Mary Connealy (92 page)

“We’re short a couple of men, Chester.” Wade looked up from the list he’d made when he went over the ranch books late in the evening.

Chester slapped leather on a feisty black mustang Wade had always admired. Chester was a steady hand, and with that bright-eyed little cutting horse under him, there was no cow that could best him. “Boog’s at the line shack and Harv’s in at the doc’s. Sid left him because he needed some care and we don’t have time for it.”

“Harv’s the one that came up on the rustlers, right?”

“Yep, caught a man kneeling over a calf, using a running iron. Leastways that’s what Sid said. Harv wasn’t talkin’. The outlaw knocked him cold. Sid couldn’t get anything out of him, a description of the man or the horse.”

Wade stared at his notes for a long second. “I went in to the doctor’s office to talk to him and he’s taken off. So that’s another hand we’ve lost. We’ve been losing cattle all winter, it sounds like.”

“Yep, nothing big, but more than can be explained by wolves and blizzards. And we’ve got more than two men missing; three of the hands you picked out yesterday as no-accounts were gone when I woke up this morning. Payday was last week. They didn’t have cash coming and they didn’t want to work, so why wait around?”

Wade got their names and marked them off his list. “That leaves us shorthanded, but those men weren’t pulling their weight anyway. We’re no worse off. I don’t want to take the time to ride to Divide and hire more help. We can get by until the roundup is finished. Who sent Boog out to the line shack?”

“Sid. Bad thinking, too, because Boog’s a top hand. Too fast with his gun, but he knows cattle. Did the work of two men. Harv wasn’t so good. Knew the job but didn’t push any harder’n he had to.”

“What was my pa thinking to hire Sid?”

Chester shrugged. “You want my opinion? Your pa wasn’t right in the head when he made that decision. Sid rode in a couple of days after Mort was hurt. He went in the house and came out with the foreman job. I’d have accused him of lying about being hired except he went in that house every day, a couple of times a day, and did a lot of the heavy lifting work for Gertie.”

“Pa must have just not cared after he fell. I think he’s coming out of the worst of that black mood and starting to show interest in the ranch again.” At least a little. Most of it rooted in anger. But Wade didn’t think those words would encourage Chester.

“Whatever Sid said, Mort must have agreed to hire him. I accepted that Mort was out of his head. First because he was knocked cold. Then, when he realized his legs wouldn’t work, he was half crazy. Sid knows cattle, I’ll give him that, but he did a poor excuse of hiring hands and a worse excuse for bossing them. He’s as lazy as the rest of this lot.”

“One hard week, Chester, we’ll have the cattle branded and can start cutting out the stock for a drive. We’ll put them in the valley with the lush grass and let ’em fatten up then drive ’em to Helena.”

“We’ll have to push it to give ’em any time at all on grass before market.” Chester swung up on horseback. The mustang danced and crow-hopped a little, but it was just spirit and Chester knew how to stick a saddle. “There’ll be no break between roundup and cutting the herd like most years. And even if we push, there won’t be as much time to fatten the cattle as we’d like.”

“Sittin’ here talkin’ doesn’t add any more days to the year.” Wade finished saddling his own horse. “Let’s get on with it. We’re burning daylight.”

I
t took considerable work to get the first of those stubborn cattle into the gap.

For a few minutes—which seemed like an eternity—Red thought he’d come up with a real poor idea.

The cattle balked inside the gap. They tried to turn.

Red had worked cattle for years, though, and he knew a thing or two. He and the rest of the men kept them crowded against the rock wall but didn’t push. Instead they waited, letting the herd sniff around and calm down.

When the herd was settled and quiet and a few had milled close to that narrow gap, Red began threading his way in, quietly, so as not to stir them up. He walked his horse straight into that gap without a moment’s pause. He went in just a few feet and stopped and poured a small bag of corn out on the ground.

It took about ten seconds for a steer to come sniffing. He licked up the corn and followed Red straight on in. Silas and the Jessups would work from the rear.

Red kept moving until he got to the slightly wider section of the gap and then eased to the side to let the cattle come on past him. Because others followed the first, the lead steer was pushed along, though he balked when he passed Red. Red used Buck’s big body to crowd the animal forward. Dust churned underfoot as the animals bawled and slashed with their wide horns.

