To Tame A Texan

by Georgina Gentry

  “Head ’em up and move ’em out!” Pedro shouted, and the herd began to move north again.

  With no one looking, Lynnie stubbed out her cigarette against her saddle. She made sure it was extinguished before she dropped it in the dirt. A prairie fire would be the devil of a thing to deal with. Red dust choked her, and she was having a difficult time seeing without her spectacles, but she was afraid to wear them, certain Ace would recognize her. As it was, the dust was so thick, she could hardly see the chuck wagon moving along ahead of her. Old Cookie seemed to be singing, or maybe he was in pain; it was difficult to tell. When she ran her tongue over her lips, it was so gritty, her teeth seemed to grind. She thought about a warm bath in clean water, soft towels, and clothes that didn’t smell like horse sweat. Oh, this was going to be a long, long trip, and it had barely gotten started. The worst of it was going to be dealing with Ace Durango, who thought he was God’s gift to women. She grinned to herself and began to plan revenge.

  Nine

  As the day progressed, her saddle seemed to get harder and harder, to the point she wasn’t sure she would be able to get off her horse, when they finally camped for the night. Ace didn’t look any better. His face grimaced as if he were suffering from a hangover—which he probably was, Lynnie thought in disgust. At least with all the confusion of the first day, no one paid much attention to her, which was good.

  Would the day never end? She glanced up at the sun, trying to hurry it along and thinking that in a few more weeks, it would turn blistering hot and the band she wore now to tie down her small breasts would become unbearable. About the time dusk finally spread across the plains, and Lynnie had reached the point she thought she’d fall from her saddle, Comanch rode along the trail shouting, “Creek up ahead! Pedro says we’ll camp there tonight.”

  Thank God! Gratefully Lynnie reined in her horse and followed the chuck wagon as it pulled off the trail. Up ahead, she heard whistles and shouts as the cowboys got the tired cattle headed toward the creek to drink and settle down to graze for the night.

  Some of the cowboys were already dismounting, unbuttoning their pants and making patterns in the dust again. Didn’t men ever get too old to find that amusing?

  “Hey, boy,” the cranky old cook yelled at her, “gather me up some cow chips to cook with.”

  She nodded. Oh, how her bottom hurt. It was all she could do to dismount from her horse and lead it over to drink from the creek. Boneyard seemed as tired as she was.

  “Hey, kid,” Ace yelled at her, “hurry it up. We got calf fries tonight!”

  Oh yes, calf fries. So-called mountain oysters. The cowboys’ delight. Yum, yum. She’d forgotten about the bloody things in the kettle. Although she felt as if she could barely walk, she tied her horse to graze on a particularly rich stretch of grass and walked out across the prairie, looking for old, dried-up cattle manure to fuel the fire. In the olden days, she knew the pioneers had used buffalo chips. Prairie coal, they had called the manure on the treeless plains, but the buffalo had been slaughtered long ago. A buffalo was now a rare curiosity. She stumbled across a big pile of old manure and stared at it with distaste.

  Ace rode by. “Hey, kid, get a move on,” he snapped. “Or we won’t save you any calf fries.”

  Oh, if only she could count on that. She started to suggest he could be a gentleman and get down off that big black horse and help her, but remembered in time. She gritted her teeth and nodded as he rode on, resisting the temptation to throw a clod of manure and knock his jaunty Stetson off. Instead, she bent to pick up the cow pie, then another and another. Even though it was dry, it still smelled terrible. Parfum de cow. She wrinkled her nose and kept picking up dung. Finally, her arms were so full, she couldn’t carry any more. With her load, she staggered through the dusk toward camp.

  Ace sat his horse, watching her, but he didn’t offer to help. Instead, he yelled at her, “Hey, kid, while you’re workin’, watch out for rattlers.”

  Snakes. Yes, this was prime country for rattlesnakes. The thought startled her, and she dropped some of what she’d gathered, then started walking again, very cautious in the tall grass. She could only hope that the next time that arrogant Ace Durango whipped out his, uh, maleness to pee, a big coiled rattler would sink its fangs in his ... well, at least his boot.

