Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 15, 2025
The Sleepy Cat band were Tenison's very first guests for breakfast. "'N' you want to eat hearty, boys," declared Ben Simeral, who had reached town the night before in order that no round crossing the Tenison bar should escape him: "Harry expec's you to blow like hell all day." Few men are more conscientious in the discharge of duty than the members of a small-town brass band.
He wanted to look up his cattle and see Simeral and he thought he knew Barb well enough to be sure the stock would be sent back very promptly in as bad condition as possible. He got to his ranch in good time. There were no signs of life anywhere. Riding about noon over to Simeral's he found his shack empty. But he hunted up food and cooked himself a breakfast.
Hard as the blow struck home, Tenison did not bat a lash: "We may be too late," he said. "It's worth trying. Warn Jim if you can." "I can." "There'll be a good horse for you at Kitchen's. Ask McAlpin for it. Tell him I couldn't get hold of a man any quicker. Will Jim sleep at your place tonight?" Simeral shook his head: "No tellin'." Tenison rose.
Trophies of the hunt, disposed sometimes in effective and sometimes in mere man fashion, flanked the racks and showed the tastes of the owner of the isolated habitation; for few trails led within miles of Laramie's ranch on the Turkey. "Breakfast?" Simeral looked at his companion, who stood vacantly musing at the door of the kitchen.
On the stove he found his frying pan face downward and the coffee pot near it with the lid raised. From this he knew that Simeral in his absence had cared for his stock; and being relieved in his mind on this score he laid his revolver at hand and threw himself on the bed to sleep. Day was just breaking.
Here's all I know, but I don't know all: About three hours ago Ben Simeral was riding up the Crazy Woman when he seen a man half dropping off his horse, hat gone, riding head down, slow, with his rifle slung on his arm. Simmie seen who it was Jim Laramie. He looked at horse 'n' man 'n' says: 'Where the hell you bin? 'Where the hell 'a' you been, Laramie says, pretty short.
"Can you ride to the Falling Wall for me right away with a word for Laramie?" Simeral said nothing, but his heavy eyes closed as he nodded again. "Laramie's gone home. He thinks Van Horn is in jail. The story is," continued Tenison, "that Van Horn and old Barb quarreled, that they came to blows and that Barb turned Stone and him over to Druel again to lock up."
Below the alfalfa stood the barn and the corral. The day after Kate Doubleday's adventure with him at the Junction, Laramie was riding up the creek to his cabin when a man standing at the corral gate hailed him. It wag Ben Simeral. Ben, old and ragged, met every man with a smile a bearded, seamed and shabby smile, but an honest smile.
Without moving, he asked the nearest bartender to take a message to the old rancher. And when Simeral passed through the door leading into the hotel, Tenison was behind him. He followed Simeral into the office and back past the wash room, through the hallway leading to the sample rooms.
Drawing from a trousers pocket a roll of bills, he slipped off several and passed them to Simeral. "What's this f'r?" asked Simeral, looking at the money as it lay across his hand and then at Tenison. The gambler regarded him evenly: "You're getting old, Ben." "Not when it comes to doin' a turn f'r Jim." Tenison literally swore the money on him. "Ride hard," he said.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking