Nick Stolter

by Lee Anne Wonnacott

  His heart ached. She would have been smiling with her pretty white teeth and sparkling eyes. He had brought home the money that they had needed, but it was a bittersweet victory. His favorite memory was watching her sitting on the riverbank watching her long hair blow around in the wind. He wanted to run his craggy, rough hands over the soft skin and hold her so tight she couldn’t breathe. He’d never have that again.

  It was a clear blue sky overhead. Not a cloud anywhere from horizon to horizon. The smell of grass and horses was everywhere. Around him in the landscape are barrel cactus with spiky orange petals with yellow centers alive with buzzing bees.

  The ground was still damp from the morning dew and the first bees hummed amongst the grass. A gentle gust of wind lifted the low hanging branches to dip and dance across the dirt.

  ###

  “This is Buckhorn. Another old time west town that started up with a boom along a road and then died out when folks went other places.” Southcott gestured to three empty buildings in the distance built up on a rise on the other side of the road.

  At the lean-to, Beulah heated up beef, corn and biscuits. Southcott made coffee. As they ate, they watched the horses graze near the creek.

  “It must be ten years ago now. There was still one man in a little store up there. The stage sometimes stopped if they were on time. Most times they went right on by. One of the freighters stopped in at my place and said that the man was gone. I can’t remember his name now, for some reason.” Southcott’s voice had a catch in it. He cleared his throat.

  The gray and purple wash crept up the hill. Birds roosted in the old trees, rustling the leaves as they got comfortable for the night.

  His watch showed 7:30. Stolter heard the horses whinnying in a panic and he ran into the tall grass to see what was happening. He was in time to see them all run west out past the end of the valley and disappear into the trees. Southcott pulled on his boots and walked out into the grass with Stolter. The only horse left if the big Mexican mustang.

  “You hear anything?” Behind them the simmering fire crackled and popped.

  Stolter shook his head. “No. Nothing.”

  “I don’t smell anything unusual. They can smell big cats, you know.” Southcott peered out into the darkness.

  Stolter asked, “Why didn’t that mustang run if it was a big cat?”

  With a gruff laugh, Southcott said, “Because he is a mustang. They don’t run if they think they can win the fight. And my money would be on that horse.”

  Stolter took a step towards the mustang who still stared at the men. “I must be losing my mind. I want to ask that horse what he saw.” Beulah started to laugh.

  Southcott called out, “He ain’t hurt, is he?”

  “No. I don’t think so.” Southcott turned and walked back to the fire. He piled on three more chunks of wood.

  After Stolter had laid back down in his blanket, he put his hands behind his head and stared up at the night sky. He had run cattle horses and stages all through Texas, Arizona, Nebraska and Wyoming. He’d been from the Gulf to the Pacific Ocean. He could remember the times when everything he owned was tied on his saddle. He never would go back to that solitary, bitter life. He would go home, raise the kids, and send them to school like those little Mexican kids had done. He would breed more stock and just continue on.

  Once when he woke up, he saw the fire had burned down to embers and Southcott was gone from his blankets. The next time Stolter woke it sounded like thousands of crickets had decided to sing. Twice more, the old lean-to creaked and groaned in the breeze bringing Stolter up out of a sound sleep.

  ###

  They had covered almost twelve miles the following day. It had taken almost an hour to find all the horses and get them on the road, but they had got them moving. Southcott gestured to the wide turnoff in between a couple of old cottonwoods. “That’s Winston Butte.”

  About twenty yards into the narrow trail, the hammerhead balked with a snort, rearing and swung around whinnying. Southcott hung on and shouted to calm his horse but to no use.

  Stolter was shocked to feel his roan dance sideways fighting the bit. He looked up to see the big hammerhead bolt back to the road. There was a panic in the eyes of the herd as they whirled and headed back out.

  Southcott shouted, “They won’t let us camp there.” He pointed to the west. “We’ll go on down about another quarter mile on the left. There’s water there and should be grass.”

  The elder man reined the hammerhead over hard and kicked him into a run into the fading light. Stolter watched the horses shake and then one by one trot after the hammerhead.

