by Arlene James
They were on the road earlier than they had expected. Also unexpected was the mechanic’s refusal to accept payment for his labor. They got out for the price of the parts. Rye marveled. Even burdened with the overwhelming tasks of logistics and organization, a part of him had relished the notion of the drive, and he had recognized the same in his friends, but he had somehow gotten lost in the gritty, day-to-day battle to pull this thing off. The romance of the trail ride, in effect, had become his reality, so much so that he had almost forgotten that the romance was real. It did him good to see that so many others had gotten caught up in it with him. Still, it continued to amaze him.
When they passed the Hetherton Sales Barn outside Manco and saw that a huge banner had been draped across the front wishing them good luck and Godspeed, he found himself turning around and going back. The moment the motor home rolled into the parking lot, a man came out of a small door marked Office and hurried to intercept them. Rye brought the vehicle to a halt and popped open the door. The large, pleasant-looking, middle-aged man stepped up inside.
“Sorry, folks, they’re already gone.” He pointed out the windshield. “They drove ’em down that slope there and around that point, heading southeast. Best chance of catching sight of them again is around Hesperus off 140.”
“Music to my ears,” Rye said, grinning and sticking out his hand as he left the driver’s seat. Kara came forward, too, smiling. “I’m Ryeland Wagner, and this is Kara Detmeyer. You must be Al Hetherton.”
Hetherton grinned and grabbed hold of Rye’s hand, pumping it enthusiastically. He nodded at Kara. “Ma’am. Wagner. Gosh, it’s good to meet you two. That’s quite an operation you got going there.”
“I want to thank you for allowing us use of your pens,” Rye said, “and for your obvious support.”
“My pleasure, sir. Honest to God, I was tickled to do it.”
“Everyone’s been so good to us,” Kara said, positively glowing. She’d been looking like that all morning now, and it unnerved Rye a bit. Last night was the end, didn’t she know that?
“Not everyone,” Hetherton said, shaking his head, “not from what I hear.” He switched his gaze to Rye. “You got any idea who’s trying to stop you?”
Rye didn’t know quite what to say to that. “We’re not ready to level charges, if that’s what you mean.”
“But you got an idea,” Hetherton surmised.
Kara said smoothly, “We’re not going to worry about that, frankly. We’re just going to concentrate on getting home on time. Once we’re there, it won’t matter anymore.”
Rye could see that she’d made up her mind about this. Even if it was her oily cousin, and even though she didn’t mean to let him win, she didn’t mean to make him pay, either. Well, Rye wasn’t so charitable. Whoever was doing this to Kara was not going to escape responsibility. Rye would make it his personal mission to see to it. But Kara didn’t need to know that.
“We have to be on our way, Mr. Hetherton,” he said. “We’ve spent too much time away from the herd as it is, but we did want to say thanks.”
“Sure, sure. Glad you stopped by. Give my best to your mother, Miss Detmeyer. She treated me to some mighty fine cooking.”
Kara laughed. “Yes, she’s becoming quite famous for that.”
“You take care now. So long.” He made to step down to the ground, but Rye halted him with an uplifted hand.
“Uh, you seemed to think before that we were—oh, I don’t know—casual observers, maybe spectators, looking for the drive. Have you had some of that this morning?”
“Some?” Al Hetherton chortled. “Son, you wouldn’t believe what’s been going on around here. This parking lot was full this morning when your boys moved those beeves out, and I must say, they put on quite a show. There was cheering when that Pogo fellow gave the go-ahead. Folks been stopping by ever since, hoping to get a bead on ’em I swear, you could sell tickets.”
Rye shook his head, grinning wide. “I never dreamed we’d catch the fancy of so many folks.”
“Well, this being the last day—”
“The last day?” Kara echoed.
“That’s what the news is saying. Apparently nobody will be allowed to follow you onto the reservation.”
Rye looked at Kara, then back to Hetherton. “Where’d they get that information?”
Hetherton shrugged. “Guess somebody talked to the Indians.”
