High Country Rescue

by Michael Skinner

  He said, “I will be back before lunch.”

  She said, “Be careful.”

  “I will.”

  Dan left the kitchen and headed for the far corner of the barn. As he passed the barn, he turned left across the pasture toward a long, narrow finger of the mountain that ran east. Just around that finger was the rifle range. The Colonel built the range, so his guests could check their rifles before their hunts. It was a pretty basic range, there was a shooting bench, and two hundred yards up the small valley created by the finger of the mountain was a target board.

  Dan laid his rifle and gear on the bench and with the target in hand walked to the target board. The target board was simple, two wooden posts about three feet apart with horizontal boards nailed to it. Dan pushed the corners of the target over the four nails that were left proud for that purpose.

  He returned to the bench where he opened the box of cartridges and sat down. He took the rifle in one hand and moved the leather pack into position to act as a rest for the rifle. Dan had kept the vernier sight folded down while on the trail and hoped that it was undamaged and correctly sighted. He opened the action and loaded a cartridge into the breach of the rifle. He closed the action and laid the rifle across the leather pack. With the vernier sight still folded down, he aimed the rifle with the open buckhorn rear sight. He sighted in on the top of the bull’s eye circle and squeezed off a shot. Even at two hundred yards, he could see the hole from the heavy .45 cal. bullet in the white paper about ten inches below where he aimed. With the buckhorn sight set for zero at a hundred yards that should be about right. He worked the action slowly to only partially eject the cartridge case and then removed the case by hand. He returned the empty case to the box then took a loaded cartridge from the box and reloaded.

  He raised the vernier sight and locked it into position and adjusted it for two hundred yards. He sighted on the center of the bullseye and slowly squeezed off a shot. He didn’t see any holes in the paper, so he assumed he was somewhere in the black. He then reloaded and fired two more times to create a three-shot group, returning the empty cartridge cases to the box each time.

  He opened the action and laid the rifle on the bench and went down to the target. He looked at the target carefully and saw three bullet holes overlapping each other in the center of the black. Dan was pleased that was the type of group this rifle should make at this distance and was how he had sighted the rifle at two hundred yards. He had hoped that with the weight of the barrel and the bulk of the action that the sights had remained stable and they had. He pulled the target and went back to the bench. He closed the ammunition box, and put the box and the target in the pack, then headed back to the house.

  Dan entered through the back door into the kitchen where he found Alice kneading some bread dough for lunch.

  He said, “I see you have really gotten into cooking.”

  “You cannot learn without getting your hands dirty. Did the rifle check out okay?”

  “Yes, it was fine as I thought it would be, but you have to shoot it to know.”

  “The Colonel said to have lunch ready at one o’clock instead of noon.”

  “Thanks that will give me time to get the rifle cleaned up.”

  He left the kitchen and went upstairs to his room. He rolled out his bedroll blanket on the bed. He checked his rifle and made sure it was not loaded, then he laid the rifle on the blanket. He went over to his gear and got out his rifle cleaning kit which he had not taken on the trail but had shipped with his gear. He used a gunsmith screwdriver and removed the forearm from the rifle and set it aside. He wanted to be able to clean any dust that might have gotten between the barrel and forearm. He moved the lever on the bottom of the receiver to the down position which dropped the breach block and opened the breach of the barrel. The High Wall had its limitations, but it was easy to clean. He oiled a cotton swab and pushed it through the barrel from the breach to the muzzle. He repeated this until the swab came out clean, then he ran a dry swab through the barrel. He then used a lightly oiled cloth and wiped down all the exposed metal surfaces. He reattached the forearm and wiped the wood surfaces down. He placed the rifle in the leather case Bill Walker had shipped it in and stood it in the corner of the room and thought ‘I think I’ll buy the High Wall from Bill.’ He then retrieved his pistols and cleaned them. He would carry one in his carpetbag and pack the other.

  Dan looked at his watch and saw it was twenty minutes to one o’clock. He rolled up the blanket and went downstairs. Seeing no one in the entry hallway, he went out to the front porch. He took a seat in one of the chairs and looked out over the pasture towards the road. He could see a couple of buzzards circling off to the north and some cattle grazing off to the south. The sky was partly cloudy with a light wind out of the south. He thought late summer days don’t get much better than this. His thoughts drifted back to the day. The Judge should be back tomorrow, but he wondered when Joe would be back. He knew that Will and Alice wanted and needed a resolution to this ordeal, but he wasn’t sure he was ready to go back to Texas just yet. He heard a noise to his right and turned to see the Colonel and Will coming around the corner of the house.

  Dan said, “Afternoon.”

  The Colonel and Will responded, “Good afternoon.”

  Dan asked, “Will, what did you think about the Colonel’s water system?”

  “It looks good, and I hope it works. Unfortunately, I don’t have a water source high enough for me to try it myself.”

  The Colonel asked, “How did your rifle sight in?”

  “The sights’ were still good.”

  The Colonel said, “I am going to clean up a little, and I will see you at lunch.”

  Dan said, “Will, tell me about your ranch.”

