Deadfall (2 page)

C
HAPTER
T
WO

Charley Sunday was smiling.

He stood reminiscing beside his favorite horse, Dice, the handsome paint with one blue eye he'd taken to Colorado and ridden during the Colorado-to-Texas longhorn cattle drive nearly a year earlier.

Charley's brown, leathery hands stroked the horse's neck. His just as tanned and deeply furrowed countenance wrinkled even more as he squinted in the afternoon sun's fading rays. For a moment, he hitched his thumbs under his lime-green suspenders and gave his pants a tug, pulling them up half an inch or so to keep them in their proper position.

Man and horse were resting in the shade of an old pepper tree at the top of a low hillock overlooking Charley's Juanita, Texas, ranch.

Charley had been casually watching a distant object nearly three-quarters of a mile away, something that had momentarily perked his interest.

A familiar old wagon was lurching down the recently graded farm-to-market road that passed the entrance to his ranch. The slow-moving vehicle was also weaving— zigzagging slowly—as if the driver might be having trouble with the steering mechanism, or with his team. Or possibly, God forbid, the driver had been drinking.

Charley continued to observe the wagon as it finally pulled over and came to a standstill at the side of the road. A single passenger was discharged before the old wagon pulled out onto the thoroughfare again. The driver put his horses into a wide U-turn, then headed off back in the direction from which he had come.

It had been a while since Charley and his brave little band of dedicated cowhands had driven the herd of Texas longhorns down from Colorado. The three hundred head of longhorn cattle had belonged to an old transplanted Texan who, years earlier, had sixty-four longhorns delivered to his new homestead—a large ranch near Denver, Colorado.

When the old man died a year ago, his family put the entire herd—which had grown to three hundred—on the auction block. By doing this—bidding on the entire herd, then driving them back home to Texas—Charley Sunday had earned for himself, to keep as his own, ten percent of the entire herd.

Flora Mae Huckabee—the local hotel, bar, and poolroom owner—had been Charley's special lady-friend on and off since their childhood years, and was also the financial backer of the Colorado to Texas cattle venture. She had allowed Charley three whole days by himself to pick and choose his way through the longhorns. Charley had spent many an hour separating out from the others the stock he wished to keep for his own. That comprised a fair amount of breeding-age heifers. It also included the only bull in the bunch—a smaller than normal-size male he called Blue Bell. Charley's friend Feather Martin had given the bull that name early on because of the animal's sweet and peaceful disposition.

Charley chewed on his pipe stem. He sucked every now and then on the stale tobacco taste that lingered in the old hand-carved bowl. He was thinking about the cattle he now owned, and how his small herd of thirty had grown by nine or so calves since he and his outfit had arrived back in Juanita ten months earlier—thanks to Blue Bell, of course, and to his personal intuition, which allowed him to look a heifer in the eye and tell if she was with calf or not.

Those same eyes were now following the narrow dirt wagon path that wound its way up from the main entrance, past the holding pens, and to the ranch house itself. The figure of the person who had been discharged from the wagon was now making his way on foot, up the path toward the corrals.

He's too slight to be a full-grown man
, Charley was thinking to himself.
He appears to be either a woman wearing men's trousers . . . or a half-grown boy.

After another good look down the path, Charley shook his head—then he looked once again.

By golly
, he thought,
that sure looks an awful lot like my grandson, Henry Ellis.

He squinted, then he spoke out loud:

“It
is
Henry Ellis,” and again to himself,
I wonder what he's doing way down here all by himself?

Charley stepped into the stirrup of Dice's saddle, swung his other leg over, then spurred out down the hill toward the approaching boy.

 

 

About then, Charley's lifelong friend and partner, Roscoe Baskin, who was just a little bit overweight and near Charley's age, happened to look out the kitchen window. He saw his partner dismount, then sweep the boy up into his arms where the two remained hugging until the horse nudged Charley from behind.

Charley lifted his grandson up and into the saddle. With reins in hand, he began leading both horse and boy up the remainder of the path toward the ranch house.

