“Well, Uncle Bill,” said he, “now you’ve got that off your chest, suppose we go out and have a farewell drink together? The Seventy Seven is moving. I’ve got quite a ways to ride to catch that herd to take my regular turn on guard to-night.” A mile from the last scattered houses of Fort Worth, Rock paused on the north side of the Trinity. The river flowed beneath him, a lovely, sparkling stream. Its banks were green with spring growth. Texas wore an April smile for her sons that were departing into far lands with many a herd. Rock looked down at the river and back at the town. “Well, Sangre,” he addressed the twitching ears of his sorrel horse, “if Uncle Bill Sayre’s hunch about this fellow executor of his happens to be right, we ought to be able to keep time from hanging heavy on our hands after we hit Montana, provided we get that far in peace and quietness.” Rock frowned slightly, as he muttered this. He had his doubts; not of the mission he had promised to undertake, however. He was thinking of something else when he repeated the last sentence. It wasn’t just an idle phrase. CHAPTER II: IN THE ODEON East and west across the flat face of Nebraska runs a river, which needs no naming, looping, like a great watery rope, the Rocky Mountains and its ultimate confluence with the Big Muddy. It was once said of this stream that it resembled the speeches of a well-known politician, inasmuch as it was a thousand miles long, a mile wide, and about four inches deep. In one particular year of our Lord, when herds of longhorn cattle were spilling out of Texas like milk seeping over a polished table top, from an overflowing bowl, the curses of many a trail boss and cattle owner were heaped upon this wide, shallow, sandy-bottomed river. Northbound herds must cross it. Under its ankle depths of flow lurked miles of quicksand. The first drives to the North suffered. Later, hard bottom crossings were located. In the height of the great bovine exodus, such crossings were like the junction of two great thoroughfares. They were heavily traffic laden. From May to September the march of the herds never slackened. Every herd had its quota of riders. Wherever there are men there is money, and money is made to be spent. So, at each of these river crossings, enterprising merchants set up with stocks of goods. Equally enterprising individuals set up establishments where a cowpuncher could find something for his throat besides dust and alkali water, where he could take a fling at faro bank and poker. In other words, the saloon and gambling hall arose, side by side, with the general store, to the profit of their owners and the glory of the trail. Clark’s Ford was such a place. When Ben Clark bogged his first herd in the quicksands, he lay on the bank, and his riders scouted for hard bottom, found it, passed over and passed on, leaving his name to the place and bequeathing future herds on that route the only safe crossing in a hundred miles.