The Free Range

  THE FREE RANGE

  by

  ELWELL LAWRENCE

  Illustrations by Douglas Duer

  They rode needlessly close together and swung theirclasped hands like happy children.]

  Grosset & DunlapPublishers :: New York

  Copyright 1913 byW. J. Watt & Company

  Published June

  To MATHEW WHITE Jr.,Editor, author, critic, friend.

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER PAGE I Flinging The Gauntlet 9 II A Late Arrival 18 III An Unsettled Score 31 IV The Six Pistol Shots 39 V Strategy and a Surprise 50 VI Ugly Company 64 VII You Have Forgotten The Mask 74 VIII Fiendish Revenge 85 IX The Man in The Mask 98 X War Without Quarter 114 XI Made Prisoner 124 XII Juliet Asserts Herself 136 XIII The Heathen Chinee 149 XIV Sentenced 161 XV Cowland Topsy-Turvy 176 XVI A Message By a Strange Hand 190 XVII A Battle in The Dark 203 XVIII The Immortal Ten 217 XIX An Indian Coulee 235 XX Somebody New Turns Up 245 XXI Julie Investigates 253 XXII The Use of Photography 265 XXIII The Crossing 279 XXIV The Story of Lester 289 XXV The Threads Meet 301

  THE FREE RANGE

  CHAPTER I

  FLINGING THE GAUNTLET

  "Then you insist on ruining me, Mr. Bissell?"

  Bud Larkin, his hat pushed back on his head, looked unabashed at thescowling heavy features of the man opposite in the long, low room, andawaited a reply.

  "I don't want to ruin anybody," puffed old "Beef" Bissell, whose cattleoverran most of the range between the Gray Bull and the Big Horn. "But Iallow as how them sheep of yours had better stay down Nebrasky way wherethey come from."

  "In other words," snapped Larkin, "I had better give up the idea ofbringing them north altogether. Is that it?"

  "Just about."

  "Well, now, see here, Mr. Bissell, you forget one or two things. The firstis, that my sheep ranch is in Montana and not Wyoming, and that I want torun my southern herds onto the northern range before fall sets in. Thesecond is, that, while your homestead may be three hundred and twentyacres, the range that has made you rich is free. My sheep have as muchright there as your cattle. It is all government land and open toeverybody."

  "Possession is eleven points out here where there isn't any law," repliedBissell imperturbably. "It's a case of your sheep against my cattle, and,you see, I stand up reg'lar for my cows."

  Bud rolled a cigarette and pondered.

  He was in the rather bare and unornamental living-room of the Bar T ranch.In the center was a rough-hewn table supporting an oil-lamp and an Omahanewspaper fully six months old. The chairs, except one, were rough andheavy and without rockers. This one was a gorgeous plush patent-rocker sovalued a generation ago, and evidently imported at great expense.

  A square of carpet that had lost all claims to pattern had become a softblur, the result of age and alkali. However, it was one of the proudestpossessions of the Bar T outfit and showed that old Beef Bissell knew whatthe right thing was. A calico shroud hid a large, erect object againstthe wall farthest away from the windows; an object that was the last wordin luxury and reckless expense--a piano. The walls were of boardswhitewashed, and the ceiling was just plain boards.

  It had not taken Bud Larkin long to discern that there was a femininecause for these numerous unusual effects; but he did not for a minutesuppose it to be the thin, sharp-tongued woman who had been washing behindthe cook-house as he rode up to the corral. Now, as he pondered, hethought again about it. But only for a minute; other things of vasterimportance held him.

  Although but two men had spoken during the conversation, three were in theroom. The third was a man of medium height, lowering looks, and slowtongue. His hair was black, and he had the appearance of always needing ashave. He was trained down to perfect condition by his years on theplains, and was as wiry and tough as the cow pony he rode. He was BlackMike Stelton, foreman of the Bar T.

  "What do you think, Mike?" asked Bissell, when Larkin made no attempt tocontinue the argument.

  "Same's you, boss," was the reply in a heavy voice. "I wouldn't let themsheep on the range, not noways. Sheep is the ruination of any grasscountry."

  "There you see, Mr. Larkin," said Bissell with an expressive motion of hishand. "Stelton's been out here in the business fifteen years and says thesame as I do. How long did you say you had been in the West?"

  "One year," replied Larkin, flushing to the roots of his hair beneath histanned but not weather-beaten skin. "Came from Chicago."

  "From down East, eh? Well, my woman was to St. Paul once, and she's nevergot over it; but it don't seem to have spoiled you none."