  “Come on, Nick. Griff’s got a good story to tell you about this place,” Beulah said with a waving hand.

  After another couple hundred yards west, Southcott pulled them into a grassy area bordering a small creek. On the west side there was a dirt clearing with an old, wide alder pole bench. Stolter unsaddled his horse and started to rub him down with the old shirt but the roan backed away and headed out to the water. The horseman frowned with consternation on his face.

  Stolter took in a deep breath. “I smell saltwater. How can that be? We aren’t anywhere near the ocean.”

  Beulah gestured to the south. “At the end of the pasture, there is a big salt marsh. In the fall it’s thick with ducks going south. These hills get snow in the winters. The run off from the melting snow feed the rivers and lakes around here. You’ll see in the morning before we leave. It’s a beautiful place. Purple, red and orange wildflowers were just starting to pop up through the grass. The edge of the marsh is thick with cattails.”

  Stolter asked, “What is this place?”

  “Winston Butte.” Southcott walked by with a chunk of wood for the fire.

  “Why did your hammerhead act up back there?” Stolter followed him.

  “I don’t know for sure. On old time stage driver told me that they had to put down two horses in that clearing. They’d been hurt somehow. They ended up shooting them. That was two years ago. That’s pretty much all I know about it,” Southcott held his belly rubbing against the bandage.

  Stolter sat down and pulled off his boots. His own wounds had been a dull ache for miles. Southcott studied his pocket watch. “We’re thirty miles out of my place. I wanna make ten more miles today by dark. That’ll give us a twenty mile run tomorrow with two stops.” Stolter nodded.

  “Here’s the thing. I want to make that run to my ranch in the dark. I don’t need the local Nosy-Nancie’s ogling your herd.” Southcott picked up a long twig and drew a circle in the dirt. He dragged the line west about a foot and made an ‘X’ south of it.

  “This is Benton House right here. Well, across the road and up that slope it is. Just before we get to the south bend of the river, we’ll stop and let the animals get to water. This time of year there should be enough foliage on the trees to screen us from the house. We’ll take ‘em on down the river about two miles and then cut back up onto the road.”

  He dragged another line about a foot farther west. “This spot right here.” Southcott drew a square. “It’s called Gold Forks. There is an old camp in there and if the water isn’t too high, they can get over to the other side where there is grass.”

  Just then three horses whinnied. All three of them went silent and stood up to look at the animals. Stolter whispered to Beulah, “Do you see the mustang?” The woman went up on her toes and craned her neck to look. She shook her head.

  Southcott tucked his shirt in and checked his revolver. “They’re looking at something in the trees. I bet that mustang is challenging whatever is there. We best go take a look.”

  Beulah ran for her rifle, Stolter drew the Colt and walked over alongside Southcott. Together and with care, they moved into the grass and headed for the mustang who was tossing his head. Stolter watched where the mustang looked and peered into the trees. Leaves rustled in the wind. Limbs raised and lowered in the light breeze.

  It was a flicker of gray again
st green. Southcott pulled his revolver and held it at his side. Beulah had gasped and went down on one knee aiming the rifle. The mustang pawed the ground and snorted.

  Two wolves, with fangs bared and white foaming mouths charged down off the hillside and into the grass. Shaggy coated gray and brown leaping with each stride. The mustang reared and whinnied.

  Beulah shot and the brown wolf fell. Southcott fired once. The gray wolf came on in a charge without fear. Stolter brought up his Colt and fired. The gray wolf fell twenty feet from them. Southcott watched the trees. He took several steps to the left and stopped to watch. Beulah shook her head and stood up. With her boot, she pushed the muzzle of the gray to the side.

  “Rabid. They were sick, out of their minds. Folks say that a rabid dog will attack anything. Buffalo. People.” Southcott nodded.

  “We’ll have to burn them so no other animals get the sickness. Nick, help me drag them over to that rocky ground. Beulah, start gathering up wood and we’ll get them burned.” Southcott’s face held a disgusted look.

  “Winston Butte? Remind me to never stop here again.” Stolter put on his gloves and gripped the hind leg and dragged the dead gray over to rocks.

