Texas Blood Feud

by Dusty Richards

“About like last year.”

  “Good. We can handle that.”

  “Dale Allen is taking the herd to Kansas, so I will be there this summer.”

  “No problem, señor.”

  “I didn’t think so. The jacales are waiting. We must rebuild my sister’s wood supply first when you all get up there. She likes for it to be dry before we uses it for cooking, so we need lots of it.

  “I’ll have frijoles, flour, cornmeal, and lard at the camp when you arrive.”

  Pepe smiled. “Good. By then we will be starved.”

  “I hope not.”

  Pepe dismissed his concern with a head shake and a mild smile. “It will be good to get back to work,”

  “These are all good men with families,” Don Miguel said as they went to the cantina for their usual drink and lunch.

  “I guess it has been a tradition for years that the San Juan people spend the spring and summer and fall working at the ranch and then winter down here.”

  “Ah, sí. They raise gardens up there and bring home lots of food for the winter, too.”

  “Good. We’ll hope it rains so we’ll have crops to tend.”

  “Always they have a Mass and pray for a good season before they leave here. They know how important that is to their jobs.”

  Chet agreed. “I have had trouble with the Reynolds family all winter. Tell everyone to keep an eye out.”

  “We have heard about it. I will tell Pepe to be on the watch.”

  “If they threaten them, do as they say. I can straighten it out later. I want no one killed or hurt who works for me.”

  “I savvy. I’ll tell them not to fight them.”

  “Good. I’ll ride back and await their arrival.”

  “No worry, mi amigo. Your workers and their families are coming.”

  That resolved, Chet cut across country to Mayfield. He’d order those supplies he’d need for his farm hands so Grosman could have them freighted in if he didn’t have them on hand.

  At noontime, he stopped at Casey’s Saloon and tied Strawberry at the rack, The town looked quiet, and he went inside for a beer. Since he wouldn’t get home for supper, he got something off the free lunch bar. A few loafers nodded, busy making sandwiches of German sausage and cheese at the counter.

  “Hey, you all right, Chet? We ain’t seen ya in a while.”

  “Last time I came in, they beat the hell out of me. I been staying away,” he told the red-faced Casey.

  “Aw, me lad, we’d never let that happen again.”

  Chet smiled. “I know that.”

  “Ain’t been a one of them in town since,” Casey said, drawing him a beer.

  “Anyone heard from Shelby?” Chet twisted around and looked at the others.

  “He took a big powder,” one said.

  “Good.” Chet moved in and made his own sandwich with some mustard, ham, and cheese. On the side of his plate, he added cold potatoes mixed with sweet pickles. Back at the bar, he ate, sipped his beer, and listened to Casey.

  “There’s a new man bought the Whortons’ ranch. He came in here from New Mexico. Said the Apaches were still too bad out there. He lost his horses twice to ’em. His name’s Edgar Caufman.”

  “Sounds like Texas five years ago.” The fresh rye bread fit the meat and cheese right for him.

  Casey agreed. “Nice-acting fella anyway.”

  “We can use all of them we can get.”

  “That’s for sure.”

  After his meal, Grosman told Chet that he could have the order on the dock any time he needed it.

  “Day after tomorrow, I’ll send the boys in after it,” Chet said.

  “That would be fine.

  “You hear—” The storekeeper leaned over the counter to whisper. “They’re trying them boys for her murder the last week of January. They call you to testify yet?”

  “No, but they will, I’m sure.” That notion did not set well. He had hoped to be down in Mexico bringing out their cattle at that time. Well, Dale Allen could go with the boys.

  He swung by Kathren’s place. It wasn’t on the way home, but he felt drawn back to see her.

  Her daughter Cady was feeding chickens when he rode up. She could smile as pretty as her mother.

  “Where’s the boss?” he asked, dropping out of the saddle.

  “She’s not back yet. Checking the cattle like she does all the time.”

  “You in charge of the chickens?”

  “Oh, yes. They’ve started laying again, too. We’ve been getting one or two eggs a day.”

  “I guess they know spring’s coming, too.”

