by Mike Kearby
A mile to the south out on the open prairie, the rising outline of a drive herd appeared.
Nestled on the ground between Charlie and Ben, Foss stoked a fire of dry cow chips and dead mesquite. A piece of cowhide was strapped to his right hand wrapped with several strips of rawhide.
Nate tossed his gaze a little west of the first herd. A second outfit came into view. He looked down at Foss, lifted his chin, and held out Crow-hop’s rein. “That’s plenty hot. Get going.”
Foss picked up a hot cinch ring from the fire with his covered hand and stepped up in the stirrup. Once settled, he took Crow-hop’s rein and nudged his pony toward the first herd.
Make sure you put enough heat on that -R pony so that he runs through their herd like a bay steer,” Nate added as a reminder.
Foss never looked back as he hoisted the cinch ring head-high. “Oh, he’ll run and play hell, big brother, that I guarantee.”
Nate nodded, tight-lipped, and looked back at Ben and Charlie, then off to the second approaching outfit. “Off you go, boys. Make sure you get a good circle on that outfit’s beeves and drift them into the Reston herd.”
The two brothers nodded, turned their ponies, and scrambled west.
July, riding the left point, saw it first. He leaned forward in the saddle and squinted. A hundred yards ahead, a piebald pony ran head long for the herd.
“Holy Lord,” he muttered and whistled through two fingers to catch Pure’s attention.
Pure tossed a quick glance at his foreman who was motioning frantically ahead of them. Pure moved his gaze toward the creek and saw what unmistakeably was Isa’s pony bounding for the lead beeves.
“He’s going to split ’em!” July screamed.
Pure focused on a rising dust cloud behind Crow-hop. Four deep furrows appeared on his forehead.
What’s he dragging?
The answer fell off his lips.
Isa!
July raced to intercept Crow-hop’s charge.
Jolted from his disbelief, Pure screamed, “No!” and raked his spurs across his piebald’s side.
July waved his hat high above his head, shouting, frantic to turn Crow-hop. The wild motion spooked the leading phalanx of cows, and the herd began to pick up speed.
Midway down the herd, riding swing, Paint watched July sprint away from the point position. “What the?” he said and lifted himself out of the saddle. The cows to his right began to run. Paint shook the rein and jumped his pony ahead.
Crow-hop turned his head at July’s approach. Undismayed, the -R foreman leaned right and deftly snatched the leading rein that dragged beside the spooked piebald. “Whoa,” he shouted out and then glanced behind the horse. A long, length of rope, tied at the base of Crow-hop’s tail, held a thoroughly mangled Isa.
Seconds later, Pure reached his younger brother’s horse. He rolled off his pony at a dead sprint simultaneously pulling a skinning knife from his belt with his right hand.
July tightened his grip on Crow-hop and tossed a quick glance back at the building stampede. “They’re on us,” he shouted.
Pure ran his left hand down the rope tied to Isa and with a downward slash of the knife severed the lariat in half, his concentration fixed fully on his brother’s badly mauled body.
Thirty-yards back, the leading edge of the herd began splitting left and right in front of July. The black cowboy watched, stunned, as the remaining -R drovers tried futilely to gain control of the explosive rush. A faint wave of despair swept over his expression followed by a cold anger. “Damned Gunns,” he swore under his breath.
Behind, an anguished moan drifted above the stampede’s chug. July glanced back at Pure. The ranch boss knelt beside Isa and clutched his brother’s shirtless body tight against his chest.
“Damned Gunns!” July’s tortured scream pierced the air.
Paint rode up in a fury and swung out of his saddle behind Pure. “What have they done?” he cried out. “What have they done, Pure?”
Pure’s rocking slowed at the sound of Paint’s voice.
“Why?” Paint screamed.
Pure refused to look at his middle brother. His face was void of expression. He was spent, blank, and uncommunicative.
Paint collapsed across Pure’s back, sobbing. “What have they done? What have they done?”
Pure stopped his back and forth motion and gently placed Isa on the ground. He rose and turning, grabbed Paint under both arms and squeezed his brother uttering softly, “They’ve killed him, Paint.” Then in a guttural whisper, “They shot him six times.”
