“Come on,” shouted Ten, “we can get ahead of them!”
He galloped his horse along the north bank, some of the Cherokee riders right behind him. Marty, Wes, Jingle Bob, and Buscadero had gotten ahead of the herd and climbed out on the south bank. They galloped their horses downriver, following Ten’s lead, and got ahead of the swimming longhorns.
“Ride into the river ahead of them,” shouted Ten. “We’ll rope the leaders and head them to the north bank.”
He entered the water from the north bank, the other riders following. Marty, Wes, Buscadero, and Jingle Bob rode in from the south bank, and they had a solid line of riders across the river. Ten roped a lead steer, kneed his horse toward the north bank, and his cow-wise bronc did the rest. Other riders had followed Ten’s lead, and when they had dragged half a dozen lead steers out on the north bank, the rest of the herd had calmed enough to follow. The drag riders had kept the steers bunched, and when it was all over, they had lost only a dozen steers, gored or drowned. Not a rider had been hurt.
The last cow emerged almost a mile downriver from where they had begun the crossing.
“Settle ’em down to graze,” shouted Ten, “and we’ll call it a day.”
They were still an hour or more away from sundown, but they were wet, muddy, and exhausted. They needed hot coffee, a chance to dry out, and good food. Charlie Two Hats had removed the pack saddle from Diablo. The brute had a horn slash the length of his belly. Two Hats had some sulfur salve, and when he’d washed the bloody gash, began applying the medication. He was working from front to back, and with Two Hats on his knees and his back turned, Diablo showed his appreciation. He snaked his head around and sunk his big teeth into Charlie’s backside.
When the mule let go, he looked at Charlie with such innocent eyes, everybody laughed, even Priscilla. Charlie Two Hats said nothing. He went to his horse, took his rifle from the boot, and headed for Diablo.
“No, Charlie,” Marty shouted, “him big, work lak hell.”
“Him malo bastardo mulo,” growled Two Hats. “Kill him dead lak hell.”
“No, Charlie,” said Ten. “Leave him be. But when this drive’s done and we get him back to the Canadian, let’s leave him there. We got off easy this time, losin’ a few steers and nobody hurt. No matter how big he is, how much a load he can handle, it’s not worth gettin’ one of us hurt or killed.”
The truth of his words sobered them, but it didn’t lessen their merriment at Two Hats’s expense.
Priscilla laughed. “It’s been worth it all, just to see that blessed mule take a bite out of Two Hats. I’d put up with the dust, the stampedes, the Comanches, the outlaws, all of it again, just to see Charlie get bit.”
With trembling hands, LeBeau fumbled around in the dark, seeking the pistol. He found it, but knocked over the empty bourbon bottle. It fell, rolled across the floor, and bumped into the wall. LeBeau held his breath, and for a moment he heard nothing. Then it started again, the slow, rhythmic cadence down the hall. LeBeau weighed his options. They were few. While he was no gunman, suppose, on this last hand, his luck changed? If he shot his way out, what had he gained? What lay ahead? There was the letter he had written, soon to be mailed. Emily was gone, Priscilla was gone, he was broke, and the house was being taken from him.
He listened, but there was only silence. They were playing with him, like a cat with a doomed mouse. Then, seemingly louder, closer, there was a sound in the hall. LeBeau put the muzzle of the pistol to his temple, and it was cold against his sweating flesh. Did he have the guts to do it? He had no choice. The game was over, and it was time to fold. He pulled the trigger, and knew no more.
Following the roar of the pistol, there was a moment of silence. Then the maddening sound started again, like slow footsteps in the hall. There was a storm blowing in from the west. The rising wind rattled the leaves of the old magnolia tree against the balcony where Ten and Priscilla had parted just a few months before. Downstairs, the front door stood open, old Joseph having forgotten to lock it. The night wind pushed the door to and fro, and on each backward swing, the brass knob bumped against the wall. When the wind paused, so did the door, but with each new gust of wind, the door again moved. The brass knob continued bumping the wall, a slow, rhythmic thump that sounded almighty like ghostly footsteps in the deserted hall….
