Harper's Round Table, March 3, 1896, Vol. XVII., No. 853

A STOLEN COURT-HOUSE.

BY GEORGE MEASON WHICHER.

Father limped across the dirt floor of our sod house, and painfully sat down on the edge of his bunk. "Boys," he said, with a little groan, "I guess you'll have to go after that Durham bull. My rheumatism is so bad I can't stir!"

"To-night?" asked Barney, eagerly, giving his book a shove.

"Who told you where he is?" I asked, hoping for time enough to look up one more word.

"They've sent word from Hermann's that he's been around there ever since that last herd came in from the South. They're going to move on early to-morrow, and I'm afraid we'll never see him if we don't get him to-night. Those drovers don't frighten off cattle that insist on going along."

"Which Hermann's is it?" I asked again. "The ranch south of Alkali?"

"You'd better not be caught calling their town Alkali," interrupted Barney. "They're touchier than ever about it since we got the county-seat away from them last election."

"That's the place," answered father; "and I reckon it doesn't take much of the potash out of their land to quit calling the town Alkali. No more will they get their county-seat back again by calling the place Fairlands."

I thrust my Cæsar under the brush thatch of our house where it joined the sod wall. Barney was rummaging in his bunk and preparing for the trip with unmistakable pleasure. He had not mourned greatly when father's health had compelled us to leave our home in far-off Illinois and settle in western Nebraska. But I had disliked to fall out of my class in the Pana High-school, and now, after working all summer on our claim, I was spending the fall and winter evenings in making up some of the neglected studies, with the secret hope that father would be well enough to spare me the next year.

"You can get Otto to lend you his ponies and go with you," went on father. "Take the lower trail to the ranch, so's not to go through Alkali. They've been feeling pretty ugly toward people from up here anyway since election, and I hear there's been a row about it this week and another of their men killed. And you be careful, Milton, and don't let Barney get into any trouble with the cowboys at the ranch. They're a dare-devil set; I wouldn't let you boys go if I could help it."

We did not hear all of this speech, I am afraid, for Barney was trying to get his revolver into his pocket without attracting father's attention, and I was still struggling with a subjunctive in the speech of Ariovistus. But we were soon ready for our short walk to Otto's claim in the section adjoining ours, and slightly nearer the little town of Garfield. Otto was our nearest neighbor, an honest, hard-working German, who had given us much assistance in the difficult work of settling on our claim, and had now promised father to go with us and recover our precious but troublesome Durham bull.

It must have been ten o'clock when we clattered across the long board bridge over the Platte, and rode on through the short main street in Garfield, the newly chosen capital of Black Ash County. We reached the end of the street and were about to turn west into the wagon-trail leading to Fairlands, or Alkali, as her triumphant rival persisted in calling the town.

"What's that new shanty?" asked Barney, pointing to a small building as we rode past. It could not have been more than twelve feet wide and twenty feet long, but the gable end facing the street was masked by the hideous square front of pioneer architecture, and from the top of the unpainted pine cornice fluttered three or four cheap flags.

"T'at's t'e new court-house," explained Otto, proudly. "T'e sheriff is alreaty yesterday mit his posse to Alkali gone, und pring t'e gounty pooks pack."

"Did he bring back his posse?" asked Barney.

"Mostly," said Otto, with a grin; "some, t'ey ko on weiter."

The county-seat feud was a serious matter to the settlers in the towns concerned, but Otto, like ourselves, could see a ludicrous side to it.

"I'll wager the Alkali gang burn it down," said Barney, as we left the court-house behind us. "They're bound to do something to get even."

Otto did not reply. On we cantered over the long swells of the prairie, the night wind blowing fresh and cold in our faces, while the frost sparkled on the russet and brown grasses along the hard trail. Far off we caught the shimmer of the moonlight on a "blow-out," where the light soil showed at the crumbling edge of a bluff, and nearer at hand, on the lowlands, we could see the straggling line of telegraph poles that marked the line of the railroad.

We had ridden about half of our eight miles when Otto, who was leading, suddenly halted. Before us lay a deep draw, as the dry hollows between the ridges of the prairie are called. At the bottom of the slope, just where the trail to Hermann's ranch joined the main road, stood a group of men and horses. The latter were mostly harnessed to two elongated lumber wagons, while their drivers and one or two horsemen were gathered around a small fire of cattle chips and sage-brush. We could hear their loud talk and laughter as we stood looking down upon them. Suddenly they became silent.

"T'ey see us alreaty," said Otto. "Kome on, poys."

