Sheep Limit/Chapter 8
If a man expected to hang around that ranch expecting to do nothing but talk and eat canned corn with a spoon he had bet on the wrong card. That was the substance of the information Tippie put into Dowell Peck's private ear early next morning. Come along out and help dip sheep, and get his first taste of what he must expect if he carried out his plans for marrying into a sheep family.
Peck took the order with good humor, even with eagerness to show himself a man among men. Mrs. Duke was barred from any part in the operation, keen as she was to bear a hand. When he wanted any women mussin' around in such affairs, Tippie said, he'd express his desire in plain words.
The sheepwoman was quite in accord with Tippie's apparently inhospitable attitude toward Peck. Noman could loll around under her roof eating the ham and canned corn of idleness. Rawlins' initiative in putting his hand to the things he found to be done around the place had made a hit with her. By that ready spirit and proof of competence he had won a job. She had fixed that with Tippie last night before the foreman joined the adventurer at the bunk-house.
They outfitted Peck with a sheep-herder's brown duck overalls and jumper, although they were unable NOW COMES A VALIANT MAN gt to find a pair of shoes or boots on the place that would fithim. Peck's feet were extensive. If traction would get him there, Peck was equipped to go to the top. His pride increased as he tried and rejected the puny footgear handed him by Mrs. Duke where he sat on the kitchen steps in his stockinged feet. If they had any man's shoes, he said, bring them along.
Mrs. Duke was greatly impressed by the size of Peck's feet, although she seemed a little disappointed when one of the late Duke's hats fitted him exactly. It was an old black hat, low in the crown, broad in the brim, flapping, greasy, bandless and forlorn. But it fitted Peck as if it had been modeled to his head.
"Yes, Mr. Duke was a sharp-headed man like you," she said, softly reminiscent. "He didn't have a business head, but he was a tender-hearted man."
Peck did not present a very engaging figure in the sheep-herder outfit. The overalls had been designed for a broad man, the jumper for a short one, but Peck appeared to get a good deal of fun out of the rig, posturing and posing to the great edification of Mrs. Duke. She said he was the comicalest feller she ever saw, and poked him in the back, and told him to go on.
Tippie delegated Peck to the business of driving the sheep out of a little pen which held only about a dozen, into the trough of dip. It was not a very savory mixture, the sheep were not disposed to plunge into it for the little swim, Rawlins standing aloft to shove their heads under as they passed. Nothing but coercion availed against the creatures' antipathy for the dip. Peck did not spare himself the labor. He pushed them along, calling "Yo, yo, yo!" after the example of Tippie and Rawlins, enjoying the vocal part of it greatly, in which he very soon excelled.
That was a small job, and soon done. Peck was proud of the dip that had splashed on his hands and face as a boy is proud of a bloody nose. He asked Tippie how he had done, glowing in satisfaction of his own performance, bidding for a boost.
"You'll be worth as much as a dog around a band of sheep in a year or two," Tippie replied.
Peck laughed, unconscious of how nearly that was a compliment. Rawlins saw that Tippie wouldn't have said it if he had meant it, for no sheepman will admit a beginner ever can become as valuable as a dog.
"Well, if that's all, I think I'll go in and scrub up and shave," Peck proposed.
"That ain't half," Tippie corrected him severely. "This is your day for makin' good. All of these mail-order fellers 're handed over to me. I've got to see the first one of 'em yet to make good."
"All of which?" Peck inquired, head to one side like a chicken looking at the sun.
"Mail-order fellers, I said; these beaux that Edith orders by mail. It's a rule of this ranch no man's fit to marry her if he can't make good. The same test I've always put the rest of 'em to I'm goin' to put you to. If you fall down on it you pack up and light out of here without another word. If you don't want to go up agin this test, you're out. You pack up your duds and go."
As Tippie delivered this in his close-mouthed, nasal growl, apparently so resentful and severe, Peck's crawfish eyes seemed to push out a little farther. The warmth of his pride in the recent job cooled, the animation faded out of his sharp face.
"I didn't know there ever was another man out here settin' up to Edith," he said, helpless as if somebody had broken him in two. "Has there been—been—many of 'em?"
Tippie took a little memorandum book from his pocket and consulted it.
