Chaparral Range War (9781101619049) (19 page)

“Good. I simply wondered. We may need to find a place of our own someday.”

“Leave here?” She blinked her lashes at him.

“I said someday.”

She tackled him around the waist. “Someday I'm going to wrestle you to the ground.”

“Someday,” he said, lifting her up to kiss her.

When she left him to go back to watering the garden, he went back to work on hoof number one. His back ached by midafternoon, but Lobo was shod all around and ready for the drive. He had two more horses to shoe so that he would have adequately shod horses to drive the small herd to Tucson. Ranch horses being shod was not so important if they were rotated. But on any drive a man needed sure-footed, ready mounts, and Guthrey was pleased to have Lobo done with. He'd need to get another horse shod before dinner.

“When can we leave?” Cally's words broke his concentration on the bay horse's hoof and what he needed to trim. He released the leg easy, let the horse lower his limb, straightened, and walked over to the corral fence to take a break.

“When do you want to leave?” He put his hand on the top rail.

“Now.”

“My, my. I have that horse to shoe and one more. We'll get there. I'm not magic.”

She wrinkled her nose at him. “Oh, I guess I want to rush it all.”

“Don't worry. It will all happen.”

She raised her face to kiss him. “I have no shame, Phil Guthrey. I can hardly wait to be your wife.”

“It is hard, isn't it? The waiting. You get your watering done?”

“Oh, yes. I'll be fine. I'm going to make a couple of pies. I'm just getting anxious.”

“So am I.” He laughed when she held her hem up and went to the house.

He settled in using the rasp to shape the horse's hooves. Noble came in about then and dismounted. “I got your two riders. Julio Contras and Jim Phelps. Jim's got two tough herd dogs. Contras can throw a rope a hundred feet, and they'll be glad to go for fifteen bucks apiece.”

“You did good. Give me a hand shaping the shoes for this horse so I can get done.”

“You look a little stiff.”

“I don't do this every day. I already did Lobo.”

Noble laughed. “I can shape some shoes, but my old back won't hold up a horse hoof to shoe him.”

“I can do that. You hear anything else in town?”

“You must be stepping on their toes. I didn't hear much but some griping about how many outlaws there were in the county jail.”

His saddle and pads off his horse, Noble put his rig on its horn so the fleece under the seat could dry. Then he took the horse to the gate and turned him out. Noble was no stranger to shoeing. When he joined Guthrey, he went to examining a new shoe.

“What else did you hear today?”

“It ain't what I heard, it's what I didn't. Bartender in the Texas Saloon I know said he hasn't heard one word in two weeks. That tells me they have sealed all talk.”

Bent over tacking on the second shoe, Guthrey agreed. “He have any idea what they planned to do?”

“No. But he'll send me word if he learns anything. That bunch that works for Whitmore have run off all his local customers by coming in and threatening them. Really hurting his business. No way he can get them to stop, and folks aren't coming back. I can't blame them.”

“I hope we know what they'll try next. He's moved on families and of course most of them won't fight back. But if we have an advantage on any trick they try against us, it would help.”

“Best shot we have so far.”

“I'm not complaining, we just need to have our ear to the ground.”

“I'll do what I can. Dan's coming in.”

Guthrey was anxious to know about his success. “I hope he found us the rest of the steers we need.”

“I saw a bunch up on the north end last week.”

“We may have to all ride up there and drive some of them down.”

Guthrey still had two more hooves to shoe. Noble's hammering to shape the shoes to fit was helping him get done. Dan dismounted and limped over to the corral.

“Quit worrying, guys, I found some more steers and drove them in with the big bunch.”

“Hurrah for you,” Guthrey said. That was the best news he could hope to hear at this point.

“That ain't bad at all.” Noble clapped his hands. “I was sure dreading riding up there to the Tucker Flats to bring some of them back here.”

“These won't be hard to drive either. They were no problem for me to round up.”

“Did you get the extra steers?” Cally asked, entering the barn.

“Yeah, they're down here now.”