  Larkin grinned and replied in kind, but all the time he was trying todetermine what stand to take. He had expected to meet opposition to"walking" his sheep north--in fact, had met it steadily--but up to thispoint had managed to get his animals through. Now he was fifty miles aheadof the first flock and had reached the Bar T ranch an hour before dinner.

  Had he been a suspected horse-thief, the unwritten social etiquette of theplains would have provided him with food and lodging as long as he caredto stay. Consequently when he had caught the reflection of the setting sunagainst the walls of the ranch house, he had turned Pinte's head in thedirection of the corral.

  Then, in the living-room, though no questions had been asked, Larkin hadbrought up the much-dreaded subject himself, as his visit was partly forthat purpose.

  He had much to contend with. In the first place, being a sheepman, he wasabsolutely without caste in the cattle country, where men who went in forthe "woolly idiots," as someone has aptly called them, was considered forthe most part as a degenerate, and only fit for target practice. This sideof the matter troubled him not at all, however.

  What did worry him was the element of right in the cattlemen's attitude! aright that was still a wrong. For he had to acknowledge that when sheephad once fed across a range, that range was ruined for cattle for theperiod of at least a year.

  This was due to the fact that the sheep, cropping into the very roots ofthe gray grass itself, destroyed it. Moreover, the animals on their slowmarches, herded so close together that they left an offensive trail ratherthan follow which the cattle would stand and starve.

  On the other hand, the range was free and the sheep had as much right tograze there as the cattle, a fact that the cattlemen, with all theirstrict code of justice, refused to recognize.

  Larkin knew that he had come to the parting of the ways at the Bar Tranch.

  Old Beef Bissell was what was known at that time as a cattle king. Histhousands of steers, wealth on the hoof, grazed far and wide over thefenceless prairies. His range riders rarely saw the ranch house for amonth at a time, so great was his assumed territory; his cowboysoutnumbered those of any owner within three hundred miles. Aside fromthis, he was the head of a cattlemen's association that had bandedtogether against rustlers and other invaders of the range.

  Larkin returned to the conversation.

  "Try to see it from my standpoint," he said to Bissell. "If you had gonein for sheep as I have--"

  "I wouldn't go in for 'em," interrupted the other contemptuously, andStelton grunted.

  "As you like about that. Every gopher to his own hole," remarked Bud. "Butif you had, and I guess you would if you thought there was more money init, you would certainly insist on your rights on the range, wouldn't you?"

  "I might try."

  "And if you tried you'd be pretty sur
e to succeed, I imagine."

  "It's likely; I allow as how I'm a pretty good hand at succeedin'."

  "Well, so am I. I haven't got very far yet, but I am on my way. I didn'tcome out here to make a failure of things, and I don't intend to. Now, allI want is to run my sheep north on to the Montana range where my ranchis."

  "How many are there?" This from Stelton.

  "Five flocks of about two thousand each."

  Bissell snorted and turned in his chair.

  "I won't allow it, young man, an' that's all I've got to say. D'ye thinkI'm a fool?"

  "No, but neither am I. And I might as well tell you first and last thatthose sheep are coming north. Now, if you do the fair thing you will tellyour cowboys the fact so they won't make any mistakes. I have given youfair warning, and if anything happens to those sheep you will be heldresponsible."

  "Is that all you got to say?" asked Bissell, sarcastically.

  "Yes."

  "Well, then, I'll do the talkin'. I'd as leave see Indians stampedin' mycows into the river as have your sheep come over the range. Since you'vegiven me what you call a fair warning, I'll give you one. Leave yourcritters where they are. If you don't do it you'll be a sight wiser andalso a mighty sight poorer before I get through with 'em."

  "Just what do you mean by that?" asked Larkin.

  "I ain't sayin' nothin' more than that now, because I'm a slow hand atmakin' ornery promises, seein' I always keep 'em. But I'm just tellin'you, that's all."

  "Is that your last word on the subject?" asked Larkin.

  "It is, an' I want Stelton here to remember I said it."

  "Then we won't say anything more about the matter," replied Bud calmly, ashe rose. "I'll go outside and look to my horse."

  "You'll stay the night with us, won't you?" asked Bissell anxiously.

  "Yes, thanks. I've heard so much about the Bar T I should like to see alittle more of it."

  When Larkin had left the room, Bissell, with a frown on his face, turnedto Stelton.

  "Tell all the boys what's happened to-day," he said, "and tell 'em to beon the watch for this young feller's first herd. He'll plenty soon findout he can't run riot on my range."