Wilderness Trek (1988) Page 4
"Thank you. I'll try," responded Sterl, sincerely. The girl's frank wistfulness touched him deeply. "But I'm a stranger. I might be what Red calls no good atall."
"You might be, but I don't believe it... I like you, Sterl. I'm not afraid of you. Mum says I'm a hoyden. But I'm sensitive. These outback men court you on sight--hug and kiss you--or try to. Outback it's a fight for love, women, cattle--for life itself."
"Leslie, it's much like that on the western ranges where I come from. I understand a little how a young girl feels."
"You are going to be a comfort, Sterl," she said, happily. "Here we are, right in town. And there comes Red, putting Jester to a canter... There's where I went to school... Oh, I forgot something I wanted to tell you. Do you remember Dad mentioning a drover, Ashley Ormiston?"
"Yes. He is the man Mr. Dann wants your Dad to throw in with."
"Sterl, I don't like the idea at all. Mr. Ormiston is new to Downsville. You'll meet him today, so I don't need to describe him. But he has been very much in evidence since the races. I met him that day, and to be honest I was fascinated. Sterl; he--he insulted me that very first night. I've tried to avoid him ever since."
"Have you told your father?" queried Sterl. "I dare not," she replied, simply.
At that moment Red caught up with them.
"Let's tie up here," Leslie said, halting. "Now boys, you hunt up Dad. He'll be somewhere, waiting for you. Stanley Dann wants to meet you. Be good. Don't drink--or forget you're my cowboys."
They turned a corner to reach a point opposite a large store, in front of which had collected a crowd, mostly men, all trying to get out of the way of a conflict of some kind. Then Sterl saw a white man kick an aborigine into the street. He heard a woman cry out that it was Slyter's black man, Friday.
Sterl stepped out of the crowd and off from the pavement. Then a white man, agile and powerful, leaped into the street to kick the black viciously, knocking him flat.
Striding over, Sterl placed a hard hand against the aggressor and shoved him back, far from gently.
The man straightened up. He was a dark-browed, handsome fellow of about thirty, garbed as a drover.
"What business--of yours?" he panted, hoarsely.
"I just thought you'd kicked that black enough," declared Sterl, deliberately.
"Who are--you?" demanded the other, his dark eyes burning. Sterl caught a strong odor of whiskey.
"No matter. I'm a newcomer."
"Damned, meddling, Yankee blighter," shouted the Australian, and with a backhanded sweep he struck Sterl a blow across the mouth that staggered him.
Recovering his balance, Sterl leaped forward, and gave his antagonist a sudden blow low down, then swung his right fist hard and fierce at those malignant eyes, and felled him like a bullock under the ax.
Red lined up alongside his comrade. The buzzing circle crowded into the street. Sterl, to his dismay, espied Leslie's pale face. Then her father dragged her back and strode out, accompanied by a tawny-haired giant, leonine in build and mien.
Slyter gazed at the prostrate man, who was stirring, and from him to the black. "Friday! Who hit you?"
"Boss, that one fella," replied the black, and pointed to his brutal attacker.
"Dann, it's Ash Ormiston!" ejaculated Slyter.
"I see. Looks as if a horse kicked him... Here you, what does this mean?" boomed the giant, wheeling upon Sterl.
Red intervened, cool and wary. "Watch thet hombre, pard. He might have a gun."
"Krehl!" exclaimed Slyter. "Did you slug, Ormiston?"
"No, Sterl did thet. But I'd have liked to."
"Stanley, these are my two American cowboys, Krehl and Hazelton."
"Drunk and rowing, eh?" queried Dann. Sterl confronted Dann, and he was not in a humor to be conciliatory.
"No, I'm not drunk," he rang out. "It's your country-man who is that. I came upon him kicking this black man, Friday. Kicking him in the face and chest! I interfered. He called me a damned, meddling Yankee blighter and hit me. Then I soaked him."
"Friday, what you do alonga Ormiston?" asked Slyter, gruffly.
"Black fella tellum bimeby," replied Friday, and stalked into the crowd, where Sterl saw Leslie try to stop him and fail.
Meanwhile Ormiston staggered to his unsteady feet, one of his eyes beginning to puff.
"Where's that ---- Yankee who hit me?" he bit out.
Dann laid a restraining hand on him. "Man, you're drunk."