Rye didn’t like the sound of that. What if the media attention worked against them with the tribal government? But that was another worry he’d keep to himself for the moment. “Yeah, that must be it. Well, thanks again, Mr. Hetherton. You have a good day.”
Hetherton stepped off the vehicle backward. Rye reclaimed his seat and put the transmission in gear before giving Hetherton a final wave and closing the door. Once on the road again, Kara took out the flip phone and called the crew to verify the rendezvous near Hesperus. Her mother, Borden Harris, Dean and George were already on site and preparing lunch. They were not, as her mother put it, alone.
“You mean you have company?”
“Sugar, just wait until you get here.”
Thankfully, they didn’t have to wait too long. Sedately walking cattle took hours to cross rough terrain; vehicles required minutes to travel smooth roads. Those smooth roads were now clogged with uncustomary traffic, however, and as they drew nearer the rendezvous point, it became obvious where all that traffic was going. The narrow road was dangerously lined with parked cars around which the browning grass had been trampled. An outcropping of rock on one side of the roadway hid the bowllike pasture beyond from view, but as soon as they passed it, they both gasped. The pasture was teeming with vehicles and people. There would hardly be room for the cattle.
“Dear heaven!” Kara gasped.
“I do not believe this.” It was becoming his pet phrase. He shook his head and began looking for a way to get to the ring of vehicles that were their own. It wasn’t possible. Finally, in sheer desperation, they crowded the motor home onto a spot of grass and got out to begin weaving their way to the temporary campsite. Dayna met them halfway there.
“Rye, you’ve got to do something! It’s chaos. They only want to watch, but it’s getting out of hand. I’m afraid the police will come!”
“Maybe they should,” Rye said worriedly. He tugged on his earlobe, then said suddenly, “Let’s find Dean.”
It didn’t take long to accomplish that feat. Prying him away from a gaggle of curious onlookers was something else.
“If this don’t beat all,” Dean said, finally making a polite escape. He looked harried and nervous. “What’re we gonna do with ’em all?”
“That’s what I want to talk to you about. I need a telephone number.”
“What’s that?”
“Nonemergency number for the local police authority. We’ve got to have some help out here.”
Dean nodded, and said, “We’re getting to be regulars with the law dogs. I’ll set up the Internet link.”
Rye turned to Kara. “Honey, see if your mom needs help getting lunch together, and tell George to meet me at the remuda. We’re going to mount up and take a stab at crowd control.”
Nodding, she hurried off. George showed up about the time Rye slung his saddle onto the back of the big bay known as Bets. “Hey, pard, how’s it been?”
“Wild,” George said. “Dean’ll be ready for you in another minute or two.”
Rye bent and grasped the girth. “I’ll ride over as soon as I get this big boy saddled. Pick a fresh mount. I’m going to need your help.”
George hurried to the back of the truck where their tack was stowed and picked up his own saddle, which was handily near the end. Rye finished and mounted up, telling George to join him and Dean as soon as he was ready. Then he rode into the center of the vehicle ring, where Dean was plunking away on the computer balanced atop his knees.
“Okay, okay, here’s the number I think you’re going to need.”
R
ye flipped out the cellular phone and punched in the numbers as Dean read them off to him. A woman answered on the third ring. Rye explained precisely and clearly who and where he was and had the distinct feeling that she recognized his name right off. He asked to speak with the senior officer and was informed that he was doing so. He wasted no time describing the situation.
“We’re amazed and appreciative, but I’m worried someone’s going to get hurt when those cattle show up. I’ve got a buddy and myself mounted, and I was figuring to ride out and tell these folks, polite as I can, to get back, but there’s the matter of traffic, too. I mean, it’s just a circus out here, and I’ve got three hundred head of cattle on the way, not to mention riders.” He was much relieved when Chief Cantu promised to get right out there with a couple of volunteers. Meanwhile, he had her permission to push back the crowd. George had already shown up, having saddled a placid piebald. Rye turned off the phone and looked to Dean. “Good work, bud. Now get on a horse and come help us move these people before they get trampled.”
