; he did n't get a right good
view of his face. He said it looked like him. But he could see the woman plain."

"Why, sure that was Brown," said the owner of the horse. "I saw Pete Harding
when I was up at the county-seat; and he came along with me to see them auction
off the bunch of strays. This horse was one of them; that's why he's so thin. I
asked Harding who had his job now, and he told me nobody had it because Brown
was running the sheep himself."

"How did the woman come to be out there?"

"There was n't any woman out there when Pete left. I know Pete. Brown came
out there to see how things were doing, and while he was there Pete remarked
that sheep-life was getting pretty monotonous. So Brown told him to go away a
while and give his mind a change. Pete did n't say anything about a woman."

"I guess Mr. Reedy did n't see very plain," remarked the drug clerk.

"See plain!" said Todd in disgust. "You don't listen plain."

"Then Harding did n't quit on his own hook?" queried Whallen.

"He did n't quit at all. He's going back in a few days if he gets through
being drunk. He told me he had to get through before the lambs was born. He did
n't know about any woman."

"Humph! Brown went off by himself and did herding like that before. He acts
queer lately. He don't say much."