Buffalo Summer

by Nadia Nichols

  “This is where they used to work on the cattle in the spring. The branding, castrating, vaccinating, deworming, ear notching,” he said. “We’ll probably use this area for the buffalo, too, once we strengthen the fences. This high valley is a natural place to do the work, because once we’re done we can turn them out and they’ll already be at summer pasture. You can see how the land lies, and where the good graze is. That pass between those mountains to the east of us leads to more high meadows just like this. Good grass and water. Once in a while a few head will stray over Dead Woman Pass, way up on the shoulder of Montana Mountain, but for the most part they stick around on this side of the range. They have all they need right here.”

  He glanced around at the circle of faces, looking for some response, some flicker of interest. Nothing. “You boys won’t be working with cattle because there aren’t many left. All the Herefords and short-horns were sold off a year ago. There aren’t many longhorns, maybe twenty head, all told. Sometimes a whole summer’ll go by and you won’t catch sight of a single one, or so my ranch manager says. They’re as wild as deer, and just as wily.”

  “Why keep them?” Jimmy said. “Why not eat them or sell them off?”

  Caleb plucked a stem of grass and chewed on it for a moment. “Well, I’m told that their meat is tougher than hell. But they’re here because Jessie Weaver wanted them to stay on the land, and I agreed to that.”

  “Who’s Jessie?”

  “You’ll meet her in a few months, maybe. She’s away for the summer, finishing up her veterinary degree, but she grew up here. The Bow and Arrow was in her family for generations, up until this past October when she sold it to me. She’s marrying Guthrie Sloane, my ranch manager, this September—”

  “You call it the Bow and Arrow,” the one called Roon interrupted, “but it says Weaver on the ranch sign.”

  Caleb threw the grass stem to the ground. “The name Weaver was carved into that cedar plank over a hundred years ago because a hundred years ago you wouldn’t hang a sign that said Bow and Arrow, not when you were a half-breed ranch owner and your neighbors were all old Indian fighters.”

  “What about now?”

  “Things are a little different now, and before the summer’s over there’ll be a new sign that tells it like it is.”

  The sun was setting, the shadows were long and blue, and a golden wash of color swept over the meadow. The sky to the east was a deepening violet and to the west the mountain peaks snagged at salmon-pink clouds. Already there was a chill in the air as the cold sank back down into the valleys from the higher climbs. “Well, boys,” Caleb said. “It’s getting late and it’s a slow crawl back to the ranch. Get back aboard and we’ll haul on home and see what Ramalda and Pony are cooking up for supper.”

  “Supper?” Jimmy said, brightening. “You mean we get to eat again?”

  “Three square meals a day. That’s the deal. You work, you eat.”

  Jimmy climbed into the cab beside him while the others piled into the open bed. “Well then, I’m for working,” he said as Caleb put the truck in gear. “I’m for working real hard. Hold on up there, Mr. McCutcheon, and let me get that gate for you.”

  BADGER SAT on the porch bench, his shoulders slouched against the wall, his worn, scuffed boots stretched out in front of him, legs crossed at the ankles. His hat was pulled down almost over his eyes and he was sleeping, or he thought he was. In his dreams he was young again, riding a pale horse called Moon across the lower pasture down near the creek and the old homestead cabin. He caught a whiff of wood smoke from the cabin’s big stone chimney and he could see Jessie’s father standing on the porch, pulling on his pipe and studying something across the creek. Badger drew old Moon in and shaded his eyes against the westering sun, following his boss’s gaze.

  By God, it was a buffalo silhouetted against the fiery Rocky Mountain sunset. A big honest-to-God bull buffalo! “Well, what do you know about that?” he said to Moon. “There ain’t been a buff on this land for a century or better.”

  The smoke smelled of cedar. Badger filled his lungs with the sweet fragrance and watched the buffalo. He folded his hands across his stomach, adjusted his rump on the bench, eased his shoulders against the rounded logs of the cabin’s west wall, and then opened his eyes a little wider, wondering with a little jolt what had happened to Moon and Jessie’s father. Badger realized he was napping on Caleb McCutcheon’s cabin porch. The dream had left him, but the buffalo was still there, standing across the creek from the log cabin, watching with an almost haughty and proprietary grandeur. Badger sat up. He swallowed and rubbed his hand over his eyes, removed his battered hat and ran his fingers through his thin white hair.

