Rob refused flatly to let Harry start that evening for Soldier, where the warrant summoned her to appear before the justice of the peace, and the "cow-punchers" finally agreed to sleep at the ranch. After they had taken their saddle blankets out to the haystack for the night, Harry described to Rob and Garnett exactly what had happened to bring about the shooting. It was hard to tell. The more she explained to those two boys sitting silently on the opposite side of the table the more complete did her disgrace seem to her. At the end Rob laughed a little and said:
"Looks like it wouldn't be safe to leave any firearms round after this."
Even Garnett, Harry realized with a sore heart, had nothing to say except a growl about, "Better men have hung than them cheap skates that call theirselves sportsmen. Sportsmen! I'd shoot a few pinheads like them some day myself, and it wouldn't be no accidental shootin', neither."
By Rob's advice Harry gave as brief an account of the affair as possible to the justice of the peace; she emphasized the fact that she had brought two of Ludlum's deserted calves inside to feed, and that, because Ludlum kept no cowboys to look after the herds in their vicinity,[Pg 232] there was always a bunch of cattle trailing round the fence, trying to get in.
All that, unfortunately, failed to impress the justice. He eyed the girl with mild, expressionless eyes, sentenced her to pay for the cow, and, with curt humor, advised her next time to "Look before she shot and then not shoot."
Rob, of course, had to pay her fine and costs. He did it without a word, but Harry knew only too well that every one of those forty dollars meant just so much less money for hay when winter came. Garnett left them and returned to the reserve. For the first time since they had known him, Harry felt relieved to have him go. It was hard enough to face the long ride in her brother's company, so desperately did she want to be alone in her depression. Beneath Rob's talk of the other things, she could feel his disappointment in her.
When they reached Robinson's, Rob's voice broke in on these dreary musings. "If you don't mind stopping, I believe I'll go in and see Robinson about that herd law. Old man Saltus says he thinks that we can put it through."
Harry assented wearily. "I'd be glad of a rest."
"Of course!" Rob looked at her quickly. "I ought to have known you were dog-tired. Why not stay overnight?" he urged. "You've had two mighty hard days and need a good rest. I can get along all right."
Mrs. Robinson welcomed them with unfailing hospitality. Almost without their knowing how it was done,[Pg 233] their horses had been led away to water, and they themselves were seated on the shady back porch. Mrs. Robinson took it as entirely a matter of course that they should stay to supper.
"You must of went by right smart early this morning." Her voice soared from the kitchen above the clatter of dishes and the surflike hiss of frying pans, while she tacked back and forth from stove to table. "Pa sent Denny over to git Rob to come help with the hayin'; he reckoned he'd begin to cut to-day 'stead of waitin'. And say! Isita has got the spotted fever. You know you said she was poorly yestiddy. How do I know? Becus Denny went on up there huntin' Rob; thought he might of druv Joe's hogs home or some such. Come along in, everybody. She's all set."
Isita sick! For the moment at least that news diverted Harry's thoughts from her own troubles. "Have they had the doctor, do you know?" she asked.
"None of us ain't seen him, if they have."
Harry felt pretty sure that the Bianes had not sent for any assistance. If it had not been for the ride to Soldier, she would probably have gone up to see how Isita was and have insisted on having the doctor at once. The spotted fever was short and sharp, sometimes a matter of hours only.
Like most buoyant people, Harry's spirits went correspondingly low when she was depressed, and now, morbidly self-conscious over one blunder, she felt herself largely to blame for Isita's neglected condition.
"I declare," Mrs. Robinson said suddenly, "you[Pg 234] ain't eatin' a thing, girlie. You'd oughten't to of took that long ride this hot weather; and after workin' so hard yestiddy and all. You're clean drilled down. That's right, go along out on the porch and I'll bring your tea to you. It's hot enough in here to fry fat out of an iceberg."
Stammering an excuse, Harry pushed away from the table, furious with herself for the tears that had suddenly blinded her. In another moment, she felt, she would have disgraced herself by sobbing aloud. Mrs. Robinson's sympathy was the one thing that her aching heart could not resist.
Rob had an instinctive idea that under the pressure of kindly solicitude, Harry would relate the whole affair to their neighbor; and he knew that if she did she would get pungent advice and wholesome consolation from that sagacious friend. He rode home after supper, satisfied that Harry would be herself in another twenty-four hours.
