"
"Well, he's all right," replied Senor Buck Johnson,"and if he
ever gets back, which same I'm some doubtful of, his dinero'll be
here for him."
In pursuance of this he rode in to Willets, where shortly the
overland train brought him from Tucson the five thousand dollars
in double eagles.
In the meantime the regular life of the ranch went on. Each
morning Sang, the Chinese cook, rang the great bell, summoning
the men. They ate, and then caught up the saddle horses for the
day, turning those not wanted from the corral into the pasture.
Shortly they jingled away in different directions, two by two, on
the slow Spanish trot of the cow-puncher. All day long thus they
would ride, without food or water for man or beast, looking the
range, identifying the stock, branding the young calves,
examining generally into the state of affairs, gazing always with
grave eyes on the magnificent, flaming, changing, beautiful,
dreadful desert of the Arizona plains. At evening when the
coloured atmosphere, catching the last glow, threw across the
Chiricahuas its veil of mystery, they jingled in again, two by
two, untired, unhasting, the glory of the desert in their
deep-set, steady eyes.
And all the day long, while they were absent, the cattle, too,
made their pilgrimage, straggling in singly, in pairs, in
bunches, in long files, leisurely, ruminantly, without haste.
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