"Whar you'uns goin' this time o' day?" demanded one of the men, as we rode up and saluted them. We recognized the speaker as Arkansaw Joe, a saloon-keeper in Fairlands of no particular reputation. Most of his companions evidently belonged to the same profession, though not so eminent as their leader; but the horsemen, I felt sure, were cowboys from the ranch to which we were going. Otto briefly explained our errand.

"It's only that Dutchman from beyond Garfield and the two tenderfoot kids," spoke another of the group. "I reckon they're all right."

Any foreigner is a Dutchman to a certain class of Americans. Otto had long since grown tired of explaining that he came from Bavaria, and no longer chafed against the classification. We were not so satisfied, but it did not seem wise to argue about it just then.

"You'll have a dandy time with that critter of yourn," remarked one of the ranchmen. "Hermann's picketed him for you, and he's tearin' mad. It'll be a regular circus to see you git him back."

"Wat you t'ink, Milt?" said Otto. "We ko pack for t'e fat'er--nit?"

"I 'low you'uns'll go straight on," interposed Arkansaw, meaningly. "We'uns are usin' this here trail to the east to-night, and it's all needed. 'Sides, the kids 'ud miss the fun with the Durham."

There was no mistaking this hint, and we took the trail for the ranch, Otto evidently worried, and Barney boiling over with indignation.

"Kids!" he exclaimed, scornfully, as we rode up the other side of the draw. "I'd like to show them--"

The rest remained unsaid, for down the trail came a jingling crowd of cowboys, and looking back as they rode past us, we saw them join the group around the fire.

"What on earth are they up to, Otto?" I asked. He shook his head soberly. Mischief was brewing, and we longed to ride back and see what was about to happen, but Otto and I at least recognized the danger of such a plan after the warning we had received.

Our thoughts were effectually diverted from this topic when we reached the ranch. The bull was not an amiable beast on ordinary occasions, and we found him in one of his wildest moods. His bellowings had attracted a score of stray cattle from the outskirts of the ranch, and they were standing beyond the reach of his horns as he strained on his picket rope, and they were pawing the ground, pretending to gore one another, until the bull was wild with rage. It took Otto a long time to get a second rope around his horns, and meanwhile Barney and I, by the vigorous use of our quirts, scattered the mavericks over the prairie. The end of the picket rope was then fastened to my saddle, and we began our struggle toward home. Again and again the bull would lower his horns and make a desperate charge at one of his captors, only to be jerked to his knees by the other. At times he would stand bellowing and snorting until Barney rode up and plied the lash, when he would plunge ahead like a runaway locomotive. Only the nimble-footed, long-suffering broncos could or would have endured the wild work. To increase our trouble the stray cattle kept close behind us. Many times they came so close that Otto and I were compelled to halt and hold the bull, while Barney, with hoarse shouts and language as abusive as he dared use, drove them back.

It was nearly dawn when we halted for this purpose on the edge of the large draw where we had seen the mysterious gathering. As I watched Barney dispersing our troublesome followers, I heard Otto muttering to himself some polysyllabic imprecation on cattle in general and the Durham bull in particular, and then he stopped short with a gasp of surprise. Over the ridge on the other side of the draw there struggled into sight two parallel columns of puffing horses, and then there slowly climbed against the ruddy eastern sky the outlines of a building. Even in that imperfect light we recognized it at the first glance as the court-house deprived of its flags.

"Ach, du liebe Zeit!" gasped Otto. "T'ey shteal t'e gourt-house!"

It had been an easy task to shift it from its flimsy under-pinning to the lumber wagons, and the horses had dragged it with little difficulty over the smooth prairie. When necessary, the cowboys had helped pull by fastening their lariats to the sill, and the party had probably reached the draw with less exertion than we. I heard the sharp clank of the drag-chains as they prepared to descend the slope.

"Where on earth are the Garfielders?" said I, and as I spoke we heard the crack of a revolver from beyond the ridge. The cowboys unfastened their ropes, and hurried back yelling like fiends and firing their six-shooters into the air. Afar off the solitary church bell at Garfield began to jingle wildly.

"Sound the tocsin!" shouted Barney, abandoning his chase and riding back to see the fun. "What ho! Garfield to the rescue!"

But it was only too apparent that the town had been taken by surprise, and had few champions in the field as yet. The shots grew fainter, and in another minute the cowboys came over the ridge laughing and swearing at the top of their voices, and rode down to help the teams up the slope.

"Good-by court-house, if they once get her past the draw!" I exclaimed.