A low moan grumbled in Paint’s throat.
Pure bore a steely gaze at July. “Shot him down like an animal,” he said in a dry rough voice. “Just like an animal.”
“No,” Paint screamed toward the sky.
“Just like an animal,” Pure cried.
“Damn them all!” Paint shrieked. “Damn them all.”
Pure rubbed the back of Paint’s head and slowly turned his mouth close to his brother’s ear. “Don’t you worry none, Paint,” he whispered. “For now, I aim to kill everyone of them.”
A half mile to the west, two appendages, which extended from a dark object lying on the prairie floor, moved in a wavy, rising, and falling pattern.
Out of view from the second trail outfit, Ben Gunn sported a large grin as the outfit’s cattle refused to approach the flailing black lump and instead drifted at a quick pace east away from the obscure spook.
The nearest point man of the crew yelled across the drifting cattle, “Let ’em go, boys! Just try to keep a little rein on those lead steers!”
Ben held his Colt head-high and fired off one shot.
The herd jumped at the explosion, and the massive ball of hide began to pick up speed.
A fit of cursing erupted from the point riders.
Charlie stifled a belly laugh, coughed, choked. He gazed at Isa’s shirt, which was tied securely through his saddle’s gullet. The youngest Reston’s shirt sleeves flapped wildly in the late afternoon breeze.
Ben glanced over at his brother and panted, “Now who was it said that no Reston could ever be good for nothing?”
Charlie, unable to hold back any longer let loose with a howling laugh. “Whew, brother,” he bellowed and slapped his chest as the second herd turned into a full stampede under the falling twilight. “Weren’t me, that’s for sure.”
Ben raised his brow and exhaled a deep breath. He watched the second herd running directly into the oncoming Reston stampede. “I’d sure hate to be the cowboys who have to straighten out that mess.”
Charlie nodded and turned his pony around. “Might take days or weeks. It’d be a real shame if them Reston boys didn’t make the railhead in time.”
Twelve
July 1878 - The Western Trail, Indian Territory
Nate Gunn sat horseback and looked across a prairie of horns, pleased at the big cut of beeves. E.B. wanted sixty head and Nate was determined to provide those sixty and more. He watched Foss mark his gelding’s neck with charcoal Xs, but Nate already knew the count. He had rustled enough cattle to have a fair figure of how many head grazed in front of him.
One hundred head, most -R, but some from the second outfit, the —∞.
Foss stuffed the charcoal back in his front pocket. “A hunerd,” he said, confident.
“Whew,” whistled Charlie.
“Pa’s gonna be happy to see this haul, Nate,” Foss Gunn said with a broad smile.
“Maybe.”
Charlie frowned. “Whataya mean, maybe?”
“Just what I said.”
“Pa was pretty clear in what he said, Nate,” Foss argued.
Charlie chewed on a dirty fingernail. “I sure didn’t hear any maybe coming out of his mouth.”
“He wants to look out from the porch and see Reston cattle in his front pasture,” Foss said. “That much was clear to me.”
“Now that’s where you’re wrong, Foss.” Nate’s eyes twitched slightly and flas
hed a cunning wickedness. “Pa ain’t ever gonna see ’em.”
“But Nate,” Ben leaned into the conversation. His mouth turned down at the corners. “Pa will skin each and every one of us if we don’t bring these beeves in like he said.”
Nate bore an icy stare right through Ben. “You’ve let him slap you around too much. You’re all punchy from it.”
Ben turned away. When he glanced back at Nate, he did so with lowered eyes. “Well, he won’t like it a bit is all I’m saying.”
Nate showed his teeth, and then poked his tongue deep into his lower lip. “You’re a might shaky today, Ben.”
Ben exhaled and scratched the corner of his eyebrow. “I know how he is, Nate, more than you anyway. Besides, none of us, including you, has ever gone contrary to his wishes.”
“Well don’t worry your little head so much. Pa ain’t going to see the beeves, but he’s going to see ample proof that we took the tallow out of them Reston boys’ pockets.”
