North to the Salt Fork (14 page)

“It takes time,” Cotton said, brandishing a large wooden spoon at them. “Now get back.”

“Let's make some halters so we can tie logs on those horses we intend to break,” Jack said, putting his hands to work on the reel of rope he'd bought from Volkner. His scheme was to let the horses drag around a large log until they calmed down and were gentler. After making a few halters, supper was ready and the four of them dug in as Jack poured the coffee.

“Kinda hard to be the cook while y'all are running mustangs all day,” Cotton complained.

“You're doing fine. Someone's got to fill our hollow bellies. It's just as important as wranglin',” Jack reassured him.

“I hate to miss the action.”

“You won't. We'll let you help us do the breaking, and you can get kicked, bit and trampled like the rest of us.”

Cotton laughed, already in a better mood. “You ever get to see Sergeant Craig when you were in town?”

Jack sobered. “No, but I sure wanted to.” It had niggled at Jack, knowing the man was so upset about his trip back with Mrs. Lerner, but between the wedding and the honeymoon he never had enough time to visit him.

“I heard that him and Marsha broke up on account of him feeling so low after the rescue. That's why he never came to your wedding either.”

Jack nodded. “After we get things settled here, I'll ride by and check on him.”

“I sure wish you would. Marsha'd be a good woman for him. He needs a wife and bless her, she needs him. She's my mom's cousin. And he'd listen to you.”

“Maybe,” Jack agreed. “At least I'll try.”

 

Early the next morning after breakfast, they separated the horse catch on horseback. Branded horses were cut out first and turned loose if they looked like discards. The good ones that looked like they were broken were corralled. Their owners would pay for their return. They'd simply escaped and joined the wild ones. Obvious cripples were cut loose, along with a clubfooted one, a bay with a bad limp from some previous wreck and a horse with problems in his neck that restricted him from raising his head.

That left about thirty prospects in the final cut. Six were freshly weaned and too young for their purposes. They branded these with Lucy's D-T iron and neutered them. They would return for them when they were older.

After a long day of sorting and working the herd, they finally made it back to camp, exhausted, ate some leftover biscuits, fell into their bedrolls and went to sleep.

 

Jack was up before dawn to help Cotton fix breakfast. The crew would need to eat hardy to work another day. They fried a pound of sliced bacon, a huge pan of German fried potatoes and onions, plus two batches of biscuits in the Dutch oven. Cotton stirred the skillet of scrambled eggs while Jack woke Jangles and Arnold.

They crawled out of their bedrolls, bleary-eyed, looking like they'd been through hell.

“This is tougher than chasing Comanches,” Jangles complained, pulling on his boots.

“Wait till you see what Cotton has cooked up.” Jack jerked his thumb toward the campfire to indicate the food.

“Hurrah!” Arnold said. “I dreamed we all would starve up here.”

Jack shook his head. He needed to hire a full-time cook next time. At least today they'd be full as ticks.

The two dozen horses they kept were worked, branded, gelded and fitted with a halter, rope and log to drag. Spooked by the trailing object, they usually threw a fit, but soon they would tire out and become tamer.

Midafternoon they went back to camp. Come morning they'd begin to break the horses. Jack felt proud of his hardworking crew. Things were moving along so well that he allowed everyone to take a siesta. At supper their spirits seemed to be lifted. Jack knew they were doing better.

 

In the morning they took their saddles and pads down to the pens. Using Mac as the snubbing horse, Jack roped the big bay, who threw a head-shaking fit. The boys rushed in, threw a jumper over his head and subdued him. Jangles worked a saddle blanket over his back, talking soothingly to the horse the whole time and dodging his flying hind heels. They untied the rope from his drag block, and using Mac they pulled him to a snubbing post. In a short while he was saddled and his left hind foot drawn up with a rope tied on the horn so if he fought he'd fall down. They left him and Jack rode in for another.

