Jean of the Lazy A

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"That the cattle were not as free as the hills?" The
quiet voice of Jean searched out the tenderest places
in the self-esteem of Robert Grant Burns. She tossed
the blank-loaded gun back upon the ground and turned
to her horse. "It does seem hard to impress it upon
city people that we savages do have a few rights in this
country. We should have policemen stationed on every
hilltop, I suppose, and `No Trespassing' signs planted
along every cow-trail. Even then I doubt whether we
could convince some people that we are perfectly human
and that we actually do own property here."

While she drawled the last biting sentences, she stuck
her toe in the stirrup and went up into the saddle as
easily as any cowpuncher in the country could have
done. Robert Grant Burns stood with his hands at his
hips and watched her with the critical eye of the expert
who sees in every gesture a picture, effective or
ineffective, good, bad, or merely so--so. Robert Grant
Burns had never, in all his experience in directing
Western pictures, seen a girl mount a horse with such
unconscious ease of every movement.

Jean twitched the reins and turned towards him,
looking down at the little group with unfriendly eyes.
"I don't want to seem inhospitable or unaccommodating,
Mr. Burns," she told him, "but I fear that I must
take these cattle back home with me. You probably
will not want to use them any longer."

Mr. Burns did not say whether she was right or
wrong in her conjecture. As a matter of fact, he did
want to use them for several more scenes; but he stood
silent while Jean, with a chilly bow to the four of them,
sent Pard up the rough bank of the little gulley.
Rather, he made no reply to Jean, but he waved his
three rustlers back, retreating himself to where the
bank stopped them. And he turned toward the bushes
that had at first hidden him from Jean, waved his hand
in an imperative gesture, and called guardedly through
cupped palms. "Take that! All you can get of it!"
Which goes far to show why he was considered one of
the best directors the Great Western Film Company
had in its employ.

So Jean unconsciously made a picture which caused
the eyes of Robert Grant Burns to glisten while he
watched. She ignored the men who had so fooled her,
and took down her rope that she might swing the loop
of it toward the cattle and drive them back across the
gulley and up the coulee toward home. Cattle are
stubborn things at best, and this little bunch seemed
determined to seek the higher slopes. Put upon her
mettle because of that little audience down below,--
a mildly jeering audience at that, she imagined,--Jean
had need of her skill and her fifteen years or so of
experience in handling stock.

She swung her rope and shouted, weaving back and
forth across the gulley, with little lunging rushes now
and then to head off an animal that tried to bolt past
her up the hill. She would not have glanced toward
Robert Grant Burns to save her life, and she did not
hear him saying:

"Great! Great stuff! Get it all, Pete. By
George, you can't beat the real thing, can you? 'J get
that up-hill dash? Good! Now panoram the drive
up the gulley--get it ALL, Pete--turn as long as you
can see the top of her hat. My Lord! You wouldn't
get stuff like that in ten years. I wish Gay could
handle herself like that in the saddle, but there ain't a
leading woman in the business to-day that could put that
over the way she's doing it. By George! Say, Gil,
you get on your horse and ride after her, and find out
where she lives. We can't work any more now, anyway;
she's gone off with the cattle. And, say! You
don't want to let her get a sight of you, or she might
take a shot at you. And if she can shoot the way she
rides--good night!"

CHAPTER VI

AND THE VILLAIN PURSUED HER

The young man called Gil,--to avoid wasting
time in saying Gilbert James Huntley,--
mounted in haste and rode warily up the coulee some
distance behind Jean. At that time and in that
locality he was quite anxious that she should not discover
him. Gil was not such a bad fellow, even though he
did play "heavies" in all the pictures which Robert
Grant Burns directed. A villain he was on the screen,
and a bad one. Many's the man he had killed as cold-
bloodedly as the Board of Censorship would permit.
Many's the girlish, Western heart he had broken, and
many's the time he had paid the penalty to brother,
father, or sweetheart as the scenario of the play might
decree. Many's the time he had followed girls and
men warily through brush-fringed gullies and over
picturesque ridges, for the entertainment of shop girls
and their escorts sitting in darkened theaters and
watching breathlessly the wicked deeds of Gilbert James
Huntley.

