“Don’t worry,” Enoch said. “You won’t be disappointed.”
“We could’ve had ham for supper,” Randy put in, “but that wild beast got it.”
“Randy and Scar don’t get along too well,” I explained.
That wasn’t the case with Bert and Scar. The youngster’s face lit up when he saw the dog, and I was about to warn him to be careful when I saw him approaching Scar. Then I realized that Scar wasn’t growling and snarling like he usually did whenever anybody got too close to him. I held my breath a little as Bert reached out to scratch those ragged ears, but Scar not only tolerated it, he looked like he enjoyed it.
“Well, I’ll swan,” I said. “I thought ol’ Bert might get his hand bit off.”
“He’s got a way with animals,” Vince said. “They all seem to like him, even when they don’t like anybody else.”
Bert got down on one knee and loved all over Scar. I just shook my head in amazement and went on into the house.
Enoch turned out to be right about Gabe’s skills in the cook shack. My biscuits weren’t exactly hard as rocks, but Gabe’s were a lot better. The stew he whipped up out of not much was pretty good, too.
After we’d eaten that evening, Gabe announced, “I’m takin’ the buckboard back down to town tomorrow so I can stock up on some real food instead of the scraps you got around here. It takes plenty of provisions to feed a handful of hungry cowboys. Might need to slaughter a steer for beef, too.”
“I reckon I can spare it,” I told him. “Do what you need to do.”
He nodded, and I knew that part of the operation was in good hands.
I hoped the rest of it would turn out to be, too.
CHAPTER 17
For the next two weeks, I worked as hard—maybe harder—than I ever had in my life, and the long days in the saddle were constant reminders that I wasn’t as young as I used to be. Even though I was the boss, Santiago pushed me as much as he did the rest of the crew. I didn’t mind, but sometimes my sore muscles did.
Since Santiago and the Gallardos had been working for Abner Tillotson for several years, I knew they had to be good hands. Enoch proved to be one, too, and even though he was considerably older than me the work didn’t seem to bother him. He went from dawn to dusk and seemed as fresh when he stopped as when he started.
Randy, Bert, and Vince were the ones who really suffered starting out. I told Santiago to take it easy on Randy as much as he could because of that wound, but Santiago said, “He’ll finish healing better if he gets out and moves around. The sun and the air will be good for him.”
I figured he knew what he was talking about, and sure enough Randy’s pallor started to go away and he seemed stronger. It helped, too, that he was eating better once Gabe took over the cooking.
I heard Santiago muttering to himself in Spanish a few times when he tried to work with Bert and Vince. They didn’t know what they were doing, but like I had told them, they kept their eyes open and gave every job an honest effort. Sure, they let some cows get away from them now and then, they couldn’t handle a branding iron very well, and their throws with a lasso usually fell short or went way wide of the mark. But gradually they began to get better at those chores and the other things Santiago told them to do.
We hazed in the cattle from the east and west pastures first, since that was the easiest job. Then Santiago turned our attention to the rugged hills to the south, and we spent long days rounding up the stock that had strayed into the canyons and valleys and brush-choked draws. It was hot, difficult work chousing those critters out of their hidey-holes and driving them down to the bedground we’d established along the creek. Even before we finished doing that, Santiago split the crew in half, four men working on the roundup while the other four got started branding all the new calves.
Once, near the end of the two weeks, Santiago and I paused and sat our saddles while we watched Randy, Vince, and Bert struggling to herd a jag of balky cattle. Grim as ever, Santiago said, “A crew of experienced men would have done this job in half the time, Señor Strickland.”
“Next time, those boys will be experienced men,” I pointed out. “Well, less inexperienced, anyway.”
Santiago shrugged and said, “That is one way to look at it, I suppose.”
“Might as well,” I told him. “What matters to me is that we’re getting it done.”
“Do you wish me to cut out a trail herd?”
I scratched my jaw and frowned in thought. I’d had a good deal of cash with me when I came across Abner on that cold night back in December, but most of it had gone to getting the ranch operating properly and keeping it that way during the time since then. I needed to fill out my poke a little, and since I’d decided not to do that the way I used to, I said, “Yeah, I guess we’d better drive some of them down to the county seat and sell them. You’ll pick out the best ones for that?”
“Sí, señor. We can have the herd ready in another three or four days.”
“All right, then,” I told him with a grin. “Have at it, amigo.”
Gabe came to me that night and said, “If you’re gonna have a cattle drive, you gotta have a chuck wagon, too.”
“We’re just driving to the railroad at the county seat,” I said. “That’ll take, what, three days?”
“If you want to go without eatin’ for three days, that’s up to you, but I ain’t sure the rest of the bunch will go along with that idea.”
“We can use the mules as pack animals and just carry our supplies with us that way.”
Gabe drew himself up to his full height, which wasn’t all that much, and glared at me.
“That ain’t the way it’s done,” he declared.
“Well, what about the buckboard? Can you turn the buckboard into a chuck wagon?”
“Not a proper one,” he answered without missing a lick. “But I suppose it’d be better than nothin’.”
