He drew another breath. Definitely a shudder. And his head was now hanging. “I knew about them riders, Bree. I knew about them all along. I found out about ‘em the day I fired Reno and the others. I’d seen their tracks out there. It looked to me like they were bearing north, so I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to worry you or Aunt Ginny unnecessarily. They were cutting some cows from our herd and taking them for beef. When I went to get the line riders to ride with me and face them, well, you know the rest. They wouldn’t follow my orders and I fired them.”
He turned to face her. “I didn’t know them riders would turn around and head straight to the valley. I didn’t know.”
Bree decided to take a chance, and dropped one hand gently to his shoulder. “Josh..,”
Wrong move. He shook free of her and bolted from the porch. “Just leave me alone.”
He turned off toward the stable. He stood for a while by the fence, staring toward the grass at his feet, then he leaned against the top rail of the fence, folding his arms atop it and burying his face.
How was he going to look Pa in the eye when he returned home? And how could Pa ever trust him to look after the ranch again?
He had beat Whitey in a gunfight. He had defeated Reno with his fists in Hunter’s saloon. With both situations he had enforced the authority Pa had bestowed upon him. He had hired some new men, and ridden with them rounding up the herd. Taking care of business, he had thought with pride. And yet, he had failed at the most important job of all - keeping Aunt Ginny and Bree safe. He was grateful for Zack, Hunter and even that gunhawk, Dusty, or whatever his name was.
Josh raised his eyes and looked off toward the meadow that opened up behind the house. The remuda grazed. One mustang pranced about in the late morning breeze.
A cup of coffee might taste good, he thought. Go into the kitchen, pour a cup, and then decide how he was going to tell Pa, and to prepare for the disappointment he would see in Pa’s eye.
Josh walked around to the kitchen door, and found Aunt Ginny sitting at the table, a tea cup and saucer before her.
He nodded to her, then continued to the kettle resting on the stove.
“It’s probably a little cold,” she said. “I let the fire go out.”
“That’s all right.” He opened a cupboard door for a cup, and filled it.
Ginny inward shuddered at the thought of what was in that pot. Cold, thick as mud, and probably gritty with grounds. How western men could drink it was something she could never fathom, but they seemed to almost crave it. Trail coffee, they called it. Mud would be the more appropriate name, she thought.
Josh started for the kitchen door, but Aunt Ginny stopped him in the doorway with one word. “Joshua.”
“Yes’m?”
“Come and sit down, please.”
“I’d really like to be alone right now, ma’am.”
“Pardon me. I didn’t mean to make it sound like a request. Come and sit down.”
Josh reluctantly ambled to the table, slid out a chair, and dropped into it.
“Joshua, did I ever tell you that you’ve grown into a good man? A reliable man? One your father can be proud of?”
Oh, no, he thought. She must have overhead his conversation with Bree out on the porch. Or Bree ran in and detailed it to her. “No, I ain’t, ma’am. Not by a long shot.”
She did not correct his grammar. “Joshua, don’t you think your father has ever made a mistake?”
He shrugged. “Everyone has, I reckon. But any mistakes he’s made are only little ones. I beat him at checkers a few months ago because he missed one move. But he was tired that night.”
“Oh, Joshua,” she chuckled. “Your father has made some mistakes. Some very big mistakes. I’ve know him for a long time, and he’s made some whoppers.”
Josh found a sudden wave of defensiveness rise up. After all, she was talking about Pa. “Like what?”
“It’s not for me to tell, but I think you might be finding out about one of them quite soon.” She took a sip of tea.
Josh hated it when she did that, acting like she knew something you didn’t, then not letting on any further. He knew it would be fruitless to prod her for any more information, though. She would reveal only what she wanted, and then, only in her own good time.
She continued. “One thing about your father’s mistakes. He never fails to learn from them. You see, Joshua, a mistake is only a mistake if you don’t learn from it. If you do learn, then it’s not a mistake but a lesson. Now, you might have erred in judgment, but not in your responsibility. In fact, it’s your sense of responsibility that’s causing you to be so unsettled about this.”
