Riders From Long Pines Read Free

and slapped it against his thigh. Dust bellowed.
    â€œYou boys don’t feel no worse than I do,” said Mackenzie. “Being trail boss, I feel responsible for—”
    Thorpe cut him off, saying, “We don’t blame you for nothing, Mac.” He fidgeted with his wire-rimmed spectacles, adjusted them on the bridge of his nose and cut a dark glance toward Cannidy and the other three looming riflemen. “We all know who dealt us this dirty hand.”
    â€œDon’t talk about it here,” said Brewer, before Mackenzie could respond. He gave Cannidy and the riflemen a hard stare. “I say we go to town and pull some cork over this. These snakes are itching to show Grissin how tough they are.”
    â€œSay, you’re not as stupid as you look, cowboy,” said Elton, wearing a cold smile. He fished a coin from his vest pocket and flipped it into the dirt at Mackenzie’s feet. “Here, let me buy the first round. I know you’re all three a little pressed for drinking money.” The other two riflemen chuckled. But Cannidy only stared. It was all he could do to keep from turning and bending his rifle barrel over Elton Long’s head and firing him on the spot. But he kept quiet, and calm.
    The youngest drover, Tad Harper, started to bend down and pick up the coin. But Brewer caught him by his forearm and pulled him away. “Let it lie, Tadpole. He meant that as an insult.”
    â€œI want you to know I ain’t happy about doing this, Mac,” said Cannidy.
    â€œYou could have fooled me,” Mackenzie said flatly, running his eyes over Elton Long and the other riflemen.
    The four drovers mounted their horses and left the Long Pines spread. When they had ridden four miles along the trail toward the town of Albertson, they stopped and sat in silence for a moment until Brewer said, “Well, I’ve got two dollars in whiskey money. What about you, Mac?”
    â€œFour and some change,” said Mackenzie. The two turned to Holly Thorpe.
    Thorpe shrugged and looked at them through his wire-rimmed spectacles. “A dollar something.” The three looked at Tad Harper. “What about you, Tadpole?” Thorpe asked him.
    â€œI don’t have any money at all,” said Harper.
    â€œWell, lucky for you, you’re traveling with a flush crowd,” Brewer said with a wry chuckle.
    Mackenzie let out a tight breath, seeing the other three had unwound a little. “If we can figure a way to drink on seven dollars for the next week, we can ride all the way up to the Bar Y. Clyde Thompson told me himself he’d be looking to take on trail hands the start of the month.”
    â€œThink it’ll pay better than out last job?” Thorpe asked with mock sarcasm.
    â€œIt can’t pay any worse,” Mackenzie replied, reining his horse to the trail. “Let’s go drinking, wash the taste of Long Pines and Davin Grissin from our gullets. I know the livery hostler in Albertson. He’ll stake our horses to keep ’til we get ourselves square.”
    â€œI thought you said a while back that Davin Grissin was a crook and a sidewinder,” said Harper, sidling up to Mackenzie.
    â€œI did say it, Tadpole,” said Mackenzie. “I reckon this is what I get for speaking ill of a man behind his back.”
    Brewer spit and said, “Just so you won’t bear that burden of guilt alone, let me say for the world to hear that Grissin is a no-good, thieving, killing, lying, rotten snake—one that was so crooked, he ended up becoming straight.” He turned a look to Harper and said, “You know a man can do that in business, Tadpole. All he has to do is make so much dirty money that after a while people begin to admire him for it.”
    Harper looked at Mackenzie and said, “You said at the railheads that cheating on a cattle count is the same as stealing a man’s money from his poke.”
    â€œThat is what I