The Iron Furrow | Page 2

possesses is about to be risked on a venture, the matter
is naturally vital; and at this moment he was moving straight to the
initiative of his enterprise.
Where the road crossed the creek bed to continue northward, a trail
branched off and followed up the stream to the little ranch house by the
three cottonwood trees. Here the creek had not yet begun to cut an
arroyo and had washed merely a course five or six feet deep and some
fifty feet wide through the mesa, so that from a distance the shallow
gash was invisible and the ground appeared unbroken. It was because
of the flat character of the mesa, too, that Bryant on reaching the bank
of the stream was able to see on the opposite side two persons a quarter
of a mile off riding toward him; women, he perceived. Far north of
them on the road, a black spot in a haze of dust, seemingly motionless
but as one could guess advancing rapidly, was an automobile.
Bryant rode his horse down into the creek bed and turned him aside to a
small pool on the upper side of the crossing, under the cut-bank, where
the horse thrust his muzzle into the water and drank greedily. The rider
swung himself out of the saddle, knelt a pace beyond, where the rivulet
trickled into the pool, and also drank.
"Wet anyway, even if warm, eh, Dick?" he remarked, when done.

"Don't drink it all, old scout; leave a swallow for the ladies." Still on his
knees he looked appraisingly down the creek and then up it, and added
derisively, "Some stream, this Perro, some stream!"
After rolling and lighting a cigarette, he meditated for a time in the
same kneeling position. His horse finished drinking and moved a step
nearer his master, where he stood with head lowered, water dripping
from his lip, body inert. But presently he pricked his ears and turning
his head toward the other bank gave a low whinny. Bryant got to his
feet.
The two women he had beheld at a distance had now reached the ford.
Their ponies snuffing water immediately dipped into the creek bed and
crossed its sandy bottom with quickened steps. Young women the
riders were, scarcely more than girls, it seemed to Bryant; wearing
divided khaki skirts and white shirt waists and wide-brimmed straw
hats tied with thongs under their chins. In this region where white men
were none too numerous, and women of their own kind scarcer yet, and
girls scarcest of all, the presence here of the pair aroused in the young
fellow a lively interest.
He led Dick aside that their ponies might approach the pool.
"Thank you; they are very thirsty," said the nearer girl, with a nod. The
ponies plunged forefeet into the water and stood thus with noses buried,
drinking with eager gulps. "The afternoon is so hot and the road so
dusty," the speaker continued, "that the poor things were almost
choked."
She was the smaller of the pair, of medium height and having a
graceful, well-molded figure, with frank gray eyes, a nose showing a
few freckles, smooth soft cheeks slightly reddened by sun, and an
expressive mouth. Bryant judged that she had small, firm hands, but
could not see them as she wore gauntlets. He further decided that she
was neither plain nor pretty: just average good-looking, one might say.
An air of friendliness was in her favour, though what might or might
not be a prepossessing trait, depending on circumstances, was the
suggested obstinacy in her round chin.

"Don't you yourselves wish a drink? You must be thirsty, too," Bryant
addressed the young ladies. "If your ponies won't stand, I'll look after
them."
"Oh, they'll not run off, unless we forget to let the reins hang, as has
happened once or twice," said the girl who previously had spoken. "For
they're regular cow-ponies. At first we had a hard time remembering
just to drop the lines when we dismounted instead of tying them to a
post somewhere; and for a while we had a feeling that they certainly
would gallop off if we did let the reins hang, as we'd been instructed.
But they never did." She turned to her companion. "Imo, aren't you
thirsty? I'm going to get down and have a drink." With which she
swung herself down from her saddle upon the sand.
The second girl was tall and thin, lacking both the spirits and stamina
of the other; a crown of fluffy golden hair was hinted by the little of it
the young fellow could see under the brim of her big hat; her eyes were
of a soft blue colour, probably weak; while her face, the skin of which
was exceedingly white with but