Cattle Brands | Page 5

in reply, "don't allow any tenderfoot around
the cattle,--at night, at least. You'd better play you're company;
somebody that's come. If you're so very anxious to do something, the
cook may let you rustle wood or carry water. We'll fix you up a bed
after a little, and see that you get into it where you can sleep and be
harmless.
"Colonel," added Baugh, "why is it that you never tell that experience

you had once amongst the greasers?"
"Well, there was nothing funny in it to me," said Carter, "and they say I
never tell it twice alike."
"Why, certainly, tell us," said the cattle-buyer. "I've never heard it.
Don't throw off to-night."
"It was a good many years ago," began old man George, "but the
incident is very clear in my mind. I was working for a month's wages
then myself. We were driving cattle out of Mexico. The people I was
working for contracted for a herd down in Chihuahua, about four
hundred miles south of El Paso. We sent in our own outfit, wagon,
horses, and men, two weeks before. I was kept behind to take in the
funds to pay for the cattle. The day before I started, my people drew out
of the bank twenty-eight thousand dollars, mostly large bills. They
wired ahead and engaged a rig to take me from the station where I left
the railroad to the ranch, something like ninety miles.
"I remember I bought a new mole-skin suit, which was very popular
about then. I had nothing but a small hand-bag, and it contained only a
six-shooter. I bought a book to read on the train and on the road out,
called 'Other People's Money.' The title caught my fancy, and it was
very interesting. It was written by a Frenchman,--full of love and
thrilling situations. I had the money belted on me securely, and started
out with flying colors. The railroad runs through a dreary country, not
worth a second look, so I read my new book. When I arrived at the
station I found the conveyance awaiting me. The plan was to drive
halfway, and stay over night at a certain hacienda.
"The driver insisted on starting at once, telling me that we could reach
the Hacienda Grande by ten o'clock that night, which would be half my
journey. We had a double-seated buckboard and covered the country
rapidly. There were two Mexicans on the front seat, while I had the rear
one all to myself. Once on the road I interested myself in 'Other
People's Money,' almost forgetful of the fact that at that very time I had
enough of other people's money on my person to set all the bandits in
Mexico on my trail. There was nothing of incident that evening, until
an hour before sundown. We reached a small ranchito, where we spent
an hour changing horses, had coffee and a rather light lunch.
"Before leaving I noticed a Pinto horse hitched to a tree some distance
in the rear of the house, and as we were expecting to buy a number of

horses, I walked back and looked this one carefully over. He was very
peculiarly color-marked in the mane. I inquired for his owner, but they
told me that he was not about at present. It was growing dusk when we
started out again. The evening was warm and sultry and threatening
rain. We had been on our way about an hour when I realized we had
left the main road and were bumping along on a by-road. I asked the
driver his reason for this, and he explained that it was a cut-off, and that
by taking it we would save three miles and half an hour's time. As a
further reason he expressed his opinion that we would have rain that
night, and that he was anxious to reach the hacienda in good time. I
encouraged him to drive faster, which he did. Within another hour I
noticed we were going down a dry arroyo, with mesquite brush on both
sides of the road, which was little better than a trail. My suspicions
were never aroused sufficiently to open the little hand-bag and belt on
the six-shooter. I was dreaming along when we came to a sudden stop
before what seemed a deserted jacal. The Mexicans mumbled
something to each other over some disappointment, when the driver
said to me:--
"'Here's where we stay all night. This is the hacienda.' They both got
out and insisted on my getting out, but I refused to do so. I reached
down and picked up my little grip and was in the act of opening it,
when one of them grabbed my arm and jerked me out of the seat to the
ground. I