Ted Strong in Montana | Page 6

want any more such nights in mine."
"That was only a starter, my friend. That was a picnic compared to what you may have to go up against before the daisies bloom again."
"Chuck!" yelled McCall, beating on the bottom of a griddle with a big iron spoon.
The fellows left the fire in a hurry and, squatting in the snow with a tin cup full of steaming coffee and a plate heaped with fried bacon and griddle cakes, were soon too busy to remember their weariness.
Stella had ridden up, her cheeks glowing, and her eyes sparkling with the frost and the exercise.
"Why didn't you wait for me?" she cried to Ted. "You're a mean thing. Thought you'd leave me behind, but here I am." She made a little face at Ted.
"I thought you'd rather stay indoors to-day on account of the cold," stammered Ted.
"Well, change your line of thought. There's going to be nothing to keep me indoors in this country, and don't you forget it. If I've got to stay indoors, I'll go South."
As soon as the boys had finished breakfast they were ready for another day's work.
"Come on, fellows," shouted Ted. "Let's hurry to where the critters are, and send the other boys back. Mac, cook up another breakfast for them."
They were in the saddle in a jiffy, and scurrying toward the south as fast as their ponies could carry them.
Ted found the herd bogged in a shallow coulee that was filled to the top with snow, in which they stood up to their bellies, lowing from fright, hunger, and thirst.
They were packed in a solid mass, and could not get out on the other side because the wall of the coulee was too steep for them to clamber up, as they might have done had it not been for the deep snow with which it was drifted full.
As a matter of fact, though, the coulee had saved the herd from drifting many miles in the night.
But how to get them out was the question that perplexed Bud, and with the arrival of Ted he thankfully turned the task over to him.
"Hike for the chuck wagon, boys," shouted Ted, as he came up.
"Well, I should smile to ejaculate," said Bud, "we're as hollow an' cold as a rifle bar'l. I'll turn this leetle summer matinée over ter you, my friend, not wishin' you any harm."
"Go ahead and enjoy yourselves," said Ted. "But as soon as you have filled up and warmed up come back. As soon as we get the bunch out of this hole it will be a snap to get them near the ranch house. If we'd only known it, we could have made it in half an hour more last night."
When Bud had ridden away Ted took stock of the situation, and found that he had a difficult problem to solve.
Under ordinary circumstances it would have been easy to snake the cattle out of the coulee by roping them around the horns and dragging them out with the ponies, but it was utterly impossible to do that with a couple of thousand of them.
While he was looking things over he became aware that Stella had ridden away. He looked anxiously after her, for he knew her propensity for getting into trouble when she rode alone. Soon she dropped out of sight behind a swell in the prairie with a flash in the sunlight of her scarlet jacket.
Ted was still studying the situation, riding up and down the edge of the coulee, trying to figure out some plan of rescue, and noting the cattle that were down, and which were rapidly being trampled to death by the other beasts, or being smothered by the snow.
The prospect was not a pleasing one to the young cow boss, for he saw the profits of the venture fading away hourly.
Suddenly a faint, shrill yell reached his ears, and he wheeled his pony in the direction from which it came.
Stella's scarlet jacket was coming toward him in a whirlwind of flying snow, and he rushed toward her.
What could have happened to her? He looked in vain for whatever was pursuing her, and saw that she was not being followed, but was swinging her arm above her head with a triumphant gesture.
He slowed his pony down, and soon she dashed to his side.
"You fellows are certainly a bright lot of cow-punchers," she exclaimed.
"What's the matter now?" asked Ted gloomily.
"Didn't any of you think of scouting down the coulee?"
"I confess I didn't."
"You ought to be laid off the job for a week."
"Why?"
"You can get those cattle out of that hole in an hour."
"We can! How do you know?"
"The coulee runs out about a mile to the west, and straight to the north, up a wide swale, lies the ranch house in full view."
"Stella, you're