  “Well, I’ve lost my appetite. I’ll eat next time we stop.” Beulah dropped a couple of dry branches on the pile.

  Stolter agreed. “I’d just as soon move a couple miles on before camping for the night. Griff, anywhere else close by we can settle in for the night?” Southcott nodded.

  “Three, maybe five miles more there is an old quarry. Slate quarry. It is used a lot by the Mexicans that come through. It’s quiet and sheltered so we should be alright there.”

  They took the next hour and moved the herd on west to the deserted overgrown quarry. The chiseled cuts could be seen going up fifty feet against the cliffs. Sounds bounced off the hard face. Four small waterfalls trickled in a shower down the cold rock. Beulah took the opportunity to wash up before supper.

  Stolter piled leaves and small twigs into a pile and laid out his bedroll. He couldn’t get warm and tossed and turned to find comfort. After an hour, he got up and fetched the heavy saddle blanket. There was a comforting smell of horse as he crawled underneath it and the rough, green wool. His fingers massages over the sore wounds in the darkness. As he closed his eyes, it was the deep ache in his heart that could not be soothed.

  ###

  A hand shook his shoulder in the dim light. Stolter groaned with his muscles protesting the movement. When he sat up, he saw Beulah had put the tin pot onto the small fire for coffee. He rubbed his eyes and grimaced as he flexed his shoulders. Half an hour later they broke camp and saddled their horses.

  South gathered his reins. “Come on, let’s make a run for home. It’s nine miles and we ain’t stoppin’ so hang on and ride.” His voice was low and quiet. Stolter watched as Beulah climbed up on her mount.

  Stolter leaned closer to Southcott. “When you hit the road, pause a minute and whistle three times so the horses can find you up there. At fifty yards down the road, whistle again so they can get their bearings. I’ll keep pushing them once I get to the top. They’ll follow you so head for home,” Southcott nodded.

  The big hammerhead scrambled up the loose incline struggling to get a foothold up the path. All three paints followed him, slipping and sliding to get up the hill. The yearlings shied from trying to get up the hill and had to get a running start to get out. The heavier gray mare flung dirt and gravel as she struggled up the hill but made it out. Stolter was the last to urge his roan to go up the narrow path. By the time he got to the top, he had to squint to make out the gray mare running away in the dark.

  Down a hard packed road that curved in and around trees they rode. In the faint moonlight, Stolter could see Beulah hunched over the neck of her horse riding fast. She followed a galloping single file line of moving animals. They came out on a broad mesa and the road went straight for over a mile. At the fork in the road, the horses veered left and galloped down into a grassy valley where Stolter could make out the outlines of a fence and a tall barn in the dark distance.

  “Nick, ride back to the fence and drag the gate across and loop the ropes over both ends. I don’t want these horses wandering off in the night,” Southcott called out. Nick waved and trotted about two hundred yards back to where the four rail fence came up to the road. There was a lodge pole gate leaning up against the fence and some grass had started to grow up around it. Stolter kicked back the grass and dragged the gate across the road. Two braided rope loops hung of the ends and he secured the gate to the fence.

  When Stolter got back to the barn, there were two lanterns lit and Beulah had unsaddled the white stockings mare. The hammerhead and buckskin were unsaddled and all three horses had the lather rubbed off them and turned out onto pasture. They closed up the barn and walked over to the ranch house where another lantern had been lit.

  Southcott showed Stolter into a bedroom on the north side of the house. An exhausted man shed his clothes and fell onto the mattress to sleep.

  ###

  The next morning outside the gray sky threatened rain. Southcott sat back in the old leather chair with a steaming cup of coffee and grimaced.

  “I haven’t always been so easy going and amiable.” He winked a flirty eye at Beulah who smirked back to him.

  “Many years back I had a partner in my business. Loren MacDonald. We called him Mac, for short. Together we supplied teams of horses for the stagecoaches at several stops between Phoenix, Tucson and Los Angeles.” He took a sip. Beulah sat down on the cloth sofa near him and tucked her feet up underneath herself.

