Bunch Grass

Looking back, I'm quite sure that John Jacob Dumble's main claim to the trust of our community—a trust he never failed to abuse—was the fact that the rascal's family were such 'nice folks,' 'so well-raised,' so clean, so respectable, such constant and punctual church members. After the Presbyterian Church was built in Paradise, no more edifying sight could be seen than the arrival on Sunday mornings of the Dumble family in their roomy spring wagon. The old man—he wasn't more than fifty-five—had two pretty daughters and a handsome son. Mrs. Dumble, a comely woman, always wore grey clothes and grey thread gloves. She had a pale, too impassive face, and her dark hair, tightly pulled back from her forehead, had curious white streaks in it. Ajax said a thousand times that he wouldn't sleep soundly until he'd figured out whether or not Mrs. Dumble was a partner in her husband's misdeeds.

My brother's imagination, as I've said before, runs wild at times. He thought that her wearing grey indicated a character that had been originally white but stained by her husband's dirty little tricks. Certainly Mrs. Dumble was a woman of few words, secretive, with lips tightly pressed together, as if—as Ajax remarked—she feared that some of John Jacob's little sins might slip out.

The father was inordinately proud of his son, Quincey, who in many ways took after his mother. He, too, was quiet, self-possessed, and somewhat pale. He worked for us and other cattlemen, not for his father, and after the boy left school Ajax began to speculate about him, just as he speculated about the mother.

'Is Quincey onto his old man's tricks?' he would ask.

It must be said that John Jacob was very careful to stay within the law, but he plowed close to the line, where the soil, as we all know, is richest and, relatively speaking, still virgin. But no man in the county was louder than him in denouncing crimes like horse-stealing or cattle-rustling, crimes that were shamefully common in those days. He might ear-mark a wandering piglet, for instance, or slap his iron on an unbranded yearling; but who could swear that these strays weren't his lawful property, seeing as they were found on his land?

At that time Ajax and I were breeding Cleveland Bays, and among our colts we had two very promising animals that might make a match team, and they were already prize-winners at the annual county fair.

One day in October, Uncle Jake, our head vaquero, reported that the colts were missing from our back pasture. A careful look revealed that the fence had been cut. Clearly, the colts had been stolen.

Ajax suggested we hire old man Dumble to help us recover the stolen property. He was shrewd and persistent, and he knew every man, woman, and child within fifty miles.

'Why, boys,' said he, when we asked him to take the job, 'I'd do more than this to help friends and neighbors. It's a duty to hunt down these scoundrels, a duty, yes—and a pleasure.'

We took the trail that night. The thief, as far as we could guess, had about twenty hours' head start, but he'd have to travel by night and by winding mountain paths. According to old Dumble, his goal would be Bakersfield, and to reach Bakersfield he'd have to cross some dry plains. At the watering holes on those plains we might hear from sheepherders and vaqueros some news about animals as handsome and as distinctive as our colts.

And so it turned out. At a dismal saloon, where the water was nearly as expensive and just as bad as the whiskey, we learned that a bright bay colt with a white star and stocking, and another with a white nose, had been seen early that morning. Old man Dumble learned even more.

'We're dealing with a greenhorn and a stranger to the saloonkeeper,' he said, as we rode into the sagebrush wilderness. 'The fool didn't know enough to spend a few dollars at the bar. He ordered a lemonade.'

'Well,' said Ajax, 'you're a teetotaler yourself; you ought to respect a man who orders lemonade.'

'I ain't a thief,' said our neighbor. 'If I was,' he added, 'I reckon I'd cover my tracks around saloons with a little whiskey. Boys, there's another thing. This fellow we're chasing is riding too fast. Those colts won't hold up. Young things need to eat and rest. The saloonkeeper said they were already footsore and kind of worn out. We need to keep our eyes peeled.'

'You're a wonder,' said Ajax. 'How you guessed that the thief would come this way beats me.'

'Well,' said old man Dumble, 'it's like this. There's a big dealer who comes three times a year to Bakersfield; he pays good money for good stock—and he asks no questions. I happened to hear he was coming down only last Sunday.'

Something in his voice, some sly glint in his eye, made me suspicious. As soon as we were alone, I whispered to my brother: 'I say, what if the old man is playing hare and hound with us?'

'Pooh!' said Ajax.

