Deep Furrows | Page 6

The former rancher threw back his head and
laughed.
"We've got the privilege of loading our wheat direct on cars through the
flat warehouses or any other way we like----"
"What's the good o' that if a man can't get a car when he wants it?"
demanded McNair impatiently. "The elevator gang 've organized to

grab everything in sight. I know it. You know it. Everybody knows it,
by heaven! So what's the use o' talkin'?"
"We've got to be fair, though. The elevator people have put a lot of
money--Say, why can't we organize, too?" suggested Motherwell with a
flash of inspiration. "We haven't tried that yet. That's constitutional.
That's what the livestock breeders have done," he said eagerly.
McNair shook his head.
"I tell you, Bill, it's too late for that sort o' thing," he objected. "Unless
you mean organizin' to fight--"
"Exactly."
"With guns, if necessary?"
"It won't be necessary."
"Possibly not to shoot anybody. The showin' mebbe'll turn the trick.
Now, look here. My idea is that if a bunch of us fellows got together on
the quiet some night an' seized a few elevators--Say, wouldn't it bring
things to a head so quick we'd get action? The law's there, but these
fellows are deliberately breakin' it an' we got to show 'em----"
"The action you'd get would be the wrong kind, Mac," protested W. R.
Motherwell emphatically. "You'd land in jail!"
"Don't see it that way," persisted McNair. "Wouldn't give a continental
if I did so long's it woke a few people up."
"I tell you you're on the wrong trail unless you want to get it where the
chicken got the axe!"
"Doggone it, man! Ain't that where we're gettin' it now?"
"Whereas with the right kind of organization----"
"Don't believe it," grunted McNair, starting to climb back to his horse.

"The time for any more o' these here granny tea-parties is past to my
way o' thinkin' an' if we can't agree on it, we'd better shut up before we
get mad." He vaulted easily into the saddle. "But I'll tell you one thing,
W. R.--there's the sweetest little flare-up you ever saw on its way. I was
talkin' the other day to Ed. Partridge, the Railton boys, Al. Quigley,
Billy Bonner and some more----"
"And I'll bet they gave you a lot of sound advice, Mac!" laughed
Motherwell confidently.
"That's alright," resented McNair, the tan of his cheek deepening a trifle.
"They're a pretty sore bunch an' a fellow from down Turtle Mountain
way in Manitoba told me----"
"That the mud-turtle and the jack-rabbit finally agreed that slow and
steady----"
"Bah! You're sure hopeless," grinned the owner of the Two-Bar, giving
his horse the rein.
"Hopeful," corrected W. R. Motherwell with a laugh. "Tell Wilson, if
you see him, that Peter Dayman and I are expecting him over next
week, will you? And I say, Mac, don't kill too many before you get
home!" he called in final jocularity.
The flying horseman waved his hat and his "S'long" came back faintly.
The other watched till horse and rider lost themselves among the
distant wheat stocks. The twinkle died out of his eyes as he watched.
So McNair was another of them, eh? After all, that was only to be
expected of an old Indian fighter and cow-puncher like him. Poor Bob!
He had his reputation to sustain among the newcomers--hard rider, hard
fighter, hard drinker; to do it under the changed conditions naturally
required some hard talking on occasion. While Mac had become
civilized enough to keep one foot in a cowhide boot planted in the
practical present, the other foot was still moccasined and loath to forget
the days of war-paint and whiskey-traders, feathers and fears. Over the
crudities and hardships, the dirt and poverty, the years between had

hung a kindly curtain of glamor; so that McNair with his big soft
kerchiefs, his ranger's hat, his cow-puncher's saddle and trappings and
his "Two-Bar" brand was a figure to crane an Eastern neck.
Likeable enough chap--too much of a man to be treated as a joke to his
face, but by no means to be taken seriously--not on most occasions. In
the present instance, with feeling running as high as it was in some
quarters, that crazy idea of seizing a few elevators at the point of a
gun--! What in heaven's name would they do with them after they got
them? Nevertheless, McNair might find rattle-brained listeners enough
to cause a heap of trouble. There were always a few fellows ready for
excitement; they might go in for the fun of it, then before they knew it
the thing would curdle over night like a pan of milk in a thunder-storm.
"He's just darn fool enough to try some funny work," muttered the