  Cady was looking away when she asked him, “You going to marry my mother?”

  “You know that you’re the second person to ask me that in two days.” He squatted down and watched her throw the grain out as the birds ran for their share.

  She laughed. “Who else asked you?”

  “It’s got to be a secret.”

  “Oh, I’ll keep a secret.”

  “My sister Susie.”

  “What did you tell her?”

  “I guess we’re thinking on it.”

  “Thinking hard about it?”

  “I guess we are.”

  “Good. You keep thinking.” She grinned at him with a mischievous look on her face.

  He’d do that. At the sound of a horse coming off the hill, he rose and looked for her. She was coming in. Good, the sight of her warmed him.

  “Hey, Mom, look who’s here?”

  “Well, stranger, you lost?”

  “No, I was looking for work. Need a hand?”

  Amused, she shook her head and flew off the horse. In seconds, she was in his arms and they were kissing like there was no else around. Her hard-breathing horse butted them to move until they broke up laughing.

  “He really wants in the corral,” Kathren said, and frowned at the gelding.

  “We better put him in there.” He took the reins and led the horse to the barn. Then he elbowed her aside and slipped off the saddle and pads.

  “You’re trying to spoil me,” she said under her breath.

  He searched for Cady and then smiled. “You need lots of spoiling.”

  “Well—you can see my girl is here.”

  “I like her. I’m not upset about that. I simply came to see you. Good reason?”

  She pursed her lips and nodded. “We can’t hardly—”

  “Can’t hardly what?” He gathered her in his arms and pulled her against him. “I have you. That’s all I need. They’re having the Reynolds boys’ trials last week of the month, I learned today. I was supposed to go to Mexico then and get some cattle from down there.”

  “What’ll you do?”

  “Send my brother.”

  She nodded and snuggled in his arms. “I am very pleased you came by anyway.”

  “My Grandmother Cooney left me something I want to show you.”

  She slightly frowned at him when he dug out the small box and gave it to her, not letting her hardly get away enough from his hug to open it.

  “Why—why—it’s a ring?”

  He nodded. Not hardly breathing. He couldn’t swallow. Her ripe body was against his. Finally, he managed, “Susie asked me when I got home—did you ask her?”

  “And?”

  “I said no.”

  “And?”

  “I got to thinking some maybe I should.”

  “Maybe?”

  “Hell, Kathren, I’m having enough trouble doing this.”

  She pressed her fingers to the base of her nose to hold it back—but laughter broke out anyway. Then he began to laugh, too.

  “What’s so funny?” Cady asked, looking vexed at their hilarity.

  “Chet’s trying to ask me something?” She leaned out and handed the box to her daughter.

  “Why it’s a ring. Mother. It’s a wedding ring!”

  “I know, honey.”

  “Did you tell him yes?”

  “He hasn’t asked me.”
/>
  “I know. He told me that.”

  “What did he tell you?”

  “He hadn’t asked you yet.”

  “Oh, Cady, you weren’t suppose to ask him that.”

  “How was I going to find out? You won’t say.”

  “Kathren Hines, will you marry me?”

  “Tell him yes. Mom, hurry and tell him yes.”

  “Why?” she asked her daughter, winking at him.

  “So the damn suspense’ll be over.”

  “Cady Hines, don’t you ever swear like that again.”

  “You know, I think Cady’s right, Kathren. Will you?”

  “Yes, Chester Byrnes. I’ll marry you.”

  Cady went to shouting and circling around them like an Indian at a war dance. He felt ready to bust some buttons and with Kathren hugging him, they danced, too.

  Chapter 30

  Their mother died the next week. It was a cold blue day. Robert came down for the funeral services, and drove the buckboard with Susie dressed in black. Rock rode with them, though he was badly confused why he had to go instead of take a nap. May stayed home with the baby and the girls. The ranch hands under Matt guarded the place while everyone else went to the schoolhouse and cemetery.

