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The herders at the cow-pens on the Keowee had also determined to reinforce Blue Lick Station, and with a number of the runaway horses of the settlers, rounded up and driven in strings, several of them set forth with the British soldiers from the fort.
No one knew what had happened when he reached his home, but the Mexican herders seemed to be badly scared, and Johnson had probably tried to drive them out of the valley.
Soldiers from Fort Leavenworth found the herders, killed and mutilated in the Indian fashion. But the cattle had been stampeded among the buffalo and it was impossible to recover a single head. We were taken back to Leavenworth on one of the returning freight wagon-trains. The news of my exploit was noised about and made me the envy of all the boys of the neighborhood.
Now, the whole thing was more upset than ever, for Moran and Rexhill could hardly be blamed if they backed up their own men, especially if the herders had been blameless, as was probably the case. Yet if the Senator did this, Wade knew that a bloody little war would be the outcome. "Where's Trowbridge, Barker?" he asked of the cowpuncher, whom he found waiting at the stable.
"Yes; but that is only the beginning of trouble. We shall then put the herd out in the wet grass a while and soften their hoofs so they can be trimmed before the flocks start for the range. Then the bells must be put on, and the bands of sheep made up for the herders." "What do you mean by making up the herd?" "I'll try to tell you.
The old rancher thought he had been poisoned or shot; Bill and Guy Isbel believed he had been stolen by sheep herders, who were always stealing dogs; and Jean inclined to the conviction that Shepp had gone off with the timber wolves. The fact was that Shepp did not return, and Jean missed him.
At ten o'clock the next morning Colonel Quinnox and a company of soldiers, riding from the city gates toward the north in response to a call for help from honest herders who reported attacks and robberies of an alarming nature, came upon the stiff, foot-sore, thorn-scratched Mr. Hobbs, not far from the walls of the town. The Colonel was not long in grasping the substance of Hobbs's revelations.
They were principally herders, their chief stock being the famous small black cattle of the Highlands. Their wars with each other were cattle raids. Only in war, however, did the Gael lay hands on his neighbor's goods. There were no highwaymen and housebreakers in the Highlands. No Highland mansion, cot, or barn was ever locked.
The motive of this deadly action was not personal, and somehow that made a difference. No outlaws were in sight. He saw several Mexican herders with cattle. Blue columns of smoke curled up over some of the cabins. The fragrant smell of it reminded Duane of his home and cutting wood for the stove. He noted a cloud of creamy mist rising above the river, dissolving in the sunlight.
"Are you always so quiet, Sandy, when you go to the range?" he asked. The Scotchman roused himself. "Why, laddie, I was almost forgetting you were here! Aye, being with a flock is a quiet life. You have nobody to talk to on the range nobody except the dogs; so you fall into the way of thinking a heap and saying but little. I like it. Some herders, though, find it a hard sort of existence.
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