Sterl confronted him. "Go for your gun if you've got one."
Ormiston violently threw Dann off.
Dann waved the crowd back. "Get off the street!" he roared.
Chapter 4
If Ormiston had a gun concealed on his person, he made no move to draw it. Sterl's hand dropped back to his side.
"I'll not exchange shots--with a Yankee tramp," panted Ormiston.
"No. But you're not above kicking a poor black when he's down," replied Sterl.
Red again slouched over to Sterl's side. "Haw! Haw!" His hard, mirthless laugh rang with scorn. "Orful particular, ain't you, Mr. Ormiston, about who you throw a gun on? Wal, you got some sense, at thet."
"Dann, you're magistrate here!" shouted Ormiston. "Order these Yankees out of town."
"You're drunk, I told you," replied Dann. "You started a fight, then failed to go through with it."
"No, I didn't. I only kicked that snooping black. This Yankee started it... I'll not engage in a gun fight with a foreign adventurer," replied Ormiston in hoarse haste.
"Mister, why don't you pull thet gun I see inside yore coat?" drawled Red.
"Dann, order these Yankees to leave," repeated Ormiston, stridently.
"No. You're making a fool of yourself," declared Dann. "Slyter has hired these cowboys to help him on the trek."
"Slyter, is that true--you're taking these cowboys?"
"Yes, I've hired them."
"Will you discharge them?"
"No, I certainly will not."
"Then I refuse to take my drovers and my mob of cattle on Dann's trek."
"Ormiston, I don't care a damn what you do," said Slyter.
Ormiston made a forceful and passionate gesture, then shouldered his way through the crowd to disappear.
Slyter lost no time in getting to Sterl and Red and dragged them with him across the pavement into a store. Dann strode after them. And there the four men faced each other.
"Gentlemen, I'm terribly sorry," began Sterl. "It's just too bad that I had to mess up your plans at the last moment. But I couldn't stand for such dirty, low-down brutality."
"Pard," drawled Red, coolly rolling a cigarette. "If you hadn't been so damn quick I'd have busted Ormiston myself."
Dann stroked his golden beard with a massive hand, and his penetrating eyes studied the cowboys.
"It was unfortunate," he began, "Ormiston had been drinking. But I'll swear the black absolutely did not deserve that kicking. Friday is the best native I ever knew. He's honest, loyal, devoted to Leslie, who was good to his gin when she lay dying."
Red eased forward a step, in his slow way. "Mr. Dann, I'd like to ask you, without meanin' offense, if there ain't Englishmen heah an' there who's jest no good atall?"
Dann let out a deep laugh that was convincing. "There are, cowboy, and you can lay to that."
"Wal, I'm glad to heah you admit it. If I ever met a low-down hombre thet Ormiston is one. Mebbe it wouldn't have been so easy to see through--him but for the drink. No, Ormiston is jest no good atall--an' he come damn near bein' a daid one."
"Tell me, Hazelton," spoke up Dann, his amber eyes full of little, dancing glints, "if Ormiston had moved to draw his revolve!--what would you have done?"
"I'd have killed the fool," declared Sterl.
"Indeed!--Did you see that Ormiston was armed?"
"No. But I knew it... Now, Slyter, I think the thing for Red and me to do is to leave town at once."
"You will do nothing of the kind," rejoined Slyter, stoutly.
"Mr. Dann, I see the necessity for you. But if Red and I go--we'll clash with Ormiston."
"Listen, you young gamecocks," went on Dann, persuasively. "Outback there will be too much clash with the elements and the blacks for us drovers to fight among ourselves. We'll all be brothers before we reach the Never-never. Isn't that so, Bing?"
"It has been proved by other treks," replied Slyter, earnestly. "If you boys are concerned about me or Leslie--just forget that and take the risk."
"Boss, we'll never throw you down," said Red.
"We will go," added Sterl, and his tone was a pledge. "But have you ever driven cattle into a hard wilderness, months on end, against all the hard knocks a desolate country can deal you?"
"No, Hazelton, we have never been on a real trek," Dann replied. "But my brother Eric has. He slights the hardships either because he is callous, unfeeling, or because he doesn't want me to know. In fact, Eric has failed after several starts in Queensland."
"Do you want my advice?"