“Will do.”
Rye turned his horse toward the women who were working apace. “Ladies, we’re going to try to quell a little chaos. When I see Bord, I’ll send him over to help you get lunch together.”
“Thanks, Rye,” Dayna called, too busy to do more than glance in his direction. Kara, however, took the time to stop and look up into his face. She said nothing, but he felt jolted just the same. She was changed somehow. It was as if that serenity had taken root in her. She was in charge, fully composed, while he himself felt fractured and confused. It irritated him, though he wasn’t quite sure why. Shouldn’t she be sad or something? He was going to have to explain to her again that Durango was the end of it, and he resented having to do it. He jerked away and walked his horse through the maze of vehicles parked around their makeshift camp.
People were, thankfully, cooperative. He knew from experience that a man on horseback somehow represented authority to those on foot, and when he began explaining that they were putting themselves in danger, they willingly withdrew back up the slope toward the rocky outcropping.
Bord found him, along with a fellow so skinny that he looked like a stick figure wearing a poorly fitted cowboy hat. “Hey, Rye, this fellow here wants a word with you.”
“Make it quick. I’ve got stock coming.”
“Yassir,” the man drawled, “that’s what I was thinking. You got nowhere to pen ‘em, though, and your fellers are s’posed to eat their lunch here. ’At right?”
“Right.”
“So, see, I got to thinkin’ on your problem, an’ I can help.” Rye tamped down his impatience and leaned a forearm on the saddle horn. “You ever ridden herd on a bunch of cows used to moving?”
The man shook his head. “Naw. But, me and the boys used to meet out on the range on a Sunday afternoon and rope in a corral made of cars.”
“Cars!”
“We’d measure off and pull our trucks ’round the perimeter, see. We’d even make a chute that way and use a rope barrier as a gate.”
Rye looked around him at the vehicles crammed into such a small space, then back at the stick man. “Cowboy, you may be a genius.”
The fellow tipped back his hat and grinned, displaying tobacco-stained teeth. “My thinker works right fine, if I do say so m’self.”
Rye chuckled. “The thing is, though, somebody’s car might get dented.”
“Never happened but once or twice on us,” he said. “Feller fell off his horse onto the hood of a car one time. Cows just naturally shy away from barriers. Tell you what, though, we’ll just ask for volunteers with old junkers like me.”
Rye pushed back his hat. “What’s your name, mister?”
“Ellis Jenkins.”
“Think you can ramrod this operation for me, Ellis?”
The skinny cowboy hitched up his jeans. “No problem.”
“I can’t promise you anything but a damned fine lunch.”
Jenkins padded his concave middle. “You got yourself a deal, but I’m warning you, I can eat my own weight at a sitting.”
Rye figured that couldn’t be too bad. After all, how much did bones weigh? “Saddle him a horse, Bord, then see what you can do to help the women. Oh, and be sure to tell them we’ll be one more for lunch.”
Borden and Ellis trotted off in the direction of the remuda. Rye turned his horse and began calling out to people to move on back. Within half an hour, Chief Julia Cantu, two volunteer policemen and a convenience store arrived. An enterprising sort, the local grocer had quickly loaded a pickup truck with iced drinks and snacks.
“I didn’t imagine you’d want to feed them.” Chief Cantu explained in her lilting Spanish accent. She was a surprisingly young, attractive woman with flashing black eyes.
“No, ma’am.”
She nodded toward the meadow below where a handful of autos were already parked. “Those the vehicles you want moved?”
Rye grinned and explained what was going on. Chief Cantu removed her beige cowboy hat, revealing a wealth of rich brown hair twisted up on top of her head. “Looks like you’ve got everything under control.”
“It’s the aftermath that concerns me,” Rye told her. “Once everybody starts pulling out of here, it’s going to be a royal traffic jam.”
Cantu sighed. “Well, guess the boys and I will just have to hang around until the show’s over.”
“In that case,” Rye said, “I insist on giving you lunch, though the cook may shoot me when I tell her.”