  Back at the fire, Cookie soon had a good blaze going and opened some canned beans and brought out the big skillet to fry the cowboy delicacy. The smell of the food and strong coffee made her mouth water, and then she remembered what they were about to eat. Up north, they wouldn’t believe this.

  A young half-breed cowboy ambled up to her. “Hey, we’ve howdied, but we ain’t shook. I’m Comanche Jones.” He stuck out his hand.

  It dawned on Lynnie that she was expected to shake it, which she did awkwardly. Women didn’t generally shake hands with men. “Lee,” she growled. “Lee, uh, Smith from the Panhandle.”

  Comanche turned a critical eye toward her horse. “That the best they got up there?”

  She resisted the urge to kick his shins. “Better than she looks.”

  Ace came up just then and dismounted. “Couldn’t be any worse, could she?”

  Both cowboys laughed like idiots.

  Ace said, “Pedro says somebody’s got to ride herd. Lee and you can start.” He was staring at her in the growing dusk. “Kid, are you sure we ain’t met some place before?”

  She gritted her teeth over his grammar, but with a mighty effort, she didn’t correct him. “Maybe in some whorehouse somewheres.”

  Young Comanche flushed to his dark hair, but Ace guffawed. “You don’t look old enough to be toppin’ no fillies, Lee.”

  Leave it to this uncivilized stud to put it that way. He was insufferable. She now had her doubts that she could stand arrogant Ace Durango long enough to ride hundreds of miles with him.

  Just then, Cookie began to beat on a pan. “Grub’s ready! Come and get it ’afore I toss it to the coyotes.”

  “Why poison a bunch of helpless coyotes?” Ace muttered under his breath.

  “I heerd that!” the old man yelled in their direction.

  Ace shrugged. “He only hears what he wants to hear, the old bastard. Believe me, this drive is headin’ for disaster—a bunch of green hands, and only old Cookie and Pedro know a damn thing about what to do.”

  She grunted an answer and moved away from him, grabbing up a tin plate and cup. She tried to turn down the calf fries, but the old man wouldn’t hear of it. The way the dozen Texas cowboys were wolfing them down and licking their lips was disgusting. Hank Dale, the curly-headed young rancher, was there, but he didn’t seem to recognize her, either.

  “Hey, Lee,” Ace yelled, “eat up! Calf balls will make a man of you.”

  It’ll take more than that, she thought, but with everyone watching, there was nothing to do but close her eyes and take a bite. The thought of what she was eating made her gag, but with the cowboys looking, she’d have to finish her plate. She pretended these were Ace’s she was grinding her teeth on, and that made it easier somehow. In fact, she began to eat with relish, wiping up the gravy with a biscuit as hard and heavy as a cannonball. Ace was right: Cookie’s grub might kill a coyote. She tucked one biscuit in her pocket for her horse. Maybe they wouldn’t give Boneyard a bellyache. Lynnie looked around for a napkin and noticed the other men, hunkered down gobbling their food and wiping their greasy faces on their sleeves. She managed to do the same, but she shuddered as she did so.

  As they finished, the Durangos’ old Mexican ranch boss stood up. “Señores, I know most of you are young and have never done this before, but I will teach you, and after a few weeks it will get easier, sí?”

  They all looked doubtful but nodded.

  Ace licked his spoon. “How do we make sure we’re headed in the right direction?”

  Cookie snorted. “’Cause I always point the chuck wagon tongue toward the north star as I unhitch my team, and we start off in the morning the way the wagon tongue p
oints.”

  “Now what do we do?” A young, green hand asked.

  Everyone looked toward Pedro, who was rolling himself a cigarillo. “We ride the herd all night, circling it to keep it calm. Two men at a time, two hours at a stretch.”

  Comanch stepped forward. “I’ll take the first watch.”

  “Good,” Ace said with a yawn, “then I won’t have to. I’m still recoverin’ from last night. Lee, you help Comanch so the rest of us can get some shut-eye.”

  Of all the irresponsible, gold-bricking ...

  Everyone was looking at her.

  “All right,” she grunted.

  Ace pulled out his bedroll, spread his blankets, and, using his saddle for a pillow, lay down and tipped his hat over his eyes. Even as she walked toward her horse, he was snoring.

