Bus Stop at the Last Chance (Loni Wagner Western Mystery Book 2)

by Sue Hardesty

  Shiichoo laughed. “And answered any question with 'Ya, by Got.’ Remember the time he was talking to JimBob? Wampas talked about fishing at the same time that JimBob talked about working?”

  Bahb grinned. “They both deaf as a post. Thought they talking about the same thing.”

  “Which reminds me.” Shiichoo turned to Loni. “When you get back, bring me up a sack of saguaro cactus fruit from the barn. We're getting low on wine.”

  “I can't help you make wine. It's illegal!” Loni insisted.

  “Well, then. I'm making cactus candy.”

  “Then okay.” Loni shook her head at Shiichoo, grinning as she stood and took her empty plate to the sink. “So, Bahb?” Loni rinsed her plate. “You gonna let me dance with you at the wine dance?”

  “What was that jab about breaking the law?”

  “Didn't say I was going to drink the wine. Thought I'd just dance.”

  Willie grinned. “I'll drink your share.”

  “It would be good time to remove last summer's evil from around you Loni,” Bahb said quietly. “Your chief of police was a truly evil man.”

  “How did he hide that for so many years?” Shiichoo wondered in an equally hushed voice. “Never saw him around much after work.”

  Bahb took his plate to the sink and rinsed it. “Evil thrives in dark.”

  Thinking about her granddad's remark, Loni followed him to the sink with her plate.

  Bahb grabbed his hat off the rack. “Time to go. Will be 100 degrees out there. Hard on the horses.”

  Loni winced. What about me? She turned to grab her gun.

  Shiichoo watched Loni slip on her gun across her chest with a shake to her head and her famous tisking sound. “Talk about evil.”

  “I know.”

  “Wearing that makes you careless. I want you to be more careful.”

  “What's the fun in that?” Loni grinned at Shiichoo.

  Shiichoo swatted Loni out the door. The pitiful brown face looked hopefully up at her. “Stay, Coco,” Loni ordered, following her granddad and Willie into the dark, envying their easy movements in the pitch black as she stumbled along wishing for their night sight. Searching for the ancient pickup, she walked into the horse trailer hitched behind it and hit her knee. “Shit, Bahb. Wish you'd pick up after yourself. Where'd this come from anyway?” She heard her granddad's low laugh as she felt her way up to the pickup door. The horses waiting in the trailer followed her progress, stomping and swishing their tails. Buck quietly whinnied.

  Loni groaned as she climbed into the seat beside Willie. “What time did you get up, anyway?”

  Bahb ignored her as he started the ancient GMC. It coughed and shuddered. Loni had tried to buy him a new pickup a few months back, but he refused. “I barely able fix this.” He bulked. “I not understand electronic things.”

  Loni’s door bounced open again. She had forgotten about the bailing wire wrapped around the door handle. Shaking her head, she didn’t even ask how to close the window. She knew that both the handle and glass were gone.

  Bahb pulled out of the driveway, and the horse trailer jerked the pickup a few times before it settled in and bumped along the ruts from years of tires banging and tilting along the desert road. Loni clenched her teeth and held on tight as worn-out shocks nearly jarred her off her seat. The inside of the old pickup gave off heat from the prior day's burning sun, but the dry breeze through the open window waffled cool on her face as she struggled to tie the swinging door shut.

  Loni was mesmerized by the pickup's headlights bouncing ahead of them, one of them loose. Its jiggling created patterns across the desert floor, and the greasewood’s shiny leaves danced in the reflection. After several silent miles of bumping around, she watched small shards of light join the headlights from the silhouette of a windmill rising in the dawn haze.

  By the time they pulled under an ironwood tree and unloaded the horses, the black of night had changed to pink dawn light. “I love this tank,” she said, thinking about all the wildlife that counted on it for survival. A handful clump of water spurted out of a spigot into a small pond with every up and down evolution of the well rod attached to the slow spinning fan that reached into the sky. A road runner shooting in front of the horses spooked Loni's horse, and she had to shove him around as he huffed against the tightening of the cinch and chomped on the bit. “Don't say it!”

  She heard Willie laugh as he said it anyway. “Get that cinch tight or you be riding upside down under his belly.”