  “Now Mac liked drinking whiskey, playing cards and entertaining the ladies. Pretty much like any other man does. He used to come back from one of his trips with stories enough for a week. Some of them were pretty outlandish and I sort of doubted that he’d done some of those things.” Stolter laughed and sipped from his mug of coffee.

  “On the last trip he made, Mac came home pretty busted up. Bandages around his ribs, arm in a sling. He’d been beaten badly. I never did find out who he got mixed up with but I guess they tried to kill him.”

  Stolter set his cup down on the small wood table and leaned his forearms onto his legs. “Musta have been a deal gone bad.” Southcott stretched out both legs and nodded with a slow understanding.

  “Mac told me he needed to get out of town for a while. His father had built small cabin up at Alton Camp and he was headed up there until he healed up. We’ve all been in jams before and friends have helped me out so it was a friend helping a friend.” Southcott examined his fingers for a moment.

  “I bundled up a week of food, some whiskey and his clothes onto a packhorse. He rode out of here in the middle of the night headed for Alton Camp,” said Southcott as he shrugged.

  “It was time for him to drop out of anyone’s sight for a while. I’ve known folks who decided to disappear.” Stolter gestured to the ceiling.

  Southcott clucked his tongue and looked at the floor. “I went into Tucson and looked up Steve Rossiter. He was pretty reliable for working hard, getting paid and then drinking every dime. I had him help me run teams west and bring back other horses that needed rest. Nine days later, I paid him wages and he headed back to Tucson.”

  Beulah got up and brought the coffee to fill the cups. She slid a small plate of berry cobbler onto the table for each of them.

  Southcott continued. “I figured that nine days would have been plenty. Nobody came around looking for him. Nothing unusual happened. He still wasn’t back yet. So I saddled up and walked my horse up to Alton Camp. It’s southwest of here about nine miles up in the hills. It’s an old gold miner camp.”

  Outside a flash of lightning lit up the porch and seconds later came the rumble of thunder. Beulah stepped to the window and looked out into the darkening sky. “Looks like a storm rolling in. We best get things put away and buttoned down.” She ran up the stairs.

  Stolter and Southcott headed out to the corral
to stow the riding gear into the barn. They carried in the barrels, chairs, and the workbench and then swung the heavy wood doors closed and put in the cross brace. The first drops splattered on the ground as they trotted up onto the broad, deep veranda.

  Southcott stepped to the wash basin on the corner near the kitchen and began to wash up. “I got up to the camp and I smelled burning wood. I thought maybe he’d been cooking outside, but it wasn’t a food cooking smell. When I got in sight, the cabin was burned out.”

  Stolter stood with his mouth open. “He get drunk and it burned down around him while he was passed out?”

  Southcott shook his head as he rinsed off his soapy hands. As he dried them on a small, white towel he stepped back from the basin and gestured for Stolter to go ahead.

  “It took me a couple of hours to sift through the burned timbers and destroyed things. His body wasn’t there. The saddle to his horse was still up on the stand under the lean-to at the corral. Both his horse and the pack horse were out grazing, most likely.” Stolter took the towel and dried his hands. They walked back into the house and closed the door buffeted by a gust of wind.

  “That was when I got to thinking about where he could be. It’s a rocky, hilly ground and not a lot of flat around there. The grass starts up on the slope of the hill and runs down over a pasture area and then it sort of falls off a ridge into a ravine. I knelt down on the edge and looked over into the rocks below. I didn’t see any body down there.”

  “You were thinking that he stumbled over the edge?” Southcott nodded.

  “It was about a mile down a path only a spry goat could walk so I was avoiding it. I walked out to the other end of the pasture and found both horses grazing in a patch of clover. I was about to turn around and head back to the burned cabin when I noticed a mound of dirt.” South glanced to Stolter and nodded.

  “It was a grave. No marker or anything. Fresh, maybe a couple of days. I figured it was him so I piled a good layer of rocks on top of the dirt and used a leather strap to fashion a cross for him.” Southcott took a bite of the cobbler and wiped his face on the bandanna.