Choking on the dirt, Red forced the recalcitrant longhorn forward until they both pushed past the wider spot. Then Red dodged to the side and dropped back to push the next cow forward. In here they could walk three abreast. A few tried to turn and go back.

Silas pushed up beside Red, and the two of them had a few uneasy moments as the cattle wallowed in dirt they were churning up from the canyon floor until it was nearly blinding. At last they moved forward, and the rest followed, pushed by the herd. They picked up speed and began trotting as Red had hoped they would, straight into the rustlers’ canyon.

A single shot rang out when the first steer charged through. Then gunfire exploded from overhead.

Red kicked his horse into the line of cattle, dodging those vicious horns. The gunfire from inside the canyon stopped before Red reached the opening. But the shooting from overhead, from Belle and Emma, rained down like hailstones. Red, Silas right behind him and the Jessups a few jumps after that, charged into the valley.

Red leaned low over Buck’s shoulders to make less of a target. Eyeing the terrain, high and low, for likely lookout spots, Red brought his gun level as Buck’s hooves thundered. Exploding bits of rock drew his eye to an outcropping about fifty yards straight ahead. The perfect spot to keep watch on that canyon mouth.

Judging by the boulder being battered by gunfire, Belle and Emma had seen the outlaw take a shot when the first longhorn came through. Then they’d pinned the shooter down. He must be crouched at ground level, so he’d never get a clear shot at the womenfolk. And the women made it impossible for the varmint to get a shot at Red and the rest of his posse. Perfect.

The focus of the gunfire was so exact Red knew Belle hadn’t seen a threat from any other direction or she’d have aimed at one man while Emma took care of the other. It struck Red as just a bit amazing to have such complete confidence in a woman and her skill with a rifle. Amazing but true, because Red had no doubt Belle wouldn’t make the mistake of being careless. But there were two men in here. Red knew it from the tracks. One had yet to show himself. Which meant he still posed a threat.

In the melee of bawling cattle and guns, Red raced his horse for cover, hearing the beating of shod hooves behind him. Swinging down, Red saw Silas alight right beside him. Silas had a look of such satisfaction as he threw himself against the rocks, Red knew the man was button-popping proud of his wife and daughter.

Red, Silas, and all three Jessups had made it into the canyon without a scratch. The women had things so well under control they hadn’t even had to duck any gunfire. A quick glance told Red that none of the cattle were even wounded. The bad
hombre
who’d done the shooting had fired a single time, and he’d missed. Or maybe he’d pulled his aim when he recognized a longhorn was coming through. But that one shot had alerted Belle, and that had been the end of the shootout.

“Spread out,” Silas yelled. “We can get the drop on him, if Belle hasn’t filled him with lead.”

The five men fanned out, slipping along the scattered rocks of the canyon entrance. There was plenty of cover in the rugged mountain canyon once they’d cleared the opening. They drew steadily nearer the rustlers’ hideout boulder, each taking turns providing cover, although Belle and Emma had pinned them down so well there was no sign of a man.

At last Red found a place on the canyon wall slanted enough he could climb and get a good look at the hiding place. A lone man lay flat on his back. Red leveled his Winchester and shouted at the bloodthirsty women. “I’ve got a bead on him.”

The thunder of bullets ended.

Red looked down on a pathetic excuse for a desperado. Bleeding, scratched to bits by chunks of flying rock. “There’s only one man back here. Be careful. There’s another here somewhere.”

The man raised his hands. “I’m alone. No one with me. Don’t shoot.”

“Stay up there and keep us covered,” Red hollered at his two faithful sharpshooters.

While Red kept his eye on the outlaw, the rest of them scoured the canyon, lush with grass, holding nearly a hundred head of cattle, all with fresh brands.

There was no one.

While the Jessups continued to search, Silas quickly trussed up the outlaw.

“Where’s the other one?” Red asked.

“I’m alone.” The man had an ugly cut on his chin, sewed up but still raw and red. He was clean shaven, except for close around his wound, and his hair looked like he’d cut it himself with a bowie knife and no mirror.

“I’m not talking to you.” Red raised his rifle in what he hoped was a menacing fashion. Truth was he’d never so much as aimed a gun at a man. The thought of pulling the trigger made him sick.

