Panhandle

by Brett Cogburn

  “Howdy,” H.B. tipped his hat to the young couple.

  The husband’s only reply was a scowl, and the pretty little thing at his side stared at him with big eyes for a split second before she gasped and ducked her head against her man’s shoulder.

  I was feeling pretty peaked, and thinking we might get shot. I gave a little tip of my hat, and tried to stare straight on ahead as we passed along the wagon. Two little kids, a boy and a girl, were riding on the tailgate with their feet dangling. The boy had a long stem of Indian grass in his hand and was picking at the milk cow tied to the corner of the wagon with it.

  The boy looked up at H.B. with big eyes. “Gosh Mister, how come you were standing in the road naked?”

  The little girl giggled. “Daddy’s mad.”

  “You kids are going to get a whuppin’ if you make that cow set back on her rope.” H.B. gave them a big wink.

  “Damned, ain’t you even the least bit embarrassed?” I said when we got out of earshot of those folks.

  “I bet their mama liked it.” H.B. puffed out his chest, curled up his tightened arms, and tried to suck in the gut that shaded his saddle horn. “I bet it ain’t every day that she gets to see a fine figure of a man like me naked.”

  “You sure ain’t a gentleman.”

  “A gentleman ain’t got a chance with any woman I ever met.”

  The timbered bottoms along the Cimarron were loaded with game. I saw more deer and turkey along that river than I had ever seen in one place in my life. A man with a good rifle and a steady aim never need go hungry in that neck of the woods.

  We came across one big camp, and then another. The last one had a well-beaten wagon trail leading to it and looked to have seen at least a couple of years’ use. There were two big wagons parked under a shade tree, but nobody was around. I counted twenty-three deer hanging from cross poles tied up high between trees.

  “Kansas market hunters. They come down every fall and spring to haul wild meat out by the wagon loads,” H.B. said.

  We continued up the river for a few miles, and came upon a set of fresh wagon tracks cutting a beeline for Kansas. We turned and followed them, and soon started finding dead turkeys littering the trail. It looked like somebody was just tossing them out of the wagon as they traveled along. I counted forty-three turkeys in the course of four or five miles.

  I was so mad I couldn’t see straight, but I was also wondering why anyone was shooting turkeys just to throw them out to waste. I looked to H.B. to see if he knew the why of it.

  “It’s still too hot this early in the fall. They spoiled in camp before they could get to town to sell them,” he said

  “The damned farmers and settlers are eating off this country as clean as a plague of locusts.”

  “Yep.” H.B. didn’t like the matter any more than I did.

  The market hunters and the game they sold were probably about all that was keeping most of those dirt herders from starving. Most of them didn’t seem to have the sense or the means to grow anything, and the only thing admirable about the whole bunch of grangers was their sheer, stubborn audacity, and a willingness to starve. I didn’t think it took any genius to recognize that this was cattle country. A lot of us at the time thought that Western Kansas would never grow anything for a farmer but blisters on his hands. Damn, were we wrong.

  “All the buffalo are about shot, there’s too many cattle grazing this country slick, and now the farmers are going to plow up everything into dust.” H.B. waved his pipe in a wide sweep around us. “Soak it in. At least it was a damn fine country while it lasted.”

  We swung west until we hit the Ft. Elliott Trail at Buzzard’s Roost on Little Wolf Creek. I liked the country where the Little Wolf dumped into its namesake, Wolf Creek. Just northwest of the junction of the two was a high white caprock overlooking a wide expanse of prairie that stretched to the northeast as far as the banks of the North Canadian. The grass was good there and there was no better water in that country.

  I don’t know why I was looking so close at that country, and thinking how I’d like to find a place like that for myself. It seemed lately that my mind was given to wandering into some strange corners. What the hell would I do with such a place? My home was the wagon that called me to chuck.

