Waltzing With Tumbleweeds Read Online Free Page A

the hardly more than a boy. It was bad enough to have salt in a festering wound, no one needed to rub it in.
    “Well,” the cocky stranger swelled out his small chest, “I seen an old cow buffalo a week ago that you missed.”
    Four sets of marksmen-quality eyes glared at the cowboy. The scrape of chair legs on the dirt floor was noisy as the hunters stood up. Was the man lying—they searched each other’s faces.
    Measles beat the others to the man by seconds. He grabbed a fistful of the cowboy’s shirt in one hand, the sharp honed skinning knife laid on the speaker’s throat as the hider bent him backwards over the bar.
    “You’re fixing to be a dead liar,” Measles said, through his rotting teeth.
    “Wait!” Ike ordered, wrestling the knife arm back. Mulky helped him pull their irate companion off the ranch hand.
    Freed, the shaken cowboy felt his throat to be certain the jugular vein was not severed. Pale faced and shocked, he looked wide eyed at them.
    “I ain’t lying,” he began, holding his hand out to hold them off. “I was checking cattle a week ago down by the Frances Mountains. I saw her all right. She was a skinny cow, but when she saw me she high tailed it.”
    “Which way did she go?”
    “West,” he said, warily searching their faces.
    “If you’re a lying to us—” Measles started for him, but Mulky and Ike blocked his way.
    “Why would he lie?” Ike asked. “He knows we’ll blow his head off if we don’t find her.”
    “Yeah,” Measles relented, sheathing his knife.
    “I swear I seen her,” the pale faced cowboy said. “She’s an old cow.”
    “I sort of thought there ought to be one left out there,” Mulky said, encouraged by the report. “A stray smarter than the rest. Damn, of the millionsof them, one had to have enough brains to get away.”
    Measles laughed, scoffing, “They were all dumb.”
    “Listen to Mulky,” Big Dee said, leaning on his gun barrel. “He may be right.”
    “Then let’s go get her,” Measles said.
    “Wait, let’s have a contest,” Ike said. “Each man goes on his own after her. The one brings her down wins the pot.”
    “What pot?” Measles asked.
    “Money that we put up,” Mulky said, impatient with the red-specked-faced, dull-witted member of the bunch.
    “How much money?”
    “Well, Ike?” Mulky turned to their educated member for a plan.
    “Two hundred and fifty apiece. That’s a thousand in the pot for the man gets her.” Ike had a dreamy way of acting when his brain was working that made Mulky jealous of his skills. No one, not even the trickiest hide buyer, ever outwitted Ike.
    “What’s the rules?” Mulky asked, expecting their educated cohort to do it right. He was not disappointed when Ike pushed his floppy brimmed hat back.
    “No one leaves here to hunt for her until sunup. Each man can take his skinning help along. But it’s got to be a fair kill.”
    “What’s fair mean?” Measles demanded.
    “Ike means running her off a bluff doesn’t count for killing her,” Mulky said,
    “Yeah, that’s a good rule.” Measles agreed.
    The money was put up. They drank two rounds, but each one was too superstitious to discuss out loud the existence of one more buffalo. Mulky could feel the tension build among the men as his own stomach roiled at the prospect of a last hunt.
    As he stepped outside the cantina, Mulky rubbed his sweaty palms on his britches. Inside his chest, his heart beat so fast, he could hear his blood gurgling. No woman had ever done that much to him.
    “Where are you headed?” Measles shouted after him.
    “To hire a skinner.”
    “Yeah, you’re heading out,” the man accused.
    “It’s a good two days ride to those mountains,” Mulky said, aggravated by the challenge of his sportsmanship. “I’ll be here at sunup. See that you’re here.”
    “You better be,” Measles warned.
    Mulky knew he must ride fast to find his helper. Blue was a cross-eyed Comanche that could track a tit mouse