“I ain’t trying to make things harder on you, Gabe,” I told him. “But the truth of the matter is, I’m not all that flush right now. I can’t afford to buy a chuck wagon. But maybe next time.”
“All right,” he said with grudging agreement. “Just nobody better complain about what I’m feedin’ ’em, that’s all I got to say.”
By the time Santiago and the rest of the boys got the trail herd ready to go, Gabe had hammered together some cabinets and attached them to the back of the buckboard. The provisions and all the pots and pans would go in them. He had found a Dutch oven stored in the house, as well, and loaded it up.
I asked Santiago, “How come Señor Tillotson didn’t have his own chuck wagon? He must have driven herds to market before.”
“Sí, but the cook he always hired had his own wagon.”
“Well, why didn’t you tell me that before? I could’ve hired that fella.”
Santiago shook his head and said, “No, you could not, señor. He passed away last fall.”
“Oh. Yeah, that would make it kind of hard to hire him, wouldn’t it?”
“Señor Wolverton will do all right. He plans to take along tortillas and beans and cabrito, so my cousins and I will eat well.”
“Where’s he gettin’ the goat meat?”
“From my madre and papa. They raise the goats.”
“Nobody said anything to me about this. I’m not sure I can afford it.”
He shook his head and said, “Not to worry. They will extend credit.”
So I was going to be in the hole before we even started on the drive. I wasn’t sure I liked that, but there didn’t seem to be anything I could do about it.
The day came when we were ready to start the drive. We had two hundred head in the herd. I’d been under the impression that was how many cattle were on the ranch, period, but when we did the final tally the number was closer to four hundred. I was far from rich, and once I covered expenses, the money I made from this drive wouldn’t amount to all that much. But it was a start, I told myself. I had come to being an honest man a mite late
in life, but so far I sort of enjoyed it.
I had been on cattle drives before, of course, but it had been a good many years since my last one. The roundup had been necessary in more ways than one. It had gotten me in shape for the chore of prodding a couple of hundred unwilling cattle into walking thirty miles to their doom . . . although they didn’t have any clue about that last part, of course.
Most of the time none of us do.
CHAPTER 18
The drive went well. It was three days of hard work and eating dust, but I expected that. And when we reached the county seat and drove the cows into the stock pens along the railroad tracks, I felt a real sense of accomplishment.
I also got my first look at the county seat. Largo could almost pass for the sort of cowtown I’d known in the old days, except for the presence of a few automobiles and the telephone wires coming into town.
The county seat was different, though. It was a real city, with paved streets, cars and trucks everywhere, and electric lights. I had seen such places before, of course. I’d been to Europe, as well as New York, not to mention Denver, San Francisco, Dallas, San Antonio, places like that. So I wasn’t some yokel who’d never been to the big city.
Still, it had been a while since I’d been around so many reminders of what the rest of the world was turning into. This went far beyond Morris Dobbs of Continental Oil and his Hupmobile.
The offices of the cattle company were in a four-story brick building. I took Santiago with me and left the rest of the crew at a café near the stock pens. Santiago introduced me to the buyer Abner had always dealt with, and I explained that I was the new owner of the Fishhook. We struck a deal pretty quickly, with me glancing at Santiago every now and then and getting tiny nods that let me know the terms were all right, and then the fella had a clerk draw up the paperwork and write me a check.
When we came out of the building, I looked at the piece of paper in my hand. Santiago said, “I will show you the bank where Señor Tillotson had his account.”
It occurred to me that Abner’s account would still be there. Dying like he had, he’d never had a chance to close it out. If Santiago found out about that, he was bound to wonder why Abner hadn’t taken his money with him when he left.
“That’s all right, I can take care of this part,” I told him. “You go on back to the café and let the others know about the sale.”
I thought I saw a flicker of something in Santiago’s eyes, like maybe he thought I didn’t trust him. He didn’t fully trust me, though, because he said, “You would not cash the check and then, how would you say it, take off for the tall and uncut, would you, Señor Strickland?”
“Santiago!” I said, taking on like I was mortally offended. “You think I’d run out on you boys while I still owe you wages?”
“If a man is going to run away, that would be the time to do it,” he said.
I shook my head and said, “I thought you knew me better than that. I owe you fellas more than wages. You’re all my friends. I couldn’t hope to make a go of the Fishhook without your help. I’d never run out on you.”
“My apologies, Señor Strickland,” he murmured.
“Just to prove that you don’t have anything to worry about, you come on with me to the bank after all.”
He shook his head.
“It will not be necessary. If we are going to work together, we should trust each other, no?”
“Well . . . you’ve got a point there. Just tell me where the bank is, and I’ll take care of the rest.”
“The First National, three blocks down this street on the left.”
“All right. I’ll see you back at the café in just a little while . . . with the money I owe you.”
He nodded and said, “Sí.”
I didn’t figure shaming him like that would work, and sure enough it didn’t. He trailed me to the bank, thinking that I didn’t see him. But when it comes to skulking around, I had a lot more experience than he did and knew what to look for. At least he didn’t come inside with me, though, and that was really all I was after. I was able to open a new account, deposit some of the money and get what I needed in cash, and never once mention Abner Tillotson’s name.