  The fact of it was that I’d started saving my money, and some scary thoughts were beginning to take hold in my head. The scariest notion of them all was the thought of giving up my trade. In my day there wasn’t any such thing as a married cowboy. Owners and managers might get married, but if you were going to be a big outfit hand you had to be single. Nobody provided houses for married men, and it wouldn’t have mattered if they did. A cowboy spent seven or eight months out of the year in the saddle, twelve if he landed a winter job riding line.

  I’d known a few hands who had married and managed to cowboy a little. They started up little rawhide outfits in some small nook amidst the country of the big operators. They ran a few cows, not enough to live on, much less prosper with, and supplemented their income with whatever work they could find. To my way of thinking, a man might as well hang up his spurs for good when that happened. He wasn’t doing anything but dragging out his misery. If it came to that you might as well just buy yourself a milk cow and put in a garden.

  Freedom is just a word to those who have never felt free. When I woke up in the morning I knew that I was beholding to no man. I owned nothing, owed nothing, and fear of traveling never got in the way of my pride. The world had no effect on the way I thought, because nothing can be dictated to a man that won’t take it, except death itself.

  I was considering trading it all for a woman who I wasn’t sure would have me, and who I had only seen three times. She would probably laugh at the fool I was should she know how I was carrying on. For all I knew I could have just been suffering from a case of inflamed glands or something. It was no surprise that in a land of few women that a man was bound to get a little silly at the sight of one. I told myself to just forget her, but the thing was I couldn’t—not until the end of all things when the sand scoured my bones, and the wind rattled the gravel in my empty skull.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  We hadn’t been back on the Horseshoe range a day when we heard that Billy had returned to his old stomping grounds. Somebody had seen him in Mobeetie, and they said he was cutting quite a swath down there. We heard that he and Andy had showed up leading a whole string of good horses, and sporting a roll of cash big enough to choke a mule. We figured the racing in San Antonio must have been really good.

  The second week of November we were on the north bank of the Washita sorting out three- and four-year-old steers to make up a market herd to drive to Dodge City. I was adjusting the neckerchief on my face in the downwind side of the cut herd when I saw Billy and Andy come riding up. Sure enough, they were leading a string of horses, and every one of them looked to be the kind you would like to own.

  Andy waved to me from afar, and went on to the river to take care of the horses while Billy came on our way. The first thing I noticed was that Billy did indeed look to have prospered. He was still dressed like a hand, but his outfit was brand new right down to the saddle he rode. There was a new light gray beaver atop his head that looked to never have seen any weather, and a diamond watch fob dangled from his vest pocket. He was smoking a cigar when he offered me his paw. We shook hands and grinned at each other like two wiggly hound pups.

  “Where are you two pilgrims headed?” I asked.

  “We’re going to winter in Dodge. I hear there’s some racing up there.”

  “You already cleaned out those suckers in San Antonio?”

  Billy pitched me a cigar before answering. “Those boys down there know a trick or two, but there ain’t any substitute for a horse that can really run.”

  “Have you still got that paint nag?”

  “Now you ought not to speak of War Bonnet that way. They’ll be writing songs about him before long.”

  “I take it he meas
ured up to the competition.”

  “It was robbery the way we took their money. That Cheyenne pony outran everything they had. I’d still be down there, but we ran out of anyone willing to race him that I had enough money to wager with.”

  “Looks like you’ve added a few more to your string that might run a little.” I pointed to where Andy was leading them.

  Billy studied them a might before he answered. “There’s a few there that show promise. A man has got to offer more than one flavor if he is to succeed running match races.”

  It looked like Billy had learned more than a few tricks on his outing down south. I looked forward to hearing about the time they had in that old town. “Why don’t you make camp with us tonight? All that high-rolling ain’t made you allergic to beans, has it?”

  “I ain’t changed any. I’ve just got a little more to jingle in my pockets, that’s all.”

  Several of the hands working the herd waved welcome to Billy, and he obviously enjoyed the attention. He waved back and passed a little banter with some of them. I pushed a new steer into the cut herd, and then rode back beside Billy.

