Merton of the Movies Part 5

"I bet they'll come out fine," he called to the departing artist. "Leave that to me. I dare say I'll be able to do something good with them. So long."

"So long," returned Merton, and was left alone on the back of a horse higher than people would think until they got on him. Indeed he was beginning to like it. If you just had a little nerve you needn't be afraid of anything. Very carefully he clambered from the saddle. His old pal shook himself with relief and stood once more with bowed head and crossed forelegs.

His late burden observed him approvingly. There was good old Pinto after a hard day's run over the mesa. He had borne his beloved owner far ahead of the sheriff's posse, and was now securing a moment's much-needed rest. Merton undid the riata and for half an hour practised casting it at his immobile pet. Once the noose settled unerringly over the head of Dexter, who still remained immobile.

Then there was the lightning draw to be practised. Again and again the trusty weapon of Buck Benson flashed from its holster to the damage of a slower adversary. He was getting that draw down pretty good. From the hip with straight wrist and forearm Buck was ready to shoot in no time at all. Throughout that villain-infested terrain along the border he was known for his quick draw. The most desperate of them would never molest him except they could shoot him from behind. With his back to a wall, they slunk from the encounter.

Elated from this practice and from the memory of that one successful rope cast, Merton became daring in the extreme. He considered nothing less than remounting his old pal and riding, in the cool of early evening, up and down the alley upon which the barnyard gave. He coiled the rope and again lashed it to the left front of the saddle. Then he curved an affectionate arm over the arched neck of Pinto, who sighed deeply.

"Well, old pal, you and me has still got some mighty long miles to git over between now and sunup to-morrow. I reckon we got to put a right smart of distance between us and that pesky sheriff's posse, but I know yuh ain't lost heart, old pal."

Dexter here tossed his head, being cloyed with these embraces, and Two-Gun Benson caught a look in the desperate eyes of his pet which he did not wholly like. Perhaps it would be better not to ride him any more to-day. Perhaps it would be better not to ride him again until next Sunday. After all, wasn't Dexter practically a wild horse, caught up from the range and broken to saddle only that afternoon? No use overdoing it. At this moment the beast's back looked higher than ever.

It was the cutting remark of a thoughtless, empty-headed girl that confirmed Merton in his rash resolve. Metta Judson, again on the back steps, surveyed the scene with kindling eyes.

"I bet you daresn't get on him again," said Metta.

These were strong words; not words to be flung lightly at Two-Gun Benson.

"You know a lot about it, don't you?" parried Merton Gill.

"Afraid of that old skate!" murmured Metta, counterfeiting the inflections of pity.

Her target shot her a glance of equal pity for her lack of understanding and empty-headed banter. He stalked to the barnyard gate and opened it.

The way to his haven over the border was no longer barred. He returned to Dexter, firmly grasped the bridle reins under his weak chin and cajoled him again to the watering trough. Metta Judson was about to be overwhelmed with confusion. From the edge of the trough he again clambered into the saddle, the new boots groping a way to the stirrups.

The reins in his left hand, he swept off his ideal hat with a careless gesture--he wished he had had an art study made of this, but you can't think of everything at one time. He turned loftily to Metta as one who had not even heard her tasteless taunts.

"Well, so long! I won't be out late." Metta was now convinced that she had in her heart done this hero a wrong.

"You better be here before the folks get back!" she warned.

Merton knew this as well as she did, but the folks wouldn't be back for a couple of hours yet, and all he meant to venture was a ride at sober pace the length of the alley.

"Oh, I'll take care of that!" he said. "A few miles' stiff gallop'll be all I want." He jerked Dexter's head up, snapped the reins on his neck, and addressed him in genial, comradely but authoritative tones.

"Git up there, old hoss!"

Dexter lowered his head again and remained as if posing conscientiously for the statue of a tired horse.

"Giddap, there, you old skate!" again ordered the rider.

The comradely unction was gone from his voice and the bony neck received a smarter wallop with the reins. Dexter stood unmoved. He seemed to be fearing that the worst was now coming, and that he might as well face it on that spot as elsewhere. He remained deaf to threats and entreaties alike. No hoof moved from its resting place.

"Giddap, there, you old Dexter Gashwiler!" ordered Metta, and was not rebuked. But neither would Dexter yield to a woman's whim.

"I'll tell you!" said Merton, now contemptuous of his mount. "Get the buggy whip and tickle his ribs."

Metta sped on his errand, her eyes s.h.i.+ning with the l.u.s.t for torture.

With the frayed end of the whip from the delivery wagon she lightly scored the exposed ribs of Dexter, tormenting him with devilish cunning.

Dexter's hide shuttled back and forth. He whinnied protestingly, but did not stir even one hoof.

"That's the idea," said Merton, feeling scornfully secure on the back of this spiritless animal. "Keep it up! I can feel him coming to life."

Metta kept it up. Her woman's ingenuity contrived new little tricks with the instrument of torture. She would doubtless have had a responsible post with the Spanish Inquisition. Face set, absorbed in her evil work, she tickled the ribs crosswise and tickled between them, up and down, always with the artist's light touch.

Dexter's frame grew tense, his head came up. Once more he looked like a horse. He had been brave to face destruction, but he found himself unable to face being tickled to death. If only they had chosen some other method for his execution he would have perished gamely, but this was exquisitely poignant--beyond endurance. He tossed his head and stepped into a trot toward the open gate.

