“No. Our stock’s the same.”
“It won’t be once that calf I’m getting from George Randolph is big enough to start fathering calves. The future of ranching in Texas is dependent on finding an inexpensive way to get our steers to market and improving the quality of our herds. Steers that carry more meat bring a higher price,” Salty pointed out.
Sarah’s father had never worried about improving his herd. He had been content to sell his cows for tallow or to someone wanting to trail them to market. Roger wouldn’t have seen the point of buying a bull when there were already dozens on the range. Sarah had been too concerned about survival to give much thought to improvements.
“Why isn’t that cow branded?” Salty asked.
“Which one?”
Salty pointed to a cow with a spotted calf.
“I guess it’s not mine.”
“That’s not what I mean. Every cow on the range should be branded. It’s the only way you can identify your cows. If it’s on your land and has no one else’s brand, it’s presumed to be your cow. She should be carrying your brand.”
“My cows are branded every year. I guess that’s one that was missed.”
“Missed long enough to have a calf?” Salty asked.
Sarah didn’t have an answer.
They eyed the stream that separated her land from Wallace’s. Salty rode his horse into it then stopped. “This looks like good water. When does it dry up?”
“It runs all year. My father said it’s spring fed.”
“I expect that’s why Wallace is trying to claim it. Not many Texas streams run all year, even ones fed by springs. Do you have any other streams on your ranch?”
“Yes.”
“How many and where are they?”
“I don’t know.” Sarah could feel his gaze home in on her. She was beginning to feel very ignorant—and it wasn’t just because of not knowing how many cows she owned, why one of them wasn’t branded, and where exactly to find water. There was a lot more, she imagined. “My father thought it was improper for women to ride horseback, work cows, or to know anything about the ranch beyond how to run the house and take care of things like chickens and the garden. Roger felt the same. By the time I had any freedom to go where I wanted, I couldn’t, because I had two babies.”
Salty seemed unperturbed. “That’s something we can rectify in a few days. As soon as it’s practical, I’ll teach Ellen and Jared as much as I can about the ranch, too. The more all of us know, the better we can manage.”
Sarah rode her horse through the stream. “We’d better start looking for those cows Wallace complained about and get them back. I don’t like leaving the children longer than necessary.”
Salty rode a little farther and looked around. “You’ve got better grass. I’d expect Wallace’s cows to cross, rather than the other way.”
The only time Sarah could recall being at this stream was for a picnic when Roger was courting her. Comparing the quality of grass on each side hadn’t been on her list of things to do. She said, “None of the men I hired reported any trouble.”
“Well, cows that aren’t fenced in are going to wander. That’s another reason why I don’t understand Wallace’s complaint.” Salty shrugged. “It’s probably just another way for him to aggravate you into selling your ranch.”
“The bank owns as much of it as I do.”
“That wouldn’t be his problem. Let’s see what we can find.”
They rode at least a quarter of an hour before they found one of her cows. “If this is the only one, Wallace can’t complain that your cows are eating up his grass. I counted seven of his on your land on our way here,” Salty pointed out. Stopping, he moved his head from side to side and sniffed the air.
“Someone is branding cattle.”
Sixteen
Salty didn’t know why the smell of singed hair and scorched cowhide should send warning signals to his brain. Because of the generally mild winters, Texas cows could give birth at virtually any time, so why should this raise a question in his mind? Probably because of his previous encounter with Wallace, and his natural suspicion of any man who was a bully.
No man branding cows on his land would be breaking any law. Still, his instincts told him something wasn’t right.
“What’s wrong?” Sarah asked.
“I don’t know that anything is.”
“Then why are you sniffing the air like a hound dog and frowning like a rancher whose daughter has just told him she wants to marry a farmer?”
That surprised a laugh out of Salty. “I didn’t know I looked so forbidding.”
“Something is bothering you,” Sarah pressed.
“Yes, but I don’t have a logical reason for it.”
She seemed to accept this, and urged her horse forward. “Then let’s find out what’s going on. I don’t believe in ignoring instincts.”
Sometimes she acted just like Rose Randolph. Salty grinned and followed.
The stream flowed through a meadow with low, unevenly forested hills on both sides. Oaks and maples were interspersed with cedar, hackberry, and cactus. The meadow was thick with a profusion of plants heavy with swelling buds ready to burst into flower at the first sustained warmth of spring. The air was crisp, the day sunny, and the breeze gentle enough to give a feeling of stillness. How could anything be terribly wrong on such a day? But the feeling that something wasn’t right reasserted itself.
“The smell is coming from somewhere up on the ridge,” he said to Sarah. “Probably by that grove of live oaks.”
As they grew near, Salty could make out the voices of three men. A calf that seemed less than a week old hovered on the periphery of the group, bleating for its mother. A moment later a cow burst into sight and raced away from the three cowhands, her still-bleating calf in pursuit. One of the men noticed Salty and Sarah’s approach and said something to the others.
“Howdy,” one of the men called. “Who might you be?”
