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Merwin broke into a run, and Longley kept with him, hearing only a rather pleasing whistle somewhere in the night rendering the lugubrious air of "The Cowboy's Lament." "It's the only tune he knows," shouted Merwin, as he ran. "I'll bet " They were at the door of Merwin's house. He kicked it open and fell over an old valise lying in the middle of the floor.
But I reckon all the strenuous work you've seen to-day ain't any tougher than most any day of a cowboy's life. Long hours on hossback, poor grub, sleepin' on the ground, lonesome watches, dust an' sun an' wind an' thirst, day in an' day out all the year round thet's what a cowboy has. "Look at Nels there. See, what little hair he has is snow-white. He's red an' thin an' hard burned up.
There, until time for a change of horses, they would graze in a loose and scattered band, requiring scarcely any supervision. Escape? Bless you, no, that thought was the last in their minds. In the meantime the saddles and bridles were adjusted. Always in a cowboy's "string" of from six to ten animals the boss assigns him two or three broncos to break in to the cow business.
Creede threw down some hay to a ponderous iron-scarred roan, more like a war horse than a cow pony, and when he came back he found Hardy doing as much for a clean-limbed sorrel, over by the gate. "Yourn?" he inquired, surveying it with the keen concentrated gaze which stamps every point on a cowboy's memory for life. "Sure," returned Hardy, patting his pony carefully upon the shoulder.
"Why, you've grown! You're almost as tall as I am. And what a grand cowboy's outfit!" Tommy did not speak. He shook Enid's hand but words would not come. The boy's face was burned to a rich shade of brown, his eyes were bright and the huskiness was gone from his voice. Health had come to him in this dry climate. Tommy looked as if he belonged there.
She stopped several times on this morning to mend breaks and to tighten slack wires, so it was late when she found the herd at West Run. Here were chuck-wagon, horse corral and camp a regular "cowboy's home," in fact. The boss of the outfit was Asa Bird, and Tom Phipps was the wrangler, while a Mexican, named Miguel, was cooking for the outfit.
"Comes as natural as breathin' to him. We trailed a hoss to this here wickiup" the hot lust of the man-hunt was in the cowboy's eyes as he swung down "and we aim to see who was ridin' him!" Houck and his three companions sat their horses as the fourth member of the posse shouldered the old Indian aside and entered the shack.
It would not utterly break the cowboy's spirit to live in suspense. Columbine was safe for the present. He had insured her against fatality. Time was all he needed. Possibility of an actual consummation of her marriage to Jack Belllounds did not lodge for an instant in Wade's consciousness. In Moore's case, however, the present moment seemed critical.
I eyed him with an entirely different glance from my other fearful one. "I should smile," was my reply, as caustic as the most reckless cowboy's, and I saw him shake. Colonel Sampson laid a restraining hand upon Wright. Then they both regarded me with undisguised interest. I sauntered away. "George, your temper'll do for you some day," I heard the colonel say.
"I'm not so sure of that," Endicott replied. "Only yesterday, or the day before, she told me she could not choose yet." "She'll choose," answered Tex, "an' she won't choose me. She ain't makin' no mistake, neither. By God, I know a man when I see one!" Endicott stepped forward and shook his fist in the cowboy's face: "It's the only chance. You can do it I can't. For God's sake, man, be sensible!
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