But in his everyday life, Gil Huntley was very good-
looking, very good-natured, and very harmless. His
position and his salary as "heavy" in the Great Western
Company he owed chiefly to his good acting and his
thick eyebrows and his facility for making himself look
treacherous and mean. He followed Jean because the
boss told him to do so, in the first place. In the
second place, he followed her because he was even more
interested in her than his director had been, and he
hoped to have a chance to talk with her. In his work-
aday life, Gil Huntley was quite accustomed to being
discovered in some villainy, and to having some man or
woman point a gun at him with more or less antagonism
in voice and manner. But he had never in his
life had a girl ride up and "throw down on him"
with a gun, actually believing him to be a thief and a
scoundrel whom she would shoot if she thought it
necessary. There was a difference. Gil did not take the
time or trouble to analyze the difference, but he knew
that he was glad the boss had not sent Johnny or Bill
in his place. He did not believe that either of them
would have enough sense to see the difference, and they
might offend her in some way,--though Gil Huntley
need not have worried in the least over any man's
treatment of Jean, who was eminently qualified to attend to
that for herself.

He grinned when he saw her turn the cattle loose
down the very next coulee and with a final flip of her
rope loop toward the hindermost cow, ride on without
them. He should have ridden in haste then to tell
Robert Grant Burns that the cattle could be brought
back in twenty minutes or so and the picture-making
go on as planned. It was not likely that the girl would
come back; they could go on with their work and get
permission from the girl's uncle afterward. But he
did not turn and hurry back. Instead, he waited
behind a rock-huddle until Jean was well out of sight,--
and while he waited, he took his handkerchief and
rubbed hard at the make-up on his face, which had
made him look sinister and boldly bad. Without mirror
or cold cream, he was not very successful, so that
he rode on somewhat spotted in appearance and looking
even more sinister than before. But he was much
more comfortable in his mind, which meant a good deal
in the interview which he hoped by some means to bring
about.

With Jean a couple of hundred yards in advance,
they crossed a little flat so bare of concealment that
Gil Huntley was worried for fear she might look back
and discover him. But she did not turn her head, and
he rode on more confidently. At the mouth of Lazy
A coulee, just where stood the cluster of huge rocks
that had at one time come hurtling down from the
higher slopes, and the clump of currant bushes beneath
which Jean used to hide her much-despised saddle
when she was a child, she disappeared from view. Gil,
knowing very little of the ways of the range folk, and
less of the country, kicked his horse into a swifter pace
and galloped after her.

Fifty yards beyond the currant bushes he heard a
sound and looked back; and there was Jean, riding out
from her hiding-place, and coming after him almost at
a run. While he was trying to decide what to do about
it, she overtook him; rather, the wide loop of her rope
overtook him. He ducked, but the loop settled over
his head and shoulders and pulled tight about the chest.
Jean took two turns of the rope around the saddle horn
and then looked him over critically. In spite of herself,
she smiled a little at his face, streaked still with
grease paint, and at his eyes staring at her from between
heavily penciled lids.

"That's what you get for following," she said, after
a minute of staring at each other. "Did you think
I didn't know you were trailing along behind me? I
saw you before I turned the cattle loose, but I just let
you think you were being real sly and cunning about
it. You did it in real moving-picture style; did your
fat Mr. Robert Grant Burns teach you how? What is
the idea, anyway? Were you going to abduct me and
lead me to the swarthy chief of your gang, or band, or
whatever you call it?"

Having scored a point against him and so put herself
into a good humor again, Jean laughed at him and
twitched the rope, just to remind him that he was at
her mercy. To be haughtily indignant with this honest-
eyed, embarrassed young fellow with the streaky
face and heavily-penciled eyelids was out of the
question. The wind caught his high, peaked-crowned
sombrero and sent it sailing like a great, flapping bird to
the ground, and he could not catch it because Jean had
his arms pinioned with the loop.

She laughed again and rode over to where the hat
had lodged. Gil Huntley, to save himself from being
dragged ignominiously from the saddle, kicked his horse
and kept pace with her. Jean leaned far over and picked
up the hat, and examined it with amusement.

"If you could just live up to your hat, my, wouldn't
you be a villain, though!" she commented, in a soft,
drawling voice. "You don't look so terribly blood-
thirsty without it; I just guess I'd better keep it for
a while. It would make a dandy waste-basket. Do
you know, if your face were clean, I think you'd look
almost human,--for an outlaw."

She started on up the trail, nonchalantly leading her
captive by the rope. Gil Huntley could have wriggled
an arm loose and freed himself, but he did not. He
wanted to see what she was going to do with him. He
grinned when she had her back turned toward him, but
he did not say anything for fear of spoiling the joke
or offending her in some way. So presently Jean began
to feel silly, and the joke lost its point and seemed inane
and weak.

