Hard Country (24 page)

“That’s where they’re headed,” Patrick said, his head bent low, reading the trail.

“Reckon so,” Cal said.

Patrick jigged his horse and loped ahead under a brilliant, cloudless sky. During the winter, he’d sprouted to five-ten, gained muscle, and filled out in the chest. His square shoulders, blue eyes, thick eyebrows, and long legs reminded Cal of John Kerney. From a distance, he looked like a fully grown man. Only up close did his boyish features give him away as a fifteen-year-old.

Like his pa, Patrick was quiet by nature, but he lacked John Kerney’s sense of humor. Most found him standoffish; others thought him downright disagreeable. Either way, it didn’t seem to matter much to the lad.

Cal smiled at Patrick’s eagerness to raise the Rhodes homestead. The lad loved to read, and Colonel Rhodes had shelves of books that he let Patrick borrow two at a time. Reading by lamplight at night, Patrick raced through tomes by Dickens, Scott, Cooper, Longfellow, Byron, and the like. When he was done with the books, Cal would read them. Sometimes, they read aloud to each other.

They entered the mouth of the canyon, rounded a curve, and slowed to a stop when they spotted smoke rising from the cabin chimney. Colonel Rhodes, his wife, Julia, and their two younger children, Helen and Clarence, had spent the winter in Mesilla and weren’t due back at the homestead until summer.

“Trouble?” Patrick asked. During the Rhodes’s absence, the remote two-room cabin had become a convenient way station for rustlers and outlaws looking to slip the law. They had come upon some tough hombres in the past.

“Maybe,” Cal said as he scanned the horse shelter, the cowshed, and the plot of fenced pasture close to the spring in the narrow canyon. The small herd of cows they’d tracked milled around the spring, and a saddled horse lazed in the pasture, ready to make tracks for his rider at a moment’s notice. A fresh, uncured cowhide draped over a cedar rail. Not signs of someone with a law-abiding nature.

But it wasn’t always easy to tell fine, upstanding citizens from hardened
pistoleros
. It was common practice on the open range to butcher an unbranded stray or a maverick for beef. A broke, hungry cowboy without a job didn’t think twice about it. Mavericking went on all the time during brandings and roundups, and most ranchers bragged about never eating their own beef at the table. But with the drought taking its toll and leaving so many dead cattle on the range, every cow mattered.

“Let’s act neighborly so as not to rile anyone inside,” Cal cautioned as they approached.

They stopped well short of the cabin, and Cal called out to announce their presence. Quickly the cabin door opened and a bowlegged, bearded, one-eyed cowboy with a gap between his two front teeth and a six-gun low on his hip stepped out.

Cal recognized him instantly. “Howdy, Bud.”

“Is that you, Cal?” Bud McPherson asked, squinting with his one good eye.

“I reckon,” Cal replied. “It’s been a long time. I heard you were up Montana way.”

“Drifted back sometime ago,” McPherson replied, giving Patrick a quick, wary glance. “Who’s your pard?”

“This here lad is Pat,” Cal said.

Being called a lad didn’t sit well with Patrick, and he shot Cal a prickly look before touching the brim of his hat in a greeting.

“Those are our cows yonder at the spring,” Cal added, ignoring Patrick’s sulkiness. “We rode sign to find them. We’ll collect them and be on our way.”

McPherson relaxed a bit. “You turned to ranching?”

Cal shrugged. “Keeps the law from worrying over me.”

McPherson chuckled. “Climb down and have some coffee. I’m just camped here for a few days. Found the place empty.”

“I could use a cup,” Cal said, turning to Patrick. “Start those cows up range. I’ll be along shortly.”

Patrick balked. “I need books.”

“Not this time,” Cal replied sternly as he swung out of the saddle. “Get those cows moving so we can raise the ranch pasture by sundown.”

Patrick stared hard at Cal before turning his pony and trotting away.

“Lad’s a book reader, is he?” McPherson said as he stepped inside the cabin.

“That he is,” Cal said.

“Well, I ain’t ever seen so many books in a homesteader’s cabin before,” McPherson said as he walked to the big stone fireplace and reached for the coffeepot. “Those folks must plumb not have enough to do.”

“The owner is an educated man,” Cal said, looking around. Everything seemed to be in its place: the tall bookshelf, the piano, the pots by the hearth, the furniture the colonel had made himself. There were some dirty dishes on the table and some clothes soaking in a pot of water, but Bud hadn’t caused any damage to the place as far as Cal could see.