  “Damn,” he said, clearing his throat. He reached into his vest pocket for a foil packet of tobacco and stuffed a big wad of it in his mouth, working it around to his left cheek. “I may be gettin’ old and senile,” he muttered to himself, “but that there’s a buffalo I’m lookin’ at, sure as shootin’. What’s the old bull doing way down here?”

  He heard the approach of a pickup truck behind the cabin and the slam of the cab’s door. Caleb McCutcheon rounded the corner of the cabin and headed for the porch steps carrying a paper bag. He grinned when he spotted Badger sitting there. “You hiding out?” he said, climbing the steps.

  “Yep,” Badger said. “That ranch house up yonder is way too crowded for an old coot like me. But look’ it over there and feast your eyes on that!” He nodded toward the big buffalo. McCutcheon swung on heel and froze, staring in disbelief.

  “By God, a hundred more yards and that bastard’ll be on my porch!”

  “He won’t cross that creek.”

  “Oh? Well, I’d like to believe that, but he’s crossed the Silver and east branch of the Snowy all in less than a week, and just this morning he was way the hell up on the mountain hanging with the rest of them. He’s covered a good five miles since then. This little ribbon of water isn’t going to slow him down. What do you suppose he wants?”

  Badger levered himself off the bench and walked over to the corner of the porch railing, leaned his hip into it, and spat over the edge. “Maybe he’s tired of hangin’ around all them sexy buffalo cows,” he said, wiping his chin.

  “Well, if that’s the case, I bought myself a bum bull. He’s supposed to be romancing those cows in another month or so.” Caleb McCutcheon shook his head with a disgusted sigh. “To hell with him. After spending the past few hours trying to entertain five boys, right now I’m more interested in having a drink. I just drove all the way to town to pick this bottle up and hide out here on my porch for a little while before going up for supper. Care to join me?”

  “Be my pleasure,” Badger said.

  A few moments later they were ensconced side to shoulder on the wall bench, watching the buffalo. The daylight waned as they sipped smooth scotch whiskey and enjoyed the silence of the early-summer evening. McCutcheon was halfway through his drink and relaxing more by the moment. “Were they all up there at the ranch house?” he said.

  “Well, I counted five boys and one little woman. Guthrie was there, too, lookin’ mighty peaked, but just before I snuck off I seen that Ramalda was pouring a big slug of her medicinal brandy into his coffee. Now, boss, I got to warn you, just in case you don’t know,” Badger said, his gravelly voice ominous. “She speaks Spanish.”

  “Pony?”

  Badger nodded, taking another sip. “Yep. She and Ramalda were chattering away like two jaybirds in that kitchen. Laughin’ and everything!”

  “Ramalda was laughing?”

  “Yep.” Badger looked grim. He took another sip. “Laughin’.”

  “What about the boys?”

  “Them boys is downright determined not to show anything of themselves.”

  “Mmm.” Caleb raised his glass, gazing at the darkening bulk of the big bull standing broadside to them across the creek. “I’ve been thinking about those kids. There isn’t really anything for them to do here, once the w
orking day is done. I mean, when supper is over, what then? It seems to me they’re going to need something.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like maybe a television.”

  Badger snorted. “That jabber box was the ruination of this nation’s youth, and if them boys put in a hard day’s work like you seem to think they will, all they’ll be needin’ after supper is a mattress to flop onto and about eight hours of solid shut-eye.”

  “But they could watch things if we had a television.”

  “What kind of things? The news? You ever seen anything good on the news?”

  “Movies, then.”

  “Them movies they show are pure violence! Trust me. Those kids don’t need to be learnin’ that stuff.”

  Caleb took another sip of whiskey. “There are a lot of good movies out there that aren’t mindless or violent. I could buy a few and they could watch them once in a while, for a special treat.”

  “Just what the hell would you power that useless thing with?”

  “The same setup we use for the water pump in the bathroom and the computer we enter all the ranch data into,” McCutcheon said. “Guthrie rigged it up. Same as he did in his own cabin. Two seventy-five-watt solar panels, four six-volt batteries, a cheap inverter. It works great and it would easily power one of those TV/VCR combos for a couple hours a week.”

