by Mike Blakely
Yet Ab was nowhere to be found. Having appeared ubiquitous during the past three days, his presence was keenly missed. He hadn’t been seen since the end of Sunday services.
“Where’s Holcomb?” the guests began to ask. Some of them were planning on leaving by train that night. “Where’s Sergeant Holcomb?” They wanted to thank their host. They wanted to toast him, favor him with a few bars of “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow,” honor him with hip hip hoorays. “Where’s Ab?” they wondered.
“Pete, where’s your father?” one of the old soldiers inquired.
“I don’t know,” Pete said. “I haven’t seen him.”
“Find him. Bring him out. Drag him by that peg of his if you have to, but bring him round to the barn where the boys are playing the old battle songs. We won’t leave until we hear him speak!”
On the way to the cabin, Pete passed a little gambler who jerked at the knot of his cravat and tipped his frazzled derby.
Pete found his father posturing in front of the mirror in his room. “Papa, they’re asking for you out there. Some of them want to see you before they go home.”
Ab stepped away from the looking glass. His hair was combed back and oiled, the gray streaks streaming from his temples like trails of smoke. He wore his best suit. A string tie closed his stiff collar. A gold watch chain draped gracefully from his vest pocket. And the leg! Had he polished it? No, he had sanded and varnished it! It shone like the banisters in Captain Dubois’s mansion.
And the awkward old leather straps that attached the peg to the belt had taken a fresh dose of blacking.
Ab breathed deep and nodded at his son. “I’m ready,” he said.
FORTY-TWO
Buster and Caleb were joining the band in a rendition of “Tenting on the Old Camp Grounds” when Ab appeared at the side of the barn. Applause overwhelmed the music, and singing voices jumped into “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow” before the musicians could agree upon a key to accompany it in.
The old soldiers patted Ab’s back and passed him hand to hand like a gallon of water in a bucket brigade until they splashed him in glory on a little platform of oyster barrels and apple crates against the barn wall. There he cowered before applause and cheers until his guests would allow him to speak.
Pete pushed his way through the throng and took Amelia’s arm, beaming with pride at his father’s great success in his first role as host. He looked across the hat brims at Caleb, who was smirking beside Buster.
Ab held his hands high to quiet the crowd. “I don’t make many speeches,” he began when the shushing trailed off. “I don’t feel at ease with it. I don’t have much to say to you, except that I am happy every one of you could attend this reunion, and it was a pleasure to see you one and all. My only regret is that we soon must go our separate ways.” He raked his hand back through his hair and wiped the oily tonic from his fingers onto his coat. “Well … in all honesty … there are other regrets, too.…”
He clasped his hands in front of him, tapped his wooden leg against the crate once or twice, and cleared his throat. “In talking with the men over the past three days it has come to my attention that many among us have fallen on hard times since the war. Not a few of you have told me you spent your last pennies in arriving here and have no idea where your next stake will come from.” Ab slapped his palms against his breast pockets. “If I were a wealthy man, I would stake every one of you. Yet I know you all too well to think you would accept my charity.”
A murmur passed through the crowd, and its members shook their heads solemnly over the hopeless, destitute conditions some of their comrades were experiencing.
“However,” the speaker said, with a more hopeful lilt to his voice, “I believe that we, as men who have fought and suffered together, owe it to one another to exploit every avenue we have at our disposal to come to one another’s aid. There are men among us with experience in many fields, and by swapping our ideas and exchanging advice, I believe we may all benefit and improve our situations. Allow me to make the first suggestion.”
Ab scraped his polished leg thoughtfully against the platform and tucked his thumbs into his vest pockets.
