Cowboys frequently practise with their revolvers at
snakes, but one of the peculiarities of this rider
was that he carried no gun, neither six-shooter nor
rifle. He drew out a short knife which might be
used to skin a beef or carve meat, though certainly
no human being had ever used such a weapon against
a five-foot rattler. He stooped and rested both
hands on his thighs. His feet were not two paces
from the poised head of the snake. As if marvelling
at this temerity, the big rattler tucked back his
head and sounded the alarm again. In response
the cowboy flashed his knife in the sun. Instantly
the snake struck but the deadly fangs fell a few inches
short of the riding boots. At the same second
the man moved. No eye could follow the leap of
his hand as it darted down and fastened around the
snake just behind the head. The long brown body
writhed about his wrist, with rattles clashing.
He severed the head deftly and tossed the twisting
mass back on the rocks.
Then, as if he had performed the most ordinary act,
he rubbed his gloves in the sand, cleansed his knife
in a similar manner, and stepped back to his horse.
Contrary to the rules of horse-nature, the stallion
had not flinched at sight of the snake, but actually
advanced a high-headed pace or two with his short
ears laid flat on his neck, and a sudden red fury
in his eyes. He seemed to watch for an opportunity
to help his master. As the man approached after
killing the snake the stallion let his ears go forward
again and touched his nose against his master’s
shoulder. When the latter swung into the saddle,
the wolf-dog came to his side, reared, and resting
his forefeet on the stirrup stared up into the rider’s
face. The man nodded to him, whereat, as if he
understood a spoken word, the dog dropped back and
trotted ahead. The rider touched the reins and
galloped down the easy slope. The little episode
had given the effect of a three-cornered conversation.
Yet the man had been as silent as the animals.
In a moment he was lost among the hills, but still
his whistling came back, fainter and fainter, until
it was merely a thrilling whisper that dwelt in the
air but came from no certain direction.
His course lay towards a road which looped whitely
across the hills. The road twisted over a low
ridge where a house stood among a grove of cottonwoods
dense enough and tall enough to break the main force
of any wind. On the same road, a thousand yards
closer to the rider of the black stallion, was Morgan’s
place.
CHAPTER II
THE PANTHER
In the ranch house old Joseph Cumberland frowned on
the floor as he heard his daughter say: “It
isn’t right, Dad. I never noticed it before
I went away to school, but since I’ve come back
I begin to feel that it’s shameful to treat
Dan in this way.”
Her eyes brightened and she shook her golden head
for emphasis. Her father watched her with a faintly
quizzical smile and made no reply. The dignity
of ownership of many thousand cattle kept the old
rancher’s shoulders square, and there was an
antique gentility about his thin face with its white
goatee. He was more like a quaint figure of the
seventeenth century than a successful cattleman of
the twentieth.