“Good.”

“Don't ask,” Guthrey said, shaking his head at her. “We can head for Tucson day after tomorrow.”

Later that day they loaded Cally's tent and camping gear in the buckboard. Guthrey planned to get some horse grain on the way. They also loaded firewood in case there was none where they camped. Three small kegs of drinking water were loaded too, and she fussed about what food she should take.

Guthrey decided he'd gone to Abilene or Newton, Kansas, with two thousand head easier than this, but made no mention out loud. The big steers all looked fine the next morning when he rode through them. Michaels wouldn't complain about them. How many more did they have to sell? Better buy that boy a tally book and make him keep track of the herd. No way to do business without a good count on your own stock. His father must have done that.

Noble went and found the two men, Julio Contras and Jim Phelps, and brought them out to the ranch. Contras was about thirty, had a dark complexion and white teeth, and looked like a vaquero. He rode a tough-looking dun mustang and carried two reatas on his big horn saddle. When he met Cally, he bowed and swept off his sombrero. His English wasn't bad and he acted proud to have the work.

Jim Phelps was close to Guthrey's own age. He rode deep in the saddle, he was short and broadly built, his hair on top was thin, and he smiled big, meeting Cally. He had two well-trained stock dogs; one had a white eye, and they both minded him. Jim called the gray one Dog, and the one with more white he'd named Gyp. Easy enough to remember, and these two were no strangers to the chaparral or cactus.

At supper, Jim asked whether they'd been lately run over by Whitmore and his outfit.

Dan told them about the loss of their father and his near run-in with two of his gun hands. Jim nodded.

“I'm hoping you get the job of sheriff,” he said to Guthrey. “Maybe we can go back to living like ordinary folks again.”

“I guess Noble told you we might have trouble taking these cattle to Tucson.”

“Bring 'em on. Right, Julio?”

“Right, hombre. They've tried before.”

“I personally hope we can go sell our cattle and come home without incident. But it's their choice if they want to die.”

The men all nodded in agreement as Cally jumped up and began to refill their coffee cups. Guthrey could tell she was upset as the trip drew closer but hid most of it.

The next morning, all the hands gathered the steers and counted them in the first light. Then, planning to get the herd well on its way, all four men rode south to get them on the main road.

Cally drove the buckboard ahead of the file. The steers, doing lots of bawling, came on behind her. The dogs nipped at the heels of a few errant ones and they soon lined out like they'd done it all their lives. Things were going all right for Guthrey's part when Noble and Dan shook his hand and parted with them.

They were soon over West Mountain and headed west. Conveyances, wagons, and even some people hiking on foot got back some from the main road to let the cattle go by. Their presence did not bother the herd.

The first day they made good time. Midafternoon at the Bar 8, the foreman, Curly Bradley, let them put the herd in a large fenced pasture with graze in it and water in a tank. By dark the steers were lying down, chewing on their cud, and settled.

Cally fixed a big meal, and Curly came down to eat with them. After the meal, he sat on his butt on the ground and hugged his knees. He wanted to know more about Guthrey's plans when he became sheriff.

“I have to get elected first.”

“Aw, you'll do that. Killion ain't got a friend left in this county. I've had cattle and horses stolen from me, and he ain't turned a tap to help me. Of course, up here on the road it's lots worse than back in the hills. But he simply won't do anything.”

“I'm going to try to stop that. I'm going to get a force of good men to be my deputies and we will worry more about crime than how many cows you have.”

“They told me that the county courthouse bunch don't want to spend much money on deputies.”

“They better get ready to,” Guthrey said. “I left the Texas Rangers 'cause we weren't being paid. They've got money to pay him a big commission for tax collecting, we'll use that.”

Bradley smiled. “I'll back you all the way.”

After a while, Cally excused herself and went to her tent to sleep on a cot. Guthrey tossed his bedroll on the ground nearby to keep close in case anything happened. The night was uneventful. The next morning they had breakfast and headed out again.

Bradley rode a few miles with them and quizzed Guthrey about his cattle deal.