“It’s just that I was trying so hard. I wanted to do right so bad, to make Pa proud of me.”
“And why do you think you might have made your mistake?”
He shrugged, was about to say, I don’t know. Then it dawned on him. “I was trying too hard?”
She smiled. “Living in San Francisco, I had the good fortune to meet an occasional Chinese person. They have an interesting saying, ‘More is less. Less is often more.’”
“More is less,” Josh repeated. “That’s just what I did, wasn’t it?”
She took another sip of tea. “And Joshua, your father is proud of you. Very proud.”
“How do you know?”
“I see it in his eyes whenever he looks at you, or talks about you.”
Bree called from outside. “Aunt Ginny! Josh! Pa’s home!”
Aunt Ginny returned her cup to the saucer, and rose from the table. “Come. Let’s go say hello to your father.”
Josh stood, sliding the chair back and away as he did so, still clutching his coffee. He felt so much better, like a heaviness was gone from him. He realized he was smiling.
PART FOUR
THE MARAUDERS
FOURTEEN
Josh felt his chest swell with pride as he watched the rider approach. Tiny in the distance, not quite to the wooden bridge a quarter mile away, but still unmistakably Johnny McCabe. Josh supposed every boy felt that way about his father, but Josh might have felt it even moreso.
It was not just any boy’s father men talked about around campfires, or in saloons over a beer, telling of the time he took down five Comanches with as many shots. Some of the stories told were not true, or had been stretched so thin you could see through them, but the one about the Comanches was true. Pa and Zack Johnson had been with the Texas Rangers, and they had been ambushed by Comanches. Zack had taken a bullet, and still carried the lead to this day. Pa’s horse had been shot out from under him. Pa then scrambled to his feet, drew a pistol as five Comanche horsemen bore down on them, and emptied his gun. Five shots, five Comanches. Two more Comanches were coming up behind the first five, so he did a border shift, and with a fresh pistol in his right hand stood waiting for them to come into range. But they reined up, sat in the saddle staring at him for a moment or two, then wheeled around and rode away.
Pa’s horse was dead, and Zack’s had ridden off. Zack had a bullet in his leg. Pa tied a bandanna about the leg to choke off the bleeding, then carried Zack the entire ten miles back to the fort.
“Just lucky shooting,” Pa had said. But Josh knew luck had nothing to do with it. Practice, and raw nerve, were more like it.
Pa rode a chocolate colored stallion with a black mane. A tall animal, more than sixteen hands. Its legs were long, like a Kentucky bred race horse. It loped along casually, yet its long stride ate up the distance quickly.
Pa rode easily, as though sitting in a saddle were the most natural thing on earth. He rode more easily than most men walked. He didn’t bounce in the saddle, and yet he didn’t give the appearance of clinging tightly to the animal. He simply moved with the horse, as though they were one.
At this distance, Josh couldn’t yet make out his blue eyes, his square jaw, or the deep lines under his chin or alongside each eye that came from a lifetime of riding into the sun and wind. But he could see the wi
de brimmed brown stetson, the gray jacket. And the twin pistols, one at each hip.
Aunt Ginny stood at Josh’s side. Bree was at the railing, the wind fluttering her hair.
As Pa drew within shouting distance of the house, Bree bounded from the porch, and ran to meet him. Pa reined up Thunder and swung out of the saddle, and Bree jumped into his arms with a squeal of, “Daddeee!”
She then took the trailing rein, and walked beside Pa, leading Thunder behind her.
Josh could hear her babbling. “We missed you so much. We’ve got so much to tell you. What took you so long? We expected you a couple weeks ago.”
“Got me a little side-tracked in the mountains, that’s all,” he said. “You know how I am, out there alone in the hills.”
He stepped up onto the porch. Aunt Ginny extended her hand graciously, like she was a Queen, Josh thought, meeting one of her subjects. But her face was alight with a smile. Johnny took the hand.
“Welcome home, John,” she said.
Pa then turned his sky blue eyes to Josh. Pa stood taller by a couple inches, and Josh had to look upward a bit to meet his gaze. Josh shifted the coffee to his left hand and reached out with his right, which Pa grasped. His grip was strong, his hand rough.
