Some More Horse Tradin'

by Ben K. Green

  Also by Ben K. Green

  Horse Tradin’

  Wild Cow Tales

  The Village Horse Doctor:

  West of the Pecos

  These are Borzoi Books

  published in New York by

  Alfred A. Knopf

  This is a Borzoi Book

  Published by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.

  Copyright © 1970, 1971, 1972 by Ben K. Green

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Distributed by Random House, Inc., New York.

  Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data:

  Green, Ben K. Some more horse tradin’.

  1. Horse buying. 2. Horses—Legends and stories.

  I. Title. SF301.G744 636.1′08′1 70-38336

  eISBN: 978-0-307-83190-3

  Reprinted Three Times

  v3.1

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Other Books by This Author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Runaway!

  Mr. Undertaker and

  the Cleveland Bay Horse

  Fast Mule Buyer

  The Shield Mares

  Watermelon Hauler’s Mule

  Gittin’ Even

  Water Treatment

  and the Sore-Tailed Bronc

  Cindy

  Brethren Horse Traders

  Texas Cow Horses and

  the Vermont Maid

  Mule Schoolin’

  Saddle Marks

  Fence Trouble

  Foreign Trade

  The Last Trail Drive Through

  Downtown Dallas

  A Note About the Author

  RUNAWAY!

  I had been into deep South Texas with a string of tradin’ horses and had sold out the last ones at Gonzales, Texas. I was ridin’ a good, head-noddin’, fox-trottin’ light sorrel saddle horse with a flax mane and tail, about fifteen hands high, that wasn’t good for a lot of things, but was a nice road horse that could drift you across the country with that natural swingin’ fox trot, apparently with little effort on his part and little jar on the rider’s part.

  We had been several days coming back north when I rode into Waco and it was First Monday Trade’s Day. The city of Waco is big, so I skirted around the edges and came in on the trade square not far from the Brazos River in the old part of town. It was early fall and there was lots of good horses and mules, milk cows, and other livestock on the square. There was already a little cotton money in circulation and traders and farmers alike were tryin’ to have some business.

  I had had a good trip and was carryin’ plenty of tradin’ money but wasn’t too anxious to buy a bunch of common stock. I did think if there was something pretty nice in the way of saddle horses that would also do for light harness that I might buy a choice one or two. Since I was mounted on a good horse, I wasn’t too anxious to swap off, so I was more of a buyer than a trader, and anytime a trader is usin’ fresh money to buy fresh stock he is harder to please than when he’s tryin’ to swap off something. So I spent the morning ridin’ around among the tradin’ stock exercisin’ my hard critical eye.

  A little after noon a nicely dressed middle-aged gentleman drove in on the square a fine-lookin’ matched pair of dark brown geldings hooked to a buckboard that had been hand made out of several different kinds of wood and had been finished with a clear lacquer that brought out the natural grain of the oak, bois d’arc, cedar, and maybe some other kinds of wood I didn’t recognize in this beautiful rig. The harness wasn’t fancy nor dressed up with a lot of bright buckles and other hardware, but when you slipped your hands over the reins and along the tugs you were quickly impressed that it was all nice English tanned soft leather.

  I had never seen a pair of horses like these. They were almost sixteen hands tall with a great deal of bone and substance and probably weighed thirteen or fourteen hundred pounds apiece. They didn’t carry any heavy hair around the back of their legs or fetlocks and there was no coarseness about their joints, yet at the same time they were heavy horses that had the appearance of some of the light-boned breeds.

  I tied my saddle horse to a hitchrack and jingled my spurs across to where this team stood. Fresh stock on the trade square always draws some lookers and some bright conversation. I felt like I was a little out of my class on this team and this nicely finished natural-grained wood rig, so I stood around and listened a good while. This was a well-mannered pair of big horses and I got a glimpse in their mouths when somebody else was lookin’. Their teeth were long and well shaped and showed to be younger by the table of the tooth than they actually were. This meant two things. They had good teeth to begin with and had been so well cared for and fed such good feed that their teeth had not been worn off what would be considered a normal amount for their years. Their legs were without blemish and they were deep-chested with a well-balanced topline. Their heads showed some refinement but still weren’t small.

  I studied this pair of horses and listened for about an hour and a half before I showed any interest in wanting to buy them. I finally asked this store-bought-lookin’ gentleman that was drivin’ the team what he would ask for them. He said that he would want to sell the team, the rig, and the harness and that he would take $500 and hand me the lines and I could figure the horses for whatever part of that $500 that I thought they were worth and the rig and the harness would be the difference.

  I went back to my saddle horse and set in the shade of the tree by the hitchin’ post and watched that beautiful team of drivin’ horses. Their manners seemed to be the best and I noticed that there weren’t any traders or any farmers could walk by them without givin’ them the second look. I hadn’t worried exactly about what use I had for this team and rig or about what I would do with them after I bought ’em, but that quality would knock a country boy’s eyes out and I knew I could own ’em for a little while even if I had to sell ’em later on.