  Kathren and Cady joined him at the school. Their presence felt comforting in the cold building despite the wood stove being started too late to drive our the chill. For the first time, he felt a part of something besides the family. These two were about to become his own. What he’d grumbled about not having for years was coming to an end. He’d have a wife and a fine daughter as saucy as his wife-to-be.

  “Theresa Myra Cooney Byrnes, born July 10th, 1812, in Shelbyville, Tennessee…” The preacher’s words rang in his ears. His mother had only been sixteen years old when she’d had him. He’d never realized it before that moment. He knew then they lived in upper Arkansas when he was born on the fifteenth of November. Near a place called Carrolton. It snowed that day. Grandpa Cooney told him about it when he was a boy. Said his mother wanted to call him Snow, but Rock said it was bad enough to be a stone. His son didn’t need to be “white stuff.”

  He’d been named Chester after Chester Cooney, an ancestor who’d earned an officer’s commission in the Revolutionary War. Sometime later, Major Chester Cooney fell overboard off a steamboat and drownd. No one said if he had been drunk or not.

  Neighbors bore his mother’s coffin up to the cemetery, and they all huddled under blankets or heavy coats at the grave site. He stood with Kathren and Cady, wishing the preacher’s pleading call for souls to save could have been shortened.

  He wanted to remember her when she was young, bright, and happy as well as when she sang all the time in the house. “Sweet Betsy from Pike…” He knew the words to all of them, including “Ole Dan Tucker” and also the “Blue Tail Fly.” Before the Comanche raids and the loss of the three siblings—there were three living he knew about. Two others died at a young age. No wonder she lost her way in life. He remembered her shooting at those rabid screaming Indians out of a small hole in the sidewall of the ranch house and telling him as a small boy to keep his head down and to stay under the thick table.

  After the last amen, he took his girls back to the schoolhouse, and the womenfolks got busy setting up the meal.

  “When can you come see us?” Cady asked.

  “Oh, Saturday.”

  “You can come see Mother. I won’t be there. I’m going to Mason with Grandma to visit Grandma’s sister.”

  “I’ll miss you.”

  She wrinkled her nose at him. “I bet you two don’t even know I’m gone that day.”

  “Cady,” her mother insisted.

  “It’s the truth.”

  He had to agree, but he did it silently. Folks came by to tell him how they would miss his mother. They, too, must have remembered the younger, brighter woman in the box on the hill.

  Cady was off talking to Heck when Kathren turned to him. “I’m sorry she thinks you are hers.”

  “I think she’s very smart for her age.”

  “She is. If they can find a schoolteacher for a session, she’ll finish the fifth grade.”

  “Don’t worry about her and me. I love her and if you look in a mirror sometime, I think you will see yourself growing up. In fact, I recall going to school with a girl just like her.”

  She nudged him with an elbow. “Wait till I get you home.”

  “I can’t hardly wait.”

  “You’re not supposed to laugh at a funeral.”

  “She won’t care. She might even have laughed with you years ago.”

  “I’ll be good. If I can get my father to feed the chickens, I might come stay at my aunt’s house in Mason while the trial is going on.”

  “I’d like that. Matt’s not busy. He’s our cook for the drive. He could come over and watch them.”

  “Really?”

  “Let’s plan on it.”

  “We can do that then.” She agreed, looking pleased.

  “I’m not rushing you, but they have a judge up there that marries people.”

  “Oh, I couldn’t leave Cady out. She’d never forgive us.”

  “Just an idea.”

  “Keep thinking, cowboy. You aren’t doing bad.”

  They parted outside after the meal until Saturday, and he went home with the rest of the family. Sheriff Trent told him the trial would start a week from Monday, and Chet agreed to be there to testify.

  Thursday, he rode the field perimeter fences in a bitter cold wind that cut like a knife. His San Juan help was there and busy cutting firewood, though he doubted they were getting much done. A Mexican and cold weather did not agree.

  It was a shot that came from nowhere. It ripped through some branches beside him. He booted his horse called Jim Bowie with both spurs, and in response the horse jumped out into space. The big black slid down a steep slope, landed in a bottom, and made a flat run for some cedars.

