_ CHAPTER XXVI. THE OLLA
The Spider's system of bookkeeping was simple, requiring neither pen nor paper, journal nor day-book. He kept a kind of mental loose-leaf ledger with considerable accuracy, auditing his accounts with impartiality. For example, Scar-Face and three companions just up from the border recently had been credited with twenty head of Mexican cattle which were now grazing on The Spider's border ranch, the Olla. Scar-Face had attempted to sell the cattle to the leader of a Mexican faction whose only assets at the time were ammunition and hope. Scar-Face had met this chieftain by appointment at an abandoned ranch-house. Argument ensued. The Mexican talked grandiloquently of "Liberty, Fraternity, and Equality." Scar-Face held out for cash. The Mexican leader needed beef. Scar-Face needed money. As he had rather carelessly informed the Mexican that he could deliver the cattle immediately, and realizing his mistake,--for he knew that the Mexican would straightway summon his retainers and take the cattle in the name of "Liberty, Fraternity, and Equality,"--Scar-Face promptly shot this self-appointed savior of Mexico, mortally wounded one of his two companions, and finally persuaded the other to help drift the cattle north with a promise of a share of the profits of the enterprise.
The surviving Mexican rode to Showdown with Scar-Face and his companions, received his share of the sale in cash,--which he squandered at The Spider's place,--and straightway rode back across the border to rejoin his captainless comrades and appoint himself their leader, gently insinuating that he himself had shot the captain whom he had apprehended in the treachery of betraying them to a rival aggregation of ragged Liberties, Fraternities, and Equalities.
The Spidery mental ledger read: "Scar-Face--Debit, chuck, liquor, and lodging"--an account of long standing--"and forty dollars in cash. Credit--twenty head of cattle, brand unknown."
Scar-Face's account was squared--for the time being.
Pete was also on The Spider's books, and according to The Spider's system of accounts, Pete was heavily in debt to him. Not that The Spider would have ever mentioned this, or have tried to collect. But when he offered Pete a job on his ranch he shrewdly put Pete in the way of meeting his obligations.
Cattle were in demand, especially in Mexico, so ravaged by lawless soldiery that there was nothing left to steal. One outlaw chieftain, however, was so well established financially that his agents were able to secure supplies from a mysterious source and pay for them with gold, which also came from an equally mysterious source--and it was with these agents that The Spider had had his dealings. His bank account in El Paso was rolling up fast. Thus far he had been able to supply beef to the hungry liberators of Mexico; but beef on the hoof was becoming scarce on both sides of the border. Even before Pete had come to Showdown, The Spider had perfected a plan to raid the herds of the northern ranches. Occasional cowboys drifting to Showdown had given him considerable information regarding the physical characteristics of the country roundabout these ranches, the water-holes, trails, and grazing.
The Spider knew that he could make only one such raid, with any chance of success. If he made a drive at all, it would be on a big scale. The cattlemen would eventually trail the first stolen herd to his ranch. True, they would not find it there. He would see to it that the cattle were pushed across the border without delay. But a second attempt would be out of the question. The chief factor in the success of the scheme would be the prompt handling of the herd upon its arrival. He had cowboys in his employ who would steal the cattle. What he needed was a man whom he could rely upon to check the tally and turn the herd over to the agents of the Mexican soldiery and collect the money on the spot, while his cowboys guarded the herd from a possible raid by the Mexicans themselves. He knew that should the northern ranchmen happen to organize quickly and in force, they would not hesitate to promptly lynch the raiders, burn his buildings, take all his horses worth taking, and generally put the ranch out of business.
Thus far the ranch had paid well as a sort of isolated clearing-house for The Spider's vicarious accounts. The cowboys who worked there were picked men, each of whom received a straight salary, asked no questions, and rode with a high-power rifle under his knee and a keen eye toward the southern ranches.
Pete, riding south, bore an unsigned letter from The Spider, with instructions to hand it to the foreman of "The Olla" and receive further instructions from that gentleman. Pete knew nothing of the contemplated raid, The Spider shrewdly surmising that Pete would balk at the prospect of stealing cattle from his own countrymen. And it was because of this very fact that The Spider had intrusted Pete--by letter to the foreman--with the even greater responsibility of receiving the money for the cattle and depositing it in a certain bank in El Paso. Heretofore, such payments had been made to The Spider's representative in that city--the president of the Stockmen's Security and Savings Bank--who had but recently notified The Spider that he could no longer act in the capacity of agent on account of local suspicion, already voiced in the current newspapers. Hereafter The Spider would have to deal directly with the Mexican agents. And The Spider unhesitatingly chose Pete as his representative, realizing that Pete was shrewdly capable, fearless, and to be trusted.
