Jim Kane - J P S Brown (22 page)

Thirty days later Kane saw Mulligan on the border.
They had a drink together at the Cortez Motel on the American side.
Mulligan told Kane his cattle were doing better than any he and
Potter had on the desert. "They're so gentle you have to kick
them out of camp to make coffee in the morning. They are just
standing still and getting fat," Mulligan said.

"The little cattle I kept home are doing real
well now," Kane said. "They've gained about a hundred
pounds apiece already on the sorghum grass. I'll ship you those, if
you want."

"
No, we're coming off the desert in two weeks
and we're going to clean everything up. I want to get shed of Fats."

"
I don't. Not until he has the great bounty to
pay me."

"
Well, I'll see he pays you in two weeks. Your
cattle and the ones you bought for him might be the only ones that
make any money."

"I'm counting on it. In two weeks I'll be flat
broke. I mean money for groceries broke."

"
I'll see you get paid," Mulligan said.

Three weeks later Kane had not been paid. Mulligan
and Potter had disappeared. Kane was reasonably sure Mulligan was
gathering cattle on the desert and having trouble, but he knew Fats
wouldn't be able to stay away from that feedlot of his for long. He
kept calling the feedlot and Fats' home. Someone would always answer
and ask who was calling, then leave the phone a while. When he came
back to the phone he would say Fats was out of town or at that
certain minute wasn't there. Fats was watering at night.

Kane was broke. He left Benigno with the cattle and
horses, borrowed 200 pesos from a friend, and went to Frontera. He
knew he was in for a long, dry summer. He realized his stake in
Mexico depended on Fats Potter now . . . the life he wanted, the life
that was natural for him. He didn't like the fact that it was in
Potter's hands all of a sudden.

On the border again after a years absence, he was
soon seeing his old friends. He went to Abe Femandez, a friend who
had a mercantile store where all the cattlemen traded. He borrowed
$500 from Abe. He gave Abe a 30-day postdated check.

He went to the motels and hotels and bars where he
knew Mulligan or Potter would be stopping and asked his friends there
to let him know when his partners came in.

Two weeks later May Randall called Kane from the desk
of the Cortez Motel and told him his partners had just checked in. He
went straight to their room. The door was partly open.  He
walked in without knocking.

Potter was sitting naked on a chair. He had just
finished showering. He was drying himself and watching television. He
had spread a stream of water from the shower to the chair and it was
still dripping off the chair onto the floor.

Mulligan was sitting on the pillow at the head of his
bed in his underwear, smoking.

"
Well, well, the big businessman? Potter said.
He didn't smile.

"
Hello, Fats. I would have bet you never
bathed."

"
Getting the sweat of a hard day's work off.
I've been working hard all morning crossing cattle."

"Good. That is what I like. Hard-working
partners. When is payday, partner?"

Mulligan set his bare feet on the floor and put out
his cigarette. "Jim, boy. We only gathered twenty head of your
little cattle. I don't know how many are left but we're going to
start gathering again next week," he said.

"
Shorty, pard, that's tough. I hope you get them
all, because you owe me for all of them."

"
Now wait. We're going to pay you for them but
not until we see how many are left."

"
You guaranteed me forty dollars a head for
forty-four. That is all I want until you sell them. Then I'll bear my
share of the loss, if any. If they don't make anything, then I'll
have tough luck too. Right now pay me for forty-four."

"
Well, I don't remember guaranteeing anything.
What do you think, Fats?"

"
That's your and his big business deal. I'm out
of it," said Potter.

"
Well, Jim, I'll tell you. A lot of those little
cattle you sent me got killed by a train one night about two months
ago. I don't know how many, if any, were yours."

"
Come on, Shorty. A train doesn't run around
killing twenty-four head of cattle in a single night out in the
middle of the Sonora desert."

"
This happened right in camp, Jim. Remember I
told you they hung around camp all the time? Besides, a lot of them
just were too weak and died."

"I also remember you telling me they were doing
real well, better than any of your cattle. You didn't say anything
about trains then."

"
They haven't done well lately. We'll be lucky
to break even on any of them. Of course, we lost freight and feed on
the ones that died. We had a million expenses. We had to keep
seventeen cowboys riding day and night, paying them double wages, to
keep the cattle in the country."

"
Where were those seventeen cowboys when the
train went through camp? Are you trying to tell me none of them were
in camp the night a train came through and killed twenty-four of my
cattle?"

"
No Jim. I'll tell you what, we'll pay you now
for the twenty head and we'll pay the rest in a month when we finish
gathering. OK? Fats, is that OK?" asked Mulligan.

"
It's your deal. You make out the draft, if
that's what you want, and I'll sign it. Forty dollars is all I want
to give, though. Those cattle won't make money. I don't want him
dunning me from now on for the cattle. I'll have a hard enough time
coming out on them," Potter said.

"
Is that OK, Jim? We'll settle up the rest in a
month. You are getting a good price for your cattle." said
Mulligan.

"
Pay for forty-four now like you agreed to do,"
said Kane.

"
Hell, Jim we haven't got any money now or we'd
pay you now. If you don't see us, draft on us in thirty days."

"
All right, if that's all you can do."

Mulligan filled out the draft and Potter signed it.

"
Remember, Fats. I get paid in thirty days,"
Kane said.

"''Dun Shorty if you want to. Don't bother me
with it."

"
No, Fats. It's your money. You pay," Kane
said.

"
You just draft on us if you don't see us,"
Mulligan said.

"
What about those three you've got in Rio
Alamos?" Fats asked. "What are you going to do about them?"

"Go and get them, Fats. They're yours. I'll tell
you right where they are. The thirty dollars you paid me to handle
your thundering herd ran out a long time ago."

