Cowboy Dave | Page 8

time, but said nothing. Finally, however, as
they dismounted to eat their lunch, Pete could not help asking:
"Have any trouble with them, Dave?"
"Trouble? Oh no."
Dave relapsed into silence, and Pete shook his head in puzzled fashion.
Something had happened, but what, he could not guess.

In unwonted silence Dave and Pete rode back to the Bar U ranch,
reaching it at dusk with the bunch of strays. They were turned in with
the other cattle and then Dave, turning his horse into the corral, walked
heavily to the ranch house. All the life seemed to have gone from him.
"Well, son, did you get the bunch?" asked Mr. Carson as he greeted the
youth.
"Yes--I did," was the low answer. Mr. Carson glanced keenly at the lad,
and something he saw in his face caused the ranch owner to start.
"Was there any trouble?" he asked. It was the same question Pocus Pete
had propounded.
"Well, Len Molick and Whitey Wasson had some of our cattle in with
theirs."
"They did?"
"Yes, but Pete and I easily cut 'em out. But--Oh, Dad!" The words burst
from Dave's lips before he thought. "Am I your son?" he blurted out.
"Len and Whitey said I was a picked-up nobody! Am I? Am I not your
son?"
He held out his hands appealingly.
A great and sudden change came over Mr. Carson. He seemed to grow
older and more sorrowful. A sigh came from him.
Gently he placed one arm over the youth's drooping shoulders.
"Dave," he said gently. "I hoped this secret would never come out--that
you would never know. But, since it has, I must tell you the truth. I
love you as if you were my own son, but you are not a relative of
mine."
The words seemed to cut Dave like a knife.
"Then if I am not your son, who am I?" Dave asked in a husky voice.

The ticking of the clock on the mantle could be plainly, yes, loudly
heard, as Mr. Carson slowly answered in a low voice:
"Dave, I don't know!"

CHAPTER IV
A SMALL STAMPEDE
Dave Carson--to use the name by which we must continue to call him,
at least for a time--may have hoped for a different answer from the
ranchman. Doubtless he did so hope, but now he was doomed to
disappointment, for the words of Mr. Carson seemed final.
"Dave, I don't know," he repeated. "I don't know who you are, who
your parents are, or even what your name is. I wish I did!"
Dave sank down in a chair. He seemed crushed. Mr. Carson, too, was
somewhat overcome.
"There--there must be some explanation," said the lad at length, slowly.
"There is," was the reply. "I'll tell you all I know. I suppose I should
have done it before, but I have been putting it off, I hoped there would
be no need.
"I don't know just how Len and Whitey found it out," went on Mr.
Carson. "If they had only kept still a little longer you might never have
known, for I intended to go away from here soon."
"Go away from here, Dad?"
The endearing name slipped out before Dave was aware of it. A surge
of red sprang up into his cheeks, under their tan.
"Don't stop calling me that, Dave," begged Mr. Carson in a low voice. I
have been a father to you--at least I've tried to be."

"And you've succeeded," Dave said, affectionately.
"And I want to keep on in the same way," said the man, softly. "So
don't stop calling me dad, Dave. I--I couldn't bear that, even though I
have no right to it. But you asked me a question just now. I'll answer
that before I go on with the story.
"I did plan to leave here. I'm not making this ranch go, Dave, as I'd like
to see it. I have been thinking of giving it up. But that was before I
knew that my secret about you was known."
"Then you're not going now,--Dad?"
Dave hesitated just a moment over the name.
"No. It would look like desertion--cowardice--as if I went because this
matter became known. It will get out soon enough now, since the
Molick outfit knows it. But that's just the reason I'm going to stick. I
won't fly in the face of the enemy. I won't desert!
"The real reason why I intended to go, though, Dave, is because the
ranch isn't making money enough. It is holding its own, but that is not
enough. As you know, I was, up to a year or so ago, pretty well off. But
those unfortunate cattle speculations pulled me down, so now I am
really, what would be called poor, as ranchmen go.
"But