  “My grandfather and father established the ranch. It is a little more than nine thousand acres, but only about four thousand is in pasture. The rest is forested mountains, not worth much, but with the lumber industry looking for private land it is becoming more valuable.”

  “It sounds like a nice spread. Do you have to ship the cattle to the low country for the winter?”

  “Yes, whatever cattle I don’t sell. As a matter of fact, I do need to get back and get that started.”

  “I am hopeful we will have some direction on this matter very soon.”

  “I hope so too.”

  “Let’s join the Colonel for lunch.”

  “I am ready.”

  They went in the house and went to the dining room. They found the Colonel talking to Alice. As Will and Dan entered, they ended their conversation, and Alice joined her father on the other side of the table. The Colonel took his seat, and the rest followed. Maria brought lunch in, and they began lunch and their conversations.

  Dan said, “Colonel, I was talking with Will earlier, and he was saying that he shipped his cattle to the low country for the winter, do you also ship yours out?”

  “Our goal is to sell about half of the herd and then ship most of the rest to a range in New Mexico that I have access to. Normally there are cattle buyers in Durango around the first of September. We will select the cattle that we want to keep and sell the rest. Then when the cattle come back in the spring, the cows will all be carrying calves, and when they drop, our herd will be back up to size. They feed all summer, and we start over in the fall.”

  “Did I understand that you keep a few here?”

  “Yes, we keep eight or ten, so we can have meat through the winter. They can handle the cold if they have a place out of the wind and something to eat. We have a lean-to on the south side of the barn where they can find shelter, and we have some pasture fenced off to raise a hay crop. We bail the hay and put enough in the barn for the horses and that few head of cattle to feed on during the winter.”

  Dan said, “Sounds like you have it all thought out.”

  “It was a little bit of thinking and a lot of necessity.”

  Dan said, “Our operation is similar. We don’t have to ship
off in the winter, but our pastures aren’t as lush as yours are up here, so we need more acres per cow. And I cannot carry as many cattle as the land would allow because I have to have some grass in reserve to guard against a dry year.”

  Will said, “I think every ranch has its’ challenges.”

  This conversation had left Alice out, so Dan asked her, “What have you been up to in the kitchen?”

  “Maria and I have been working on something special for dessert tonight.”

  Dan asked, “Can you tell us what it is?”

  “I think I will just let it be a surprise.”

  The Colonel said, “We look forward to dinner tonight.”

  Lunch ended, and Alice began clearing the table and then Maria joined her from the kitchen. Dan knew that even if no one talked about it, everyone was waiting on Judge Parker’s return. The Colonel went to the parlor, Will went upstairs, and Dan went out the front door. He went down the steps and around the house to the corral. He looked over the corral and studied the layout. It was a square on the east side of the barn with the corners away from the barn rounded. This would keep a bucking horse from running into a corner and throwing the rider. There was a door from the corral to the barn large enough for the horses to pass. He had not seen anyone use it, so he wondered if it was only used in the winter.

  He went into the main door on the front of the barn, which was the north side of the barn. He paused and studied the layout and construction. He was always looking for ways to improve the operation of his ranch. The barn was very typical except that it was larger to handle the larger hayloft which was needed for the large amount of hay required to see the livestock through the winter. The barn had a large center aisle that ran north to south with horse stalls along the west side which was opposite of the wall by the corral. The stalls were separated by five-foot-high partitions. On the side toward the corral, there were more horse stalls to the left of the door to the corral with a tack room near the front of the barn. The area to the right of the door was devoted to a single large stall or holding area with wood rails and a watering trough. He didn’t see anything that he needed to take back to Texas, but then he didn’t see anything he would change on this barn in Colorado. Dan walked through the barn and out the door at the back. He found himself under the lean-to the Colonel had talked about. He noted the roof was sloped to help shed the snow in winter and walled in on the east to reduce the crosswind. Dan decided that he had spent enough time just wandering around and he headed back toward the house. He walked around the west side of the barn and back to the front of the barn.

  He was walking toward the house when Alice came out of the kitchen door. She was headed toward the bunkhouse, so he met her halfway.

  Dan asked, “Where you headed?”

  “I told Maria I would get the coffee pot from the bunkhouse.”

  “I will get that for you.”

  “Thank you, then I will get back to helping Maria in the kitchen.”

  He headed toward the bunkhouse and Alice went back to the house. He entered the Bunkhouse and found it empty, which was not unexpected since it was mid-afternoon. He picked the coffee pot up off one of the tables and returned to the house. Entering through the kitchen, he found Alice and Maria washing and drying dishes. Alice turned as he sat the coffee pot on the kitchen table.

  She said, “Thank you.”

  And Dan said, “I am glad I could help. I will see you at dinner.”

  Alice nodded, and he went upstairs to his room. Once in his room, he began to pack the items that he was not going to need again into the shipping crate. The afternoon passed slowly, but he had everything in the crate that he wanted to put in it for now. He looked at his watch and decided to go down for dinner.

