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Updated: June 15, 2025
And the sheep! A minute after, there were no sheep. Those that were not down were gone scattered to the winds, lost, annihilated! Seized by the mad contagion, the cowboys themselves joined in the awful rout, spurring through the dark cañon like devils let loose from hell. There was only one who kept his head and waited, and that was Jefferson Creede.
His courage rose before the flattering solicitude of Kitty Bonnair and he resolved then and there to fool Mr. Creede or know the reason why. "Well," he replied, stoutly, "they may look kinder tame alongside of your Arizona lies, but " "Oh, Mr. Lightfoot, do tell me all about it!" broke in Kitty, with an alluring smile. "Colorado is an awfully wild country, isn't it?
"Sure thing," agreed Creede, now quite satisfied, "he calls everybody that way. If your name is Jim you're James, John you're Jonathan, Jeff you're Jefferson Davis but say, ain't they any f'r short to your name? We're gittin' too far out of town for this Mister business. My name's Jeff, you know," he suggested.
"Got any mail to go out?" he inquired, coming back to the fire, and Hardy understood without more words that Jeff was going on another drunk. "Why, yes," he said, "I might write a letter to the boss. But how're you going to get across the river she's running high now." "Oh, I'll git across the river, all right," grumbled Creede. "Born to be hung and ye can't git drowned, as they say.
To these explorations of Hardy's Creede paid but slight attention, he being engaged in cooking a hurried meal and watching Tommy, who had a bad habit of leaping up on the table and stealing; but as Hardy paused by the desk in the front bedroom he looked up from mixing his bread and said: "That's your room, Rufe, so you can clean it up and move in.
Creede was a nice man, but I am beginning to change my opinion of him. But you have just got to be nice to me and Kitty while we are here. I had so many things to tell you about your father, and Tupper Browne, and The Circle, but you just sit around so kind of close-mouthed and silent and never ask a question! Wouldn't you like to know how your father is?" she asked.
"I'll fight you," he said, raising his hand in challenge, but Swope's answer was drowned in a wild yell from Creede. "Come back here, Rufe, you durn' fool!" he called. "Come back, I tell ye! Don't you know better than to trust a sheepman?" "Never mind, now," answered Hardy, turning austerely to the bluff. "I guess I can take care of myself."
Down the middle of the broad valley they came, flying like the wind before their pursuers; at sight of Creede and his cowboys and the familiar hold-up herd they swerved and slackened their pace; then as the half-circle of yelling cowmen closed in from behind they turned and rushed straight for the box cañon, their flint-like feet striking like whetted knives as they poured into the rocky pass.
His huge, hairy hand tapped the nugget. Then Kells caught the implication. "What does it say to you?" he queried, coolly, and he eyed Gulden and then the grim men behind him. "Somebody in the gang is crooked. Somebody's giving you the double-cross. We've known that for long. Jim Cleve goes out to kill Creede. He comes in with Creede's gold-belt and a lie!... We think Cleve is the crooked one."
After many years of struggle they had at last obtained their legal rights their sheep were up to the ears in grama, eating out the heart of the cow country but Jeff Creede was just over the hill, and the Mexicans were afraid. For years now the huge form of "Grande" had loomed before them whenever they entered that forbidden range, and they had always given way before him.
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