“My specialty in the area of business, if I may claim one, is land speculation. Now not long ago I learned of a new law put into effect by the General Land Office that I think may benefit many of you here today. The law allows veterans to gain immediate title to homestead lands without the requirements of residing on or cultivating the land as is usual in homesteading.…”
A sudden vision came to Buster, and he finally grasped the scheme behind Ab’s reunion. He saw the plat map in the county clerk’s office. He saw his own little quarter section on Monument Creek with his name on it—Thompson—proclaiming the proprietorship in which he, as a former article of property himself, took so much pride. Then, above the Thompson Plat came the first of the squares labeled Holcomb—Ab’s original homestead—then Javier’s former quarter section, then those that had belonged to cowboys long proved up, bought out, and returned to Texas. The Holcomb squares flanked the creek for miles, halfway and more to its head, almost to the Pinery, where it poured from the mountain ranges onto the shortgrass plains.
Then Buster envisioned that blemish on the map, that one plat labeled other than Holcomb, that pockmark on an otherwise perfect slate: the Mayhall claim, just above the Holcomb quarter section once claimed by Matthew.
But above Mayhall’s name were empty parcels, unclaimed lands, blank squares on the map, waiting for impoverished homesteaders to take them away from Ab Holcomb—twenty-odd squares lining the creek all the way into the Pinery, all the way to its source among the grotesque, red, sandstone monuments that had given name to the stream.
Now Buster saw the empty squares taking on the names of discharged soldiers—shiftless, penniless drifters aching to convert the quarter sections Uncle Sam gave them to gambling stakes or whores’ wages. It all made such good, sudden sense. The land office that day in Colorado City, the telegrams sent to the newspapers, the sudden inclination toward hospitality. Old Mister Ab wasn’t changing; he wasn’t taking his blinders off; he was as single-minded as ever. He was thinking only of land!
In wanton disrespect to the speaker, Caleb was tuning his mandolin, rather noisily. He felt the elbow of Buster in his ribs.
“Listen, boy,” the black man whispered, leaning toward him. “Your papa’s gittin’ you a bigger ranch.”
“… so you see,” Ab continued, “any one of you who has done your duty in service to the Union may take one hundred and sixty acres at no cost other than the filing fee and establish yourselves as farmers. That is my advice, and I hope some of you may make good use of it.”
A murmur circulated among the listeners.
Ab went on. “Those of you interested in farming may come with me to the land office in the morning, if you want, to look at the possibility of getting land in this area. I know the best parcels for farming. I myself farmed between wars.”
“What’s it take to file?” asked a rawboned ex-private in overalls.
“You must have discharge papers,” Ab explained. “But that is a mere formality. My word is good with the county clerk, and I will vouch for you in the morning if you want to get a farm. Are you a farmer?”
“I’m hired on a farm out of Greeley,” the ex-private said. “I’d like to have my own, though.”
“You’ll have it before dinner tomorrow,” Ab promised.
Whispers turned to talk in the audience.
“Who wants to settle alongside of him?” Ab asked. “There are parcels unclaimed along Cheyenne and Camp creeks where a dozen of you might farm as neighbors. You can share equipment, form a soldiers’ colony.”
“I’ll take a farm!” a voice shouted from the back of the crowd.
“I’ll come along, too,” another said. “Maybe I’ll take up farmin’.”
“Sergeant Holcomb!” yelled the grinning dandy in the frazzled derby and the diamond-stuck cravat. “So
me of our hands don’t fit plow handles. Does Uncle Sam have a saloon or a gambling parlor we might file on?”
The old soldiers split the evening calm with laughter.
Ab appeared annoyed. “No property of that nature has been surveyed for filing,” he said. “All the government has to offer is farmland or cash.”
“Cash?” asked the husky voice of one of the soldiers’ wives, her face reddening at her own outburst.
“That is to say,” Ab explained when the tittering died down, “cash earned indirectly, through land speculation.”
“What does that mean, sergeant?”
“Well, there are certain land speculators who would organize discharged soldiers to file on adjacent plots of land and then purchase the whole of them together at a set price, at pure profit to the soldiers.”
“How much will they pay?” asked the man with the diamond-stuck cravat.
“Not more than a dollar and two bits per acre, for that’s the government price, and quite likely half that or less. Any land speculator is going to offer as little as he can get away with.”
“You speculate, don’t you, sergeant?” The dandy tipped the derby back on his head.