'He's keen as mustard to catch this thief—the keener, probably, since he found out the fellow is a greenhorn. I've got him pegged. He wants to establish a good record. It's like this teetotal business of his. People here refuse to believe ill of a man who drinks water, goes to church, and catches horse thieves. I'll say one more thing. To give the old fraud his due, he truly despises any crime that might land him in the state pen. Hey! There's a faint wisp of dust out there. Let me take a look through my glasses.'

We called a halt. We were now on the alkaline plains beyond the San Emigdio mountains. We'd ridden all night and had changed horses at a ranch where we were known. Ajax peered through his binoculars.

'What we're after,' he said quietly, 'is in sight.'

He handed me the glasses. I could barely make out a horseman herding two animals. The plains were blazing with heat. In the distance a soft blue haze covered the horizon; against this, faintly, were three spirals that looked like white smoke: three moving pillars of alkaline dust.

'He can't get away from us,' said old man Dumble.

Looking at him, my suspicions vanished. He was, as Ajax said, keener than we were to catch the thief. His small eyes sparkled with excitement; his right index finger was crooked, as if itching to pull the trigger; his lips moved. In his mind he was rehearsing the 'Stand and deliver' of a lawman!

'We can ride him down,' he muttered.

'Yes,' said Ajax.

We checked our girths and our pistols. It was unlikely the thief would put up a fight, but—he might. Then we mounted and galloped ahead.

'Forward—for-r-r-ward!' shouted Ajax.

Within a few minutes, a quarter of an hour at most, the man we were chasing would see us; then the chase would really begin. He would abandon the footsore colts and make for the hills. And so it happened. Soon we saw the horseman turn off at a right angle; the exhausted colts hesitated, trotted a few yards, and stood still. A faint neigh drifted downwind.

'Doggone it!' exclaimed old man Dumble, 'his horse is fresh. He's got friends in the hills.'

We had left the trail and were pounding over the sagebrush desert. I could smell the sage, sharp and pungent, and the alkaline dust began to irritate my throat; the sun, if you stood still, was strong enough to blister the skin on your hands.

For three-quarters of an hour it seemed to me that the gap between us and our quarry stayed the same; but Dumble said we were falling behind. The thief was lighter than any of us, and his horse was clearly a stayer. The hills rose out of the haze, bleak and bare, cut with gullies, a safe refuge for all wild things.

'If that cuss was in range, I'd take a shot,' said the old man.

'I'd like to see who he is,' said Ajax.

Suddenly the thief's horse stumbled and fell. We found out later that the animal had stepped into a patch of ground full of squirrel holes. The man got to his feet; the horse struggled where it lay but couldn't rise. Its shoulder was broken.

'We've got him!' yelled Dumble.

'Yes; we've got him,' repeated my brother. 'Let's go take a look at him?'

The thief had given up all idea of escape. He stood beside his horse, waiting for us; but from that distance we couldn't tell if he meant to surrender quietly or fight. Ajax adjusted his glasses and looked. Then, with a shout, he handed them to me.

'Can you make him out, boys?' asked our neighbor.

'Yes,' said I, giving the glasses back to Ajax. He handed them in silence to old man Dumble. Then, without thinking, both our right hands went to our belts. We weren't sure what a father might do.

He did what we should have expected—and avoided. He dropped the binoculars. Then he turned to us, shaking, pale—a scarecrow of the man we knew.

'It's my boy,' he said hoarsely. 'And I thought he was the best boy in the county. Oh God!'

A minute might have passed, no more. I guess that in that brief moment the unhappy father saw clearly the inevitable consequences of his own roguery and sharp practice. He had sown, broadcast, countless nameless little frauds; he reaped a big crime. I looked across those dreary alkaline plains and out of the lovely blue haze beyond I seemed to see the Dumbles' spring wagon rolling to church. Mrs. Dumble's pale, impassive face was turned toward the bleak plains. At last I understood her, that quiet, silent woman. She knew the father of her children from the outside to the inmost core. I thought of the pretty daughters, who did not know. And out there stood the son.

Ajax motioned me aside. We whispered together for a moment or two. Then my brother spoke—

'We're going to lead home our colts,' he said curtly, 'and you can lead home yours. We'll take better care of ours after this experience. They won't be allowed to run wild in the back pasture.'

'Boys—Quincey and me—'

'Shush!' said Ajax. 'That fellow out there is a long way off. I couldn't swear in a court of law that he's the person we take him for. Who he looks like we know, who he is we don't know, and we don't want to know. So long.'

We rode back to our colts.