Toward evening of the third day out of Showdown, Pete came upon a most unexpected barrier to his progress--a wire fence stretching east and west; a seemingly endless succession of diminishing posts. He estimated that there must he at least forty thousand acres under fence. According to location, this was The Spider's ranch--the Olla--Pete reined around and rode along the fence for a mile or so, searching for a gateway; but the taut barbed wire ran on and on, toward a sun that was rounding swiftly down to the western horizon. He dismounted and pulled the staples from several lengths of wire until he had enough slack to allow the top wire to touch the ground. He stood on the wires and jockeyed Blue Smoke across, tied him to a post, and tacked the wire back in place.
Headed south again, he had just passed a clump of chaparral when up from the draw came a tall, muscular cowboy, riding a big horse--and a fast one, thought Pete.
"Evenin'," drawled the cowboy--a slow-speaking Texan, who was evidently waiting for Pete to explain his presence.
"How!--Is this here the Olla ranch?"
"One end of her."
"I'm lookin' for the foreman."
"What name did you say?"
"I didn't say."
"What's your business down this way?" queried the cowboy.
"It's mine. I dunno as it's any of yours."
"So? Now, that's mighty queer! Lookin' for the fo'man, eh? Well, go ahead and look--they's plenty of room."
"Too much," laughed Pete. "Reckon I got to bush here and do my huntin' in the mornin'--only"--and Pete eyed the other significantly--"I kind of hate to bush on the ground. I was bit by a spider onct--"
"A spider, eh? Now that's right comical. What kind of a spider was it that bit you?"
"Trap-door spider. Only this here one was always home."
"So?" drawled the Texan. "Now, that's right funny. I was bit by a rattler once. Got the marks on my arm yet."
"Well, if it comes to a showdown, that there spider bite--"
"The ranch-house is yonder," said the Texan. "Just you ride along the way you're headed. That's a pretty horse you're settin' on. If it wa'n't so dark I'd say he carried the Concho brand."
"That's him," said Pete.
"He's a long jump from home, friend."
"And good for twice that distance, neighbor."
"You sure please me most to death," drawled the Texan.
"Then I reckon you might call in that there coyote in the brush over there that's been holdin' a gun on me ever since we been talkin',"--and Pete gestured with his bridle hand toward the clump of chaparral.
"Sam," called the Texan, "he says he don't like our way of welcomin' strangers down here. He's right friendly, meetin' one man at a time--but he don't like a crowd, nohow."
A figure loomed in the dusk--a man on foot who carried a rifle across his arm. Pete could not distinguish his features, but he saw that the man was tall, booted and spurred, and evidently a line-rider with the Texan.
"This here young stinging-lizard says he wants to see the fo'man, Sam. Kin you help him out?"
"Go ahead and speak your piece," said the man with the rifle.
"She's spoke," said Pete.
"I'm the man you're huntin'," asserted the other.
"You foreman?"
"The same."
"Thought you was jest a hand--ridin' fence, mebby." And as Pete spoke he rolled a cigarette. His pony shied at the flare of the match, but Pete caught an instant glimpse of a lean-faced, powerfully built man of perhaps fifty years or more who answered The Spider's description of the foreman. "I got a letter here for Sam Brent, foreman of the Olla," said Pete.
"Now you're talkin' business."
"His business," laughed the Texan.
"Nope--The Spider's," asserted Pete.
"Your letter will keep," said the foreman. "Ed, you drift on along down the fence till you meet Harper. Tell him it's all right." And the foreman disappeared in the dusk to return astride a big cowhorse. "We'll ride over to the house," said he.
Pete estimated that they had covered three or four miles before the ranch-buildings came in sight--a dim huddle of angles against the starlit sky. To his surprise the central building was roomy and furnished with a big table, many chairs, and a phonograph, while the floor was carpeted with Navajo blankets, and a big shaded hanging lamp illumined the table on which were scattered many dog-eared magazines and a few newspapers. Pete had remarked upon the stables while turning his own horse into the corral. "We got some fast ones," was all that the foreman chose to say, just then.
Pete and the foreman had something to eat in the chuck-house, and returned to the larger building. Brent read The Spider's letter, rolled the end of his silver-gray mustache between his thumb and forefinger, and finally glanced up. "So, you're Pete Annersley?"
"That's my name."
"Have a chair. You're right young to be riding alone. How did you come to throw in with The Spider?"