  Badger shook his head. “Maybe, but a movie ain’t gonna make ’em happy if they don’t want to be here.”

  The buffalo shook his head suddenly, and Caleb leaned forward, his keen eyes narrowing. “True. But I want this thing to work. I want them to like it here.” He watched as the bull took two steps and then lowered his massive head to graze. “I want them to stay,” he said with conviction.

  Badger drained the last of his glass and felt the whiskey burn deep. “Well, boss, you keep tellin’ yourself that and you might just come to believe it. Meantime, you best finish off your drink. It’ll give you the courage to face that silent tribe at supper. I don’t know about you, but I ain’t lookin’ forward to it one little bit, much as I admire Ramalda’s cookin’.”

  “Maybe we have time for another,” Caleb said, lifting the bottle from the floor beside him with the expression of a condemned man.

  Badger examined his glass. “That ain’t the worst offer I ever had,” he said, holding it out for a refill. “No point rushin’ into things.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  PONY WAS STANDING at the kitchen counter when he came into the room, just as Ramalda was running through yet another string of heated rants about Caleb McCutcheon always being late, always late! And then quite suddenly the tall lean broad-shouldered rancher was there, and just as suddenly Pony felt all confused inside, turning quickly back to the task she had set herself—sliding the hot biscuits out of the pan and into a deep basket lined with a clean kitchen towel.

  The boys were already seated at the table, washed and silent, watching this next culinary performance with a kind of suspicious anticipation. McCutcheon stopped just inside the kitchen door and glanced around the room, nodding almost imperceptibly when his eyes met hers, and then again at Guthrie Sloane, who stood in the back hallway as if hiding from the moment. “Sorry we’re late,” Caleb said to Ramalda, removing his hat as if he were in the presence of royalty. “It’s my fault. I hope you aren’t too angry.”

  Ramalda paused in mid-waddle from stove to sink, holding a pot with something delicious-smelling in it. “Lavate las manos!” she said, nodding her head curtly toward the sink and glaring at them. She wrinkled her nose as if smelling something bad. “Hueles a vaca. You wash!”

  “Yes, ma’am.” McCutcheon nodded humbly. He and Badger hung their hats on pegs beside the door and made for the sink, standing politely to one side until Ramalda had finished with it.

  Pony had discovered that beneath that gruff and scowling exterior, Ramalda had an exceptionally soft heart. From speaking with her during supper preparations, Pony had also learned that the Mexican woman had worked for Jessie Weaver’s family back in the ranch’s glory days, before the fall of cattle prices, before Jessie’s father had gotten cancer. Ramalda had been like a mother to Jessie, whose own mother had died when she was just a child. When hard times had come to the ranch, both Ramalda and her cowboy husband, Drew Long, had been laid off, and Ramalda had confided that it had been a kind of miracle when Caleb McCutcheon had bought the ranch and hired her back—at Jessie’s prompting—shortly after Drew’s death.

  Having washed up, both McCutcheon and Badger approached the table, where they stood awkwardly for a few moments before claiming chairs together at one end of the table. Guthrie joined them, and the three sat down and rested their elbows on the table, glancing around the room. McCutcheon’s eyes touched hers again briefly and Pony felt her cheeks warm. He cleared his throat.

  “That bull buffalo is standing right across the creek from my cabin,” he said, reaching for the coffeepot that Ramalda had plunked in the center of the table and filling his cup. He did the same for Guthrie and Badger.

  “I’ll be damned. Guess he traveled some today, didn’t he?” Guthrie said, raising his cup for a swallow. “Maybe in the morning he’ll be standing on your porch, lookin’ in the window.”

  “That big buff’s like a mountain on hooves,” Badger said. “I’ve never seen any bigger. Kind of spooky, if you ask me. I’ll take beef cattle any day.”

  “That’s because you don’t know what from wherefore,” Guthrie said. “Buffalo are the wave of the future. The meat is healthier, tastier, and since when could you sell a beef cow’s skull and hide for nearly a thousand dollars?”

  “Since when could you throw a rope around a buffalo and slap your brand on it?” Badger challenged, adding three heaping spoonfuls of sugar to his coffee.