  He went downstairs and joined everyone else in the dining room. They sat in their usual places. Maria brought in the meal, it was pot roast with potatoes and hot cornbread. The meal passed with casual conversation. Toward the end of the meal, Alice excused herself and went into the kitchen. It was then that Dan remembered that she had said there would be a surprise this evening. A few minutes later Alice opened the kitchen door and held it for Maria. Maria entered carrying a large chocolate cake. She set the cake on the table.

  The Colonel said, “What do we have here?”

  Maria said, “Alice and I have baked a white cake with chocolate icing.”

  Will said, “Alice I remember your mother made a chocolate icing like that.”

  She said, “Yes, I remembered how to make the icing and Maria showed me how to make the cake.”

  The Colonel said, “Alice go ahead and cut the cake if you would please.”

  Alice sliced the cake and Maria got some fresh coffee from the kitchen. Alice served the cake on saucers which she passed around the table. Maria went around the table filling everyone’s coffee cup. Dan took a bite of cake and then thought, he had cake in restaurants, but he was sure his cook Bob had never baked a cake. If they had dessert, it would be a cobbler or a fruit pie, but that wasn’t very often.

  The Colonel said, “This is very good Alice, I hope Maria can remember how to make your chocolate icing.”

  “I am sure she will.”

  They finished the cake and dinner was over. Alice went into the kitchen to help Maria.

  Will and the Colonel went into the parlor. Dan thought a minute, then walked out on the front porch. He sat in one of the chairs and looked at the mountains in the fading light. His thoughts turned to Texas and Alice. If she did love him would she go to Texas or would she need to stay close to her father? Would she like Texas or his ranch. The view from the Colonel’s front porch was quite a bit different than his in Texas. After a while, he heard the door open and turned to see Alice.

  She said, “Mind if I sit with you?”

  “No, of course not.”

  Alice sat in the chair beside him and said, “When do you think the judge will be back?”

  “He should be meeting with the prosecutor this evening. If that meeting goes as expected, then he will see the prosecutor off on the train in the morning and head back here. Based on that he should be back here by lunchtime, give or take an hour.”

  “Time passes slowly when you are waiting.”

  “Yes, it does, and it gives you too much time to think.”

  “Sometimes you overthink things when you have too much time.”

  “That’s true, the decisions you have to make fast are easy. If you have too much time, you start questioning your decision.”

  Alice smiled and said, “Your first decision is often the best.”

  “I think we have carried this as far as it needs to go. What have you got planned for tomorrow?”

  “After breakfast, I will help Maria clean up and then I thought I would spend some more time with my father. What have you got planned?”

  “I want to spend a little time talking to Bob Robert about his hay and feed operations. I have some thoughts about doing something on my ranch. I don’t have the winter problems, but we can have some grass shortages in the dry years.”

  “Are you ready to get back to Texas?”

  “No, I am just using this waiting time to think about things I might like to change. I am not going to think about leaving until all of this is over.”

  “Thank you. Can we just sit here a little longer and enjoy the evening?”

  “Yes, we can.”

  They sat there looking at the mountains for some time, then he asked, “Are you getting cold?”

  “Yes, I am but I was enjoying sitting out here so much I was trying to pretend that I wasn’t, but it is time to go in.”

  They went into the house, she said goodnight and went upstairs, and Dan went into the parlor. Will was in the parlor looking at a book.

  Will said, “Would you like to play some cards?”

  “I would be glad to, would a game of cribbage work for you?”

  “That is good with me.”

  Dan sat down, and they cut for the deal. They
played two games with each winning one. At the end of the second game, Dan said, “I think I will call it a night, but thanks for the card game. I haven’t played that much since I left the Marine Corps. Where did you learn to play?”

  “The game is popular in New England where my wife came from, and she taught me how to play.”

  “Thanks again, I will see you in the morning.”

  “Goodnight.”

  chapter 28

  The Judge Returns

  The next morning after he finished getting ready, Dan was sitting on the back steps drinking his coffee, watching the activity at the barn. The hands were heading out for the day. Bob Robert was at the corral talking to a group of saddled riders. He walked over to the corral to talk to Bob Robert. The riders left before he could get there, and Bob Robert turned to go back to the barn.

  Dan called, “Wait up!”

  Bob Robert turned and saw Dan and stopped and waited for him.

  Dan walked up to him and said, “Are you going to be around here this morning?”

  He said, “No, I will be out on the ranch ‘till late morning, but if you need me, I can be available.”

  “No, I just wanted to visit with you on your hay and feed operations, will after lunch work for you?”

  “That will be fine. Just find me when you are ready.”

  “Thanks.”

  Dan returned to the kitchen and refilled his coffee cup. He went into the dining room and found the Colonel. They talked about ranching and hunting until Will and Alice came in. They had breakfast with a little social conversation. After breakfast, Alice went to help in the kitchen, and the men went out on the front porch.

  Will asked, “Will the Judge be back today?”

  Dan answered, “I expect him to be back around noon to an hour later.”

  Will said, “It has been a long two days.”

  The Colonel said, “Yes it has, and I understand that this wait has been even longer and harder for you and Alice.”