The big gruella he picked pawed with his forefeet and flashed his teeth. Despite his surgery from the previous day, he was not going to be easy.

“Go get a blanket,” Jack told Arnold. “We're laying him down and showing him who's boss.”

Jangles frowned as he tried to work closer with the saddle pad. “What're we going to do?”

“We'll put him down on his side and you can sit on his head and neck and talk to him awhile.”

“What is he, four or five?”

“He ain't a baby.” Jack watched the gruella shake his head furiously.

“No, he's been in some fights too. Got several scars from battles with stallions.”

“He should make a good stout horse,” Jack said.

Before the day was over, Arnold was bitten on the arm by a furious bronc. No broken skin, but it tore through his sleeve. He was jumpy for the rest of the day, leaping back whenever a horse flashed his teeth at him, which several did. The others got a kick out of it.

After they had successfully tamed a few horses, the crew rode back to camp, joking and laughing.

“What was it like up there in Abilene?” Jangles asked.

“No one ever went to sleep,” Jack said. “Those cowboys never stopped their wild parties. They gambled till they lost all their money. They hugged and kissed every shady lady that would stand still for them and drank lots of bad whiskey.”

“Were they pretty?” Jangles asked. “The women, I mean.”

“Not particularly, unless you were starved for one.”

“You don't act too excited about having been there.” Jangles sounded a little disappointed.

“It was just another wild place. Folks didn't show good sense and there were some shootings that were uncalled for. Whiskey and guns don't mix well.”

“Sorry I asked,” Jangles said.

“No, it wasn't . . .” Jack gave a sigh. “It simply wasn't a good experience for me.”

“Something bad happen to you up there?” Cotton asked in a low voice.

Jack looked off across the rolling hills, which were distorted by heat waves. Those boys needed an answer, but he felt too choked up to talk about it. He couldn't swallow.

“My youngest brother, Cory, was there with me.” He chewed on his lower lip before he continued. “Cory was seventeen. I guess he got involved with a lady of the night in a saloon. A drunk came in claiming she was his girl. When she protested he slapped her down to the floor.

“Cory caught his arm to make him stop. The man whirled, answered him with a .45 and shot him five times.”

“Five times?”

Jack nodded.

“Did the law get him?” Jangles asked.

“No. He got away.”

“What was his name?”

“Julius Knotts.”

Cotton looked up from the floury board where he was cutting biscuits. “You know where he's at?”

“I hear every once in a while that he's been in such and such a place. In fact I was looking for him the night I learned about the Lost Dog Creek dance and rode up there to see if he was around someplace.”

“I never heard the name before,” Arnold said, busy peeling potatoes between his knees.

“He goes by Jewel sometimes,” Jack said.

“That the reason you been saying no to the trail-boss job?” Jangles asked.

Jack looked off at the low setting sun. It would be dark in a half hour. “The job ain't all it's cut out to be. I buried three young men along the trail to Abilene. Their mothers won't ever be able to decorate their sons' graves. They're buried at river crossings and places we had stampedes. By now the crude crosses we planted over them have been trampled down by other herds passing through, so there aren't even any markers.”

He shook his head and asked them to excuse him. Everyone felt subdued.

Standing on the highest point he watched the bleeding sun dissolve away the last of the day. Abilene was over, but it still felt like a spear in his chest when he talked or even thought about Cory's death at the hands of that cruel man. One shot would have been enough, but to empty his six-gun in Cory's body seemed like cold-blooded murder.

Jangles broke his thinking. “Sorry, Captain, I never meant to stir up bad memories. I brought you some food. Better eat. You're sure going to need your strength.”

He took the plate and sat down cross-legged on the ground. “Thanks. I'll be fine. Just need a little space.”

“You got it.” Jangles left him.

He was grateful for Jangles' thoughtfulness. Maybe sleep would put the matter to rest. Sometimes it did; sometimes it didn't.

