Zane Grey

The Rustlers of Pecos County Zane Grey

A month had passed, a swift-flying time full of new life. Wonderful it was for me to think I was stillin Diane Sampson's employ. It was the early morning hour of a day in May. The sun had not yet grown hot. Dew like diamonddrops sparkled on the leaves and grass. The gentle breeze was clear, sweet, with the song of larksupon it. And the range, a sea of gray-green growing greener, swept away westward in rolling ridges andhollows, like waves to meet the dark, low hills that notched the horizon line of blue. I was sitting on the top bar of the corral fence and before me stood three saddled horses that wouldhave gladdened any eye. I was waiting to take the young ladies on their usual morning ride. Once upon a time, in what seemed the distant past to this eventful month, I had flattered myselfthere had been occasions for thought, but scornfully I soliloquized that in those days I had no cuefor thought such as I had now. This was one of the moments when my real self seemed to stand off and skeptically regard thefictitious cowboy. This gentleman of the range wore a huge sombrero with an ornamented silver band, a silken scarf ofred, a black velvet shirt, much affected by the Indians, an embroidered buckskin vest, corduroys, andfringed chaps with silver buttons, a big blue gun swinging low, high heeled boots, and long spurswith silver rowels. A flash cowboy! Steele vowed I was a born actor. But I never divulged the fact that had it not been for my infatuation for Sally, I never could havecarried on that part, not to save the Ranger service, or the whole State of Texas. The hardest part had not been the establishing of a reputation. The scorn of cowboys, the ridicule ofgamblers, the badinage of the young bucks of the settlement-these I had soon made dangerousprocedures for any one. I was quick with tongue and fist and gun.