  “Why don’t you come to Dodge with us?” he asked.

  I gave it some serious thought, but decided against it. “No thanks, Billy. I ain’t got the constitution to handle the ups and downs of the gambling life. It looks like they’ll keep me on for the winter, and I’m going to play the pat hand.”

  I could tell my refusal bothered Billy, though he didn’t let on like it did. “That’s all right. I’m thinking of leaving my horses with a man in Dodge come spring. I’ll be back to work the roundup come hell or high water. We’ll show these jaspers who the top hands are, won’t we?”

  I grinned in agreement while I made to push a steer back that threatened to run off from the herd. Billy dove right in and helped me turn him back.

  “You don’t mind if an old hand hangs around awhile, and shows you how it’s done?”

  I didn’t mind at all.

  Billy helped us hold the cut herd while a part of our crew cut out what didn’t shape up in the other herd. Those cattle that didn’t fit the requirement for the fall shipment were driven out of the herd and over to the cut herd. Only a few of the hands entered the main herd at one time. It was somewhat of an honor on most ranges to be chosen to cut cattle. If you were sent into the herd, that meant the bosses judged you to be a top hand, smart enough and skilled enough to work the herd quietly and with as little fuss as possible. Another prerequisite was the possession of a good cutting horse in your string.

  Many a hand bragged about his roping horse, or a horse that could go all day without falter, but the most prized horses of the range were the cutting horses. Trail men valued a good night horse, but the cutting horses were kings.

  Each ranch or outfit had one that they bragged about, and every cowboy had an opinion as to the greatest cutting horse he had ever seen. It was not unusual to see men with a lifetime spent on the back of a cowpony, and witnesses to a million cuts, stop and intently watch a good horse and rider work. When we gathered around the campfire at night, it wasn’t just bad men and whores we talked about. We had all heard the names of good cutting horses that we had never seen from way down in Mexico to up yonder in old Calgary.

  As for those without a good cutting horse in their string, or not known for their skill, they held herd. I patted Dunny’s neck and wished we were riding into the herd to cut something out. There I was on what Billy claimed was the best cutting horse in Texas, and that meant the world, and I was holding the cut herd.

  I am not ashamed to admit that I watched enviously as Hoos Hopkins, the foreman’s brother, eased into the main herd on the back of a little brown horse we called Booger. Through the dust I could make him out, easing a small bunch of cattle to the outer edge of the herd. Hoos and Booger had their eyes on the steer they wished to cut, and the other cattle in front of them were allowed to slowly slip by them and back to the herd.

  At the right moment, he guided Booger up into the steer to block his way and stop him from returning to the herd with his pals. That was when the dance began. The steer’s instincts were to return to the herd, and he would try anything to get there. Booger’s job was to prevent that from happening, and to drive him away to the other herd.

  Booger was good enough that the rider had to guide him little once Booger knew which steer was selected. With his ears pinned flat against his neck, and his neck stretched out like a snake, Booger went to work. The steer ran right and left trying to get by the horse and rider, but Booger would head him off every time. He ran until he headed the steer, stopped hard, and rolled back into a turn to match each change of direction the steer made. The steer faced up to the horse and darted in quick spurts, right and left, back and forth, trying to get by this nemesis that blocked his way.

  With his butt to the herd behind him, Booger locked down on his hindquarters, and his front end rocked from side to side mirroring the steer’s movement, each time just far enough ahead to pin the steer in place. Old Hoos sat high and tight, his legs and hips in rhythm with the wild movement of his horse. It was a beautiful, dusty animal ballet.

  Finally, the steer threw up his tail and angled away from Booger, giving up the fight, but attempting to gain distance and circle the herd. Booger drove out at him, still counteracting the steer’s moves, but at each turn driving him farther away from the herd he had left.

  When they neared the cut herd Billy and I rode in behind the steer and finished driving him on to where he belonged. We pulled up and bragged on Booger a little, and Bee Hopkins, the foreman, heard us.