It turned out as he hoped. Mrs. Robinson had divined that something more than fatigue had affected the girl. As she was showing Harry to her room she put her hand on the girl's shoulder and said gently, "Yestiddy was just one lick too much for you, wa'n't it, child?"
"It wasn't that. Oh, it wasn't!" Harry began: and then, dropping her face on her hands, she sobbed miserably.
But oh, the relief of having it out! Of telling some one who could and would say exactly what she thought[Pg 235] of it all—why Harry's firing a rifle merely in warning had been so reprehensible. That was exactly what Mrs. Robinson did tell her.
"It took the Almighty consid'able time to make dirt enough out of these lava buttes to grow crops on, and you'll learn, if you live in this country, that you've got to have some of the Almighty's patience to wear down these here varmints that call themselves men into the dust ordinary humans are made of. I know how you feel about your sage hens gettin' shot out. Didn't I ride clear to Shoshone once behind a wagonload of them 'sportsmen,' a gun in my fist ready to drop the first guy that lifted his eyebrow? I did.
"They'd cut our fence and druv in onto the wheat and was wadin' round in it like it was wash water. They laughed at me when I ordered 'em out—that is, until they seen I had the drop on 'em. I run 'em all into court in Shoshone and seen 'em pay their fines good and proper. Wasn't that all right, you'll say? Looks so. But them four men has spent their lives, you may say, gettin' even with us. Nothin' you could catch 'em in, just sneaky things; like stealin' our range, cuttin' our fences, runnin' off our stock with theirs in the round-up, scatterin' dope with the salt where our stock would get it. I wisht I had two bits right now for every dollar they lost us. I tell you, you never get nowhere in this country tryin' to bust up a lava butte with a sulphur match."
"But surely we should do something to protect the birds—and ourselves!" Harry protested. "I think[Pg 236] it's our duty to fight the poachers. Indeed, I do!"
The old spirit rang in her voice, shone in her eyes, still dim from crying. The comers of Mrs. Robinson's mouth twitched in fellow feeling. She saw that Harry had come to the place every one comes to in the splendid morning ride of youth; the place where the fight is waging between right and wrong, and into which every one in his turn wants to plunge with a shout and a hailstorm of blows.
"You can't never save the birds with bullets," she said, "not if you was to plug every game hog in the land full of lead."
"But what are we to do?" cried Harry. "They laugh at mere words."
"There's one they won't laugh at more than twice: law."
"Law! Isn't there a law against trespassing now, and against shooting out of season?"
"That's right; but once all the folks stand together and show they mean to have sure-enough law, there'll be an end to poachin' and game hogs and all the rest of the pizen-mean lawlessness that makes the rancher's life a burden."
"Just as the herd law would rid us of the big stockmen," added Harry. "With their herds gone off these hills, there would be plenty of feed for all our cattle."
"That's what! It's got to come same's the spring break-up. It'll be some satisfaction to know we give her the first shove, too."
As Mrs. Robinson in her droll way made everything[Pg 237] clear to the girl, Harry felt her soul being smoothed out like a piece of crumpled paper. When Mrs. Robinson said good night, she reached out impulsively, put her arms round her and exclaimed, "You're so good to me!"
Her mind was still tranquil when she rode home the next day. It made her feel that, in spite of Ludlum's methods she was going to come out ahead in the end.
Unfortunately, her confidence received a setback the moment she reached home. Rob was just unsaddling and looked as if he had been up all night.
"What's happened?" she inquired quickly. "Aren't you going over to help Robinson?"
"I've got to get things straightened out here first. I don't know what happened last night but something scared the critters up in the hills. They sure were stampeded—such a bellowing and pounding of hoofs when they went down the lane and through the fence you never heard. There wasn't any use getting up. Nothing short of a rifle bullet in each one of their crazy heads would have stopped them. Somebody else must have thought as I did, though, for I heard a shot."
"But Rob! What would any one start shooting up a herd at night for? Could it have been hunters camping up above?"
"More likely somebody with orders to get our critters on the run, and they made a mess of it and scared the other fellow's."
"But there's no one round us that we know of; except Ludlum."............