  He slid him to a halt and jerked out the Sharps. One shot. Where had it came from? Two shots, you can locate the shooter. One shot when he wasn’t counting on it had no source. If he didn’t testify at their trial, they might get a jury to overlook the evidence—he wanted Marla’s killers punished. Memories of her and their affair only made him heartsick.

  Angry to the bone, he sent Bowie scrambling up the hillside, and topping a ridge, on the high point, caught a glimpse of a distant rider heading southwest. Was it Shelby? Could even be Earl.

  He sent Bowie down that slope and hit the flat in a dead run. If the pony had the bottom he knew he had, they could overtake that rider and get him in range for the Sharps. With the reins, he crossed-whipped him from side to side. In a half mile, he could see the rider and his horse, obviously intent on finding someplace to hide. At that range, Chet would be lucky to shoot the horse—he whipped Bowie again and got another surge from him.

  The gelding closed the gap, but it was still a long ways and he couldn’t see enough to distinguish the rider, but the man was flailing his horse to get away. Chet put the stop on Bowie and swung down. The rear sight on the last notch, he zeroed in on the far-away horse, clicked the first trigger, then eased down on the second one.

  The .50-caliber shoulder like a big mule. The charge deafened his eardrums. The blast ran to the core and the smoke stank his eyes, but the glimpse he had of the rider and horse going ass over teakettle drew a smile. He didn’t care which one it was—he’d taken out another back-shooter. Better go home and clean the Sharps.

  Saturday, he rode over to Kathren’s, and the two of them spent an easy afternoon before her fireplace making popcorn. Cady was grandmothering it for the day.

  “You know, I’m not supposed to make you mad or get in a fuss with you,” she said, looking back at him from where she squatted by the fireplace shaking the long-handled skillet with the cover.

  “Who said?”

  “My daughter. I think she’s worried I’m going to run you off.”

  They both laughed
. Cady didn’t know there would be no running away on his part.

  He rode home late Sunday afternoon, wearing his slicker in a drizzle. Moisture from gulf had blown in on a warming trend. Someday, having Kathren for his wife was going to be all right. He’d send Matt over to watch her place the next Sunday so she could drive up to Mason for the trial.

  Plans can change. When he sat down with Dale Allen to discuss the trip to Mexico for the five hundred head, right off his brother said, “Matt wants to take a pack string rather than a chuck wagon to Mexico. That country is too rough the way we’ll come back, and the river may be up.”

  When he’d gone down there before to get the cattle, he’d always bought the food for the crew from some small village venders. Dale Allen and Matt had other plans. He’d need to find someone to replace Matt. “Sure, you’re the trail boss. You’ll need five thousand dollars for the purchase. Don’t take any scrubby ones. I mean, cut them out. Rodrigo is all right, but like all cattle traders he’ll try you.”

  Dale Allen nodded. “Ten days if we get along good to get back?”

  “I’d say so. Don’t mess around below the border. Keep moving all you dare. There’s enough outlaws down there to eat those cattle in one meal. All right, you’re taking the hands with you, right?”

  “I know that you have to go to Mason and testify. That’ll leave the ranch unguarded.”

  “I’ll ride up to Mason tomorrow and hire a couple of fellas that Bob Trent recommends to stay here while you’re gone. What if I send Heck over to watch Kathren’s place while she’s up there with me?”

  “He’d like that.” Dale Allen shook his head. “Thinks he’s grown up now.”

  “I have the money for the cattle in the safe. I’d not carry it on me. Maybe hide it on the lead packhorses in a flour sack.”

  “Matt will know where to put it.”

  Chet agreed. His brother was taking a good lead in doing this job. It might work out well in the end. The next morning, Chet saddled and, after breakfast, rode for Mason. Matt took the buckboard and headed for Mayfield to get the last things he needed. They parted with a wave.

  Chet found the sheriff in his office. Mid-morning sunshine streamed in the window, and Trent sat behind a pile of wanted posters and papers. They shook hands and exchanged pleasantries for the day, including telling Trent what Susie was doing when he left the ranch.