  She gave Boneyard the biscuit, and the big yellow teeth chomped it up and nuzzled Lynnie’s pockets for more. The half-breed kid called Comanche caught up with her, and together they swung up on their horses.

  “Hey, Lee,” Comanche said as he reined his bay gelding out toward the herd, “maybe tomorrow night we’ll reach a pretty good-sized creek so we can all skinny-dip and wash the dust off.”

  “Good.” She turned her horse and started off, wondering how on earth she’d deal with that—swimming with a bunch of naked cowboys. Well, that wasn’t tonight’s problem. She wondered suddenly how Ace Durango would look naked, and was then properly shocked at herself for the image that came to her mind.

  She took her position, riding in a slow circle around the grazing herd. Comanche rode the other direction, and some time within the hour, they passed each other and nodded. Comanch was singing softly, “As I walked out in the streets of Laredo; as I walked out in Laredo one day; I spied a young cowboy all dressed in white linen . . .”

  She was so tired, her bottom ached, but if she protested or disobeyed orders, her ruse might be discovered and she’d be sent back. Too bad she wasn’t more of a tomboy. She kept hearing about these girls who could rope and ride and shoot as well as any man, but she thought they must all be in the dime novels, because she didn’t know any girls like that.

  It had grown dark and the cattle were settling down, contentedly chewing their cuds, except for old Twister, who was over by the chuck wagon, begging for biscuits. The steer must be a glutton for punishment. A cool breeze dried her damp face, and in the distance a lonely coyote howled. Around her, katydids chirped away, and the smell of Indian paintbrush and bluebonnets drifted to her nose. Despite the fact that she was tired and dirty, she felt a sense of satisfaction that today she had held her own among a bunch of rowdy cowboys, worked just as hard, and was the equal of any of them. Maybe she could make it all the way to Dodge City after all.

  When she was so tired she didn’t think she’d be able to get off her horse because her bottom was stiff, Ace came riding toward her, yawning and rubbing his eyes. “Pedro says I take the next shift, Lee—interrupted a great sleep. I was dreamin’ about the girls at Miss Fancy’s place in San Antone; you ever been there?”

  “Nope,” Lynnie muttered. The leering idiot. Did he think of nothing but women?

  “You missed something,” Ace sighed wistfully as if he wished he were there now. “They got real cold beer, too, and the card games go on all night.”

  Lynnie didn’t say anything. The boys at the Lazy M bunkhouse had taught her to play poker, and she was pretty good at it, although probably not as good as this rake.

  She nodded to him and headed back toward the welcome beacon of the campfire. It was all she could do to dismount, but she still had to unsaddle her horse and rub her down. No good cowboy rode a horse hard and put it away wet with sweat. Then she hobbled the mare and turned her out to graze with the other horses. Comanche was already crawling into his blankets by the fire.

  Where to spread her bed? She hesitated, looking around at the snoring men around the fire. She didn’t really want to bed down among them. Maybe she could spread her blankets quite a distance away. A lone wolf howled unexpectedly somewhere close by, and she quickly rethought her plans.

  Carrying her saddle and bedroll, she tiptoed over dirty, snoring bodies and made her bed as best she could, using her saddle for a pillow. She felt rocks and cockleburrs under the blanket, but she was too tired to move it or search them out. She lay there, tired and dirty, her muscles hurting. She had chigger bites itching in some places she couldn’t scratch without taking off some of her clothes, and she wasn’t about to do that. Oh, the romance of the Old West. She wished she could get her hands on some of those dudes who wrote dime novels about the thrill of the cattle trail and its lusty cowboys.

  She took a deep breath. It was more than obvious that all these cowboys had been eating beans. Here and there, somebody let out a big, noisy sound.

  Lynnie wrinkled her nose. Phew! Again she was tempted to pick up and move away from the fire. Then the wolf howled again, and she decided to stay where she was—smells and all. Well, she started this and she had to see it through. Lynnie McBride might be a lot of things, but she was no quitter.

  About the time she was dozing off, she heard two cowboys get up and head out to saddle their horses for the next shift. Nighthawks, they called the riders, keeping the spooky cattle calmed by singing to them and watching for coyotes or anything that might start a stampede.