“My mother and father have been abducted, Grampa,” said Henry Ellis.

Charley stopped in his tracks. He turned and looked up at his grandson.

“Abducted?” said Charley. “My daughter? My Betty Jean? . . . and Kent? Where? . . . and by who?”

“Brownsville,” answered Henry Ellis. “I think they were bandits.”

“What in tarnation were the three of you doing in Brownsville?” asked Charley.

“My father was going to Mexico on business . . . he was taking Mother and me along because the invitation had said for him to bring us with him.”

Roscoe had been in the process of cooking a chicken dish for that evening's supper. He just happened to look out the window again as he set a freshly baked pie on the sill to cool. He adjusted his wire-rimmed glasses so he could see better.

Charley was now leading Dice, with the boy in the saddle, and the two were talking. Roscoe knew the new arrival was Henry Ellis right off, by the way Charley helped the boy dismount in front of the house. Then Charley took him into his arms, swinging the just under five-foot-three boy around at least three times, before letting him go so he could stand back to get a better look at his only grandson.

The next hug contained a few kisses—several on the boy's forehead administered by Charley, and more than the usual amount planted on Charley's cheeks from the overly animated Henry Ellis.

“It's a long story, Grampa,” said the boy, as the two of them entered the ranch house through the rear screen door.

“As soon as Roscoe gets some nourishment down you, I want to hear the rest of the story,” said Charley.

“Well, look who's showed up out a' the blue,” said Roscoe as he met the two of them at the kitchen door.

“Give Henry Ellis some room,” said Charley, leading the new arrival over to the kitchen table, where he let him sit. “He's been on the road for a while without anything to eat. Can't you see he's starved, Roscoe?”

Roscoe, who had been preparing supper for Charley and himself anyway, grabbed a plate and dished up some of his chicken casserole. He used a fork to put a sweet potato onto the platter along with it. After adding some biscuits and gravy, he set the plate down in front of the boy.

Roscoe moved to the icebox, where he found a pitcher of buttermilk. Taking a clean glass from the cupboard, he filled the container to the brim before setting the chunky liquid down on the table beside Henry Ellis's plate.

“Dig in, sonny boy,” said Roscoe. “There's always more where that came from.”

 

 

A short time later, right after Henry Ellis had sopped up what remained on his plate with one of Roscoe's special-made sourdough biscuits, Charley urged him once again to continue his story.

“So, you were in Brownsville, with your parents, on your way to visit someone in Mexico, when you were attacked by a gang of Mexican thugs on the street? Is that right?”

“At first none of us knew what was happening,” said the boy. “Then Señor Fuerte said something about an ambush.”

“Fuerte?” said Charley. “Who is Señor Fuerte?”

“He's an undercover security man who works for the gentleman we were going to visit in Mexico. He was supposed to be a bodyguard for us. He met the three of us at the train depot with a rented carriage and said he was not to let us out of his sight during our entire stay with Don Roberto,” said the boy. “When it was all over I almost went with him, then I remembered my father's last words to me.

“And what were those words, son?”

“My father said, ‘Trust no one.' And he meant it, Grampa. I know he did.”

“So instead of going off with this . . . bodyguard, you—”

“I saw that there were still a lot of people standing around, so I just ran, hoping the crowd would help block his view of me, while I made my way back across town to the train station.”

“So, you got back on the train and then came here?” said Roscoe.

“I wasn't going to go all the way back to Austin,” said Henry Ellis. “There's no one there I can depend on. Plus, Grampa Charley's the only person I thought of when I knew I had to find someone I trusted.”

He leaned in closer to Roscoe. “You too, Uncle Roscoe . . . I trust you almost as much as I trust Grampa.”

“Let's get back to your story, Henry Ellis,” said Charley. “How did you ever manage to buy a seat on the train with no money?”