"You make thirteen," he replied. "All of 'em failed. Maybe your luck'll change, you've got the lucky number."
"She never told me there was anybody else, she never told me nothing about no test," Peck declared in injured tone. "Let me ask you one thing?"
"Shoot."
"Has that girl got anything of her own? I mean, is she a pardner in this ranch? Before I go up against any tests for a girl that's had twelve men on the line already, I want to know how much she's worth."
"She's worth a million, if she's worth a red dime," Tippie replied.
"Well, I don't know," Peck demurred. "I ain't got no dead cinch on it she'd have me if I was to put through that test you're talkin' about. She's as cold as kraut, she treats me like a stranger."
"She's been disappointed so much in these mail-order fellers that's come out here from Boston and Kansas City and places. You can't blame her. Show her what's in you and you'll be ace high. This is a dangerous country, men ridin' around achin' to take a shot at a sheepman all the time. You've got to prove you can take care of yourself and her, and protect her property, before she's goin' to spread any 'lasses around on you."
"You said she was worth a million?"
"Nearer two, I'd say, if I was 'praisin' her."
"Well, what is that test you was talkin' about? What's it like?"
"In the sheep country we say to a man: 'I've got a job for you.' If he's the right kind of a man, he says: 'Lead me to it.' We ain't got any use for any other kind of a man. Edith ain't. Missis Duke ain't. Nobody ain't."
Peck stood kicking the dust of the trampled corral like a boy under rebuke. Rawlins was doubtful of Tippie's bold scheme going any farther as he watched the reflection of Peck's thoughts in his face. The man was suspicious; he was looking slyly toward the kitchen door, across which the generous form of Mrs. Duke paraded frequently. He was thinking of an appeal.
"Go on in and ask her about it if you've got doubts," Tippie challenged, rather than proposed, startling Rawlins almost as much as Peck by his penetration. "When you come back, you and me we'll measure it off and mix. No man's goin' to question my word or authority around this ranch. What I say goes."
"All right," said Peck, throwing up his head, recko less as a man who has decided to place his last money on a bet, "I'll go you. Win or lose, I'll go you. Jumpin' or runnin' or standin' on my head—I don't care a dern what it is—I'll go you."
"That's more like it," said Tippie, but grudgingly. "Bring them horses out, Ned."
They helped Peck aboard of a small roan horse with white eyes, a treacherous-looking creature that did not act up to its appearance. It carried its long-legged burden placidly, nipping at things as it went along. Peck's legs were pretty well drawn up in the short stirrups, his knees hugging the animal's shoulders. He preferred that adjustment, he said; it gave him a better grip.
Mrs. Duke watched them curiously as they rode past the house and turned up the road along which Rawlins had come with Edith the day before. She did not hail them, or question them about their purpose as they passed, knowing too well that Tippie had a time and a way for doing what there was to be done, and no satisfaction of her curiosity on this expedition would be had out of him.
Tippie laid a course, once they were beyond sight of the house, which brought them in the most direct way to the fence that marked sheep limit. Here he pulled up, slewing round in his saddle, calling Peck's attention to the fence with a sweeping motion of the hand.
"There it is, young feller. There's your test," he said.
Peck, of course, was no nearer the explanation of the thing than he had been at the beginning. He goggled at the fence, his long neck stretched in the straining, with the curious, baffled expression of a rooster trying to see over the edge of a coop.
"Wire fence," said he.
"Wire fence," Tippie agreed. "That's right. You said it. Wire fence."
"What the dickens has that got to do with it?" Peck wanted to know, testily, a color of anger in his face.
"Everything. Didn't you ever hear of this fence?"
"Me? No. Do you expect me to know about every wire fence in the United States? What's a derned old wire fence more or less to me?"
"Let me tell you," said Tippie portentously. "Come on up here."
He led the way to a hilltop that gave them a view of the fence for a considerable distance, where he drew away from the barrier a few rods, stopping among a growth of shrubs that concealed them pretty effectively.
"It's this way," said Tippie. "The man that built that fence built it agin the law. The land he's holdin' inside of it belongs to me, and you, and Rawlins, and every other citizen of this country that ain't ever used up his homestead right. But we can't go in there and take it. Why? Because that robber inside of that fence says 'No.' He don't give any reason, he ain't got no law nor right back of him, but he says 'No.'"