McPherson handed Cal a tin cup, filled it with coffee, and poured one for himself. “Sit a spell,” he said as he kicked a chair back from the table.

Cal pulled up a chair across from McPherson.

“Is that your boy riding with you?” Bud asked.

Cal took a sip and shook his head. “His pa is dead. I look after him. He fights the bit once in a while, but mostly he’s a good lad if you can put up with his sullen moods. You may have met some of his other kinfolks sometime back.”

“Not around here, I reckon.”

“Nope, up on the panhandle when you and your boys were none too careful about what you threw a rope at.”

Bud laughed. “Hell, that was a long time ago, and I admit we didn’t stop to tip our hats and say howdy. Doubtful I’d remember his kin.”

“Dick Turknet brags he paid half what your horses were worth before you lit out for Montana.”

“Them ponies were some fine horseflesh. Old Dick caught me with empty pockets and a sheriff on my trail looking to hang me.”

Cal pushed the tin cup to one side. “For horse thieving or murder?”

“From his point of view, a little bit of both, I reckon.” Bud squinted at him with his one good eye. “Why the all-fired interest in what happened in Texas?”

“Because you killed that lad’s kin in Texas,” Cal replied. “And from what I gather, you haven’t stopped your murdering ways.”

McPherson dug for his six-shooter, and Cal shot him between the eyes before he could clear leather. His head snapped back and he slumped forward in the chair.

Cal didn’t feel the least bit bad about shooting McPherson. The man’s habit of killing people had made a mess of Patrick’s young life. And if Colonel Rhodes and his family had been at the cabin when McPherson showed up, they’d likely all be dead.

At the Doña Ana County courthouse there was a wanted poster out of Arizona for McPherson with a reward of five hundred dollars, dead or alive. He’d gunned down a deputy sheriff in Tucson.

In better times, Cal would have planted McPherson in a shallow grave, turned his horse loose in Cottonwood Canyon to find its way, and forgotten about it. But five hundred dollars would keep the Double K afloat for another year without going hat in hand to the bank.

He got McPherson’s horse from the corral, tied his body across the saddle, packed up his bedroll, cleaned up the blood inside the cabin as best he could, and put out the fire. Before starting out, he looked for books Patrick hadn’t read and settled on one about the Revolutionary War hero John Paul Jones and a worn copy of Robinson Crusoe.

He stuffed them in his saddlebags and set out at a lope. He should have no trouble catching up to Patrick trailing those slow-moving cows. The lad would have to get them to the ranch by himself, but he was enough of a hand to do it.

Patrick would surely be curious why Bud McPherson was suddenly deceased. Cal pondered the best way to explain it. He settled on the notion that John Kerney’s son deserved to know that some justice had finally been served.

He caught up to Patrick trailing behind the tiny herd in a long valley that snaked between two bleak ridgetops and gave him the lowdown on Bud McPherson.

Patrick gazed at the body draped across the saddle. “How do you know he was one of the killers?” he asked.

“Your pappy learned of it years ago. He just didn’t see a reason to go chasing after McPherson up Montana way. Not with a boy to find and raise.”

“Well, then I guess it’s a good thing you shot him for what he did,” Patrick said. “But there was no need to send me away before the gunplay.”

“There’s no sport in seeing a man shot down,” Cal replied.

“I don’t need to be mollycoddled.”

“I’ll decide what you need until you’re full grown. I’ll be gone for a day or two getting this straightened out with the sheriff. You head home and stay close by.”

Patrick nodded abruptly and spurred his horse in the direction of the cattle. He didn’t turn to look back until Cal was well out of earshot. For years, he’d heard about the murder of John Kerney’s kin on the Texas panhandle, but he had no strong feelings one way or the other about McPherson or his gang. Those folks who’d been killed long ago had never been real to him. He felt no binding ties to them. McPherson’s death meant nothing to him one way or the other. The five-hundred-dollar reward Cal had mentioned sure was good news in hard times, though.

Still miffed at missing the gunplay at the cabin, Patrick watched Cal disappear up a rocky draw. He sure would like to have seen that, and who was to say what he needed?