Whooping and shouting the next day, Jangles fanned the bay's ear with his hat. The best that the horse could do was crow-hop stiff legged. After some time Jangles got the horse to respond to the reins and rode him around the large round pen.

“Open the gate. I'm going to ride the hair off him.”

“Don't forget we've got more,” Jack reminded him.

They'd left the gruella for the boss man. Tying the horse's head to his left leg, he mounted and turned him loose, and the ride was on. Things became rowdy. Gus, as they called him, made some high-flying lunges through the air and Jack thought for a short while he'd overpower him. But in a short time Gus became confused and Jack took the upper hand, punishing him when he tried to break out. Soon Jack rode him out the gate, short-loping and teaching him to rein. The big horse learned quickly.

 

They all intended to rest on Sunday. Midmorning a wagon showed up bearing Lucy and Tally. Everyone busied themselves hand-brushing their hair and tucking in their shirttails.

Jack smiled, grateful to see the two of them. He hugged both of them, kissed his wife and led her over to the fire. “This is Cotton's kitchen.”

Arnold offered to show Tally the horses they had caught. Lucy shooed her off with him.

“We butchered some chickens early this morning. Thought you boys might want something hearty after all this camp fare,” Lucy said, presenting the chickens.

The others cheered and she winked at Jack. “I knew they wouldn't turn down a meal from me.”

“No way,” Jack said, and shared a private wink with Cotton. “Would we?”

“No, sirree.”

“If I keep these horses up here much longer I'll need a wagonload of hay. They've eaten most of the grass in those pens,” Jack told her.

“One of the Yarboroughs would bring a load up here for ten dollars, I'm certain,” Lucy said, on her knees as she started the fire under a large skillet.

“Order me one,” Jack said. “In two weeks we'll come out with the horses, drop by for a visit, and go on to Fort Worth.”

“Will you be there for the dance?” Lucy asked, referring to an upcoming town event.

“That'd be good. We'll be there.”

She smiled wide. “I'd appreciate that.”

“How's Luke?”

“Antsy. He had to watch the place instead of coming up here. He wants to join your rangers when his leg is healed.”

“I'll see how we're doing when his leg is fully healed.”

She shrugged, spooning lard into the pan. “I just wanted to warn you. He's gonna ask you one of these day.”

“I guess he's as old as these boys.”

“And he's got a steady head on his shoulders to boot.”

“I'll think on it. Anyway, I sure appreciate you coming out here. It's nice to a have a woman who'll save me out here with her fried chicken,” he teased.

Lucy laughed, poking him in the side with a spoon. “Don't underestimate the power of my chicken. You boys need to keep up your energy, and beans and biscuits ain't gonna do it.”

Tally and the rangers returned looking refreshed; Tally's cheeks were especially rosy, and Jack figured it had something to do with all the male attention. She helped her mother fry chicken, mash potatoes and stir the huge pan of bubbling white chicken gravy. The three boys sat around the fire, hugging their knees and rocking back and forth, trying not to drool over the savory aromas.

After dinner Lucy and Tally packed everything up to leave. Lucy and Jack took a walk over a hill to have a private moment before she headed back home.

“It gets lonely,” she said, holding his hand between them, “when you're gone.”

“It gets lonely up here too. But if we can break two dozen horses and sell them in Fort Worth, it'll be a nice sum. I'll be able to afford some of that good barbed wire down at the blacksmith's so we can finally mend that break in the fence around the cornfield.”

“I know, I know. I just miss you.”

They kissed in a long embrace, then he herded her back to the waiting wagon. They could spend all day in each other's arms, but they needed to be back at the ranch before dark.

When Lucy and Tally were gone the crew lounged around, praising Jack's choice of a wife.

“She's sure a great cook,” Cotton said.

“She's always a well-dressed lady,” Jangles said.

“You were plumb lucky to find her,” Arnold said.

Jack just smiled in amusement. He couldn't say enough about his good fortune. “Two weeks and we'll be back for the schoolhouse dance.”