“How were things while I was gone, son?”
Josh smiled. “I kept things together, I guess. Got a few things to tell you about, though.”
Pa’s hair had grown an inch or so since he had last been home, now falling past his shoulders. Sprouting from his jaw was nearly an inch of white whiskers. His clothes were covered with trail dust. But even so, Aunt Ginny violated her own rule of requiring you to be freshly bathed before you sit down at the table, and suggested they all come into the house for lunch.
Bree brewed a fresh pot of coffee while Josh filled Pa in on all that had happened since his absence. Reno and Whitey. The gunfight. The fist fight. Aunt Ginny was hearing some of this for the first time, and the way she leveled her gaze at Josh told him she wasn’t happy about it. Not happy about the events themselves, and less happy that she hadn’t been told.
And Josh told Pa about the raiders, first the trail he had happened upon outside the valley and the remains of a cow that indicated they were rustling McCabe stock, and then how Hunter and the young gunfighter working for him had ridden out here to protect Aunt Ginny and Bree. Pa didn’t offer a comment as Josh told him about his error in judgment, didn’t speak at all until Josh had finished.
“Yeah,” he said. “When I was riding through mountains outside the valley, I saw signs of riders, and the remains of a camp. Once I’ve had a cup of hot coffee, why don’t you and I saddle up and take a ride?”
After the coffee, Bree went outside to find Fred and have him saddle a couple geldings for Pa and Josh. Fred had already stripped the saddle from Thunder, and was commencing to give the horse a rub-down.
Josh buckled on his gunbelt, and then at Pa’s recommendation grabbed a Winchester carbine, and thumbed cartridges into it until the magazine was loaded to its capacity of twelve.
“John, I’m concerned about you,” Aunt Ginny sad. “Here you’ve not been home an hour, and you’re going to be back in the saddle.”
“Think these old bones need a rest?” he asked, not smiling, but with the twinkle of amusement in his eye.
“Well, you’re not a young man, anymore”
“I'm hardly ready for the rocking chair yet. Give me a couple more years.”
“John, let Josh go into town and get Dusty, the young man working for Hunter. They can scout about and find the location of those riders. Dusty is very capable at that sort of thing.”
Josh snapped, “And I’m not?”
“This is not the time for male pride,” she leveled her gaze firmly at him from over the top of her spectacles. “You are more than a competent cattleman and horseman, Joshua, but Dusty has knowledge about this sort of thing. The kind that can only come from experience. Almost on the level of your father or Zack. And watch that tone of voice, young man.”
“Yes’m.”
She turned her attention back to Johnny. “Seriously, John. Let the boys handle this.”
Josh looked at her curiously. Why was she so worried about Pa? When Ma died and Aunt Ginny moved in to help with Josh and Jack and Bree, they had struck an agreement. The household would be her domain, and the working of the ranch would be Pa’s. Defending the place also fell into his territory. She had never, in Josh’s memory, questioned him about such matters.
Pa looked at her squarely in the eye, and for a moment didn’t speak. A sort of silent communication was happening between them. Josh frowned a bit, and placed his fists on his hips, wondering what the hell this was about?
Then Pa said, “We’ll be all right. We’ll be back before dark.”
And that was all that was said. Pa returned his dusty stetson to his head, opened the door, and Josh followed him out to the porch and down to the gravely yard, and out to the corral.
Tethered to the middle rail of the corral were two gray geldings, one with two white stockings, and one with three. Josh’s saddle was on one, Pa’s on the other. Pa’s saddle bags were still strapped on, but his bedroll was now gone. And his Sharps was still in the boot.
Fred stood behind the fence, his foot up on one rail. He chewed a strand of hay. “I kind’a figured you’d be wanting to check things out,” he said, the strand of hay wobbling as he spoke. “I picked a couple of mounts that shouldn’t stand out color-wise. I took the liberty of dumping the extra weight out of your saddle bags. Your stuff’s in the tackle room. All I left in there were your moccasins and a couple boxes of ammo.”
Pa nodded and swung into the saddle. One easy, smooth motion. Easier than most men half his age. Josh couldn’t imagine what Aunt Ginny was concerned about.