Foss chuckled. “What’s rolling through that head of yours, Brother Nate?”
“Money, sure and simple.”
Out in the herd, Charlie heard the conversation turn to money and edged away from the milling beeves. He sidled his ponies in close to the group.
Nate beamed as Charlie rode up. The oldest Gunn brother loved holding court with his siblings. “The way I figure it, we’ve got the perfect opportunity to finish off them Reston boys once and for all.”
“Do tell,” Charlie sang out. Excitement coated his voice. “For I surely hate Restons.”
Nate pointed at the rustled herd and said, “It’d be senseless to waste so much time driving these beeves all the way back to South Texas.”
Charlie glanced over at Ben. “That’s sure enough so.”
Nate leaned back in the saddle and said in a devilish voice, “We’re going to split up.”
The remaining brothers chattered at the pronouncement.
“Charlie, you and Ben are taking this herd to the town below Fort Griffin.”
Ben raised an eyebrow. “Fort Griffin?”
“There’s a man there, goes by Cap Millett.”
Ben shot a warning glance at Nate. “I don’t know, big brother,” he said and nodded at Charlie.
Nate ignored Ben. “He lives north of the fort.”
Charlie made a face. “You’re sending us into a soldiering town with stolen beeves?”
Nate chuckled. “As wild a town as you’ll ever see, Charlie.”
Charlie settled all his attention on Nate.
“Don’t worry, the Millett ranch is a good ways from the fort.”
A broad smile stretched across Charlie’s face. “Your plan is beginning to make sense, Nate,” he spouted.
“Wait-a-minute, Nate, how can you be so sure this Millett fella will even see us?” Foss asked.
Nate smiled. “He’s a man goes after our own heart. He’ll take the beeves or find buyers for you.”
Charlie shrugged. “So, who is this Millett fella?
Nate snarled at Charlie’s questioning tone. “He’s a rancher who dabbles in thievery, especially against plow-chasers. E.B.’s traded with him before … back in ’76, as I recall.”
“What’s he get out of the deal?”
Nate rolled his shoulders from side to side, exasperated. “Hell, Charlie, those beeves there didn’t cost us a thing ’cepting a couple hours work. Give Millett whatever cut he wants. We’ll still come out ahead.”
Charlie nodded. A flicker of a smile gleamed from each eye. “And after we’re finished with this Millett fella, you say the soldiering town is only a few miles south?”
Ben made a face. “Don’t even think about it, Charlie,” he said.
Nate noticed the spark in Charlie’s expression. “Charlie, you stay away from the card tables while you’re working for me.”
Charlie peered at his brother with mock astonishment. “Me?”
“I mean it,” Nate said harshly, and then looked over at Ben. “You watch him.”
Ben raised his brow and nodded with little enthusiasm.
“Foss and I’ll meet back up with you there in a week or so.”
“And me and you?” asked Foss. “Are we just going to sit around here in Indian Territory for a week?”
Nate eased his horse close to Foss and grinned. “Nope, you and me are headed north.”
Foss returned Nate’s grin. “North is a big place, brother.”
Nate slapped Foss across the back. “Well, sure it is, Foss, so we’ll be stopping off in Dodge City.”
Foss twisted his head, confused.
Charlie looked at Foss and mouthed, Dodge City?
Nate flashed a flinty look at the pair. “I reckon if we want to finish this thing with Pure Reston that’s where we need to go, because he still needs to get the rest of his herd to the railhead.”
Charlie nodded and then wrinkled his brow with some uncertainty.
Nate stared at his brother and clicked his tongue against his teeth. “What is it, Charlie?”
Charlie made a face and asked, “How come you and Pa hate the Restons so much?”
A soft murmur arose from the other three.
Nate studied them all briefly and then parted his lips in a scornful grin. “Has to do with Street,” he whispered, and then added playful, but serious, “And whenever any of you boys’ dispositions gets rank enough, then you just go ahead and tell old E.B. you want to hear all about it.”