  “Why I saw Old Possum once drive a jackrabbit from the herd with his bridle off. They won a bet on that, a thousand dollars,” he said.

  If I had a nickel every time some cowboy told me he had seen a cutting horse so good that he could cut a jackrabbit I would be a rich man. It was just like the fact that every cowboy in Texas had drank out of a muddy hoof print at one time or another. If you didn’t believe them, all you had to do was ask. Actually, you didn’t have to ask, they were prone to volunteering the information without provocation.

  I had no response for Bee. For one, because there was no response, and secondly because despite the fact that the boss was easy to get along with, I didn’t think it was too smart to go arguing with the man who had offered me a winter job.

  “He ain’t near as good as Dunny,” Billy said.

  “You sound pretty sure of that.” Bee didn’t seem to mind arguing.

  Billy eyed Hopkins for a moment like a he was eyeing a wasp nest, and thinking about bumping it just to see what havoc he could cause. “This ain’t any place for a fine horse and a top hand.”

  Before I could inform him that was just where we were, Bee was telling me to go make some cuts. “Have at it, and let’s see this horse.”

  Billy motioned me to the herd with a grand gesture, sweeping his arm in a wide arc while slightly bowing at the waist. “They just don’t know who they’ve got working for them.”

  There was about a thousand head left, and two other riders were cutting out cattle. A man entering the herd had to know a steer old enough and big enough to ship from one too young, small, or lacking in the requirements given by the bosses. All these cuts had to go to the cut herd. Billy had stuck his neck out for me by risking his own reputation to vouch for Dunny and me.

  Once I had Dunny deep into the herd I had no doubts about him. He walked on cat feet among the cattle, alert but soft and waiting. His ears worked nervously back and forth, and his head worked ever so slightly from side to side. He was waiting for me to move him toward an individual animal long enough for him to know what I had selected.

  Guessing about the kind of horse I rode, I deliberately worked my way toward a high-tailed yearling crashing crazily away from me through the herd. There were still twenty head between him and us when I became aware that Dunny already knew what I was after. He, like I, looked over the animals in front of us, his attentio
n solely on the wild-eyed red roan steer at the edge of the herd. We worked the bunch to the edge of the herd hardly without even stirring up the dust.

  The steer was so wild that when the bunch hadn’t gone thirty feet out from the herd he tried to double back and forced my hand. Before I could spur Dunny toward the steer he was already leaping forward, ears pinned flat. Dunny was locked on to him, and in two strides he had a neck past him. The yearling tried to stop and suck back to the right. Dunny’s butt dropped out from under me in a ground-rending stop, his hocks almost parallel to the ground. Like a spring he seemed to coil back on himself, launch his head and neck back the other way, and uncoil in one smooth explosion of muscle. The rest of him flowed out of the ground in succession, like water turning a bend.

  Where Booger had been graceful, Dunny was brutally powerful. Instead of holding a line and not attempting to drive the cow away until it turned tail, Dunny worked forward at the cow a little bit each time before a stop and turn. After each stop Dunny changed direction in an explosion of dust; his mane and the heavy tails of my split reins flew out flat beside me when he turned.

  In a matter of seconds Dunny had the yearling confined to a ten-foot run, and at each turn he drove the yearling farther away. The yearling faced us and threatened to charge right by us. Dunny crouched to meet him, his nose outstretched and inches from the ground. The standoff seemed to last forever. I could feel Dunny’s muscles quiver with anticipation. He buckled at the knees slightly, getting ever lower into the ground.

  The yearling started right and Dunny jumped out and headed him, the two of them almost colliding. The yearling whirled away, beaten and ready to head for the high country. Dunny came out of his tracks like a sprinter, racing after the yearling and driving him to the cut herd while biting at his rump. He got close enough to bite a clump of hair from the steer’s tailhead, and I thought he was half alligator. I raised my rein hand for the first time, taking a light hold on the bit to back him off a little.