Hopalong Cassidy's Rustler Round-Up (BAR-20)

by Clarence Edward Mulford



1906




CHAPTER I

Buckskin

The town lay sprawled over half a square mile of alkali plain, its
main Street depressing in its width, for those who were responsible
for its inception had worked with a generosity born of the knowledge
that they had at their immediate and unchallenged disposal the broad
lands of Texas and New Mexico on which to assemble a grand total of
twenty buildings, four of which were of wood. As this material was
scarce, and had to be brought from where the waters of the Gulf lapped
against the flat coast, the last-mentioned buildings were a matter of
local pride, as indicating the progressiveness of their owners.

These creations of hammer and saw were of one story, crude and unpainted;
their cheap weather sheathing, warped and shrunken by the pitiless
sun, curled back on itself and allowed unrestricted entrance to alkali
dust and air. The other shacks were of adobe, and reposed in that
magnificent squalor dear to their owners, Indians and Mexicans.