Dann nodded his leonine head. "Indeed yes! It's too late now, even if I would back out. Hazelton, perhaps Providence sent you rangemen to help us. To get down to fundamentals, tell us just what kind of range you have driven mobs of cattle over--how far--what kind of obstacles--how you worked."
"That's easy, gentlemen, and you can believe what I tell you," replied Sterl. "Some years ago, just after the Civil War, Texas was overrun with millions of longhorn cattle. The ranchers had no home market. A rancher named Chisholm conceived the idea of driving herds of cattle from southern Texas across the plains to Kansas. Chisholm started out with over three thousand head of cattle and twelve riders. He made it--five hundred miles--in something over ninety days, losing four cowboys and two thousand head of cattle. But he sold what was left at a huge profit. His Chisholm Trail inaugurated trail driving in Texas.
"As for hardships--in that early day fifty million buffalo ranged from the Gulf of the Dakotas. For years stampedes of buffalo were the worst obstacles the trail drivers had to overcome. Next to that were the attacks and raids of savage Indians. There were rivers to ford, some of them big and wide, often in flood. In dry years there were long drives from water to water. Thunderstorms often stampeded herds. Dust storms, sandstorms were terrible to drive against. In the fall and winter, the Del Notre, the freezing gale that blew out of a clear sky, was something the riders hated and feared. Lastly there came rustling--the era of the cattle thieves, which is in its heyday right now."
"Wonderful! Wonderful!" exclaimed Dann, his eyes shining. "Jesse Chisholm was a man after my heart. A savior of Texas, yes?"
"Indeed he saved Texas and built the cattle empire."
Red emitted a cloud of smoke, and drawled: "Boss, I rode for Jesse once. He was a great hombre. Harder than the hinges on the gates of hell! Sometime I'll tell you stories about him, one thing special, his jingle-bob brand, thet was so famous."
"Boys, I'll enjoy your stories, when time permits," boomed the drover. "I thank the good Lord for sending you to Australia! Hazelton, one thing more. How did you drive your mobs?"
"We rounded them up into a great triangle, with the apex pointing in the direction we had to go. 'Pointing the herd,' that was called. Two of the nerviest cowboys had the lead at the point. The mass of cattle would follow the leads. Two cowboys on each side at the center of the herd, the rest at the broad base where stragglers and deserters--'drags' we called them--had to be watched and driven."
"Were you one of those cowboys who rode at the head?" queried Dann.
"No, but Red was, always. I was a good hand after the drags."
"Shake hands with me, cowboys," bellowed Dann. "Slyter, I'll order my drovers to start my mob tomorrow, positively. I'll tell Ormiston to go or stay, as he chooses... Meet us soon out on the trek. Good-by."
Sterl became aware that the store was full of inquisitive people. He and Red were the cynosure of all eyes. Red enjoyed such attention, but Sterl hated it, especially, as had happened so often, when he had just engaged in a fight. He shivered when he thought how closely he had come to shooting Ormiston. He had hoped Australia had not bred the type of bad man among whom he had been compelled to work.
Leslie met him outside with her arms full of packages. Sterl and Red promptly relieved her of them. After one look at Leslie's white face and eyes blazing almost black, Sterl felt too dismayed to speak. She had witnessed his encounter with Ormiston. As she walked along between him and Red, she had a hand on Sterl's arm. They came to a point opposite the horses.
"Heah we air, Jester, agonna make a pack hoss out of you fust thing," spoke up Red, and Sterl knew that the cowboy was talking to ease the situation.
"Leslie, have you finished your buying?" asked Sterl.
"Not quite. But I'll not stay longer--in town," she replied in thick unsteady tone. She mounted her horse as Sterl remembered seeing Comanches mount. "Let me have some of the parcels."
Handing these to her, Sterl looked up into her face.
"Leslie--you were there?" he asked. "Yes. I saw it--all."
"I'm sorry. Bad luck like that always hounds me."
"Who said it was bad luck?" she retorted. "But Sterl--you jumped at that chance to hit Ormiston--on my account?"
"Well--Friday's first--and then yours. Still I'd have interfered if I'd never heard of either of you. I'm built that way, Leslie."
"You're built greatly, then... A thrill hardly does justice to what I felt--when you hit him... But, afterward--when it looked like shooting--I nearly fainted."
