The Fighting Shepherdess

The Fighting Shepherdess, by
Caroline

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Lockhart, Illustrated by M. Leone Bracker
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Title: The Fighting Shepherdess
Author: Caroline Lockhart

Release Date: November 3, 2007 [eBook #23296]
Language: English
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THE FIGHTING SHEPHERDESS
by
CAROLINE LOCKHART
With Frontispiece by M. Leone Bracker

[Illustration: Kate was sitting on a rock--a dark picturesque silhouette
against the sky. See page 235.]

A. L. Burt Company Publishers New York Published by arrangement
with Small, Maynard & Company
Copyright, 1919, By Small, Maynard & Company (Incorporated)
Second Printing, February, 1919 Third Printing, March, 1919 Fourth
Printing, March, 1919 Fifth Printing, May, 1919 Sixth Printing, June,
1919

CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I The Sand Coulee Roadhouse 1 II An Historic Occasion 13 III Prouty
28 IV Disillusionment 40 V For Always 52 VI The Wolf Scratches 58
VII The Blood of Jezebel 75 VIII The Man of Mystery 85 IX The
Summons 98 X The Bank Puts on the Screws 109 XI Kate Keeps Her

Promise 120 XII The Dude Wrangler 131 XIII Mrs. Toomey's
Friendship Is Tested 139 XIV Like Any Other Herder 156 XV One
More Whirl 165 XVI Straws 175 XVII Extremes Meet 189 XVIII A
Warning 207 XIX An Old, Old Friend 212 XX The Fork of the Road
228 XXI "Heart and Hand" 253 XXII Mullendore Wins 263 XXIII
When the Black Spot Hit 274 XXIV Toomey Goes into Something 283
XXV The Chinook 298 XXVI Taking Her Medicine 309 XXVII The
Sheep Queen 322 XXVIII The Surprise of Mr. Wentz's Life 333 XXIX
Toomey Distinguishes Himself 344 XXX Her Day 353

THE FIGHTING SHEPHERDESS
CHAPTER I
THE SAND COULEE ROADHOUSE
A heavily laden freight wagon, piled high with ranch supplies, stood in
the dooryard before a long loghouse. The yard was fenced with crooked
cottonwood poles so that it served also as a corral, around which the
leaders of the freight team wandered, stripped of their harness, looking
for a place to roll.
A woman stood on tip-toe gritting her teeth in exasperation as she
tugged at the check-rein on the big wheelhorse, which stuck obstinately
in the ring. When she loosened it finally, she stooped and looked under
the horse's neck at the girl of fourteen or thereabouts, who was
unharnessing the horse on the other side. "Good God, Kate," exclaimed
the woman irritably; "how many times must I tell you to unhook the
traces before you do up the lines? One of these days you'll have the
damnedest runaway in seven states."
The girl, whose thoughts obviously were not on what she was doing,
obeyed immediately, and without replying looped up the heavy traces,
throwing and tying the lines over the hames with experienced hands.
The resemblance between mother and daughter was so slight that it

might be said not to exist at all. It was clear that Kate's wide, thoughtful
eyes, generous mouth and softly curving but firm chin came from the
other side, as did her height. Already she was half a head taller than the
short, wiry, tough-fibered woman with the small hard features who was
known throughout the southern half of Wyoming as "Jezebel of the
Sand Coulee."
A long flat braid of fair hair swung below the girl's waist and on her
cheeks a warm red showed through the golden tan. Her slim straight
figure was eloquent of suppleness and strength and her movements,
quick, purposeful, showed decision and activity of mind. They were as
characteristic as her directness of speech.
The Sand Coulee Roadhouse was a notorious place. The woman who
kept it called herself Isabel Bain--Bain having been the name of one of
the numerous husbands from whom she had separated to remarry in
another state, without the formality of a divorce. She was noted not
only for her remarkable horsemanship, but for her exceptional
handiness with a rope and branding iron, and her inability to distinguish
her neighbors' livestock from her own.
"Pete Mullendore's gettin' in." There was a frown on Kate's face as she
spoke and uneasiness in the glance she sent toward the string of
pack-horses filing along the fence.
The woman said warningly, "Don't you pull off any of your
tantrums--you treat him