He moved the small herd along at a good pace, chasing a few strays now and then, and raised the ranch at dusk. He put the cattle in the pasture next to the horse corral, fed the ponies some hay, and fixed a dinner of beefsteak, boiled potatoes, and canned peaches. He sat at the kitchen table with his food and looked over the two books Cal had brought him from the colonel’s library. The Robinson Crusoe one looked interesting, and he was soon engrossed in the story, until he got too drowsy to continue.

A clear sky had let the night cool down nicely, and he was tired from a long day. Tomorrow, he’d ride to the far north canyon where two years ago Cal had hired a crew to dig a well and put up a windmill. The windmill fed a big dirt-and-rock stock tank that held three hundred gallons of water, and to keep every critter on the basin from drinking it dry, they’d fenced off the narrow entrance to the high-walled canyon.

The steep cliffs of the canyon looked like huge building blocks quarried by giants and stacked neatly on top of one another. The canyon walls were sheer enough to keep stock from straying in or out, the grass hadn’t been overgrazed and there were stands of four-wing saltbush cattle liked to munch on in early spring.

He’d grease and adjust the windmill, a chore that needed doing on a regular basis, water any strays he rounded up along the way, and let them graze for a time in the pasture.

The last time he’d been up there, he got stung several times by wasps from a nest beneath the platform at the top of the wooden tower, and it had made him as sick as a pup. He’d knocked the nest down and burned it, and sure hoped the wasps hadn’t come back.

He rolled on his side and drifted to sleep listening to the far-off whistle of a female mountain lion calling her cubs.

21

A
t sunup, Patrick was tending to the horses when two riders appeared on the flats. He left the corral, mounted his pony, and loped in their direction, wondering who would be calling so early in the day. He didn’t recognize the riders or their horses, and the closest neighbors were thirty miles away and not prone to visiting at first light. If they were rustlers or outlaws, it would be certain trouble if they found out he was alone at the ranch. He had to stop them before they got too close.

He reined in fifty yards shy of the men, yanked his rifle from the scabbard, and called for them to state their business.

The riders pulled up.

“No need for that rifle,” one of the riders replied. “I’m Oliver Lee from Dog Canyon, and I’m looking to speak to Cal Doran. This here with me is my brother, Perry Altman.”

Patrick put his rifle away. He’d met Lee and Altman in town several times. They were Texans who’d arrived in ’84 and now ranched on the east side of the Tularosa. They each had their own spread, and both were considered excellent horsemen.

Patrick jigged his horse forward to the men. “You can talk to me,” he said when he arrived.

Oliver Lee smiled. “Best we speak to Cal.”

Patrick held his tongue and stared at Lee. He had dark black eyes, a square jaw, and the reputation of being a wizard with both a rifle and a six-gun. According to those who knew him well, he neither drank nor smoked.

“Is Cal up yonder?” Perry Altman asked with a nod toward the ranch house. Lanky and sandy haired, Altman was Lee’s older half brother.

Patrick shook his head. “But you fellas are welcome to light, sit a spell, and have a cup of coffee.”

Lee nudged his horse closer to Patrick. “Appreciate the invitation, but we’re short on time. We cut sign on some cattle a ways back that were stolen off my ranch, and we mean to catch up with the rustlers that took them.”

“I brought some strays in from Cottonwood Canyon last night, but none were yours,” Patrick replied.

“Figured as much,” Altman said, eyeing the cows up in the pasture. “Did anybody ride through while you were gone?”

“Can’t say as they did,” Patrick replied. “I didn’t see any fresh sign.”

“They probably skirted north to avoid the Double K,” Altman said to Lee.

Lee nodded and touched the brim of his hat. “We won’t take any more of your time. Let Cal know we need to parley with him.”

“I’ll do it,” Patrick said, wondering what was so all get-out important. Whatever it was, he darn sure wouldn’t be excluded from it.

The men turned back toward the flats, their horses kicking up dust that glittered like flakes of gold in the early morning sunlight. Already hot, it would be a scorcher when the winds picked up. Patrick shoed two of the saddle horses he’d gentled for the army, packed a lunch of hardtack and jerked beef, put tools and a grease can in a saddlebag, and left a note for Cal telling him where he’d gone. Then he closed up the house and headed for the windmill.

Setting a steady pace, he made good time into the mountains, where the piñon pine and juniper trees clung to the higher slopes and desert willows nestled in narrow draws. On a mound of tailings near an old mine shaft, a buck mule deer watched cautiously, its big ears twitching, before bolting away. The buck would be fun to hunt come fall if the drought or a mountain lion didn’t get it first.