She turned back, threw off the loop that bound
his arms to his sides, and coiled the rope. "I wish
you play-acting people would keep out of the country,"
she said impatiently. "Twice you've made me act
ridiculous. I don't know what in the world you wanted
to follow me for,--and I don't care. Whatever it was,
it isn't going to do you one particle of good, so you
needn't go on doing it."

She looked at him full, refused to meet half-way the
friendliness of his eyes, tossed the hat toward him, and
wheeled her horse away. "Good-by," she said shortly,
and touched Pard with the spurs. She was out of
hearing before Gil Huntley could think of the right
thing to say, and she increased the distance between
them so rapidly that before he had quite recovered from
his surprise at her sudden change of mood, she was so
far away that he could not have overtaken her if he had
tried.

He watched her out of sight and rode back to where
Burns mouthed a big, black cigar, and paced up and
down the level space where he had set the interrupted
scene, and waited his coming.

"Rode away from you, did she? Where'd she take
the cattle to? Left 'em in the next gulch? Well, why
didn't you say so? You boys can bring 'em back, and
we'll get to work again. Where'd you say that spring
was, Gil? We'll eat before we do anything else. One
thing about this blamed country is we don't have to be
afraid of the light. Got to hand it to 'em for having
plenty of good, clear sunlight, anyway?"

He followed Gil to the feeble spring that seeped from
under a huge boulder, and stooped uncomfortably to
fill a tin cup. While he waited for the trickle to yield
him a drink, he cocked his head sidewise and looked up
quizzically at his "heavy."

"You must have come within speaking distance,
Gil," he guessed shrewdly. "Got any make-up along?
You look like a mild case of the measles, right now.
What did she have to say, anyhow?"

"Nothing," said Gil shortly. "I didn't talk to her
at all. I didn't want to run my horse to death trying
to say hello when she didn't want it that way."

"Huh!" grunted Robert Grant Burns unbelievingly,
and fished a bit of grass out of the cup with his little
finger. He drank and said no more.

CHAPTER VII

ROBERT GRANT BURNS GETS HELP

"You know the brand, don't you?" the proprietor
of the hotel which housed the Great Western
Company asked, with the tolerant air which the
sophisticated wear when confronted by ignorance. "Easy
enough to locate the outfit, by the cattle brand. What
was it?"

Whereupon Robert Grant Burns rolled his eyes
helplessly toward Gil Huntley. "I noticed it at the time,
but--what was that brand, Gil?"

And Gil, if you would believe me, did not remember,
either. He had driven the cattle half a mile or more,
had helped to "steal" two calves out of the little herd,
and yet he could not recall the mark of their owner.

So the proprietor of the hotel, an old cowman who
had sold out and gone into the hotel business when the
barbed-wire came by carloads into the country, pulled
a newspaper towards him, borrowed a pencil from
Burns, and sketched all the cattle brands in that
part of the country. While he drew one after the
other, he did a little thinking.

"Must have been the Bar Nothing, or else the Lazy
A cattle you got hold of," he concluded, pointing to
the pencil marks on the margin of the paper. "They
range down in there, and Jean Douglas answers your
description of the girl,--as far as looks go. She ain't
all that wild and dangerous, though. Swing a loop
with any man in the country and ride and all that,--
been raised right out there on the Lazy A. Say! Why
don't you go out and see Carl Douglas, and see if you
can't get the use of the Lazy A for your pictures?
Seems to me that's just the kinda place you want.
Don't anybody live there now. It's been left alone ever
since--the trouble out there. House and barns and
corrals,--everything you want." He leaned closer
with a confidential tone creeping into his voice, for
Robert Grant Burns and his company were profitable
guests and should be given every inducement to remain
in the country.

"It ain't but fifteen miles out there; you could go
back and forth in your machine, easy. You go out and
see Carl Douglas, anyway; won't do no harm. You
offer him a little something for the use of the Lazy A;
he'll take anything that looks like money. Take it
from me, that's the place you want to take your pictures
in. And, say! You want a written agreement
with Carl. Have the use of his stock included, or he'll
tax you extra. Have everything included," advised
the old cowman, with a sweep of his palm and his voice
lowered discreetly. "Won't need to cost you much,--
not if you don't give him any encouragement to expect
much. Carl's that kind,--good fellow enough,--but
he wants--the--big--end. I know him, you bet!
And, say! Don't let on to Carl that I steered you out
there. Just claim like you was scouting around, and
seen the Lazy A ranch, and took a notion to it; not too
much of a notion, though, or it's liable to come kinda
high.