  I was almost a stranger in a strange land and I didn’t see anybody I knew to ask about the team. Late in the afternoon, I made a bid of $425 that seemed to insult this town-bred gentleman, but along towards sundown he hadn’t had any better offers and I watched him work himself around through the horses and mules and visit a little bit as he got over close to where I had been loafin’ with my horse. It seemed to me it would be a good time to break him down a little, so I got on my horse and started to ride off. Just as I expected, he hollered at me to wait a minute.

  He told me I was lettin’ $75 cheat me out of the best driving team that had ever lived and the most beautiful buckboard. I said I wouldn’t let $75 do that to me and he was quotin’ it wrong—that he was lettin’ $75 cheat him out of $425. Well, that kind of intellectual figurin’ went on until he finally offered to take $450. I told him that I didn’t believe I wanted to raise my bid, and it had begun to run through my mind that I hadn’t seen these horses work except when he drove them in on the square and I said, “Before I would give $450 for them, I believe I would want to drive ’em.”

  He said, “Well, let’s go over and have another look.”

  As he put in a little light conversation, he said, “I believe I’m just goin’ to go ahead and trade with you and take the $425.”

  Well, he didn’t know it, but I was sweatin’ worse than he was and was goin’ to give the $25 extra so to cinch the deal right quick, so I counted out the money. I put a lariat rope around my saddle horse’s neck and tied it where it wouldn’t choke him. After I took his bridle off and tied it to the saddle horn, I stepped up into the rig and took a hold of my new drivin’ team and let my sad
dle horse trot along on a loose rope since I hadn’t tied it anywhere to the buckboard; I had it draped over the spring seat next to where I was.

  As I left town, I went across the Brazos River and drove over to East Terrace, which was a few acres of land with a great big old-timey two-story brick house on it that belonged to Howard Mann. Howard was a fine old-time horseman whom time, and I guess progress, had overtaken. Most of this world’s goods had slipped through his fingers, but he still had good judgment and expensive tastes. As I drove up to circle around in the front, Howard came off the porch, showin’ a big burst of enthusiasm for an old man. I hadn’t seen him for a year or so, and of course we shook hands. I got down on the ground and we had just started to visit when Howard looked at the rig and the team and said, “I’m glad you have gotten Dr. Bond’s team of Heidelberg harness horses. They’re the finest driving horses that have ever been in Waco.” And as he laughed he said, “Probably the meanest, but that won’t bother you any.”

  I asked, “Why do you say they’re the meanest, Howard?”

  He said, “Oh Ben, they’re not really mean, they’re just bad to run away. You see those two front wheels that have been built out of bois d’arc and so beautifully lacquered. Well, they used to be oak like the two back wheels, but during runaways these horses ruined both wheels and Dr. Bond had Old Man Shultz build replacements out of bois d’arc, thinking maybe they would be harder to break up.”

  And he said, “All these extra pieces of cedar you see in this bed is where they have replaced boards after different runaways. That buckboard originally had a stationary spring seat and it was broken off so many times that finally Old Man Shultz put a portable spring seat on that rig just like you would find on a wagon.”

  As he told me all this, he kept tellin’ me, “Ben, this won’t bother you. You aren’t afraid of a runaway team and you’ll figure out a way to break them.” And as an afterthought he said, “I just imagine a few days’ work to a loaded wagon might stop a lot of that.”

  I didn’t stay too long with Howard and turned up the road north toward Hillsboro. I thought I would drive until about dark or till I found a good campin’ place. These nice big horses moved along in a fair trot—not so fast but what my saddle horse could keep up without strikin’ a lope—and we got along fine drivin’ up the side of the road out of the traffic.

  About dark, I pulled out by the side of the road at Elm Mott under some big trees and made camp for the night. I had picked up some feed as I left Waco, so I let my saddle horse eat off the back of the buckboard and tied my drivin’ team to a big gentle tree and poured their feed on the ground where they could eat together.

  Next morning I hooked up and threw my saddle on the buckboard and thought I would I would tie my saddle horse. Then I got to thinkin’ about that runaway team so I ran my lariat rope all the way up to my spring seat and tied it in a slipknot around one of the springs where I could reach down and jerk it loose in case I needed to. I had been driving this good team up the road at just a brisk trot and after about five miles of warming up had let them break into a good moving kind of road trot that would get you over lots of country in a day.

  We crossed a concrete bridge with banisters and just as I cleared the north end, these horses suddenly found them a spook and broke to run away. When I took hold of the lines to try to check them, they had both cold-jawed and clamped their bits between their teeth. With their size, arched necks, and stout bodies, it would have been a joke for me to have thought I could hold them. I reached back and jerked the slipknot to untie my saddle horse to keep from draggin’ him.

  About half a mile in front of me I saw a country road curving off at an angle to the right. I dropped what pull I had on the left line and pulled on the right line just enough to throw their balance to where they would go up that country road. When I knew I had them on that country road and there wasn’t anybody comin’, I reached and got a bull whip that had been tied on my saddle and started knockin’ hair off those big horses about every time they hit the ground and furnishin’ them all the slack that I could on the line. It came as a sudden shock to them that there wasn’t goin’ to be any screamin’ and pullin’ and tryin’ to keep them from runnin’ and when it looked like they were goin’ to show some sense and slow down, I laid the leather on them and hollered some more. I went through the little town of Leroy and I still had up speed. When I was almost in view of Mt. Calm and the road was even less populated, this ball of fast horses began to lose interest in tryin’ to leave this earth.