“I’m Salty Benton, and this is my wife, Sarah.”
“I don’t know no Salty Benton with a wife named Sarah,” one of the hands said.
“I used to be Sarah Winborne,” Sarah replied. “I own the neighboring ranch, the F&P. I just got married.”
The youngest cowhand winked at Salty. “Congratulations.”
“What are you doing over this way?” the first hand asked.
“Your boss said some of our cows were on his land.”
The man regarded Salty. “I ain’t seen any today, but if we do, we’ll be glad to run ’em back for you.”
“It sure would make it easier on me. There’s only one of me, and my wife’s ranch is right large.”
The cowhand nodded. “You got to get some help. None of the men your wife hired before could do half the work it took to run that place. I’ve seen Arnie wrestle a cow down before he could brand her calf. I doubt he could brand as many as half the calves.”
Salty had already come to the conclusion that much of Sarah’s herd had gone unbranded. The question in his mind was whether they were still unbranded. It was perfectly legal for a rancher to claim any unbranded cows on his land even if he knew they didn’t belong to him.
“I see you’ve been doing some branding,” he remarked.
“Yeah. The boss was away during the war. We’re still trying to catch up on the cows that went unbranded. The hands that ran the place back then weren’t worth a damn.”
It wouldn’t do any good for Salty to accuse him of branding F&P cows even if he’d known for a fact they were doing so. Even if this man suspected not all these cows belonged to his boss, he had a right to brand all of those found on his boss’s land. So Salty said, “Tell you what. I’ll run your cows back if you’ll do the same with ours. I want to do everything I can to make your boss happy, but I can’t be everywhere at once, and you know
what cows are like.”
“He ain’t never going to be happy,” the youngest cowhand said with a grim look and a shake of his head. “I ain’t never seen a man with a temper like his. You’d think someone had done shot his favorite horse.”
“The boss has had his troubles just like everybody else,” the first hand said.
“Maybe, but he don’t have to take it out on us.”
“If you don’t like working here, you’d best look for another job.”
“I’m thinking about it,” the youngster said. “Been thinking about it for a while.”
“We’d better be going,” Salty spoke up. “We’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”
“You take care,” the older hand said. “We’ll be sure to run back anything bearing your brand.”
But would they do the same if the cow wasn’t branded?
* * *
Sarah didn’t know it was possible to be so angry and feel so stupid at the same time. She and Salty had ridden over as much of her ranch as they could cover in six hours, and with each clearing they entered, each group of cows they flushed out of the trees, the brutal truth hit home with greater force: maybe as much as a third of her cows were unbranded. There was no way to estimate how many had wandered off and been collected by other ranchers. She reminded herself of all the reasons she hadn’t overseen the ranching herself, but that didn’t change the fact that it was ultimately her responsibility to see that the men she hired actually did the work she hired them to do.
“What are we going to do?” she asked Salty. He was nearly as angry as she.
“We’re going to start branding every cow we find without a brand.”
“What about the calves?”
“They’ll stay with their mothers for most of the year. Anyone who owns a cow owns the calf at her side and the one she’ll drop the next spring.”
“How are we going to do it?”
“I’ll show you, starting first thing tomorrow. Now let’s see if we can haze these cows away from the borders of your ranch. I don’t want any more of them wandering off to be stolen.”
“Do you think that’s what happened?” Sarah asked. It seemed probable.
“I’m sure of it—which makes it difficult for me to understand why Wallace complained about your cows being on his land. I suspect he has instructed his men to brand any unbranded cows they find there. Why would he complain if he was getting free cows? It would only be illegal if he chased them off your range onto his.”
“His cowhands didn’t look guilty,” Sarah pointed out.
Salty nodded. “I agree.”
Sarah didn’t know much about moving cows, but they were so wild they wanted to avoid all humans. The difficult part was getting them to move in the right direction. For each step the cows took, her horse took a dozen. She was beginning to understand why all of her hired men had kept asking for more horses, as well as why it was impossible for one person to do all the work of running the ranch.
Talk broke off while Salty went after an unbranded yearling that tried to leave the group, and it was a while before it began again because they collected more unbranded cattle as they worked their way home. The cows didn’t like being moved off familiar range.
“What are we going to do with them?” she shouted at Salty over the heads of more than two dozen steers, cows, and calves.
“Put them in the corral.”
Sarah wondered how the two of them were going to get that done. There were so many cows!
Apparently the children had been watching for their return. Ellen came riding up even before the ranch house came into view. “I can help.”
Sarah wasn’t sure her daughter knew enough to herd full-grown steers, but she soon proved so adept at handling her horse that Sarah was filled with pride. Her daughter was fearless as well as talented.
Jared, figuring out what they intended, had gone to the corral and pulled down the bars. After that he positioned himself to one side, apparently intending to haze runaways back with his crutch. But a boy with a crutch was no match for an angry cow.
“Get up on the fence!” Salty shouted.
Sarah turned in time to see a steer heading straight toward Jared. Her breath caught in her throat.