“I need to make some sales like this. I usually let Ike Clanton have my big steers to fill his army and Apache contracts. But I've never got that much for them.” Guthrey nodded and they shook hands.

That day they passed the halfway point to Tucson, and in the afternoon Guthrey started looking for a good place to stop for the night. They found water for the herd in a wash, some good holes, and plenty of grazing. They planned on taking turns at riding herd through the night.

When the tent was up, Cally cooked them supper. She made a big pot of coffee for the night herders and turned in. Guthrey watched her go in the tent and nodded to himself. It had been a long, hot day for her. He felt good that they were selling while the cattle had plenty of flesh. Without rain, the summer would be a tough one.

By midafternoon of the next day, they were probably ten miles out of Tucson. They found another good camping spot and settled in for the night, the routine from the previous night running just as smoothly tonight.

In the morning they moved on to the pasture. They reached it by the time the sun was overhead. When they reached his place, Gar came down and inspected the cattle, which were watering beside his windmill.

“Good-looking cattle. You never lied about them. Michaels will sell lots of that kinda beef.”

“They'll do,” Guthrey said. “In two weeks or so I'll be back here, or I'll send someone, to pay you the rent and collect my money for them.”

“Fine with me, Guthrey,” Gar said and went back to sit on his porch.

After paying the two hands for their work, he drove Cally on to the dress shop. He noticed she wrinkled her nose a lot going into the city.

“Sanitation isn't too big a deal around here, is it?”

“Whew,” she said. “I forgot how this place stinks so much. I have already seen two dead pigs lying beside the boardwalk, and one dead burro on an empty lot feeding the buzzards. And their outhouses smell like they're cooking them.”

He laughed. “Nice to live out in the country, isn't it?”

“Yes, very nice.”

The dress took her breath away when the girls showed it to her. She looked close to tears. When she came out in the front room dressed in it to show him how well it fit, she was crying and sniffing. “Oh, Phil, you spent too much.”

He shook his head. “You only go around once in these deals.”

“But where will I ever wear it again?”

“Any damn place that you want to.”

That evening they camped on the river by themselves. She still wasn't over the shock of the dress. In the morning, she made them breakfast and they headed home early. Halfway home, a tall bank of clouds showed on the southern horizon. They were dark, forbidding thunderstorms coming up from the Gulf of California. Monsoons were about to begin. Guthrey made the team trot and kept a wary eye on the storm.

He decided they should stop at the next stage station and wait the weather out. The wind had picked up, and dust and sharp bits of sand were pelting them by the time they reached the outpost and he hurried her inside. The man who ran it stood on the porch and told them they were welcome. By then visibility was down to ten feet or so. Guthrey secured the horses with thunder making rapid-fire booms close by.

The man who ran the station was a tall, thin man who wore a white shirt. He had an enlarged Adam's apple and it bobbed up and down when he talked. “We sure needed rain, but not all this.”

He was talking about the reddish mud that ran off the porch eaves. His short squaw wife held her hands over her ears and looked bug-eyed at him in the candlelight as heavy winds and driving rain rattled the small windows and the very building they were in. Guthrey and Cally sat in the back of the room and held hands. Hail pounded on the shake roof, and drips began to leak in the room. The woman went for empty tin cans to arrange under them. Then some men began stomping on the porch. They were cussing when they pushed open the door.

In the dim light, Guthrey watched the big man come in first and sling the water off his sodden hat. Then two more half-drowned, unshaven men followed him in, still cussing.

“Hush up,” the big man said curtly to his companions. “There's a white woman in here.”

“Aw, hell, Curt, who gives a big damn? That damn rainstorm blew away my good hat that I paid ten bucks for.”

Then Guthrey saw the ring on the leader's left hand. A large ruby stone glinted in the candlelight when the man they called Curt sat down. Guthrey hoped that Cally had not seen it. But who were the other two? Hired guns, he guessed. But the raider and rapist was in the room not twenty feet from him. What backup would those others give him?