27
Ten continued scouting far ahead, finding an occasional blaze on a tree trunk that assured him they were following the original Chisholm Trail. On a good day, they made fifteen miles. He wasn’t afraid to “short” a day’s drive, sacrificing distance for good graze and water at hand. Chisholm’s trail led due north. They were roughly halfway between the Cimarron and the Arkansas when they came upon the trail of six horsemen riding east.
“Tracks maybe three days old,” said Ten. “Shod horses, so that rules out Indians.”
“Mebbe outlaw,” said Two Hats enthusiastically. “Ride lak hell, go see.”
“No,” said Ten. “We don’t know that they’re outlaws, and even if they are, they’ve given us no cause to go after them. This is a trail drive, and our business is in Abilene.”
“We outnumber them three to one,” said Wes. “Their only chance would be to ambush us, and if they aimed to do that, they wouldn’t have left a trail for us to cross.”
“That’s sound thinkin’,” said Marty.
“I’d have to agree,” said Ten. “We’ll be watchful, but I don’t look for any trouble from this bunch. We’re not that far from the ranch on the Arkansas, and Jess keeps twenty to thirty Injun riders there. This wouldn’t be a healthy place for renegades and owlhoots to hang out.”
“Since the Chisholm Trail leads right to the ranch,” Priscilla asked, “are we going to stop there?”
“For a day or two,” said Ten. “I think we’ll leave Diablo there, and get him on the way back. We can get the loan of a less temperamental mule if we need a third one. That suit you, Charlie?”
Charlie Two Hats nodded. There were grins and chuckles from the other riders, as they recalled Two Hats being bitten by his own mule. He would be a while living that down.
September 25, 1866, they reached the Chisholm ranch on the Arkansas. Although Ten hadn’t been there since he was eleven, some of the riders still remembered him. The little Cherokee in charge was named Bandywood, and was called “Bandy” for short. Bandy waved a greeting at Ten and then rode out to meet Charlie Two Hats. Charlie had lived and worked at the ranch until the summer of 1865, when he’d been one of the riders accompanying Chisholm and the tribe of Wichita Indians traveling south into Indian Territory. It would be a good time, Ten thought, for Two Hats to dispose of Diablo. The rest of the Cherokee riders were busy stringing the longhorns out along the Arkansas. As impressive as Chisholm’s trading post was, the ranch was even more so. There were horses, mules, hogs, chickens, and a small herd of milk cows.
“I didn’t know Indians milked cows,” said Priscilla.
“The men don’t,” said Ten. “That’s squaw work.”
“That’s disgraceful,” said Priscilla.
“What, milking cows?”
“No,” said Priscilla, “setting aside all the things men don’t want to do and calling them ‘squaw work.’ I’ve never seen a cowboy milk a cow either.”
“You won’t,” said Ten. “That’s why we all drink our coffee black. When we get us a ranch, we’ll skip the milk cows. You can scrape buffalo hides instead.”
Everybody laughed at that; even the Indian riders.
“With a ranch like this,” said Wes, “just seventy-five miles from the railroad, a man could run a million head of cows. How can your pa sit down yonder on the Canadian, in a tradin’ post, with all this goin’ to waste?”
“Back in ’thirty-six,” said Ten, “somebody hired Jess to lead a party lookin’ for gold. They didn’t find the gold, but Jess liked the country, so he built his tradin’ post there. I always reckoned Kansas was gettin’ a mite too crowded for him, and maybe too ta
me. Besides, he didn’t fancy himself a rancher, a cattleman. He’s a trader, and he trades with the Indians. Bein’ a government scout, he could see the time comin’ when the tribes would be assigned lands in Indian Territory, and moved south, like the Wichitas were moved just last summer. For a man that trades with the Indians, I reckon Jess is where he wants and needs to be.”
“If he likes it on the Canadian,” said Priscilla, “and we’re going to have a ranch, why don’t we buy this one?”
“Because the railroad’s coming,” said Ten, “and it’ll bring the farmers. They’ll plow up the grass, fence the land, and the days of free range will be gone.”
“I don’t see how’n hell they’re goin’ to build that much fence,” said Marty. “There ain’t enough trees in Kansas for all the dogs to have one.”