Journal Entry - The morning after, Pure dug Isa’s grave all by himself, and he wouldn’t allow me or Paint to help with it. When he finished digging, he scooped up Isa and placed him in the ground. He didn’t even say words over him, just covered him up, and then Pure just plopped down on Isa’s grave. He sat there most of the morning without speaking a word to anybody. A little later, Paint gathered up the boys and rode out to try and round up the herd. I stayed back with Pure and waited. And after a long time, Pure stood up, dusted off the back of his britches, and said, “Let’s go for a ride.” We rode across Brushy Creek, and a little ways after crossing we came across a small burned out fire and six spent shells. Pure bounced those shells around in his palm for some time, thinking mighty hard over them. Then he pocketed those shells and as serious as I ever saw, looked me straight in the eye and said, “You know C.A. was Street’s daddy.” Well, I must have looked like a mule kicked me right in my stomach because Pure walked over, put his hand on my shoulder, and added, “Happened after momma died and Mr. Gunn was away during the war.” Course, I didn’t know what to say to that, so I just stood there balking like a Missouri mule. Pure said C.A. told him the story before he died. And then Pure said that with the killing ahead, he wanted the truth of the matter known just in case he didn’t make it through the difficulty. But after today, he didn’t ever want to talk about it again. Ever. And he didn’t. But that revelation carried its toll and on that very day Pure changed. His face lost its color and turned hard and chiseled like limestone. I never saw him smile again in my whole life, and when he did set his gaze on you, it would chill your backbone. When we rode back to camp that day, Pure told Paint and the boys to spend the next two days rounding up the beeves as best they could and then drive what they could muster on to Dodge City. “Don’t worry about finding them all” he told Paint. “For the Gunns are of such vengeance that they will retrieve the thirty beeves I took back plus some.” When Paint asked Pure what he was going to do. Pure just glanced south and said he and I were headed for Fort Griffin, that he and I had an appointment there in the town below the fort. Locals called it The Flat, and it was a place filled with gamblers, lowlifes, and owl hoots of all persuasions. Pure said it was just the place the Gunn boys would drive the stolen cattle to sell. And it was there that I became involved in one the most talked about shoot-outs in Texas.
Thirteen
August 1878 - Cap Millett’s Ranch, Texas
Charlie Gunn squeezed his eyes shut and pounded two trail-hardened fists on a cedar-planked table that
occupied a prominent spot on the front porch of the Millett house. The card table bounced once on uneven legs, and its contents—playing cards, gold coins, and cigarette fixings scattered to the edges. The other card players at the table—Cap Millett, Frank Coe, and Virgil Lattimore, all leaned away at Charlie’s outburst. The three pushed their backs hard against their chairs as if an eight-pound cannonball had landed square in the middle of them.
Charlie glanced at the startled trio with an upturned lip. “What are you gawking at?” he muttered and then slammed his fists on the table once more, cursing every card in the playing deck.
Cap Millett smiled respectfully at Charlie’s blow-up but kept a cautious eye on the steady Ben Gunn, who leaned against the porch railing, shaking his head from side to side. Millett tugged at his earlobe and waited patiently for Charlie’s tantrum to subside. The earlobe tug was a signal every Millett hand understood: keep your hand close to your pistol. Several of the Millett cowpunchers moved closer to the porch and the Gunn brothers.
Frank Coe, a hired gun fighter of some distinction, sat directly across from Charlie. He stared at the coins scattered across the table and counted his winnings aloud. “Ten, twenty, thirty, and…five. Thirty-five dollars.”
Charlie fumed at the gun hand.
Coe took notice of Charlie’s increased frustration. “Let me see,” he said and jingled the coins in his right hand. “I better count this again…just to be sure.”
Cap Millett sat tight-lipped and tense.
Coe looked up at Charlie and placed his winnings on the table.
Charlie’s face turned beet red.
“Ten, twenty, thirty, and…five. Thirty-five dollars. Yep, it’s all here.”
Charlie muttered under his breath.
Coe glanced over at the south Texas rustler. “That didn’t bother you none, did it, Charlie?”
“What?” Charlie growled. “What bothered me?”