Pete hesitated. Why should he tell this man anything other than that he had been sent by The Spider with the letter which--he had been told--would explain his presence and embody his instructions?
"Don't he say in that letter?" queried Pete.
"He says you were mixed up in a bank robbery over to Enright," stated the foreman.
"That's a dam' lie!" flared Pete.
"I reckon you'll do," said Brent, as he folded the letter. The Spider had made that very statement in his letter to Brent for the purpose of finding out, through the foreman, whether or not Pete had taken it upon himself to read the letter before delivering it. And Brent, aware of The Spider's methods, realized at once why his chief had misstated the facts. It was evident that Pete had not read the letter, otherwise he would most probably have taken his cue from The Spider's assertion about the bank robbery and found himself in difficulties, for directly after the word "Enright" was a tiny "x"--a code letter which meant "This is not so."
"Reckon I'll do what?" queried Pete. "Let The Spider or anybody like him run a whizzer on me after I run a good hoss ragged to git here with his doggone letter--and then git stuck up like I was a hoss-thief? You got another guess, uncle."
The old cowman's eyes twinkled. "You speak right out in meetin', don't you, son?" His drawl was easy and somehow reminded Pete of Pop Annersley. "Now there's some wouldn't like that kind of talk--even from a kid."
"I'd say it to The Spider as quick as I would to you," asserted Pete.
"Which might be takin' a chance, both ways."
"Say"--and Pete smiled--"I guess I been talkin' pretty fast, I was some het up. The Spider used me as white as he could use anybody, I reckon. But ever since that killin' up to his place, I been sore at the whole doggone outfit runnin' this here world. What does a fella git, anyhow, for stickin' up for himself, if he runs against a killer? He gits bumped off--or mebby he kills the other fella and gits run out of the country or hung. Pardners stick, don't they? Well, how would it git you if you had a pardner that--well, mebby was a girl and she got killed by a bunch of deputies jest because she was quick enough to spoil their game? Would you feel like shakin' hands with every doggone hombre you met up with, or like tellin' him to go to hell and sendin' him there if he was lookin to argue with you? I dunno. Mebby I'm wrong--from the start--but I figure all a fella gits out of this game is a throwdown, comin' or goin'--'for the deck is stacked and the wheel is crooked."
"I was fifty-six last February," said Brent.
"And how many notches you got on your gun?" queried Pete.
"Oh, mebby two, three," drawled the foreman.
"That's it! Say you started in callin' yourself a growed man when you was twenty. Every ten years you had to hand some fella his finish to keep from makin' yours. 'Got to kill to live,' is right!"
"Son, you got a good horse, and yonder is the whole State of Texas, where a man can sure lose himself without tryin' hard. There's plenty of work down there for a good cow-hand. And a man's name ain't printed on his face. Nobody's got a rope on you."
"I git you," said Pete. "But I throwed in with The Spider--and that goes."
"That's your business--and as you was sayin' your business ain't mine. But throwin' a fast gun won't do you no good round here."
"Oh, I don't claim to be so doggone fast," stated Pete.
"Faster than Steve Gary?"
Pete's easy glance centered to a curious, tense gaze which was fixed on the third button of Brent's shirt. "What about Steve Gary?" asked Pete, and even Brent, old hand as he was, felt the sinister significance in that slow question. The Spider's letter had said to "give him a try-out," which might have meant almost anything to a casual reader, but to Brent it meant just what he had been doing that evening--seeking for a weak spot in Pete's make-up, if there were such, before hiring him.
"My gun is in the bedroom," said Brent easily.
"Well, Gary's wasn't," said Pete.
"We ain't had a gun-fight on this ranch since I been foreman," said Brent. "And we got some right fast men, at that. Seein' you're goin' to work for me a spell, I'm goin' to kind of give you a line on things. You can pick your own string of horses--anything that you can get your rope on that ain't branded 'J.E.', which is pet stock and no good at workin' cattle. You met up with Ed Brevoort this evenin'. Well, you can ride fence with Ed and he'll show you the high spots and hollows--and the line--south. If you run onto any strangers ridin' too close to the line, find out what they want. If you can't find out, get word to me. That goes for strangers. But if you get to arguin' with any of my boys--talk all you like--but don't start a smoke--
for you won't get away with it. The Spider ain't payin' guns to shoot up his own outfit. If you're lookin' for real trouble, all you got to do is to ride south acrost the line--and you'll find it. And you're gettin' a straight hundred a month and your keep as long as you work for the Olla."
"Which is some different from takin' my hoss and fannin' it easy for Texas," said Pete, grinning.
"Some different," said Brent. _