Metta yelled in triumph. The rider tossed his own head in rhythm to Dexter's trot. His whole body tossed in the saddle; it was a fearsome pace; the sensations were like nothing he had ever dreamed of. And he was so high above the good firm ground! Dexter continued his jolting progress to the applause of Metta. The rider tried to command Metta to keep still, and merely bit his tongue.

Stirred to life by the tickling, Dexter now became more acutely aware of that strange, restless burden on his back, and was inspired to free himself from it. He increased his pace as he came to the gate, and managed a backward kick with both heels. This lost the rider his stirrups and left him less securely seated than he wished to be. He dropped the reins and grasped the saddle's pommel with both hands.

He strangely seemed to consider the pommel the steering wheel of a motor car. He seemed to be twisting it with the notion of guiding Dexter. All might have been well, but on losing his stirrups the rider had firmly clasped his legs about the waist of the animal. Again and again he tightened them, and now Dexter not only looked every inch a horse but very painfully to his rider felt like one, for the spurs were goring him to a most seditious behavior. The mere pace was slackened only that he might alarmingly kick and shake himself in a manner as terrifying to the rider as it was unseemly in one of Dexter's years.

But the thing was inevitable, because once in his remote, hot youth Dexter, cavorting innocently in an orchard, had kicked over a hive of busy bees which had been attending strictly to their own affairs until that moment. After that they had attended to Dexter with a thoroughness that had seared itself to this day across his memory. He now sincerely believed that he had overturned another hive of bees, and that not but by the most strenuous exertion could he escape from their harrying. They were stinging him venomously along his sides, biting deeper with every jump. At last he would bear his rider safely over the border.

The rider clasped his mount ever more tightly. The deep dust of the alley road mounted high over the spirited scene, and through it came not only the hearty delight of Metta Judson in peals of womanly laughter, but the shrill cries of the three Ransom children whom Merton had not before noticed. These were Calvin Ransom, aged eight; Elsie Ransom, aged six; and little Woodrow Ransom, aged four. Their mother had lain down with a headache, having first ordered them to take their picture books and sit quietly in the parlour as good children should on a Sabbath afternoon. So they had noisily pretended to obtain the picture books and then quietly tiptoed out into the backyard, which was not so stuffy as the parlour.

Detecting the meritorious doings in the Gashwiler barnyard, they perched in a row on the alley fence and had been excited spectators from the moment that Merton had mounted his horse.

In shrill but friendly voices they had piped, "Oh, Merton Gill's a cowboy, Merton Gill's a cowboy! Oh, looka the cowboy on the big horse!"

For of course they were motion-picture experts and would know a cowboy when they saw one. Wide-eyed, they followed the perilous antics of Dexter as he issued from the alley gate, and they screamed with childish delight when the spurs had recalled to his memory that far-off dreadful day with the busy bees. They now balanced precariously on the alley fence, the better to trace Merton's flight through the dust cloud.

"Merton's in a runaway, Merton's in a runaway, Merton's in a runaway!"

they shrieked, but with none of the sympathy that would have become them. They appeared to rejoice in Merton's plight. "Merton's in a runaway," they joyously chanted.

Suddenly they ceased, frozen with a new and splendid wonder, for their descriptive phrase was now inexact. Merton was no longer in a runaway.

But only for a moment did they hesitate before taking up the new chant.

"Looky, looky. He's throwed Merton right off into the dirt. He's throwed Merton right off into the dirt. Oh, looky Merton Gill right down there in the dirt!"

Again they had become exact. Merton was right down there in the dirt, and a frantic, flas.h.i.+ng-heeled Dexter was vanis.h.i.+ng up the alley at the head of a cloud of dust. The friendly Ransom tots leaped from the fence to the alley, forgetting on her bed of pain the mother who supposed them to be engrossed with picture books in the library. With one accord they ran toward the prostrate horseman, Calvin ahead and Elsie a close second, holding the hand of little Woodrow.

They were presently able to observe that the fleeing Dexter had narrowly escaped running down a motor car inopportunely turning at that moment into the alley. The gallant animal swerved in time, leaving the car's driver and his wife aghast at their slight margin of safety. Dexter vanished to the right up shaded Spruce Street on a Sabbath evening as the first call to evening wors.h.i.+p pealed from a neighbouring church tower.

His late rider had erected himself and was beating dust from the new chaps and the front of the new s.h.i.+rt. He picked up the ideal hat and dusted that. Underneath all the flurry of this adventure he was still the artist. He had been set afoot in the desert by a treacherous horse; he must find a water hole or perish with thirst. He replaced the hat, and it was then he observed the motor car bearing down the alley upon him.

"My good gos.h.!.+" he muttered.

The Gashwilers had returned a full two hours before their accustomed time. The car halted beside him and his employer leaned out a warmly hostile face.

"What's this mean?" he demanded.

The time was not one to tell Gashwiler what he thought of him. Not only was there a lady present, but he felt himself at a disadvantage. The lady saved him from an instant necessity for words.

"That was our new clothesline; I recognized it at once." The woman seemed to pride herself on this paltry feat.

"What's this mean?" again demanded Gashwiler. He was now a man of one idea.