“They’ll find a way,” said Ten. “The Indians are bein’ moved south, to assigned lands, lands nobody else wants. Yet. I believe there’ll come a time when the tribes will have to fight for that land. Someday that land, Indian Territory, will be a state. Then the settlers, the sodbusters, and the politicians will decide it’s too good for a bunch of Injuns.”
“If that happens,” said Marty, “where do you aim to settle?”
“West,” said Ten. “Somewhere on the high plains, where there’s room to grow. Where I can ride all day through the tall grass without seein’ anybody’s cows but mine.”
None of them had thought beyond the next trail drive, and they listened to his words in some awe. Priscilla was the first to speak.
“Lord, you make it sound like an adventure, a quest. When are we going?”
“I’m thinking the spring of ’sixty-eight,” said Ten. “I figure we can bring maybe two more drives up the Chisholm Trail before it gets crowded and prices began to fall. That last herd, then, will be a mix, some of it breeding stock. That’s when I aim to move west.”
“It’s a dream,” said Chris. “Is it just yours, or can we go with you?”
“You’re welcome to come along,” said Ten. “I don’t aim to fight the outlaws, hostile Injuns, and catamounts by myself.”
Toward late September, they left the Chisholm ranch on the Arkansas, pointing the longhorns north, toward Abilene. The troublesome Diablo had been left at the ranch, and a gray mule of gentler disposition had taken his place. Barring any unforeseen trouble, such as stampedes, they were five days from trail’s end. But there was no trouble and there was no sign of the riders whose trail they’d crossed, south of the Arkansas. It was near sundown a few days later when they came within sight of the cluster of mud huts that was the “city” of Abilene.
“My God,” said Marty, “a bunch of digger Injuns could have built a better-lookin’ town. The whole damn place hung together without hammer or saw.”
“None needed,” said Ten, “for what they had to work with. But see the wagons beyond the huts? Joe McCoy has bought lumber and is havin’ it hauled in from God knows where. Let’s move the herd around the town and north a ways, until we find water and grass. We’ll likely be here awhile.”
They crossed a small river that ran just south of the town, and moved the herd west, and then north. They bedded down the herd on a stream they later learned was Mud Creek. Leaving Charlie Two Hats and his riders with the longhorns, Ten took Priscilla, Marty, Wes, Chris, and Lou with him. They rode back to the squalid collection of buildings that represented the town of Abilene. The crooked river they had crossed just south of town, they later learned, was the Smokey Hill, and the wagon track that followed the river to the southwest was a military road, bound for a distant intersection with the Santa Fe Trail. What concerned them was not the town itself, however, but what was taking place northeast of it. There were three wagons, their canvas a silver-gray in the October sun. An enormous tent was being erected, and half a dozen men with mallets were hammering stakes into the ground. Ten and his companions reined up, watching. One of the men, who looked like he might be in charge, turned to them, a question in his eyes.
“I’m Tenatse Chisholm,” said Ten, “and this is part of my outfit. We got nine thousand Texas longhorns up the creek a ways. Is McCoy here?”
“McCoy’s away on business. I’m Harlan Venters, and I’m in charge of all building that’s to be done. We saw your dust as you come in. You’re way too early. We ain’t even got our tent up. The railroad’s still three months away, and we’re maybe two months away from havin’ any accommodations ready, includin’ cattle pens. Lumber, tools, ever’ damn thing, has to be shipped by rail to end-of-track and wagoned in from there.”
“We aim to be first,” said Ten. “When do you look for McCoy to return?”
“About a week. There’ll be more materials from end-of-track, and he’ll ride one of the wagons.”
They rode back through Abilene, and crude as the place appeared, they found it had a barbershop and bathhouse, a blacksmith shop, a store, a one-story “hotel,” and a post office. The rest of the nondescript huts were dwellings in which a few settlers lived. They followed the Smokey Hill River to its confluence with Mud Creek, and turned north. While the area wasn’t devoid of timber, it was concentrated mostly in the bottomland, along the streams. There was hackberry, elm, ash, burroak, and walnut, but much more numerous were the prolific cottonwoods, their pale leaves whispering in the never-ending prairie wind. They discovered Mud Creek was aptly named, and three days later, moved the longhorns east of Abilene, to a clear-running stream called Chapman Creek.
