Stewart Edward White

“ Finally, one day, we run on a four-months' calf all by himself, with the T O iron onto him—a mighty healthy lookin' calf, too.
"Wonder where his mother is!" says I.
"Maybe it's a 'dogie,'" says Larry Eagen—we calls calves whose mothers have died "dogies."
"No," says I, "I don't hardly think so. A dogie is always under size and poor, and he's layin' around water-holes, and he always has a big, sway belly onto him. No, this is no dogie; and if it's an honest calf, there sure ought to be a T O cow around somewhere." ”

“ Imagine riding along a slant of rock shelving off to a bad tumble, so steep that your pony has to do more or less expert ankle work to keep from slipping off sideways. During the passage of that rock you are apt to sit very light. ”

“ You see, a rustler will take a cow and hobble her, or lame her so she can't follow, and then he'll take her calf a long ways off and brand it with his iron. Of course, if we was to see a calf of one brand followin' of a cow with another, it would be just too easy to guess what had happened. ”

“ The bad man is just a plain murderer, neither more nor less. He never does get into a real, good, plain, stand-up gun fight if he can possibly help it. His killin's are done from behind a door, or when he's got his man dead to rights. ”

“ And, until you've seen a few men called out of their shacks for a friendly conversation, and shot when they happen to look away; or asked for a drink of water and killed when they stoop to the spring; or potted from behind as they go into a room, it's pretty hard to believe that any man can be so plumb lackin' in fair play or pity or just natural humanity. ”

“ Larry took one step back.
"You ought to be almighty glad I got into the cañon at all." says he.
Hahn stepped up, holdin' out his hand.
"That's right," says he. "You done us a good turn there."
Larry took his hand. At the same time Hahn pulled his gun and shot him through the middle.
It was all so sudden and unexpected that I stood there paralyzed. Larry fell forward the way a man mostly will when he's hit in the stomach, but somehow he jerked loose a gun and got it off twice. He didn't hit nothin', and I reckon he was dead before he hit the ground. ”

“ The bad man takes you unawares, when your sleepin', or talkin', or drinkin', or lookin' to see what for a day its goin' to be, anyway. He don't give you no show, and sooner or later he's goin' to get you in the safest and easiest way for himself. ”

“ The Texas outfit I'm tellin' you about had settled up above in this Double R cañon where I showed you those natural corrals this morning. They'd built them a 'dobe, and cleared some land, and planted a few trees, and made an irrigated patch for alfalfa. Nobody never rode over his way very much, cause the country was most too rough for cattle, and our ranges lay farther to the southward. Now, however, we began to extend our ridin' a little. I was down towards Dos Cabezos to look over the cattle there, and they used to send Larry up into the Double R country. ”

“ So I scratched up to the top where my pony was waitin'. It was a tur'ble hard climb, and I most had to have hooks on my eyebrows to get up at all. It's easier to slide down than to climb back. I dropped my gun out of my holster, and she went way to the bottom, but I wouldn't have gone back for six guns. Larry picked it up for me. ”