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"These stirrup-straps they're too short," he announced. "Pete or somebody's been using my saddle." "I came to bring you this 'first-aid' bandage for your hand," said his daughter. Cahill gave a shrug of impatience. "My hand's all right," he said; "you go to bed. I've got to begin taking account of stock." "To-night?" "There's no time by day. Go to bed."
But most of the Eta followed the business of tanners and leather-dressers. They alone had the right to slaughter and flay animals, to prepare various kinds of leather, and to manufacture leather sandals, stirrup-straps, and drumheads, the making of drumheads being a lucrative occupation in a country where drums were used in a hundred thousand temples.
When the song was finished the loud snoring of Captain Wriothesley became audible. He had begun to spread some rugs to lie on, but, becoming hopelessly entangled in his bridle-reins, surcingle, and stirrup-straps, had fallen to sleep with his feet on his saddle and his head on the floor. "Hallo, we can't have this!" shouted one of the fellows.
His small face, adorned with straggling blond whiskers and as wrinkled and rough as a winter apple, was hidden by a large oil-cloth hat lined with felt; a sort of gray coutil coat was drawn up to his hips and bagged around his stomach, while his trousers stopped at the knees and disclosed his bare legs reddened by the rubbing of the stirrup-straps, and his blue hose, which hung over his shoes.
No sooner had they sighted their quarry than Jack's horse stepped in a hole and went head-long which was bad enough. When he got up he planted a foot hastily on Jack's diaphragm and then bolted straight for the peacefully slumbering herd which was worse. With stirrup-straps snapping like pistol-shots, he tore down through the dreaming cattle, with none to stop him or say him nay.
The flaps of our saddles, the great spatterdashes that protected our feet from the mud, and the broad stirrup-straps were covered with carved and embossed patterns; indeed almost all leather-work is decorated in this way, and the saddle-makers delight in ornamenting their wares with silver plates and bosses; so that it was not surprising that our saddles and bridles should have cost, though second-hand, nearly as much as the horses.
"Never do to have them see these!" he said. He threw the stirrups from him, behind the row of hogsheads. "I'll ride in the stirrup-straps!" He still spoke in the same low, brisk tone. Crosby seized him savagely by the arm. "No, you won't!" he hissed. "Look here, Ranson. Listen to me; for Heaven's sake don't be an ass! They'll shoot you, you'll be killed " "And court-martialed," panted Curtis.
Stooping down, he loosened the stirrup-straps, bound his knees tightly to his saddle-flaps, twisted his hands in the bridle, and then, putting the gallant horse's head for the mountain path, he dashed the spurs in and fell forward fainting with his face buried in the coarse, black mane. Little could he ever remember of that wild ride.
The fellow, on reaching the wriggling horse, first of all caught firm hold of its front legs and then tied all four legs tightly together with the stirrup-straps. Thereupon, he seized the beast by his fettered legs, pulled them over his shoulders, and with a violent jerk freed the animal from its uncomfortable position and carried it down into the valley likewise.
He sank on his knees and began tugging violently at the stirrup-straps. The two officers, their eyes filled with concern, pursued him across the room. With Cahill twenty feet away, they dared not raise their voices, but in pantomime they beckoned him vigorously to return. Ranson came at once, flushed and smiling, holding a hooded army-stirrup in each hand.
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