"THE TRAIL TO SEVEN PINES" - читать интересную книгу автора (L'Amour Louis)

LOUIS L'AMOUR
first to drift. One tough hand who worked for the Gores on their 3 G spread heard
the name at sundown.
He looked up quickly from his plate. "Hopalong's here?" He was incredulous, worried.
"Yeah, that's his name." John Gore was not impressed. He had never heard of Cassidy
nor of the old Bar 20 outfit.
The tough hand got to his feet. "Boss," he said quietly, "I reckon I want my time.
I'm driftin'."
"Quittin?" Gore was amazed, and the others looked up too. "What's the matter, Slim?"
"Matter?" Slim stared at him. "Look, John. I'm as tough as the next, but I ain't
no fool. I know ^Hopalong Cassidy. I ain't
i
buckin' him for any price. He's a curly gray wolf from the high timber, and anyway,
I feel like driftin' south where there's more sun."
"Shucks, it's only spring now. Wait another month or so and you'll get all the sun
you want."
"Maybe. But right now I feel mighty cold."
"If you ask me," Con Gore said harshly, "it's your feet get-tin' cold."
Slim turned on him. "That's right, Con. They are. I'd rather be alive with forty
bucks in my kick than dead with four hundred. You stay here, and the day will come
when you'll wish to heaven you'd drifted with me!"
For three days Hopalong scouted the range. Once he rode west toward the Black Sand
Desert, which barred the cattle from further travel that way. But mostly his rides
took him toward Haystack Valley and the distant Blue Mountains. As he rode he studied
the range and the country. Spring rains had
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THE TRAIL TO SEVEN PINES
been good, and the cattle were already increasing in weight. The range was well cared
for, the ponds cleaned out and shored up, the water holes and springs deepened, the
washes dammed to stop the wasting of soil as well as to impound water. Young Bob
Ronson was a thoughtful and intelligent man, a rancher who, given peace, would prosper.
The home ranch lay on the western slope of the Antelopes, but a small pass gave easy
outlet to the vast range to their east where many of the cattle ran. It was upon
this range where the battle with the Gores had opened. Not only were cattle missing,
but the Gore brothers were pushing their own cows onto range that had always been
used by the Rocking R.
Southward, Rocking R cattle ranged as far as Poker Gap and Cow Creek Canyon, and
westward to the Black Sand Desert. Southeastward, as Frenchy Ruyters had told Hopalong,
lay the outlaw village of Corn Patch. Sometimes it was deserted, sometimes crowded.
"And now?" Hopalong asked.
"Crowded," Frenchy replied grimly, "like coyotes flockin' to a fresh kill. Those
Gores, they worry me more than the regular outlaws. The three of them are tough as
mule hide and poison-mean. They take to trouble like a bear to a berry patch, and
they are slippier than a mustang on a blue clay sidehill!"
"We'll see 'em," Hopalong said easily. "We'll talk to 'em."
"Well, you won't have to wait," Frenchy replied dryly. "Here they come."
Tex Milligan drifted his pony down off the hillside. "Here comes Windy Gore and some
of his hands."
The riders were four in number, and they came swiftly. Hopalong was riding Topper