“After a fashion. Land speculation and ranching: Those are my concerns.”
“Would you happen to be offering cash to soldiers in exchange for quarter sections?” He straightened his cravat.
“Well, now, sir,” Ab said. “It isn’t my intention here to increase my own holdings. Rather, I intend to see that you men who have done your service to your country get all that’s coming to you.”
“To your credit, sir, but, as a speculator, are you offering cash to those willing to sell their claims?”
Ab drummed his fingers on his chest and looked at the sky for a moment. “Well, in fact, there are certain parcels,” he said, “not suited to farming on which I might graze a few head of cattle. But I’m afraid I can offer very little per acre. Perhaps you would earn more through another buyer.”
“How much do you offer?” the gambler asked. “If I am not too bold in asking.”
“Not at all,” Ab said. “My methods are open to the public. But I’m afraid I could offer no more than, say, oh, two bits an acre. For a quarter section of land that would add up to, oh, let’s see…” Ab pretended to make calculations with his peg leg.
“Forty dollars!” shouted the gambler, shifting his derby.
“Is that the figure? That sounds correct, yes.”
“Might I have the forty in my pocket by the time the gentleman in the overalls has his farm? That is, by dinner tomorrow?”
Ab chuckled. “It could be arranged, sir. However, like any speculator, I prefer to buy land in larger parcels. I’m not at all sure I would be interested in buying just one claim.”
“He’s got ’em now,” Buster whispered to Caleb.
“Who needs forty?” the gambler shouted, whirling to look the crowd over. “Forty dollars by tomorrow’s dinner. And Sergeant Holcomb will be the better off for it. This is not charity, men, but business that benefits everybody. Raise your hands if you’ll earn your forty dollars with me.”
By ones the hands rose. Grimy vagabond hands; soft-fingered hands of loafers and poor-farm idlers; manicured hands of swindlers and card sharks; eager, greedy, opportunistic hands that could already feel the coins pressing against their palms.
The wife who had spoken out grabbed her husband by the elbow and raised his hand for him. “That new stove,” she said.
“Do you see what he’s done?” Pete said, shaking Amelia.
“Yes, he’s very generous,” she replied.
“No, not that. He’s just acquired every claim left along the Monument. The creek is ours. And Monument Park. The whole danged valley! I guess you’ll have to marry me now. I just became the biggest rancher in the county.”
Amelia shrank from the commotion around her. How often would that one-legged man invite his old war chums after she married Pete? How many crippled cows would they hang in the doorway? How much longer could she possibly put it off? She was going to marry Pete Holcomb. She was going to become a wretched little ranch wife.
“Eighteen, nineteen…” The gambler shoved his way toward the platform of kegs and crates. “We have at least two dozen takers,” he said. “That’s a large enough parcel for any speculator. And you say we’ll have forty each by dinner tomorrow?”
“I stand on my word,” Ab said. “We’ll leave at first light. Any man who wants a farm or forty dollars will have it tomorrow.”
“I’ll shake on it!” The gambler took Ab’s hand and used it to pull himself onto the stage. “I have a proposal!” he shouted, squeezing Ab’s shoulders in his hands. “Holcomb has worn stripes on his sleeves too long. He’s fought in two wars, led us all to victory at Apache Canyon, fed and entertained us here for three days, and now he has brought us to farms and grubstakes! A promotion is in order. I say we brevet him Major … no, Colonel Holcomb!”
As the former enlisted men sorely outnumbered the officers, all opposition was shouted down with hip hip hoorays, and Ab was thrust into the crowd to the tune of “For He’s the Jolly Good Fellow.”
This last bit was the gambler’s own device, and it took Ab completely by surprise. Imagine that! Colonel Holcomb! The king of all cattlemen between Denver and Colorado Springs. If only Ella could be here with him now.
“I told you,” Buster said to Caleb. “I told you he was gonna get you a bigger ranch. Now he’s gone and done it.”
“It ain’t my ranch,” Caleb said, watching the crowd mob his father.
