Sticky ropes

“Dusty” Corbett licked his dry lips and stared up at a morning sky. Somehow the waking was painful, and realization came slowly. He rolled his head and stared at the forefeet of a shaggy-legged bronco.

Some straw and a bunch of fox-tail grass seemed to irritate the back of his neck, and he swore wonderingly as he sat up and surveyed his surroundings.

He was, or rather had been, lying in the exact center of a corral, in which were several loose horses. The ground was lumpy and uneven, which accounted partly for the cramp-pains in his neck and shoulders.

On the top pole of the corral sat a long, lanky cowboy, humped like a buzzard, puffing negligently on a very limp cigaret. Dusty surveyed him closely through squinted eyes. Dusty was no beauty; not by any manner of means. His eyes were habitually squinted and set in mats of grin-wrinkles. His nose was deformed from many hard smashes, and, although still in his twenties, he looked to be forty.

After a close scrutiny of the tall cowboy, he spat dryly and scratched his mop of dust-colored hair, which scraggled down over his forehead.

“What in ----’s goin’ on?” he asked hoarsely.

“You been drunker’n seven hundred snakes,” grunted the tall one seriously.

“Um-m-m!” Dusty licked his lips thirstily. “Weary, that ain’t reasonable.”

“Weary” Willis rubbed his ear violently, which action dropped his wide sombrero down over his left eye.

“It ain’t,” agreed Weary. “It ain’t noways reasonable f’r a sheriff e-lect to do a thing like that.”

Dusty got to his feet and dusted himself with his hat as he walked over to the corral fence, started to climb up beside Weary, but decided that the accomplishment was not worth the effort, and leaned against it instead.

“You’re takin’ office t’morrow,” stated Weary, “and right away yuh gits loaded to the gills and bunks in the corral. My ----, ain’tcha got no pride, Dusty?”

“Yeah,” Dusty nodded. “I got pride, Weary. ----, yes, I’ve got a heap of pride--lotsa pride. But what I needed was capacity--not pride!”

“You ain’t con-trite, that’s a cinch.”

“Aw, where’d yuh git that word?” Dusty grew belligerent. “You lay off’n them big words, cowboy. ’F yo’re goin’ to be my deputy, why in ---- do yuh suffer me to lay out here in the open?”

“I ain’t no bouncer,” said Weary. “Nobody hired me to throw drunks out of the corrals.”

“Aw-w-w,” protested Dusty, “yuh ain’t sore at me, are yuh, Mister Willis? C’m here t’ me!”

As he spoke he grasped Weary by both feet and yanked him loose from his perch. The tall cowpuncher hooked his elbows around the top pole and tried to hang on, but Dusty was not to be denied, and a moment later he was sitting on Weary’s chest, and Weary was begging to be released.

“Ain’t no corral-bouncer, eh?” jeered Dusty. “Let yore boss lay out in the corral, will yuh? Beg to be excused before I turn yore long nose upside down and let the next rain storm drown yuh.”

“Hol’ on!” begged Weary. “Leggo m’ ribs. Yee-ow-w! Dusty, fer ----’s sake, lemme up! I ain’t tol’ yuh half the news.”

“Go on and tell it,” Dusty grinned. “I’m listenin’.”

“’Member leavin’ yore paint pony at Smalley’s hitch-rack last night?”

“Y’betcha. Whatsa joke?”

“He’s went,” declared Weary seriously.

“Thasso?” Dusty spat reflectively and squinted down at Weary’s serious face.

“Who took him?”

Weary rolled his head negatively.

“I dunno. There’s a piece of rope hangin’ there on the hitch-rack, and it’s been smeared----”