  “Speaking of which,” McCutcheon interrupted, “Badger, weren’t you and Charlie supposed to give me a roping lesson yesterday? Charlie mentioned something about it when I ran into him at the Longhorn Cafe.”

  Badger’s eyebrows raised and he rubbed his whiskery chin. “That’s the first I heard of it.” He shook his head in disgust. “Charlie’s a senile old coot.”

  Pony helped Ramalda with the final preparations while listening to the conversation, and the boys’ heads turned solemnly from one speaker to another as if watching a tennis match.

  Guthrie reached for the coffeepot. “Charlie and Badger can’t throw a rope anyhow,” he said, topping off his mug. “Between the two of them, I doubt they could rope a stump and tie it to a tree. Why’d you want to take lessons from them?”

  “I was throwin’ a rope long before you hit the ground, son,” Badger said, adding another spoonful of sugar to his cup. “And I expect I can still throw one better’n you.”

  “Maybe we should have us a rope-throwing contest after supper,” Guthrie said. “I could use a little extra pocket money betting on a sure thing like that.”

  Badger laid down his spoon, straightened his spine and smoothed his mustache. “Son, there’s no such thing as a sure thing, but if you want to run on the rope, go right ahead. To my way of thinkin’, you’d be better off keeping your money in your pocket. You’re going to need all the cash you can get to pay for this big wedding of yours that your sister Bernie’s plannin’.”

  Guthrie sipped his coffee. “Why, Badger, I thought you was plannin’ to foot the bill. You’re always talkin’ about how Jessie’s been just like a granddaughter to you.”

  “That she is,” Badger said, his voice gruff but his expression softening. “Maybe we’d both best be saving our money.”

  McCutcheon leaned back in his chair. “I guess this means I’m never going to get my roping lesson.”

  Pony set the basket of golden biscuits on the table, but when Jimmy immediately reached for one she said, “Wait.” She helped Ramalda bring the rest of the food, and then took a chair between Jimmy and Roon. Ramalda went back to the sink and began fussing with the dirty pots and pans. Badger reached for a biscuit. “Wait,” P
ony said again, and Badger drew his hand back as if he’d been slapped. Pony folded her hands in front of her. “We must wait.”

  The boys sat silently. McCutcheon and Guthrie exchanged a questioning glance while Ramalda scrubbed noisily away at the pots in the kitchen sink. The wait stretched out for several long minutes and finally Badger cleared his throat. “Now, maybe I’m practicing rude behavior here, ma’am, but just what the devil are we waiting for?” he said, giving her a reproachful look. “Are you about to say grace?”

  Pony’s clasped hands tightened. “It is impolite to begin eating before everyone is seated.”

  Badger snorted. “Hell’s bells, Ramalda never sits with us. We’ll all starve if we wait for her. She eats in her own place, at her own time.”

  Pony looked at McCutcheon with a surge of indignation. “You mean that she is not allowed to eat with you?”

  His face flushed. “She’s more than welcome, but she won’t. Maybe you can convince her to, but I can’t. Believe me, I’ve tried.”

  She looked behind her to where the woman worked at the sink. “Ramalda, sientate, y come con nosotros.” Ramalda swung her bulk about and scowled, raised a dripping hand holding a scouring pad and shook her head.

  “No. Comaselos ustedes ahora que están caliente.”

  Pony faced front again, her cheeks flushing with embarrassment. “She says for us to eat while the food is hot.”

  “There now, you see?” Badger said. “She’s an old-time camp cookie, Ramalda is. She knows full well that us cowboys is nothin’ more than a big appetite ridin’ a horse.” He reached for the basket of biscuits and helped himself, handing the basket to his left, and did the same with the platter of two plump roasting chickens. A spicy dish made of cornmeal with peppers and onions followed, and finally, the big pitcher of milk. For a while there was only the noise of cutlery scraping against plates as the boys dug in and the men followed suit. Pony glanced up as Ramalda plunked a big cast-iron pot of spiced beef and beans onto the table and replenished the biscuits and the milk. She tried to eat but couldn’t, her nerves were that rattled. But it didn’t matter. The noon meal had been sufficient to last her several days.