With the help of his new crutch, Jared scrambled out of the steer’s path. At the same time, Salty brought his horse alongside the runaway. He used the greater size and weight of his horse to knock the steer off balance and turn him in the direction of the corral. Much to Sarah’s relief, several animals followed, and it didn’t take long for the three riders to corral the rest of the small herd.
“That was fun!” Ellen was so happy she was almost laughing. “Are you going after some more tomorrow?”
“We have to figure out how to brand these,” Salty said.
“Can we start now?” Jared asked.
Salty grinned, clearly pleased by his enthusiasm, but shook his head. “The cows need time to settle down. They don’t like being driven from their home ground. In the meantime, I want to see what you did in the garden. Then we have to find the chickens that are roosting in trees and feed the pig.”
“And I have to start supper,” Sarah said.
“After we eat, you can help me start on the chute,” Salty said to the children. “We’ll need it for the branding and build it when it’s too dark to ride.”
* * *
Salty packed dirt around the last of ten posts he’d set into the ground. The muscles in his shoulders and arms burned from the work of cutting trees to form them, digging the holes in the hard ground, and packing the soil back so tightly the posts wouldn’t move. He sighed with relief then turned to Ellen. “We can finish this chute tomorrow night. We’ll start branding the day after that. Now you’d better head to the house and go to bed.”
“You promise I can help with the branding?” Ellen asked Salty.
“I promise. Now scat.”
He’d never realized a child’s head had so much room for questions. Earlier, Jared had shown Salty the work he and Ellen did in the garden then went inside to help his mother with supper. While Salty and Ellen completed the rest of the chores, she’d pelted him with a steady stream of questions. “Can I brand a steer? Can you teach me to wrestle a steer to the ground? How do you build a chute? What is a chute? Can I go with you tomorrow? Can I ride one of your horses? Did Mr. Wallace shoot any of our cows? Do you think he will? Why did Arnie want to kill our pigs? If we go to Austin again, can we stay in a hotel?” Salty had been relieved when Sarah called them inside for supper, but of course the girl had come out to work on the chute. She’d been a help, too. Salty absentmindedly massaged a sore shoulder as he watched her run to the house. Didn’t the child know how to walk?
“Come on, Bones,” he said to the dog who’d watched him work while resting comfortably on an old blanket. “You have to earn your keep tomorrow. No more lounging around.”
Bones got up and trotted over, apparently untroubled by the gash in his side. Salty carried on a meaningless conversation with the dog as he washed up and headed back to the shed. He thought longingly of his comfortable bunk at the Randolph ranch, but he might as well put a soft mattress out of his mind until he had sold the first group of steers. Maybe not even then, depending on how much money Sarah owed the bank. He’d have to talk to her about that. He didn’t like having something like that hanging over his head.
He opened the door to the shed. “In you go,” he said to Bones, “but don’t get used to it. You’re supposed to be a watchdog, though I can see how getting a knife in your side might sour you on the job.”
He tossed the dog’s blanket into the corner. Bones trotted inside the shed, ambled over to the corner, circled a few times, then lay down on the blanket. He then looked up at Salty as though expecting something better.
“Be thankful for the blanket. Tomorrow it’s the co
ld ground.”
Salty dropped onto the pile of blankets that comprised his bed. As soon as he had the energy, he’d wash them. He knew nothing about the men who’d slept here before him, or about the insects and rodents that undoubtedly had tried to make this their home. He’d sleep more soundly once he knew all trace of them was gone.
He needed to clear his mind of everything. He needed sleep, and worrying about the challenges that would face him in the coming days wasn’t going to help. But the longed-for sleep didn’t come, because images of Sarah getting ready for bed filled his mind. He felt like a Peeping Tom, but he couldn’t stop himself. Spending the whole day with her had heightened his awareness of her presence.
Thinking of her in bed, her body clothed in a loose gown that probably clung to her every contour, caused him to harden. He was surprised by its force, the wave of desire that surged through him. He’d always had an appreciation for women, but four years in the army had taught him how to live without them. He didn’t understand why being around Sarah had caused everything to change so quickly. Fantasies not unlike the ones that had invaded his dreams during his teens assailed him, but he couldn’t afford that now. He had too much work to do. Rounding up and branding cows required large reserves of energy and alertness.
Bones’s head came up and he whined.
“Be quiet. I don’t need you keeping me awake.”
The dog ignored him.
“Don’t tell me your side is hurting.”
Bones got to his feet, walked to the door, and pushed against it with his nose.
“I’m not getting up to let you out. You’ll have to hold it until morning.”
But Bones’s whine changed to a growl deep in his throat, and Salty decided this wasn’t a call of nature. The dog heard or smelled something outside he didn’t like.
“Okay. I’m getting up, but stop growling,” he whispered. “I don’t want you to scare off whoever’s out there.”
Bones’s growl turned into a snarl, and Salty figured he knew who was prowling around the ranch. Arnie. It was stupid of the man to come back. What did he hope to gain?
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