  The windmill squawked and the saddles creaked as they silently mounted and turned their horses north. Loni broke the quiet, complaining, “How come it’s still so hot, Bahb? You forget to say your prayers?”

  Bahb grinned at her. “If I say prayer, it be for you. You keep slouching in that saddle and that horse'll dump you.”

  Grimacing, Loni sat up straight as the horse crow-hopped, almost causing Loni to lose her seat. Roanie limped yesterday so her granddad had saddled her a horse she didn't know, a pretty Appaloosa. Before she got on, she thought his long legs would make him fun to ride, but she couldn’t get him into a rolling walk to save her life. There was no way to relax with his jaw-breaking trot. “You coulda’ warned me about this horse. Where’d you get him from anyway?”

  “It's Carl’s horse. Good cutter.” Willie grinned at her.

  “Hope so. He’s not worth a shit to ride. What’s its name anyway?”

  “Jarhead.”

  “Figures.”

  Bahb turned his head away but not before Loni caught his slight smile as he guided his horse down a sharp incline, hoofs kicking loose rocks. Her horse skittering, she followed him to the bottom of a wash. When the sliding, side-walking horse headed for a wait-a-minute bush, she hollered, “No, you don't!” and pulled his head away from the bush during the horse's downward rush. “You are NOT piling me in that thing.”

  Grinning even more broadly, Willie waited until she got the horse under control. They rode side-by-side in the wide wash as Loni kept nervously blabbing. “Should have been named Shithead,” she said to the horse. “Bahb?” Loni turned to her granddad. “How’d you end up in this country?”

  “After school came down here to work. My ma from O'odham reservation. She had brother maybe help me, but I never found him. Your grandfather Ben Wagner gave me job breaking horses and a nice place for Shiichoo and your mother.” He stopped talking as they climbed out and around a long drop that would make a beautiful waterfall during the next rain. Dropping back into the wash, Bahb continued. “I broke many horses for ranches around here.” Loni watched him remember. “He good man, Ben Wagner. Took your ma in as his own when your dad marry her.”

  “How’d you end up half Navajo and half Papago?”

  Willie frowned at her. “How many times I tell you how I hate the name Papago."

  Loni asked her granddad, “Do you hate it?”

  “Na. Sounds bettern’ Pima.” Bahb teased Willie.

  Willie grumped. “Most O'odham people don't like being called bean eater.”

  “Fine. Half Pima then. Well?”

  Bahb shrugged. “My ma tell different story every time she drunk. I don’t know which true.”

  “What do you think?”

  “One I like best is that my pa save ma during a raid against the cavalry. They had a young Pima girl with them as they rode into Navajo country where my pa ran into their camp. Pa snuck in and grabbed my ma and he took her back to O'odham land. She fell in love on the way back to her home and wouldn't leave him.” Bahb was quiet a few minutes. The only sound was the plod of the horses' hoofs scrunching against the dry white sand. The mountains were still purple with the dawn, but the rising sun was already hot on her back. “He got kicked in the head by a bad horse. When the government came to take children to boarding schools, she ran with me.”

  “How old were you?”

  “Maybe ten. I do not know when I was born.”

  “Where’d she take you then?”

  Bah
b shook his head as he turned Buck and climbed out of the wash. The chestnut horse’s four white legs flashed as he crow-hopped a few steps before her granddad settled him down again. “Willie. You circle that way.” Bahb pointed to his left. “Loni. You go that way. Meet me back at the tank.”

  “When?” Loni hollered at his back. Her granddad’s shoulders shrug, and she hollered at him again. “You just want to get out of painting this afternoon.”

  “Yi.” He waved at her without turning around and disappeared among the giant saguaro cactus that thickly scattered the hill.

  Loni liked being alone, especially on the desert. When she was young and things got too hard for her, she'd saddle Roanie and ride out for hours. The desert always smelled good in the early morning before the wind kicked up the dust. She took several deep breaths as she followed the south-leaning barrel cactus to maintain her circle. Carefully avoiding the jumping cactus patches in her path, she searched for cow tracks.