Julia Cantu laughed. “As long as I don’t have to arrest him until after lunch.”
“Her,” Rye said, “and she’s some cook, let me tell you. Walk on over with me. Maybe the sight of that badge will make her keep her hands off the firearms.” He swung down off the horse and together they walked over to the noon camp.
Dayna was frying sweet-potato cubes, while Kara grilled sourdough bread and Bord Harris sliced roast beef. Rye made the introductions, particularly noting the way Kara’s eyes flared slightly at the sight of Julia Cantu’s well-filled uniform. Rye couldn’t help a surge of satisfaction.
Despite his dire predictions, Dayna took the addition of three more mouths to feed in stride. “Just don’t think 1 can manage that crowd out there.”
“Actually,” Julia said, “I brought a vendor with me.” She craned her neck and twisted around, trying to get a view of the goody truck.
“Looks like he’s doing land-office business,” Rye said, straining upward to look over the vehicles parked slightly downslope around them.
Julia Cantu sighed. “Wish I was tall. The hat helps, but not much, especially when I have to haul in some drunk, lard-belly, chauvinist-type.”
Rye was wondering how long it would be before the herd arrived. He resisted the impulse to check his watch, figuring it would be rude. “That must be a challenge for you,” he said, trying to sound interested.
She shrugged. “Doesn’t happen often, fortunately.”
He nodded and said, “Well, I’d better see how that car corral is coming.”
Kara turned from her work, then. “Bord told us about Ellis Jenkins and his idea. Says he’s from Texas, west of the Pecos. Thank him for me.”
“You can thank him yourself at lunch,” Rye said.
She nodded and turned away again, looking a little hurt. Well, she was finally facing the facts, he told himself. So why wasn’t he relieved? He resisted the urge to walk over and slide an arm around her waist, giving her a squeeze. Instead, he turned toward the horse he’d tethered to the farrier’s wagon. Suddenly Dean rode in at a gallop, hauling up so short that his horse gave a little hop.
“Holy—”
“Rye, come quick. It’s George.”
“What happened?”
“Saddle came off! Bad spill.”
Rye jerked forward again, yanking free the tether and vaulting into the saddle as Julia Cantu cried, “Wait for me!”
He didn’t take time to think about it, jus
t kicked one foot free of the stirrup and leaned down a hand. She grabbed it and climbed aboard. They were moving before she got settled, so she threw an arm around his waist. They were there within seconds. George lay on the ground, a crowd of people around him. Someone had his horse by the bridle, and several people were crouched down around the saddle. Someone else reached for Rye’s horse, leaving Rye free to leap down from the saddle and shove his way to George, Chief Julia Cantu at his back.
“Nobody touch that saddle!” Cantu yelled.
Rye went down on one knee beside George, who was struggling to sit up and moaning.
“Whoa, there! Let’s get a look at you before you go moving around.”
“I’m all right,” George groaned. “It’s just my arm.”
Rye saw a small patch of blood on his sleeve but chose to ignore it for the moment, running his hands over George’s legs and ribs first. People were talking.
“One of the volunteer cops went for a medical kit.”
“He was knocked out for a minute or so.”
“Saddle just fell off, like it came apart.”
“Somebody ought to call an ambulance.”
Rye fished out the flip phone and handed it off without even bothering to see into whose hands he was putting it. “I’ll call the local doc first,” Julia Cantu said. “He can get here a lot faster than the ambulance out of Durango.”
“Do it,” Rye said, and rammed a hand into a pocket, pulling out his small, well-used pocket knife. He flicked open the blade and reached for George’s sleeve. “Step back everybody. George, old buddy, this has gotta come off.”
George licked his lips and nodded. Rye carefully inserted the tip of the blade into the heavy fabric of the shirt and slid it upward through the cuff and all the way to the shoulder seam. George hissed in his breath but made no other sound. He looked over the white tip of the bone sticking out of his arm with almost detached interest. Other people made sounds of disgust or sympathy. Rye heard Julia Cantu say to someone on the phone, “Compound fracture.”