Kane took the draft down to Abe Fernandez' store and
paid Abe the $500 he'd borrowed. He came out with the $300 change
feeling bad he'd had to borrow. Even being able to pay hadn't opened
Abe's closed face to him. Abe had been worried. He had been hearing
things, probably.

With this $300 and the $960 they owe me I could go
home, Kane thought, as he walked out in the street. The money would
go a long way on the Alamos River. Three hundred dollars won't get me
across the street here. I ought to go home anyway. I could find
something to keep me going, I bet. But if I get back down there and I
don't find something and they don't pay, then I got to come back and
hunt them. If I stay here I catch them when they cross the cattle.
Maybe I can get an order for cattle here anyway. It's a bad time,
though. It's June. Everybody is stocked for the summer.

On the first of July Kane drafted on Potter. The
draft bounced. Kane couldn't locate Potter or Mulligan. He made out
another draft. He discounted 10 percent for death loss and $100 he
stipulated on the draft as share of partnership loss. That draft
bounced, too.

Kane knew a little more about Fats Potter now. Dick
Spencer, an oldtimer at border trading, told Kane about some
partnership cattle he and Potter had. They didn't sell the cattle on
the border where the partnership was supposed to end. Potter said
they would make more if he took them home with him to his feedlot.
Several months later when Spencer asked for a liquidation Potter told
him the cattle had all died.

"
Watch him, Jim. Besides being a cow thief he'll
pull a knife or gun on you. He pulled a long knife on me there in the
Gay Nineties bar when I tried to get a settlement out of him. I just
turned the whole deal over to him. It wasn't worth it to me.

"I'll tell you another thing. Potter will
slander you. He's telling around you tried to draft on him for a load
of cattle you didn't have. He said he had to take your draft book
away from you. He says the only reason he didn't put you in jail was
because he had known your dad so well."

"
Dick, that is a dirty lie."

"Look, Jim, you don't have to explain to me. I
know him better than you do. But you better put a stop to it. He's
telling it everywhere and a lot of bootlickers that would like to
have that draft book want to believe him."

Kane was out of money again. Rather than borrow, he
took a job on construction of a bridge, pushing cement around in a
wheelbarrow. He made $10 a day. He sweated hard in the sun and he
joked the gross Mexican obscenties with his companions. In the
evenings he cleaned up and roamed the trader hangouts looking for his
partners and for an opportunity to buy cattle for someone so he could
go home.

One evening he got a call from his friend Dan Gibson.
Potter and Mulligan had landed in the Cortez Motel Bar. Kane thanked
Dan, got in his pickup, and drove to the motel. He walked into the
dark room and sat down at the bar with Gibson.

Potter was at the other end of the bar holding forth
to a group of young Mexicans. Kane and Gibson listened to him tell
them how smart he was and how many thousands of Mexican cattle he
bought and he never failed to make money in a business that broke
many.

Potter spotted Kane. He grabbed one of the Mexicans
by the shoulder and pulled him over close. "There's Jim Kane,"
he said loudly, pointing at Kane. "Now there is a fine feller
and a big businessman in Mexico. Big businessman and cowboy." He
said something only the Mexicans could hear and they all laughed.
Potter turned his back on Kane. The young men kept looking over at
Kane.

"
Let's go get him," Dan said.

"
No, we won't get anything done. I want that
money. I'll wait until his suckups leave."

Mulligan was sitting closer to Kane. He was talking
earnestly to another Mexican. Kane got up and went over and sat next
to Mulligan. Dan moved over next to the Mexican.

"
Hello, Shorty," Kane said.

"
Well, Kane. How the hell are you?" said
Mulligan.

"I'm broke, Shorty. Pay me."

"
Just a minute. I've got business with this
man." He turned back to the Mexican who was talking to Dan now.

"
He's got another beau now, Shorty," Kane
said. "Talk to me a while."

"
What were you saying?" said Mulligan.

"
Pay me."

"
I'll have to see how many of your cattle are
out there but I think we overpaid you last time. A lot of your little
cattle died, you know. I told you all about that the last time I saw
you.

"
Did you lose a lot of cattle, Shorty?"
Kane asked.

"
By last count we lost forty head," said
Mulligan.

"
My gosh. How many did you have on the desert?"

"We had twenty-seven hundred head."

"
Shorty, you mean you had twenty-seven hundred
head and you lost forty and you are trying to tell me twenty-four of
them were mine? Shorty, I hate you lying to me," Kane said
quietly.

"
Kane, I'm not going to argue with you about it.
As far as I'm concerned you've been paid all you are going to get."

"Don't argue. just stop lying and pay me."

"Kane, those cattle you sent were practically
dead when they got to the desert."

"
Look, Shorty. If those cattle had been going to
die, that six hundred-mile train ride would have killed them all. I
let you cut the weakest cattle out in Rio Alamos. I garbaged the tail
end of them and they've gained at least two hundred pounds. Yes, and
you told me thirty or forty days after they got there the cattle you
took were doing real well. Now you say you lost forty head. I can
account for twenty. Seventeen of the Brajcich cattle died on the
train. Three stayed in Rio Alamos. And you tell me twenty-four of
mine are dead. That adds up to forty-four cattle, Shorty, not forty.
Stop lying, Shorty."

"Jim, be reasonable about this. Fats never has
liked the deal I made with you and he's the man with the money. He
won't even pay me what he owes me."

"So that's it," said Kane.

"
I'm sorry, Jim. I can't do anything more for
you."

"
You poor little shit. Get out of my sight."

"
I'm sorry, Jim."

"
Go on, Shorty."

Mulligan got off the stool and left the bar.