“That was as easy as pie,” said the boy. “When we travel, my father always pins a brand-new one-hundred-dollar bill inside my coat sleeve . . . just for emergencies. Well, I figured that the abduction of my parents was an emergency, so I bought a ticket and got here to Juanita as quick as the train could get me here. It was getting from the depot to your ranch that had me stumped, Grampa. The folks that run the passenger wagon at the depot only go as far as Juanita's Main Street. I thought finding someone who would take me on to your ranch might be a problem until an old man offered his services. That's how I got here.”

“So, Feather Martin brung ya, did he?” said Roscoe.

“I thought that man looked an awful lot like Feather,” said Henry Ellis, “but he was really dirty . . . and smelly . . . and he never said he was Feather . . . plus he had a full beard that covered most of his face. I think he had fleas, too, the way he was always scratching himself. I'm sure I would have recognized Feather if that was him . . . don't you think?” he added.

“I'd say that under the circumstances it was up to Feather to recognize you, son,” said Charley . . . “Unless he's gone and lost his memory, too, this time.”

“It wasn't Feather,” said the boy. “Why I'd know Feather anywhere.”

Charley shook his head. “Not anymore you wouldn't, I'm afraid,” he said. “I don't think Feather Martin has drawn a sober breath . . . or taken a bath . . . since summer, when we got the longhorn herd back here to Juanita.”

“He's become a barrel-boarder, Henry Ellis. A bum. A drunken sot. Plus the fame kinda went to his head, you might say,” added Roscoe.

“It was the lack of fame for Feather if you ask me,” said Charley. “Now let's get back to
your
problem, Henry Ellis . . . enough about Feather Martin.”

Charley stood and walked over to the kitchen sink, where he turned on the faucet and filled a glass with some water for himself.

“What do you think, son?” he asked the boy. “In case you didn't notice, we got inside plumbing these days, too.”

“And that includes an indoor privy,” said Roscoe. “I won't be havin' ta clear the ol' two-holer out back of spiders and their webs fer ya anymore, kid.”

“And we finally got electricity for the whole house,” said Charley.

“Which means we got e-lectric fans everywhere,” added Roscoe. “Lots a' e-lectric fans. So we don't have ta live out there on that back porch all summer long anymore.”

 

 

The three of them sat on the back porch steps together, finishing up their pie and watching the sun go down. Charley puffed on his pipe while Roscoe collected the forks and plates, stacking them on a tray on the step beside him. He finally got to his feet, picked up the tray of dishes, then excused himself.

“I'll be back,” he said as the screen door slammed behind him. “Want me ta turn on the porch light fer ya?”

He flicked the switch on without thinking.

The porch light glowed bright in its new fixture beside the door.

“No . . . shut it off, will you, Roscoe?” said Charley. “Me and Henry Ellis want to watch the sun go down over the horizon together, don't we, boy?”

“Yes, Grampa,” said Henry Ellis. “We sure do.”

The light went out, and the sound of Roscoe's old boots faded as he clomped across the unvarnished floorboards into the kitchen.

Charley turned to his grandson.

“It's times like this when I miss that old dog,” he said.

Henry Ellis looked up.

“We got your letter telling us Buster had passed on, Grampa. I'm sorry, I was really sad when I heard about Buster.”

The boy's eyes began to well up.

“I cried, Grampa,” Henry Ellis continued, “I really did. I loved ol' Buster like he was a . . . human being . . . or a horse.”

“Sometimes dogs are wiser than us humans,” said Charley. “Buster was wiser than most. I raised that ol' dog from a pup, you know. Did I ever tell you that story, bub?”

“You told me, Grampa,” said the boy. “As a matter of fact, you told me that story more than once. But I'd still like to hear it again, if you don't mind telling it again.”

“I don't mind telling it, Henry Ellis, you know that.”

He turned some so he was facing the boy. Then he began.

“Roscoe, me, and Feather was sleeping out on the open range one night a long time ago. This was when we were working cattle for a living, not during our Ranger years, mind you. It was my turn to nighthawk . . . a warm night. The reason I remember it being warm is because there aren't that many warm nights in west Texas during the Fall.