"
Alaire rode into the herd with her foreman, while Dave settled his
loop over a buckskin, preparatory to joining the cowboys.
The giant herd milled and eddied, revolving like a vast pool of
deep, swift water. The bulls were quarrelsome, the steers were
stubborn, and the wet cows were distracted. Motherless calves
dodged about in bewilderment. In and out of this confusion the
cowboys rode, following the animals selected for separation,
forcing them out with devious turnings and twistings, and then
running them madly in a series of breakneck crescent dashes over
flats and hummocks, through dust and brush, until they had joined
the smaller herd of choice animals which were to remain on the
ranch. It was swift, sweaty, exhausting work, the kind these
Mexicans loved, for it was not only spectacular, but held an
element of danger. Once he had secured a pony Dave Law made
himself one of them.
Alaire sat her horse in the heart of the crowding herd, with a sea
of rolling eyes, lolling tongues, and clashing horns all about
her, and watched the Ranger. Good riding she was accustomed to;
the horses of Las Palmas were trained to this work as bird dogs
are trained to theirs; they knew how to follow a steer and, as Ed
Austin boasted, "turn on a dime with a nickel to spare.
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