"What's to keep you out, then?" Peck asked, contemptuous of the valor of such men.
"Fellers ridin' up and down inside of that fence with pump-guns. That's all. No law behind 'em, no right. Nothing but power and bluff. There's never been a man come into Dry Wood big enough to break the cast-iron cinch Jim Galloway's got on that land inside of his fence. We're looking for that man."
"Huh! You don't expect me to do it?" said Peck.
"I don't," Tippie admitted, "but Edith does. That's your test. I bring all of her mail-order fellers up here and put it up to 'em the same way I've put it up to you. Edith don't ask you to go in there and take up a homestead and hold it down, but she does ask you to show you've got the stuff in you to do it if you had to."
"I don't git you," said Peck.
"Cut that wire—you'll break no law when you do it—and ride two miles inside of that fence to the top of that hill you see off yonder. When you git there, shoot your gun three times, wave your hat and yell. Edith's standin' on a knob back there by the house watchin' for you. That's all you've got to do."
"Yes, you say it easy, but suppose one of them fellers shoots me? It's a dang big risk to ask a stranger to take, I'm here to say!"
"You're playin' for big money. It's worth a big risk."
"I don't know about that," Peck said, twisting his head seriously, his eyes on the hill inside the fence. "What did the other fellers do when you put it to them that way?"
"Seven of 'em tried it, the rest of 'em passed it up."
"What happened to the ones that tried it?"
"Them fence-riders shot 'em. The others"
"The dickens you say! Well, not me, not me!"
"That settles it for you, then," Tippie said conclusively. "You just ride along and foller the fence that way, turnin' when it turns, and it'll take you to Lost Cabin. Put the horse in the livery barn, tell Phogenphole I'll send for it. I'll start Rawlins over with your grips this afternoon."
Tippie headed back toward the ranch, followed by Rawlins, who was full of admiration for the effective method of getting rid of an unwelcome suitor. He had hoped very little for it, feeling that Tippie had allowed somewhat too free rein to his imagination in the number of mail-order men who had come to disaster in the trial of the fence. It did not appear credible that any full-grown man would be simple enough to swallow all that at a gulp, but Peck seemed to have got it down.
Peck was riding slowly along the fence in the direction pointed out by Tippie, a drooping and dejected look about him that was a strong bid for sympathy. It must be that the fellow could write a whole lot better than he talked, or his appearance promised, indeed, to lead a girl like Edith on to the point where he could take her affections as won.
Rawlins rode abreast of Tippie, grinning his appreciation. If the foreman got any pleasure out of the incident, none of it was apparent in his face. It was as solemn as a ham. Rawlins made no comment. He rode along trying to picture Peck's arrival at Lost Cabin, wishing he might be present to hear his explanation of his sudden going from the ranch in that rig, to the liveryman, who had pumped him dry of his romance in the trip over to the ranch.
Tippie looked as if he might say something pretty soon; Rawlins rode on beside him in that hope. They were heading down to the creek when a commotion of hoofs sounded behind them. Peck, riding like a sack of bran, came tearing in pursuit, waving his hand for them to stop.
"Must 'a' seen a rabbit," Tippie said.
"That fence-rider, I expect," said Rawlins.
"I guess you'll have to go with him. He ain't got sense enough to last him from here to Lost Cabin."
Peck came jolting up, leaning back on the reins, which he held shoulder-high, bringing the horse to a sliding stop. The little roan shook its head in surly protest of this treatment, rolling its wall eyes in an effort to see what kind of a man was in the saddle.
"Say!" Peck began, fairly sweating excitement, "I'm game! I'll take you on!"
This was an unexpected turn, for which Tippie was unprepared, as Rawlins could see. It had come when the foreman had concluded Peck disposed of, and out of the way for good.
"Say," Peck went ahead, scarcely breathing in his hurry to get it out of his chest, "I believe you've been stringin' me, right along, about them other fellers. I'm here to call your bluff. You've got to show me where the danger is cuttin' that fool fence and ridin' in there—you've got to show me!"
"All right," Tippie agreed, that being one incidental, at least, over which there would be no difficulty, chancing that one of the fence-riders was somewhere around. "We'll go back."