He turned away in disgust, left his mandolin in his seat, and trudged off. The corner of the barn dulled the sharp clamor of the celebration when he turned it, and he found Allegheny hanging in her sling in the doorway. It was something of a surprise to see her suspended there, though he had helped do the suspending. It was just such a ridiculous thing to do to a cow. But with the noise of his father’s success throbbing in his ears, he decided he might as well let her down a notch, ridiculous or not.
The old cow’s eyes rolled to follow him when he walked behind her to loosen the rope, and when he yanked at the knot, she kicked him. The sharp hoof of her right hind foot jerked back and caught him on the shin right above the top of his boot. He sucked in an epithet and started to kick her back or give her a good twist of the tail when he realized what she had done.
He hobbled back to the corner of the bam. “Hey, Pete!” he called. “Buster!” But there was no use in hollering. The music and commotion that surrounded Ab drowned out his voice.
At that moment Caleb knew he hated his father. Suddenly he despised old Ab Holcomb more than he ever thought possible. The man was a soulless fraud. He had no right hoarding all that attention. He didn’t even enjoy it. He probably hated it. That false smile on his face was a scandal.
Caleb Holcomb was the one who deserved the adulation. He was the one who needed it, lived for it, sought it so desperately through his songs, his stories, the music within him that made his fingertips itch for the bite of catgut.
But all his life, his father had taken things from him. And now he would take this, too.
FORTY-THREE
Pete found Caleb in the corral the next morning, tying a fiddle and a mandolin behind his cantle. The ranch droned with voices and rattled with equipage being piled into wagon beds.
“Allegheny’s standin’ up,” Pete said, cheerfully.
“I know. She kicked me yesterday.”
Pete watched his brother loop the end of the latigo through the saddle ring as neatly as a silk tie. “Where you goin’?” he asked.
“I don’t know. I have to hunt up some work somewhere.”
Pete blinked in wonder. “Work? I’ll have more work than you can stand after these old soldiers leave.”
“I haven’t been asked to stay on.”
“I’m askin’ you right now.”
“I didn’t mean by you.”
Pete climbed over the ra
ils, into the corral. “Well, listen, you haven’t even given Papa a chance. He’s had this reunion on his mind. If you’d ask him whether or not he wants you to stay, he’d tell you.”
“I’m not gonna ask him nothin’. He should have thought about me before his danged old war pals. He doesn’t even like any of them old soldiers. He just wanted them to file on land.”
“Yeah, for us. He’s buildin’ us the biggest ranch on the Front Range. We’ll own the whole creek after today and control every acre it drains.”
Caleb shook his head. “He never did want me to be part of this ranch. I don’t plan to stay where I ain’t wanted. Open that gate for me, will you?”
Grudgingly, Pete lifted the sagging gate so it would swing open. “You’re leavin’ just to spite him, ain’t you?”
Caleb paused with his foot in the stirrup. “You don’t know how it feels, Pete. He doesn’t look away from you when he sees you comin’.” He threw his leg over his instruments and settled into the seat.
“You know what I think? It’s a problem you don’t want to handle, so you’re just up and turnin’ your tail. Takin’ the easy way out.”
Somehow Caleb felt he had a better argument from the saddle, looking down on his brother. “You come ride with me for a year if you think I’m takin’ the easy way.”
Pete couldn’t find words. He tried to make them form in his mouth, but none would come. He huffed and gritted his teeth in frustration. “You’re just like him,” he finally said. “You’re just as hardheaded as him.”
They glared at each other until Caleb got tickled at the colors Pete was turning and started to laugh. “I guess I’ll see you next spring,” he said.
“That’s fine. That will give you the rest of the year to grow some brains. I swear, you’re just like him.”
“Oh, settle down, Pete. There’s always a chance we’ll run this ranch together someday.”
“When? When Papa’s gone? Do you think he’s gonna move back to Pennsylvania? You think he’s gonna up and die for you?”
Caleb stared at his saddle horn. “All I know is, I won’t stay where I ain’t wanted. You don’t know how that feels, so don’t tell me I ain’t talkin’ sense.”