  Two hours and three sightings later, she was retracing her trail when suddenly she jerked her horse away from her granddad's horse running straight at them, bucking and throwing a hind leg out behind him in his headlong rush past her. “Oh, my god!” Loni froze a few seconds. “He's been snake bit!” She turned her horse onto Bahb's trail. “Bahb!” She drove her horse into a run, rushing dangerously along the edge of a canyon in her frantic search. “Bahb!” she cried into the wind.

  Forcing herself to calm down and pay attention, Loni climbed down from her horse and began tracking, following Buck's hoofed shoes dug deep by his frantic running and kicking. Half trotting, she pulled her reluctant horse behind her down into a thin wash as she kept screaming for her granddad. Intermittently, she stopped and listened, praying for a faint reply. Nothing answered her except for the sad “coo coo” from a mourning dove in a mesquite tree. Her panic mounted. Please don’t be dead, Bahb!

  An hour later she trailed along a stock path leading high up on the side of a black rocky hill dangerously steep and narrow and nearly tripped over a huge diamondback rattlesnake, its head smashed. “Bahb!” Loni cried out. “Where are you?”

  “Here,” came a subdued answer. She hurried around a huge outcropping jutting out from the side of the hill and found him sitting in the shade under a ledge. A scalp wound left dried blood down the side of his face. “Rattlesnake got Buck,” he said in greeting. “He fell back on me, broke my leg.”

  “Oh, shit!” Loni kneeled by him. “We've got to get you home!” Frantically, Loni spun around as she kept looking around her.

  “Calm down, Loni.”

  Stunned by his sharp tone, Loni squatted back and took a deep breath. “I'm okay.”

  “Good. Find two sticks.” Bahb’s tone had gone back to normal.

  Finding them and binding them to his leg was easy. Getting him on the tall horse wasn’t. “What I wouldn't give for a squatty desert broomtail right now.” Loni grunted, pushing her granddad onto the saddle until he settled in. “What do you think? You want your foot in the stirrup? Maybe tie your leg to the fender?”

  Grunting, he shook his head. “We just go.”

  Loni climbed on behind Bahb as Jarhead flattened his ears in displeasure and turned his head back to stare at her. She kept her legs out of Bahb's way, and they began a slow trek back to the tank. Loni knew he had to be in pain and worried about the jostling of the horse, but his quiet voice didn’t reflect his misery. “You find any mother cows?” Bahb asked.

  “No. I ran across Willie though. Said he found old Bossy. She had two heifers with her. They looked good.”

  “Yi. Bossy's youngins, Rain, and Jiggers.”

  Loni tried to keep him from thinking about his leg. “Let me guess. Rain was born on a rainy day. How come Jiggers?”

  “That's Willie's name. Bossy had a hard time, calf badly twisted in birthing. When Russell sees the calf born he said, ‘By Jiggers. It lives!’ Willie thought that was funny.”

  “You find anything?”

  “Yi, up on north canyon. All but the three you found. They were also well. Looked like last thunderhead brought up six-week grass.”

  It was late morning by the time they stumbled to the tank and found Willie waiting. Buck was still missing. Willie loaded the two horses as Loni carefully placed her granddad in the bed of the pickup and kept up her mindless chatter. “Damn, Bahb. Don't you think you went too far to get out of painting this afternoon?” He gave her a wry, pained smile.

  Willie stayed in the back, holding Bahb as she carefully drove them home, hurting for Bahb as Willie held him. She fought the jerking of the horse trailer banging against the hitch of the pickup every time they hit a pothole. The springs squawked as they bounced along in the ruts of the dusty tracks. By the time they pulled up into the yard, Loni was soaked in sweat from worry and fear.

  “Shiichoo!” Loni hollered as she bailed from the pickup. She quickly unloaded the two horses and handed the reins to Shiichoo as she hurried around to unhitch the trailer from the pickup. “Bahb broke his leg and I've got to get him to the clinic.”

  “Watch out for Buck,” Bahb warned Shiichoo as she fussed around him. “If he shows up, he'll be in bad shape.”

  In the clinic waiting room Loni worried about Bahb as she silently thanked the old pickup for making it to the clinic. Even wide open, it didn't go over forty miles an hour. Her own truck could have made it faster, but he couldn’t climb into her tall cab.

