Browning chief. [volume] (Browning, Mont.) 1941-1953, 1943-01-15
CHAPTER l
@GREGoRY

udyS, Helu by some Ilueu WITH unlQu1-
ty and general hen-raising, were
numbered and his sands were rum
ming fast. He had kno IN for six
months and with a sort of devilish
flicker of glee in all that he did, had
gone about making the final ar
engagements. He was rare old lone
eagle and in him was a stripe of
Satan a yard wide, at infrequent
times something almost saintlike,
and on many joyous occasion a
dash of Santa Claus.
Even if got to die like other
fool folks" he consoled himself,
I'm going to get me my mite of
fun out of it! Hell's bells, yes, sir!"
With his preparations pretty well
in order, Early Bill Cole of the King
Cole Ranch still estimated that his
course had a few weeks to run, but
that was before this particular
morning had blossomed in shining
gold out of the pleasantly cool, shad-
owy dawn. 1t was always his habit
to be astir before the new day. He
had no great fondness for the night
time. The things he loved with all
that wild old heart of his we're the
good earth and green things growing
and the earliest hours with the last
stars winking out rather like the twin
kle in his old, hard, steely blue eyes,
and the little dawn breeze and the
sunup and the glorious unfolding.
And of late he was up and out of
his enormous old adobe ranch house
each morning earlier than was even
his habit. He didn't want folks to
see him and realize what he was up
to. For each day he was telling
some part of his wide spread acres,
the whole of his world, a last adios.
For many the year he had in
habited all alone the ancient, pic
turesque adobe building which long
before his days had been the home
of the Spanish-California Estradas.
At first, being younger and even
wilder then than at the end, he had
always had house full, and very
colorful accounts of proceedings un-
der the red tiled roof and within
the thick white earthen walls leaked
out. But now, no. A quarter Of a
mile from the old adobe, beyond a
big grove of cottonWoods, were out
buildings, stables and corrals and
barns and quarters for hired hands.
His latter years he wanted to be
alone, like an old wolf, except when
he himself went out in quest of COM
pany.
Thus, this morning, he should be
sure of going about whatever his
own business might be, with no fear
of spying eye. He stepped along
under the fading stars with his
horny thumbs hooked into his car
fridge belt, his battered old black
hat pushed far back on his thatch
of white hair, his high-heeled boots
stepping briskly. He was darned
if he'd crawl about like an old man,
seen or unseen.
The house was on a gently boS-
omed site with big oaks all about it;
to the west, miles away, lowered
the mountains; between the house
and the mountains were little rip
ping green hills where many a tall
pine and many a tight clump of
young pines grew. He walked to-
ward the nearest hill with the three
nobly tall pines on its crest. Here
was place of vantage well above
the slopes where chaparral and
manzanita wove themselves into
thickets for rabbits to hide in.
1t was still half dark when he
came to the one pine which, with
no one in the least suspecting it, he
had loved with a deep, still, fra
gravity romantic love for nearly
forty years. There was a reason,
locked away in his own heart. In
the half dark, and with no eyes to
see. he pulled off his hat and looked
up at the one star, still bright,
laughing down at him through the
branches. He put his long, thin,
sinewy arms as far as he could
about the tree. He pressed his griz-
zled cheek against the bark, so
rough yet to his feeling so tenderly
soft
Then a rife shot, clear and vi
cious, cracked through the still love-
illness of the hour, and old Early Bill
'SolS iell d StdD VI PAIN. UT a mo-
ment he chung to the pine tree, grip
ping it tight for support. Then,
quick and erect, he stepped free of
it and as he did so dragged both of
his old guns, almost as old and
worn and deadly as himself, up
from their loose feathers.
His shrewd old wintry eyes bare
ly discerned puff of smoke like a
wisp of vanishing mist hanging
above the thicket where fiercer
animal than brush rabbits was hid
ing this morning. And not waiting
for any sure target he started blaz-
ing away with both guns. What
amazed him was that no second
shot was winged his way.
So still was the hour that small
sounds carried far and distinct;
he heard man crashing his way
through the bushes, and prayed
through clenched teeth for fair
sight of him. None was afforded |
however until his assailant, having
run to horse tethered under the |
crown of the slope, went up into the