"And, say!" Real enthusiasm for the idea began
to lighten his eyes. "If you want good range dope,
right out there's where you can sure find it. You play
up to them Bar Nothing boys--Lite Avery and Joe
Morris and Red. You ought to get some great pictures
out there, man. Them boys can sure ride and rope
and handle stock, if that's what you want; and I reckon
it is, or you wouldn't be out here with your bunch of
actors looking for the real stuff."

They talked a long while after that. Gradually it
dawned upon Burns that he had heard of the Lazy A
ranch before, though not by that euphonious title. It
seemed worth investigating, for he was going to need
a good location for some exterior ranch scenes very soon,
and the place he had half decided upon did not alto-
gether please him. He inquired about roads and
distances, and waddled off to the hotel parlor to ask Muriel
Gay, his blond leading woman, if she would like to go
out among the natives next morning. Also he wanted
her to tell him more about that picturesque place she
and Lee Milligan had stumbled upon the day before,
--the place which he suspected was none other than
the Lazy A.

That is how it came to pass that Jean, riding out with
big Lite Avery the next morning on a little private
scouting-trip of their own, to see if that fat moving-
picture man was making free with the stock again, met
the man unexpectedly half a mile from the Bar Nothing
ranch-house.

Along every trail which owns certain obstacles to
swift, easy passing, there are places commonly spoken
of as "that" place. In his journey to the Bar Nothing,
Robert Grant Burns had come unwarned upon that
sandy hollow which experienced drivers approached
with a mental bracing for the struggle ahead, and with
tightened lines and whip held ready. Even then they
stuck fast, as often as not, if the load were heavy,
though Bar Nothing drivers gaged their loads with that
hollow in mind. If they could pull through there
without mishap, they might feel sure of having no trouble
elsewhere.

Robert Grant Burns had come into the hollow
unsuspectingly. He had been careening along the prairie
road at a twenty-mile pace, his mind fixed upon hurrying
through his interview with Carl Douglas, so that
he would have time to stop at the Lazy A on the way
back to town. He wanted to take a few exterior ranch-
house scenes that day, for Robert Grant Burns was far
more energetic than his bulk would lead one to suppose.
He had Pete Lowry, his camera man, in the seat beside
him. Back in the tonneau Muriel Gay and her mother,
who played the character parts, clung to Lee Mulligan
and a colorless individual who was Lowry's assistant,
and gave little squeals whenever the machine struck a
bigger bump than usual.

At the top of the hill which guarded the deceptive
hollow, Robert Grant Burns grinned over his shoulder
at his character-woman. "Wait till we start back;
I'll know the road then, and we'll do some traveling!"
he promised darkly, and laid his toe lightly on the
brake. It pleased him to be considered a dare-devil
driver; that is why he always drove whatever machine
carried him. They went lurching down the curving
grade into the hollow, and struck the patch of sand that
had worn out the vocabularies of more eloquent men
than he. Robert Grant Burns fed more gas, and the
engine kicked and groaned, and sent the wheels bur-
rowing like moles to where the sand was deepest. Axles
under, they stuck fast.

When Jean and Lite came loping leisurely down
the hill, the two women were fraying perfectly good
gloves trying to pull "rabbit" brush up by the roots to
make firmer foothold for the wheels. Robert Grant
Burns was head-and-shoulders under the car, digging
badger-like with his paws to clear the front axle, and
coming up now and then to wipe the perspiration from
his eyes and puff the purple out of his complexion.
Pete Lowry always ducked his head lower over the jack
when he saw the heaving of flesh which heralded these
resting times, so that the boss could not catch him
laughing. Lee Milligan was scooping sand upon the other
side and mumbling to himself, with a glance now and
then at the trail, in the hope of sighting a good samaritan
with six or eight mules, perhaps. Lee thought that
it would take about that many mules to pull them out.

The two riders pulled up, smiling pityingly, just as
well-mounted riders invariably smile upon stalled
automobilists. This was not the first machine that had come
to grief in that hollow, though they could not remember
ever to have seen one sunk deeper in the sand.

"I guess you wouldn't refuse a little help, about
now," Lite observed casually to Lee, who was most in
evidence.