“This is goin’ to be an almighty long wait,” said Marty. “Instead of us bein’ in Texas the week after Christmas, we’ll be settin’ right here.”
“Maybe not,” said Ten. “McCoy and his two brothers are in the livestock business. They have connections in Chicago and New York. Suppose we sell them our herd, let them hold it here, and ship it east when the railroad gets here?”
“Suits me,” said Wes, “if they don’t beat our ears down on the price.”
“They’re sayin’ the first herds may bring thirty dollars a head,” said Ten. “If we sell for just twenty, we’ll ride out of here with $187,000.”
“All of that won’t be ours,” said Marty.
“No,” said Ten, “fifty thousand of it will belong to Jess. But you and Wes, along with Chris and Lou, will have twenty thousand dollars among you. If we can get back to Texas before the price goes up, that’ll buy you another five thousand head. Resell at twenty, and you’ll come out of the next drive with a good hundred thousand dollars. You can stock some kind of ranch with that.”
“Lord in heaven,” said Lou, “just our part seems like a fortune. But you, you’re a rich man, without ever making another trail drive.”
“No,” said Ten, “because I’m takin’ the advice Jess gave me, and buying land. Remember what I said about farmers and fences? Jess told me that, and he says the high country will be safe for a while, but not forever. Legally, I can homestead a hundred sixty acres, a quarter section. So can Priscilla, but how many cows can you graze on three hundred twenty acres? Jess says a man can build an empire on the high plains, and when you buy and pay for the land, nobody can take it from you.”
“Me and Wes ain’t got the money to buy that kind of range,” said Marty. “Not now, we ain’t.”
“You will after another trail drive,” said Ten.
“You can share our range,” said Priscilla. “If I’m going to be in the middle of millions of acres, with grass up to my chin, I want neighbors in there with me.”
The seven days they waited for Joseph McCoy’s return seemed like forever. When they finally saw the dust cloud to the east. Ten had to look twice to believe his eyes. When the whackers had drawn their teams to a halt, a lone passenger stepped down from the first wagon. Ten waited, allowing McCoy to converse with Harlan Venters. Venters said something to McCoy and nodded in Ten’s direction. Ten dismounted and waited for McCoy to approach. He was much younger than Ten had expected, no more than thirty, if that. He was slender, wore range clothes under
a short topcoat, had a black slouch hat on his head and heavy miner’s boots on his feet. He had brown eyes, dark hair, and a goatee that partially concealed his receding chin. His grin and the enthusiastic sparkle in his eyes brought life to an otherwise bland face.
“I’m Joe McCoy,” he said, putting out his hand. Ten took it.
Marty, Wes, Priscilla, Chris, and Lou were still mounted, and McCoy’s eyes went to them. Ten introduced them.
“I’m sorry none of the facilities are ready,” said McCoy. “As Venters told you, it will be a while. I’ll have buyers coming, but not until there’s a train. Nobody expected a herd so soon. How many do you have?”
“Ninety-three hundred,” said Ten, “six thousand of them steers.”
McCoy whistled long and low.
“We’re not of a mind to wait for the railroad,” said Ten. “What kind of offer can you make me for this herd right now?”
McCoy was caught totally off guard. He swallowed a time or two, wiped his brow with the back of his hand and cleared his throat before he spoke.
“I really don’t have the funds. I’ve bought land here, I’m having to haul materials from end-of-track—”
“You also have brothers in Chicago and New York,” said Ten, “and all of you are in the livestock business. Successfully.”
McCoy laughed, his eyes twinkling. “You’re a bold young man, Chisholm. The truth is, I’d like to take you up on your offer, but I have no means of caring for a herd of this size until the railroad gets here. I’m sure you have adequate help, but I do not. My men aren’t cowboys; they’re here to build these facilities which we need right now but don’t have. Besides, we’re talking about a great deal of money, I’m sure, and all I have are travel funds and checks already consigned to specific debts.”
“How far are we from end-of-track?”
“Between ninety and a hundred miles,” said McCoy. “Why?”
“Make me a decent offer,” said Ten, “and we’ll trail this herd to end-of-track for you.”
The Chisholm Trail Page 29