"So that's why you're so pale?" rejoined Sterl, endeavoring to speak lightly, as he mounted. Red rode a tactful distance ahead.
"Am I pale?" she asked.
"Not so much now. But a few minutes back you were white as a sheet."
"Sterl, I ran into Ormiston."
"And what did he say?"
"I don't remember everything. One thing, though, was what you called him."
"That's not calculated to make Ormiston love me any better."
"Do you think he'll make good his threat not to go on the trek?"
"I do not," said the girl, positively. "Ash Ormiston couldn't be kept from going. I wouldn't say wholly because he's so keen after Beryl Dann and me."
"Beryl too? Well!... He's what Red would call an enterprising agent."
"He's deep, Sterl. I distrust his attitude toward the trek."
"Leslie, what had he against your black man?"
"He had enough. I should have told you that... Once when Mum and Dad were in town, Ormiston found me in my hammock. He made violent love to me. I was scared, Sterl. He... I... I fought him--and Friday ran up with his spear. It was all I could do to keep him from killing Ormiston."
"Is Friday going on the trek?"
"Dad wants him. To track lost horses. The blacks are marvelous trackers. But Friday says no. Maybe you can persuade him, Sterl. A black never forgets a wrong or fails to return a service."
"I sure will try. What a lot I could learn!"
They rode on at a canter and halted at the paddock. "Come up later for tea--oh, yes, and to see my pets," said Leslie, as they dismounted and gathered up her bundles.
Left to his own devices, Sterl went among his string of horses, which Roland had tethered in the shed, and while he set about the slow and pleasing task of making friends with them, he mused over the momentous journey from Brisbane. He could no more keep things from happening to him than he could stop breathing. But he recalled only one man, out of the many rustlers and hard characters who had crossed his trail, who had incited as quick a hatred in him, as had this man Ormiston. If possible, he must keep out of the man's way. Offsetting that was the inspiring personality of Stanley Dann. Here was a man. And Sterl did not pass by the fair-haired Beryl, with her dark-blue eyes
and the proud poise of her head. Leslie was appealing in many ways, but the charm she had, which he found vaguely sweet and disquieting, was the fact of his apparent appeal of her, of which she was wholly unconscious. Well, he was in the open again, already in contact with raw nature, about to ride out on this incredible trek. That was all left him in life--this strenuous action of the natural man. Sterl discounted any lasting relation with these good white folk who needed him.
When he returned to the tent, Sterl found Red sitting before the flap, profoundly thoughtful and solemn. He had not even heard Sterl's approach.
"Pard, did you heah anythin'?" he asked, almost in a whisper.
"Hear?--When?"
"Jest about a minnit ago--mebbe longer. I don't know. I'm dotty... Did I have any drinks uptown?"
"You sure didn't."
"Gosh, I'm shore I've got the willies... Sterl, I was in the tent heah, when somebody busted out in a laugh--snortinest hosslaugh you ever heahed. 'Who'n hell's laughin' at me'?' I said, an' I was mad. Wal, pard, you never in yore life heahed such a loud brayin'-ass laugh. When the smart alec got through I come out to bust him. Seen nobody. Then I seen a big brown an' white bird, sittin' right there on thet branch. Stuck his haid on one side an' looked out of his devilish black eyes at me, as if to say, 'Heah's one of them Yankee blighters.'... If thet bird didn't give me thet hosslaugh, then yore pard has gone plumb stark ravin' crazy."
"Let's go up and ask Leslie."
On the way up the path under the wattles they met her. Red burst into the narrative of his perplexing experience. Leslie burst into uncontrollable mirth.
"Oh--Oh! It was--Jack," she choked out. "Jack who?"
"My pet kookaburra--Oh, Red!--my laughing jackass!"
"Wal, I figgered he was a laughin' hyena, all right! But thet pet kooka somethin'--thet has me beat."
"Jack is our most famous bird. He is a kind of giant kingfisher. I'm taking him on the trek, but I can't take my little bears. It breaks my heart--Come in to tea." At the door Leslie whispered to Sterl. "I didn't tell Mum about what happened uptown."
Slyter had not returned, nor did his wife expect him. "I'm too terribly busy to chat," she said, after serving them, and drinking a cup of tea. "Les, I wanted Friday to carry things down to the wagon. Have you seen him?"