When I got to the café I found all eight members of the crew sitting in a round booth at the back of the room. They made space for me. I took the envelope of cash out of my pocket and handed out the wages. As Santiago took his and muttered, “Gracias, señor,” he had the decency to look a mite crestfallen. From here on out he would trust me.
“Well, the roundup’s done, boys,” I said with a certain amount of satisfaction. “What do you plan to do now?”
I admit, when I looked around that table at them, an idea tickled the back of my brain. There were things I could do with eight good hombres. Enoch and Gabe still had plenty of bark on ’em, despite their age, and I would have been willing to bet they had smelled some powdersmoke in their time. They were old enough they might have ridden some lonely trails, back before the turn of the century. Santiago and the Gallardo brothers were tough as nails, too, although they’d never given me any reason to think they might have strayed across the line laid down by the law. I knew Randy had been on the other side of that line, although by his own admission he hadn’t been very good at it. That was only because he’d fallen in with some fools who didn’t know what they were doing.
That just left Bert and Vince. The idea of making owlhoots out of them put a smile on my face. Some chores were too big even for me.
But six good men—seven counting me—there were jobs we could pull off, I thought. Money to be made without much risk, the sort of money that would make what I’d just been paid for those cows seem like chicken feed. And maybe even more important, it would be fun. Just like the old days, a band of boon compadres, a life full of deviltry and reckless excitement, the sort of things that had been like air and water to me for so long, the necessities of life . . .
I let those thoughts prance around in my brain for a minute or two, then put them aside. Those days were gone, I told myself. They weren’t coming again. All I had to do to prove that was to step outside and see all the signs of progress and civilization around me.
Some things, once they were gone, you could never get them back. I just had to accept that.
They hadn’t answered my question. Finally, Randy said, “We, uh, we sort of thought we’d keep on working for you, Mr. Strickland.”
That took me by surprise. I said, “All of you?”
“Not my cousins and I,” Santiago said. “We have our own rancho to look after. But any time you need extra hands, we will be glad to pitch in and help.”
Enoch said, “The rest of us thought we might stick around, though. If that’s all right with you, Jim.”
I didn’t know what to make of that. I said, “I hired you fellas to work the roundup. I might be able to keep a couple of you on to help around the ranch. It’s a little big for one man to keep up with. Randy was hired first, so I reckon he’s got first claim on one of the jobs.”
“I’ll take it,” he said without hesitation. I knew he didn’t have any family or anywhere else to go.
“And Gabe and me will work cheap,” Enoch said. “Hell, at our age, a place to sleep and some grub is almost enough. We don’t need much else. Ain’t that right, Gabe?”
“I’m a little tired of driftin’,” Gabe admitted. “Besides, if you have to go back to eatin’ your own cookin’, you’re liable to starve to death.”
I didn’t think my cooking was that bad, but maybe he had a point. I might be able to stretch the ranch’s income to cover all three hands.
But that left Bert and Vince, and Bert was giving me a look like a lost soul.
“We really don’t want to go back to pushing brooms at the depot, Mr. Strickland,” he said.
“Maybe you could find something better,” I suggested. “You said Vince’s pa works for the railroad.”
“Yeah, but he’s just a brakeman,” Vince said. “He ca
lled in the only favor he had to get us those jobs the first time. He wouldn’t be able to help us again.”
“Well . . . well, dadgum it . . .”
That’s always been my problem. I’m just too blasted softhearted. I couldn’t bring myself to throw any of them to the wolves.
So I said, “All right. The five of you can all come back to the ranch with me. I warn you, though. There may be some lean times ahead of us.”
“That’s all right, Mr. Strickland,” Bert said with a relieved grin. “We’ll all work together to make the Fishhook the best spread west of San Antonio!”
How could you argue with optimism like that? I said, “Damn right we will, Bert.”
“You know,” Randy said, “I heard there’s gonna be a dance in Largo tomorrow night. We all ought to go, to celebrate a successful roundup and cattle drive.”
“Yeah,” Bert agreed. “That sounds like a good idea. What do you think, Mr. Strickland?”
I looked around the table at them again and thought about how crazy my speculations of a few minutes earlier had been. Three green kids, two old-timers, and a trio of vaqueros . . .
Not exactly what you’d call a Wild Bunch.
But they were my friends, so I nodded and said, “Sure. We’ll go to the dance.”
CHAPTER 19
The three youngsters talked about the dance all the way back to the ranch. We didn’t get there until well after dark. Enoch and Gabe and I weren’t quite so enthusiastic about it. Dances are for young men. But I planned to go anyway because I knew I’d enjoy the music and the good fellowship. I might even take a turn or two around the floor with a gal in my arms, if there were any there who struck my fancy and would be willing to dance with a disreputable old cuss like me.
About three-fourths of the way back to the Fishhook, Santiago and his cousins bid the rest of us farewell when we reached a trail that angled off to the west. Their ranch lay in that direction, Santiago told me.
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