Thank You, God. We ended this without any killing.

“We saw tracks from two men, so we know there’s someone else.”

“No!” The man’s clothes were battered and slashed as if he’d gone a few rounds with a grizzly. “The tracks were just me riding two different horses.”

Red didn’t think so, and he wasn’t about to take the word of cattle-stealing scum. “Silas, are you sure the canyon’s empty?”

Nodding, Silas rose from beside the man he’d just hog-tied. “I was careful. But remember how that gap opened so you could barely see it? There could be a back way out of here just as hidden.

I found his camp. Two men have been here, but one’s gone.”

“Are Belle and Emma in danger? Could the other one have gone out over the rim?”

Both men wheeled to stare up at the women. The rocks the women stood on were so sheer from this side of the canyon that no one could have gotten within a hundred yards of them.

Emma waved down when they looked at her, but the girl was uncommonly smart. She kept low to the ground, never relaxing her guard.

“I’ve got me a family of women, don’t I?” Silas blew a soft whistle through his teeth.

“They’re the kind of women who can help tame a wild land and make no mistake about it.” Red turned back to the outlaw and prodded the vermin with his toe none too gently. “They work their hearts out. They put in long hours in the blazing sun. They work in the bitter cold. They miss meals and get knocked around by longhorns and feisty mustangs. Then you come along and steal from the labor of their backs. You’re going to hang, or if you’re lucky, spend a lot of years in prison. Let’s get you to the sheriff. Maybe if you help us catch your friend, and any others of your gang, the sentence won’t be quite so long. The judge who comes through Divide likes a cooperative prisoner.”

The Jessups rode up. Huey Jessup, the oldest of the brothers, seemed to be the spokesman for the taciturn family. “I think we found where a man went out on foot over the west rim. It’d be a scramble, but a man could make it and stay low enough not to draw attention. He couldn’t pack things with him, though. He left on foot and his bedroll is still here. I found two horses and leather for both of ’em. We might find a name.”

“Let’s gather everything up,” Silas said. “I’ll start heading the whole herd out of here. It’ll be slow going, but we need to drive them into Divide then put out the word that we’ve recovered stolen cows. The area ranchers can come in and identify them best they can through those altered brands.”

“We’ll let the law sort it out.” Red untied the outlaw’s feet and nudged the man to stand. “What’s your name?”

Glaring through mean, animal black eyes, the man refused to answer.

Red didn’t wait around to try to get it out of him. That job he’d leave for the sheriff.

I
want this step fixed!” Pa’s fist hammered against the door frame. “I want to get out of this house.”

Wade had only moments ago strode into the kitchen out of the dark, up the three steps that formed a back stoop. He had a ladle full of Gertie’s delicious chicken noodle stew ready to dump on a plate full of biscuits.

Wade lowered his plate and the ladle. He was starving, exhausted, frustrated, filthy, saddle-sore, and grouchy. Not a good time to have to handle his father. “How do we fix the step, Pa? Got any ideas?”

There, dump it back in Pa’s lap. Wade figured the old man would rant and rave steadily for about ten minutes while Wade ate. No trouble tuning out the sound of Pa’s yelling. Wade had become a master over the years. He returned to dishing up his dinner, his stomach growling nearly as loudly as his father.

“Someone with any brains would know that.”

Abby came in with Gertie right behind her.

“Sit down and let me get that for you, Wade.” Gertie immediately began flapping at him, shooing him aside.

Grinning, Wade escaped with his full plate and sat at the small kitchen table. It was a relief to not have to sit in the formal dining room and eat off china. Instead he had a tin plate and quick access to seconds. “Sit down with me, ladies. It’s been a brutal day and I could stand the sound of a woman’s voice or two.”

“We’re going to fix this door or I’m ripping the whole back of the house down with my bare hands.” Pa grabbed at the door frame as if intending to begin right now.

Sighing, Wade said, “You ladies are gonna have to talk loud to drown out Pa.”

Gertie gave Pa a wide-eyed look. Had he taken his nasty temper out on the housekeeper? In earlier days, after Wade’s ma had died, Gertie had protected Wade to the extent she was able, and Wade had never seen Pa use his fists on her. But Pa’s temper was out of control at times. Why else would Gertie be so scared?