Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 5, 2025
To be sure Allan found some merit in the least promising dogs as a rule, and perhaps the faint praise he was beginning to bestow on Baldy had in it more or less of the impersonal approval he gave to all dogs who did not prove themselves hopelessly bad.
"Come on, girls!" he cried, as he saw Ruth and Alice peering from their shelter. "It's all right!" "Oh, what does it mean?" asked Ruth. "Where's daddy?" "Here I am," answered Mr. DeVere. "It's all right!" yelled Baldy, capering about, and vainly clicking his revolvers, for he had fired all the cartridges in the cylinders. "It's the boys from Rocky Ranch! They saw my signal and came to the rescue!"
Brand Williams watched the man and the boy as they walked along the line-fence trail together. Collie leading the pony, the man talking and gesticulating earnestly. Finally they shook hands. The tramp crawled under the fence. The boy mounted Baldy and rode away. Williams, catching up his own horse, spurred quickly across the ridge above the spring that the boy might not see him.
Gee, Baldy; ye y cow, you! It was thus the unseen bushman discoursed to his cattle, and in a minute or two the horns of his leaders, swaying slightly in their yoke, appeared at the bend of the track, the bolt-heads in the yoke shining like bosses of silver in the slanting rays of the new-risen sun.
The huts, which were really quite substantial wigwams, were apportioned among the prisoners. Ruth and Alice received the largest and best one, and their father had one by himself next to theirs. Paul and Russ "bunked" together, for Baldy said he wanted to be free to come and go as he liked. "I'll have to be on the watch," he said.
He dragged the body outside, and with Julia's help lifted it up and placed it across the saddle. Then he tried to steady his load with his right hand, and to guide the horse by the bridle with his left, but he soon found that a dead man was a bad rider; Baldy kept slipping towards the near side or the off side with every stride of the horse, and soon fell to the ground.
There were shallow lakes and swamps, but he could not put the corpse into any of them with safety: search would be made wherever there was water, on the supposition that Baldy had been drowned after drinking too freely of the gin he had brought from Nyalong, and if the body was found, the appearance of the skull would show that death had been caused, not by drowning, but by the blows of that cursed axe.
After consulting together upon the return of Baldy, and after they had ridden behind the steam man to their heart's content, they decided upon their future course. As the boy, Johnny, had no intention of devoting himself to manual labor, even had he been able, it was agreed that he should take upon himself the part of sentinel, while the others were at work.
"That there rider ought to have knowed the names, but he didn't. Only knowed that the man was called 'Baldy. Didn't know the bride's name at all. But it don't make any difference; they wouldn't have had to have a license at all in this Territory. But it makes it look more regular when they've got one. All that's got to be done is for Baldy to go over to Dry Bottom an' have the names recorded.
She could not guess how that thought stabbed him, for he replied cheerfully: "I heard you call, and Baldy brought me on the jump." Phyllis covered her face with her hands. She was badly shaken and could not quite control herself. "It was awful awful." And short staccato sobs shook her. Buck put his arm around her shoulders, and soothed her gently. "Don't you care, Phyllis. It's all past now.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking