When the cutters penetrated the dust and came threading their way through the noisy, restless horde, the calf became doubly uneasy. A man on a blazed-face bay was particularly insistent. Come-a-Seven watched him work deviously through the entire herd after a cow and her young, and drive them forth to the open; so he tried to keep out of sight. But it was no use. Soon the horse was close to them, and mother and son felt, rather than saw, that they were the objects of the quiet maneuvering that followed. Wherever they dodged and doubled the blazed-face was sure to be there, close behind, patient, untiring. A wave of resentment against this steady pressure broke them into a run, and, before they knew it, the outer rim of cattle split wide open and they were beyond the herd. In a panic they endeavored to dart back, but the big bay interposed. Seeing this, the cow sped toward a draw where the scrub-cedar appeared to offer chances of escape. With the speed of light the puncher was after them, twisting, wheeling, heading her off toward the cut-bunch. And the calf found the same indefatigable foe between him and freedom when he emulated his mother. “Git in, you low-lived whelp,” howled the cutter, and he spurred furiously. They finally gave up the contest as hopeless and trotted meekly to join the bunch of cattle they perceived ahead of them. There were cows which shot from the herd at a gallop and then would break to a hesitating trot, their heads nodding loosely close to the ground. Their gait had an odd uncertainty about it. The animals would shrink from a weed and draw back. One stopped at perceiving a shadow and went around it fearfully. “Locoed,” a puncher commented. For these had eaten of the strange loco weed and were afflicted. By ten o’clock, the herd was worked. Fires were lighted and the branding irons thrust into them. The roper and flankers got into action, two sets of them, and every minute calves emitted protesting wails as the hot irons seared their sides. He worked like an automaton, that roper. He seemed removed from human passions, remote from the ordinary human impulses. His loop dropped unerringly, and back the horse would go at a trot or a lope, with a panic-stricken, crying calf plunging, bumping along in rear, sometimes turning somersaults--for life is too short to carry calves to the flankers with solicitous care, though possibly the flankers would prefer them that way. The red-and-white edged away from the field of this gentleman’s labors and ran straight in front of a sorrel horse. Baw-aw-aw-aw-aw-aw! he cried, as something settled about his neck and a resistless force commenced to drag him into the open.