  I had been squattin’ down behind the seat on my knees just in case somethin’ might happen, because I didn’t want to get thrown over on the team, and I knew better than to stand up, because I might get thrown out on either side. I was a little tired of this, so I stepped over the spring seat and set down. By now this pair of big stout horses were wringin’ wet with sweat, and lather was workin’ out from under their harness. I didn’t think that I wanted to windbreak them, but I didn’t want them to think it was goin’ to be a short day so I spoke to them without takin’ the slack out of my lines and they slowed up to a lope.

  There was a big wide place where the road forked and I dropped the slack on the right line and shook the left line before I pulled on it, and, sure enough, they had turned the bits loose, so I drew them down and turned them around. This had been a seven- or eight-mile run and as we turned around they dropped down into a slow trot. I didn’t squall at them or pull on them and in another mile they had slowed down to just a good average walk and were tryin’ hard to get enough breath to live on since they were pretty well winded. In about an hour and a half I got back to the road where I had turned my saddle horse loose and he was very comfortably grazin’ along the right of way and draggin’ his lead rope.

  This time I thought that it might be smart to tie him up even with the team, so I tied him to the right hand horse’s harness on a fairly short rope to where if we had another horse race, he could be in it and I wouln’t have to come back after him.

  By now these horses were cooled out good and had very little live sweat on them, so I clucked to ’em and popped the lines over their backs and struck a pretty good travelin’ sort of trot and we got into Hillsboro in about middle of the afternoon. I went to the wagonyard to put up my horses and loaf around awhile before dark.

  Next morning I took a lot of time to brush and curry the dried sweat off this drivin’ team that thought they were racehorses and to wipe their nostrils and eyes out with a damp sack and clean out and clean off their feet and give them the attention they had been used to. I took the harness to the water trough and dipped it in and then wiped the dirt and sweat off with my hands before I harnessed the team and hooked them to the buckboard.

  The usual kind of horse and mule dealers were standin around that morning as I was gettin’ ready to leave and they, of course, tried me on price with no intentions of buyin’. I knew they were just wonderin’ what a team like that was worth, so I priced the team and rig for $750. I didn’t get much back talk because, for the most part, none of them knew whether the deal was high or cheap.

  This pair of nice big horses hadn’t been used very much lately, probably because of their bad habits, and they were sore and stiff from the runaway that they had pulled and the day’s work that I put on ’em along with it, but I had my doubts about them stayin’ stiff too long, so I tied my saddle horse to the hame of the right-hand horse. We hit a slow jog trot in the edge of Hillsboro headed north. These big horses warmed up and seemed like they were goin’ to drive real nice.

  I stopped up about middle of the morning at Itasca and drove around behind the stores and tied my team to a hitchrack. I don’t know exactly what caused me to think to do it, but I untied my saddle horse from the hame and tied him to the hitchrack by himself. I hadn’t tied this team before and I just used the nice light leather straps that snapped on to the bits and tied each horse to the hitchrack.

  I was just goin’ to walk around town and loaf a little
bit and went into the grocery store to buy some grub to eat later on in the day. I had paid for my groceries and had the sack in my arm when I heard two or three people holler, “There goes a runaway team!”

  The grocery store was on the corner of the street and I stepped to the door and watched them pass. I was real glad I had a saddle horse tied separate. I put the rope around his nose and jumped on him bareback and broke off in a lope acarryin’ that sack of groceries in one arm and the coiled up end of the rope in the other, and between nursin’ that sack of groceries and ridin’ that horse with a rope on his nose, I wasn’t in too good a shape to catch a runaway team. However, I thought that if I couldn’t keep up, I would catch up when something happened to ’em.

  They were about a mile out of town on a country road runnin’ about full tilt and apoppin’ that buckboard back and forth behind them when a farmer drivin’ a team of mules to a wagon with a cultivator hooked on behind the wagon drove across the road in front of them before he saw them comin’ and could get out of the way. This pair of runaways wasn’t too badly scared. They were just runnin’ for fun because they swerved over by the side of the road and stopped by themselves to keep from runnin’ into the barbwire fence and went to grazin’. I was just a little piece behind and I was mad enough to kill ’em, but, at the same time, I was awful glad that they hadn’t tore up my rig.

  I pulled my saddle horse up to a walk and reined him to the far side of the road and went past them like I didn’t know they were there. Then I slipped off my horse and walked back facing them and got a hold of their lines. They had their mouths full of grass and were actin’ as innocent as horses can act with broken tie straps hangin’ from each pair of bits. I had found out something else about ’em. They would break tie straps to get to run away.

  I kept a pretty tight line on ’em the rest of the day and drove into Alvarado and found an old man with a good barn and plenty of feed that would let me put my team up overnight. I had my saddle blanket and a blanket tied on the back of my saddle so I made a pallet in the back of the buckboard and spent the night.