The Fighting Shepherdess | Page 3

voice made them both turn quickly. "As an entirely
impartial and unbiased spectator, friend, I should say that you are
outclassed." The man addressed himself to Mullendore. The stranger
unobserved had entered by the corral gate. He was a typical
sheepherder in looks if not in speech, even to the collie that stood by
his side. He wore a dusty, high-crowned black hat, overalls, mackinaw
coat, with a small woolen scarf twisted about his neck, and in his hand
he carried a gnarled staff. His eyes had a humorously cynical light
lurking in their brown depths.
Mullendore did not reply, but with another oath began to untie the lash
rope from the nearest pack.
"Wonder if I could get a drink of water?" The stranger turned to Kate
as he spoke, lifting his hat to disclose a high white forehead--a forehead
as fine as it was unexpected in a man trailing a bunch of sheep. The

men who raised their hats to the women of the Sand Coulee were not
numerous, and Kate's eyes widened perceptibly before she replied
heartily, "Sure you can."
Jezebel, who had come up leading the big wheel horse, said
significantly, "Somethin' stronger, if you like."
The fierce eagerness which leaped into the stranger's eyes screamed his
weakness, yet he did not jump at the offer she held out. The struggle in
his mind was obvious as he stood looking uncertainly into the face that
was stamped with the impress of wide and sordid experiences. Kate's
voice broke the short silence, "He said 'water,' Mother." She spoke
sharply, and with a curt inclination of her head to the sheepherder
added, "The water barrel's at the back door, Mister. Come with me."
Apparently this made his decision for him, for he followed the girl at
once, while Jezebel with a shrug walked on with the horse.
Kate handed the stranger the long-handled tin dipper and watched him
gravely while he drank the water in gulps, draining it to the last drop.
"Guess you're a booze-fighter, Mister," she observed, casually, much as
she might have commented that his unkempt beard was brown.
Amusement twinkled in his eyes at the personal remark and her utter
unconsciousness of having said anything at which by any chance he
could take offense, but he replied noncommittally:
"I've put away my share, Miss."
"I can always pick 'em out. Nearly all the freighters and cow punchers
that stop here get drunk."
He looked at her quizzically.
"The trapper you were playing tag with when I came looks as if he
might be ugly when he'd had too much."
He was startled by the intensity of the expression which came over her
face as she said, between her clenched teeth:

"I hate that 'breed'!"
"He isn't just the pardner," dryly, "that I'd select for a long camping
trip."
Her pupils dilated and she lowered her voice:
"He's ornery--Pete Mullendore."
As though in response to his name, that person came around the corner
with his bent-kneed slouch, giving to the girl as he passed a look so
malignant, and holding so unmistakable a threat, that it chilled and
sobered the stranger who stood leaning against the water barrel. The
girl returned it with a stare of brave defiance, but her hand trembled as
she returned the dipper to its nail. She looked at him wistfully, and with
a note of entreaty in her voice asked:
"Why don't you camp here to-night, Mister?"
The sheepherder shook his head.
"I've got to get on to the next water hole. I have five hundred head of
ewes in the road and they haven't had a drink for two days. They're
getting hard to hold."
Kate volunteered:
"You've about a mile and a half to go."
"Yes, I know. Well--s'long, and good luck!" He reached for his
sheepherder's staff and once more raised his hat with a manner which
spoke of another environment. Before he turned the corner of the house
an impulse prompted him to look back. Involuntarily he all but stopped.
Her eyes had in them a despairing look that seemed a direct appeal for
help. But he smiled at her, touched his hat brim and went on. The girl's
look haunted him as he trudged along the road in the thick white dust
kicked up by the tiny hoofs of the moving sheep.
"She's afraid of that 'breed,'" he thought, and tried to find comfort in

telling himself that there was no occasion for alarm, with her mother,
hard-visaged as she was, within call. Yet as unconsciously he kept
glancing back at the lonely roadhouse, sprawling squat and ugly on the
desolate sweep of sand and sagebrush, the only sign of human
habitation within the circle of the wide horizon, he had the same
sinking feeling at the heart