  Loni relaxed and laughed as she watched her granddad rolled out of the emergency room, his Levis in his lap. One leg was covered with a fluorescent purple cast, and his other skinny leg was partly covered with his boot. Waiting for Willie to load Bahb into his old pickup, Loni listened to her granddad complain about cutting his good boot off his foot. Hurrying back into the office, Loni used the phone to call her grandma. “Shiichoo? We’re on our way home now. Wait till you see his beautiful purple cast!”

  A crowd of people surrounded Shiichoo as they pulled into the ranch house’s driveway. Bahb gave a big grin as Russell opened the door and picked up him like a baby. Shiichoo fluttered around them like one of her old bantam hens. Everybody else on the ranch followed them into the house, Russell’s three children hiding shyly behind his wife’s skirt. Loni left Russell and her grandma to deal with Bahb's fussy complaints while she called Carl. “Bahb broke his leg.”

  “Oh, god! Is he alright?”

  Loni laughed. “He's fine now. Got a ranch full of people to wait on him. But I need help finding his horse. Buck's got a rattlesnake bite and still has a saddle on.”

  “You want me to come help you look?”

  “Yeah, I really would. It'll be light enough for several more hours. I really need to find that horse. I'll even saddle up your old cutting horse for you.”

  Carl laughed. “I'm not riding that bone-breaking nag.”

  “Fine. You can have Tubby.”

  “Shiichoo got any tamales?”

  “All you want.”

  “Okay, then. I'll be there as fast as I can.”

  Loni and Willie had the horses loaded in the trailer and ready to go when Carl drove in. “Shiichoo's tamales are waiting for you.”

  Carl's grin said it all as he hurried into the house. Loni had the motor running as Carl came back out with a fist full of tamales. “Bahb looks good.” he said jumping into the moving pickup. “What the...?” Carl tried to slam the door shut again.

  Willie laughed, leaning across him. “Door lock's broken. Tie the baling wire like this.”

  Warning Loni off the tamales, he left them on the dash to finish wiring the door shut. “I forgot about this part of ranching.” Carl groaned. Picking up a tamale, he unwrapped the husk. “You know what really won the West don't you? Baling wire, that's what. Back in the day it fixed anything,” he said, stuffing his mouth full. “And a good tamale.” He was already unwrapping a second one before he swallowed the one in his mouth. “God, these are good!” Carl stuffed a third one in his mouth before he was ready to talk again. “Yo
u got a plan?”

  “I think so. He was running south toward the ranch.”

  “Sure. He’d try to get home if he could.”

  “We can unload at the tank. I'll ride up toward the place where Buck and I crossed trails and try to find his tracks. You go west a few miles and turn south. Willie, you go east. That way we'll make sure to cross his tracks if he kept on south toward the ranch.”

  “Sounds good. How about you shoot once if you found his tracks and twice if you find him. We'll do the same.”

  Loni sighed. “Bahb really needs us to bring Buck home.”

  “How come you pronounce your granddad's name so it sounds like baaab?”

  “It means grandfather in Pima.”

  “Damn. And after all these years I thought his name was Bob.”

  Loni smiled. “He won’t tell anyone his real name. Left over from the early days. He always says the less people know his name the less they can hurt him.”

  “What does he sign on papers?”

  “He doesn't. Uncle Herm always signs any papers dealing with the ranch.”

  “What about his driver's license?” Carl asked.

  “What driver's license?”

  “Come on,” Carl said in disbelief. “So what is his real name?”

  “Estalote Bisupanni.”

  “Wow. You're right. Bahb's much better.” Carl laughed. “I love Bahb's old ways. They make total sense to me.”

  “You know, Carl? You never told me why you didn't stay on the ranch.”

  “Lots of reasons. I went into the military right out of high school, and they trained me in military police work, mainly at crime scenes. I really liked it. And the wife wanted to live in town. After my dad died and I had to come home to help my mom, I hired cowboys to take care of the ranch while I tried to fix things around the ranch and figure out what to do.”

  Glancing over, Loni could see Carl pulling on his ear. “My mom faded fast without my dad and followed him within two months. There was nothing I could do.” He sat a few minutes in silence. “I took the detective job even though I really hated Chief. About that time, the O'Neal's came along and gave me a long-term lease with an option to buy. At fifty thousand dollars a year, it was too good to pass up.”