"We wouldn't refuse a little, but a lot is what we
need," Lee amended glumly. "Any ranch within
forty miles of here? We need about twelve good
horses, I should say." Lee's experience with sand had
been unhappy, and his knowledge of what one good
horse could do was slight.

"Shall we snake 'em out, Jean?" Lite asked her, as
if he himself were absolutely indifferent to their plight.

"Oh, I suppose we might as well. We can't leave
them blocking the trail; somebody might want to drive
past," Jean told him in much the same tone, just to tease
Lee Milligan, who was looking them over disparagingly.

"We'll be blocking the trail a good long while if we
stay here till you move us," snapped Lee, who was
rather sensitive to tones.

Then Robert Grant Burns gave a heave and a wriggle,
and came up for air and a look around. He had
been composing a monologue upon the subject of sand,
and he had not noticed that strange voices were speaking
on the other side of the machine.

"Hello, sis-- How-de-do, Miss," he greeted Jean
guardedly, with a hasty revision of the terms when he
saw how her eyebrows pinched together. "I wonder
if you could tell us where we can find teams to pull us
out of this mess. I don't believe this old junk-wagon
is ever going to do it herself."

"How do you do, Mr. Burns? Lite and I offered to
take you out on solid ground, but your man seemed to
think we couldn't do it."

"What man was that? Wasn't me, anyway. I
think you can do just about anything you start out to
do, if you ask me."

"Thank you," chilled Jean, and permitted Pard to
back away from his approach.

"Say, you're some rider," he praised tactlessly, and
got no reply whatever. Jean merely turned and rode
around to where Lite eased his long legs in the stirrups
and waited her pleasure.

"Shall we help them out, Lite?" she asked distinctly.
"I think perhaps we ought to; it's a long walk to
town."

"I guess we better; won't take but a minute to tie
on," Lite agreed, his fingers dropping to his coiled rope.
"Seems queer to me that folks should want to ride in
them things when there's plenty of good horses in the
country."

"No accounting for tastes, Lite," Jean replied
cheerfully. "Listen. If that thin man will start the
engine,--he doesn't weigh more than half as much as you
do, Mr. Burns,--we'll pull you out on solid ground.
And if you have occasion to cross this hollow again, I
advise you to keep out there to the right. There's a
little sod to give your tires a better grip. It's rough,
but you could make it all right if you drive carefully,
and the bunch of you get out and walk. Don't try to
keep around on the ridge; there's a deep washout on
each side, so you couldn't possibly make it. We can't
with the horses, even." Jean did not know that there
was a note of superiority in her voice when she spoke
the last sentence, but her listeners winced at it. Only
Pete Lowry grinned while he climbed obediently into
the machine to advance his spark and see that the gears
were in neutral.

"Don't crank up till we're ready!" Lite expostulated.
"These cayuses of ours are pretty sensible, and
they'll stand for a whole lot; but there's a limit. Wait
till I get the ropes fixed, before you start the engine.
And the rest of you all be ready to give the wheels a
lift. You're in pretty deep."

When Jean dismounted and hooked the stirrup over
the horn so that she could tighten the cinch, the eyes
of Robert Grant Burns glistened at the "picture-stuff"
she made. He glanced eloquently at Pete, and Pete
gave a twisted smile and a pantomime of turning the
camera-crank; whereat Robert Grant Burns shook his
head regretfully and groaned again.

"Say, if I had a leading woman--" he began
discontentedly, and stopped short; for Muriel Gay was
standing quite close, and even through her grease-paint
make-up she betrayed the fact that she knew exactly
what her director was thinking, had seen and understood
the gesture of the camera man, and was close to
tears because of it all.

Muriel Gay was a conscientious worker who tried
hard to please her director. Sometimes it seemed to
her that her director demanded impossibilities of her;
that he was absolutely soulless where picture-effects
were concerned. Her riding had all along been a subject
of discord between them. She had learned to ride
very well along the bridle-paths of Golden Gate Park,
but Robert Grant Burns seemed to expect her to ride--
well, like this girl, for instance, which was unjust.

One could not blame her for glaring jealously while
Jean tightened the cinch and remounted, tying her rope
to the saddle horn, all ready to pull; with her muscles
tensed for the coming struggle with the sand,--and
perhaps with her horse as well,--and with every line
of her figure showing how absolutely at home she was
in the saddle, and how sure of herself.

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