Free The Cowpuncher by Bradford Scott Page A

face.
    “No—wait, please.” There was a note of appeal in her voice.
    For a moment Ma hesitated, then she snapped: “What do you want?”
    “Huck Brannon, of the Bar X Ranch, Stevens Gulch, Texas, stopped here about three weeks ago with the rest of the boys. Do you know what happened to him? He hasn’t returned to the ranch.”
    “That drunken rapscallion—”
    “He is not! I won’t let you talk like that about him,” Sue said very firmly.
    Ma Hennessey gazed at Sue queerly for a moment and a glint came to her eye. She seemed to unbend a little.
    “Keep your shirt on, lady. Are you his sister?”
    She could feel her face heat. “No,” she said. “He rides for my father.”
    “Oh! So you’re Sue Doyle.”
    “How do you know my name?”
    “Your drunken cowboy spent the whole livelong night singing and shouting your name at the top of his lungs.”
    Sue’s heart leaped. A sudden fever ran through her veins.
    “He isn’t my cowboy,” she protested helplessly.
    “So the rancher’s daughter falls in love with her old man’s rider,” Ma mocked, “and comes running after him when he don’t come runnin’ home to the ranch.”
    Anger coursed through Sue’s brain and she could hardly keep back her furious retort. Ma might know where Huck had gone, and if she did, Sue wanted to learn it. And something told her she’d find out nothing if she made Ma angry.
    “It doesn’t matter why I came looking for Mr. Brannon,” she said. “All I asked is what you know about what happened to him.”
    “Nothing!” snapped Ma Hennessey. “Nothing happened to your cowboy. He came in roaring drunk and singing and I told him to shut up or I’d throw him out. So he shut up and went to sleep.The other boys left early, but your Mr. Brannon slept nearly to noon and then cleared out. I would have charged him for another day if he stayed one minute later:”
    “But where did he go?”
    “How do I know?” snapped the woman. “I ain’t his Ma. The last I seen of him, he was cutting across to them railroad yards.”
    “Thank you, Mrs. Hennessey. Thank you very much. You’ve been very kind,” Sue lied.
    Ma Hennessey glared at Sue, shouted an angry, “Bah” at her and slammed the door. But Sue was beyond caring about Ma’s rugged manners.
    All she could think of was that Huck Brannon had sung and shouted her name. She was no longer in doubt. But she was certain now that something had happened to Huck.
    Suddenly her heart contracted. Suppose he was hurt—hurt badly and needed her care? She brushed the thought from her mind, as she turned rapidly back to the railroad station.
    She was oblivious of the hot sun beating down on her, of the men flirting with her from street-sides—of everything—until she reached the station shed.
    The ticket agent, although interested and sympathetic, was unable to give Sue any helpful information—except that he remembered selling a batch of tickets for Stevens Gulch to a flock of cowboys some weeks back. He was certain no one answering the description of Huck Brannon bought a ticket later that same day for Stevens Gulch. As amatter of fact, he assured Sue, no one had bought any tickets for the Gulch since that one morning.
    Sue groaned inwarly. “You’re sure you don’t remember him?” she asked for the tenth time.
    “I’m sartain, ma’am,” the agent replied kindly. It was evident that the young lady was deeply distressed. “Say, why don’t you try the yardmaster. Mebbe he seen him.”
    Sue, following his directions, walked down the railroad yard, threaded her way past a line of empties, crossed ties and tracks and finally located the yardmaster at a caboose. He was directing the loading of railroad ties and piles for construction work somewhere on the line. He turned when one of his men pointed to Sue.
    He was a squat, bulky, bald-headed man and stood mopping his sweat-beaded forehead with a large gray kerchief as Sue repeated her questions. When she began describing