  As she watched, Ace and Hank rode in from their shifts, dismounted, and unsaddled and hobbled their horses. Then the two came to join the sleeping circle. There was an empty spot next to her, and Ace threw down his saddle and spread his blanket. Without thinking, she scooted in the other direction.

  “What’s the matter, Lee, you see a tarantula?”

  The image of the black, hairy giant spider crossed her mind, so now she had something new to worry about. She muttered something unintelligible, but it didn’t seem to matter to Ace. He was already asleep and snoring. He looked as big as a mountain lying there.

  The wolf howled again, and it seemed close—too close. She scooted a little nearer to Ace without even thinking about it. Somehow, she felt safer when she lay closer to his big body. The April night had turned chill, and her one blanket wasn’t enough. The fire was dying down, but if she tried to build it up, she’d wake people. Very cautiously, she scooted right up against Ace. He not only generated as much heat as a coal stove, he felt hard as iron—and she knew he had a rifle in his bedroll. He was a good shot, too; everyone knew that. She closed her eyes and listened to Ace’s steady breathing. Somehow, it was a comforting sound to know he was right there if she needed the big brute.

  When she awakened, it was not quite dawn, the sky splashing the first pale pink across the prairie. What a beautiful sight, Lynnie thought; maybe there was something romantic about cowboys after all. And then she turned her head and saw half a dozen cowboys over on the grass with their pants unbuttoned, peeing in the dirt. She needed to go, too. Frantically, she looked around for some bushes so the men couldn’t see her, and dashed there as fast as she could. Ace rose up on one elbow and looked at her quizzically in the gray light as she returned. “Kid, you get cold last night?”

  She kept her head low and shrugged. “Why?”

  “When I woke up, you was curled up against me like a kitten next to a warm brick.”

  Were, she thought, mentally correcting his grammar. “Maybe you were curled up against me.”

  Ace looked horrified and jumped to his feet, grabbing up his boots.

  About that time, Cookie hit his frying pan a couple of times. “Come and get it or I’ll throw it out.”

  “That’d be a blessing,” a skinny cowboy near her muttered.

  “I heered that!” Cookie limped over to stoke his fire. “Just for that, you don’t get much.”

  The cowboys laughed, grabbed their tin plates and cups, and lined up. She must have been hungry, because the fried bacon and hard biscuits made in the iron Dutch oven tasted pretty good to Lynnie, although the coffee was the way most Texans liked it—strong enou
gh to float a horseshoe.

  Ace looked at Pedro. “Okay, compadre, now what? Any chance we can forget this whole deal and go home?”

  The Mexican stroked his black mustache and frowned at him. “I promise your papa to make a real cowboy of you. Maybe we make more than ten miles today.”

  Ace groaned aloud. “All those pretty women and cardsharps in Austin and Laredo are going to miss me while I nursemaid these stupid cows.”

  Pedro shrugged and grinned. “As Señor Durango would say, ‘saddle up anyway, hombre.’”

  Ace picked up his saddle, his shoulders slumped with resignation.

  Lynnie’s muscles hurt so badly that she almost groaned aloud as she slipped on her boots. Ten miles on a horse today. Ten long, long miles on her sore, aching bottom, and hundreds of miles more to the north. Around her, the cowboys were saddling up. She was tempted to take down her hair, give up the masquerade, and get sent back home. In fact, Ace might even welcome the incident. It would give that malingering loafer an excuse to end this ill-fated cattle drive and get back to his saloon whores and gambling. Even as she thought that, she knew she couldn’t do it. Her quest was for the cause and for all Texas women who were under the heel of all these male brutes who wouldn’t let them vote. She must continue.

  “Hey, Lee,” Ace yelled at her, “why don’t you leave that old crowbait behind to die, and pick another horse?”

  She shook her head and grabbed her saddle. The old-time stock saddle was so heavy, she almost staggered under the weight, but she couldn’t ask one of the men to saddle for her, as she could have done if they’d known she was a lady. Besides that, they’d all be horrified that she was riding astride like a boy instead of using a sidesaddle.