He and Josh started away, Josh riding alongside Pa. Most riders held the rein in the right hand and any excess rein back and away with their left, using the excess as a quirt, slapping it against the rump of the horse if more speed was desired. Pa, however, had taught Josh to ride with the rein in his left, and with the excess simply hanging freely. If a horse couldn’t pick up his pace with but a touch of the rider’s heels to his ribs, he wasn’t much of a horse. And this method allowed the rider to keep his gunhand free. Pa rode with his right hand usually resting lightly against the side of his holster, so if need should arise he could slide the hand upward and draw his pistol in one fluid motion.
“We’ll make like we’re riding to town,” Pa said. “Head to the back horse trail, in case we’re being watched. Then once we’re in the woods, we’ll cut north and up the ridge, and find last night’s camp site.”
At the far edge of the meadow, the horse trail began. It cut through the forest that covered the low ridges and hills between the ranch house and McCabe Gap, coming out behind Hunter’s.
Once they were in the forest, with tall pines as straight as arrows closing in on them, Josh fell in behind Pa, assuming single file. He did so without being told.
Pa swung his horse to the right, Josh following, and they began the gradual ascent that would take them to the ridge where the campfire had been the night before. Pa slid his Sharps from the saddle boot and rode with it across the pommel. Josh slid free his Winchester and did the same.
The woods were now thick, pine trees no more than fifteen feet apart. These woods were different than those Pa had roamed as a boy in the hills of western Pennsylvania. Though Josh had never been east of the Missouri, Pa had described the forests of the east, with maples and oaks and alders dropping leaves that grew dry and crunched underfoot, and that were tangled with underbrush you could never get a horse through. However, in these ridges and hills, the trees were mostly ponderosa pines and Douglas firs, some ranging more than fifty feet in height. There was little underbrush, and the forest floor consisted of brown, dry pine needles. This type of forest had its advantages, as Pa and Josh were now enjoying. They were riding their horses unencumbered up the slope, with
iron shod hooves striking the pine needle laden earth almost silently.
When the slope leveled off, Pa swung from the saddle and reached into his saddle bags for his moccasins. Long, buckskin boots with soft soles, sewn together with rawhide strips. He had made them himself, based on the footwear the Shoshone used. His first pair had been given him by a war chief when he and Zack Johnson and Uncle Josiah had first wintered in this valley, nearly twenty years earlier.
Pa pulled off his riding boots, which took a moment because most cowhands preferred such boots to be skin-tight, clinging to the foot like they had been glued in place. Then he pulled on his moccasin boots, tying each with a rawhide thong just below the knee.
“I’m going to go cut for sign afoot,” he said. “Stay with the horses.”
Josh gave a nod. You can travel faster on a horse, but right now, secrecy was more important than speed. Pa would be able to move practically unobserved afoot.
Moving as silently as wind whispering through a pine bough, Pa slipped into the trees and was soon gone from sight. He could move through the wilderness as well as any Indian Josh had ever seen. Josh sometimes felt Pa was more at home in the wilderness than anywhere else. Josh thought, if things had been different and Pa had never met Ma, he might have been content to find a stretch of land deep in the mountains, far from any trace of civilization, and build himself a cabin and simply live out his days there.
Josh swung out of his saddle, keeping his Winchester in one hand. He felt he was too much of a target sitting up on his horse.
He waited for Pa. A gust of wind picked up, causing some pine boughs to sway a bit, then it died away. From somewhere off in the trees, a crow called out. Josh removed a canteen, took a sip, and he waited.
Sudden movement from off to his left caught his eye. It was Pa, silently materializing from the woods.
“I found a trail,” he said. “Lots of riders. Looks like it might have been made this morning.”
He and Josh mounted up, and Josh followed Pa for a couple hundred yards along the ridge until they came to the tracks. Then they back-trailed until they found the previous night’s camp. The blackened remains of what had been a huge fire. Empty cans of beans. The stubs of cigars and cigarettes. A couple empty whiskey bottles.
The Long Trail (The McCabes Book 1) Page 16