"No, nothing's wrong," replied the puncher. "I was just riding out this way--I was some nervous, that's all."

"That don't go with me!" the sheriff said sharply. "I've lived too long to bite on a yarn like that. Why, you can't look at me!"

The puncher did not reply and the sheriff continued:

"Now, look here, Bucknell, take some good advice from me--stay on your ranch, mind your own business and let liquor alone. As sure as you monkey around the Star C Blake will give you a d----n sound licking, and he's man enough to do it, too, make no error. And as for the A-Y, well, the temporary foreman of that ranch is the cleverest man with a gun that I ever saw, and I've seen some good ones in my time. If you go up against him you'll get shot, for he'd think you were about the easiest proposition he ever met. As sure as you drink you'll get drunk, and as sure as you get drunk you'll work up an appet.i.te for a fight, and if you pick a fight with him you'll never know what hit you. You stick to water and the Cross Bar-8."

"Oh, I reckon I can take care of my own business," sullenly replied Bucknell. "I can come out here drunk or sober if I wants to, I reckon."

"You can do nothing of the kind," rejoined the sheriff. "And you certainly ought to be able to take care of your own business, as you say," he retorted, holding his temper with an effort. "But in the past you didn't, and you may not in the future. And when your business gets too big for you to handle it gets into my hands, and if you make any trouble I'll d----n soon convince you that I can handle your surplus. Now, get out of here and think it over."

Bucknell swung into his saddle and then turned, the liquor making him reckless.

"D----n it!" he cried. "The Orphant killed Jimmy and a whole lot more good cow-punchers! He's nothing but a murdering thief, a d----d rustler, that's what he is! And you are his best friend, it seems!"

The wan smile flickered across the sheriff's face, but still he refrained, for such is the foolish consideration given by brave men to liquor. A drunkard may do much with impunity, for the argument states he is not responsible, forgetting that in the beginning he was responsible enough to have left liquor alone, and that injury, whether unintentional or not, is still injury.

"There is no seem about it!" he retorted. "I _am_ his best friend, and he needs friends bad enough, G.o.d knows. But speaking of murder, those four good cow-punchers that stopped me in the defile tried hard enough to qualify at it, and The Orphan not only saved me, but also some of them, for I'd a gotten some of them before I cashed. You're a h--l of a fine cub to talk about murders, you are!"

"That's all right," retorted Bucknell, "he's just what I said he was. And a side pardner of our brave sheriff, too!"

"D----n you!" shouted Shields, his face dark with pa.s.sion. "You have said enough, any more from you and I'll break your dirty neck! Just because I felt sorry for you when you got half killed in the saloon and let you stay in the country don't think you are the boss of this section. When I saw what a pitiful, drunken wreck you were, I felt sorry for you, but not any more. You don't want decent treatment, you want to get clubbed, and you're right in line to get just what you need, too!

Now, I'm not going to stand any more of your d----d foolishness--my patience is played out. And if you were half a man you wouldn't sit there like a b.u.mp on a log and swallow what I'm saying--you'd put up a fight if you died for it. You are no good, just a drunken, lawless fool of a puncher; just a bag of wind, and it's up to you to walk a chalk line or I'll give you a taste of what I carry around with me for b.u.ms of your kind. What in h--l do you think I am? No, you don't, you stay right where you are 'til I get good and ready to have you go! You've come d----d near the end of your rope and there is just one thing for you to do, and that is, get out of this country and do it quick! You stay on your own side of the Limping Water, for if I catch you riding off any nervousness off of Cross Bar-8 ground without word from your foreman, I'll shoot you down like I'd shoot a coyote! And for a dollar I'd wipe up the earth with you right now! You d----d, sneaking, cowardly cur, you tin-horn bully! Pull your stakes and get scarce and don't you open your mouth to me--come on, lively! Pull your freight!"

Bucknell slowly rode away, his eyes to the ground and not daring to say what seethed in his heart. He swore to himself that he would get square some day on both, not realizing in his anger that when sober he feared them both.

The sheriff stared after him and then returned to the point where he had left his horse. As he mounted he shook his head savagely and swore.

Glancing again after the puncher he struck into a canter and rode toward the ranch.

CHAPTER XX

BILL ATTENDS THE PICNIC

The picnic aroused quite a stir for so frivolous a thing. When Blake read Mrs. Shields' invitation to the outfit they acted like schoolboys dismissed for a vacation. Grins of delight were the style on the Star C, and the overflow of bubbling happiness took the form of practical joking against Humble, whose life suddenly held much anxiety. In Ford's Station there was an air of expectancy, and Bill spent all of Sat.u.r.day morning from daylight until time to start in cleaning his stage and grooming the horses, whose astonishment quickly pa.s.sed into prohibitive indignation. After narrowly escaping broken bones and chewed arms Bill decided that the s.e.xtet could go as it was.

"Serves 'em right!" he yelled to his friendly enemy, the clerk, after he had barely dodged a vicious kick, wildly waving a curry comb. "Let the ignoramuses go like they are! Let 'em show how cheap and common they are!

They never was any good for anything, anyhow, eating their heads off and kicking their best friend!"

"How about the time they beat out them Apaches?" asked the clerk, settling back comfortably against the coach.

"You get out!" yelled Bill pugnaciously. "Who asked you for talk, hey? And get away from that coach, you idiot, you'll dirty it all up!"

"Sic 'em, Tige!" jeered the clerk pleasantly. "Chew 'em up!"

"What!" yelled Bill, swiftly grabbing up the pail of water which stood near him. "Sic 'em, is it!" he cried, running forward. "Chew 'em up, hey!" he continued, heaving the contents of the pail at the clerk, who nimbly sprang inside the vehicle and slammed the door shut behind him as the water struck it. He leaped out of the other door and was safely away before Bill realized what had happened. Then the driver said things when he saw the mess he had made of the coach, upon which he had spent two hard hours in polishing.

"Suffering dogs!" he shouted, dancing first on one foot and then on the other. "Now look what you've done! You're a h--l of a feller, you are!

After me rubbing the skin off'n my hands and breaking my arms a-polishing it up! You good for nothing, mangy half-breed! Wait till I get a hold of you, you long pair of legs, you! Just wait! I'll show you, all right!"

The clerk twiddled his fingers from afar and jeered in his laughter: "Serves you right! Sic 'em, Towser! Eat 'em up, Fido! Sic 'em, sic 'em!"

he shouted joyously, and forthwith ran for his life.

Bill returned to the coach and worked like mad to undo the evil effects he had wrought and finally succeeded in bringing a phantom glow to the time-battered wood. Then he hitched up and drove to the sheriff's house, where he saw huge baskets on the porch.

"Good morning, Mrs. Shields," he said as he stamped to the door. "Good morning, ladies."

"Good morning William," replied the sheriff's wife as she hurried to collect shawls and blankets. "Will you mind putting those baskets on the coach, William? We will soon be ready."

"Why, certainly not, ma'am," he answered, recklessly grabbing up the two largest. "Jimminee!" he exulted. "These are sh.o.r.e heavy, all right, all right! Must be plumb full of good things! To-day is where your Uncle Bill Halloway gets square for the dinner the company froze him out of.

Wonder if there's apricot pie in this one?" he mused curiously. He gingerly raised the cover and a grin distorted his face. "Must be six, yes, eight--mebby ten!" he soliloquized as he placed it on the stage.

"Hullo, bottles of some kind," he whispered as he picked up another basket. "Hear the little devils clink, eh? Must be coffee and tea, hey?

Yes, sh.o.r.e enough it is. Good Lord, how hungry I am--wish I had eaten that breakfast this morning--how in thunder did I know we was going to be so late? I'll be the strong man at this picnic, all right!"

"Here are some blankets, William," called Mrs. Shields. "Helen, would you mind showing him how to carry that box?--he's sure to turn it upside down if you don't."

"Next!" he cried, returning from the trip with the blankets. "I put them blankets up on top, Mrs. Shields, is it all right? How do you do, Miss Helen, any more freight?"

"How do you do," she replied. "This box is to go, please. Now, do be very careful not to turn it up, or jar it!" she warned. "And put it on the seat inside the coach where we can steady it."

"Gee, what's in it?" asked Bill, nearly dying from his curiosity. "Must be the joker of the feast, eh?"

"Three layer cakes," she laughingly replied. "Chocolate, cocoanut and lemon."

"Um!" he said. "I'll carry this one high up, it deserves it."

"Oh, do be careful!" she cried as he swooped it up to his shoulder. "Oh!"

she screamed as it thumped against the top of the door frame.

"Whoa! Back up!" cried Bill, executing the order. "Easy, boy--all right, off we go!"

"Grace, Mary," cried Helen, "we are all ready to go!"

"Ain't there any more boxes?" asked Bill from the coach.

"Come, girls," cried Mrs. Shields as she stepped into the coach. "Close the door after you, and lock it, dear."

Bill gallantly helped the ladies into the coach, grinned at the cake box and started toward the front wheel when he was called back.

"Now, William," cautioned Mrs. Shields, laughing. "We will not be pursued by Apaches to-day, and this cake must not be shaken!"

"You won't know you're riding, ma'am, you sh.o.r.e won't," he a.s.sured her as he danced toward the front wheel again.

"Wake up there, you!" he yelled from the box. "Come on, Jerry, think you're glued to the earth? Come on, Tom! Easy there, you fool jackrabbit!

--haven't you learned that you can't reach this high!"