Sipping Whiskey in a Shallow Grave (32 page)

Two men came around the corner of the house.

“Here comes Billy Ney and Arizona Johnny,” Matlock said pointedly. “They're on my Xmas list.”

“What's going on, Que?” Billy Ney shouted, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand. He was covered in dust and sweat. They both were. It was another hot June day in the Yellow Houses Pastures.

“They're firing me, Billy,” Campbell shouted back. “Cuttin' me out. This is how they show appreciation for good hard work.”

“It's done, Campbell!” Matlock spoke firmly. His gray eyes were sharp.

Campbell kept glaring at Boyce, bristling. He knew he was in a tight place. They must have watched and waited until he was far enough from his men. If they had tried this back at the branding chute, it would have played out differently. But Barbeque Campbell could see the odds were not so sunny at the moment.

“On the authority of the members of the Chicago syndicate, we are taking charge,” Boyce announced. “You're gone, Campbell. Ride out today.”

“Que?” Billy shouted again. He and Arizona Johnny stopped a little ways off. They had left their guns in the bunkhouse since it was a branding day. It was too easy to lose a handgun wrestling a steer or bending over the firepit to get another iron. Billy could not believe what he was seeing.

“Don't you worry none, Billy.” Barbeque stared hard at Boyce. “I'll straighten this out.”

“Set your gun on the ground, Campbell,” Boyce instructed. “See that horse? Take it and go.”

Barbeque Campbell eased down and set his Colt .45 on the ground. He straightened up slowly until he was eye to eye with Boyce again.

“Get on back there, Billy!” Campbell yelled. “Go help Earl. Finish up for the day. Guess I'm not on the payroll no more.”

Billy Ney spun around and headed back to the corral. Arizona Johnny stood there a little longer, gawking. Finally, he followed Ney, and the two of them disappeared around the corner of the ranch house.

Barbeque Campbell set off towards the hitching post where a horse was tied to the rail, eyes half closed. Earlier, Boyce had put an old saddle on one of Campbell's day horses. If the man rode off and kept the horse, which he undoubtedly would, it would not be a major loss considering the circumstances. It was more important to get him to leave before the rest of his men knew what was happening. Billy Ney and Arizona Johnny were getting the crew riled up at that very moment. But without Campbell to lead them in some kind of upstart, Boyce was confident the tension would ease off.

Campbell untied the horse and climbed aboard. He walked the horse right past Matlock and Boyce, glaring down as he rode by.

“Here's your final pay,” Boyce said and tossed an envelope up to Campbell, who caught it and looked inside.

“You had all this planned out. My horse…the money,” Barbeque realized. He looked up at the ranch house window and saw a figure inside. It was Rollin Larrabee, the rotund bookkeeper, watching through the curtains. Campbell pointed at him with the envelope, shaking it angrily.

“I see you, Rollin Larrabee! You had time enough to get my pay together. You could have come out n' warned me instead. I see where you stand!”

“Light out…now!” Matlock demanded and pointed the shotgun directly at him.

“Oh, I will. You high-falutin'
bastard!
”
 

Barbecue Campbell, former general manager of the XIT Ranch of Texas, dug his rowels into the horse's sides and took off at a run. He loped out into the grass and headed due east. The sun was bright on his back and cast a long shadow out in front of him. Just then a group of hands came up from the corrals, predictably, led by Billy Ney and Arizona Johnny. Boyce went straight up to the group and addressed them sharply.

“Gentlemen. I am Colonel AG Boyce, and I am managing this ranch now. What I say happens. And I say Billy Ney is no longer foreman of the Yellow Houses division. Frank Yearwood is.”

Boyce singled out Frank Yearwood, who stepped up and shook hands with Boyce. The rest of the cowhands began chattering. Some of them, like Albert Smith and Henry Higglesworth, were clearly pleased with Yearwood's promotion. Some were even relieved. But others threw hard looks. Billy Ney was speechless and looked around for some support.

“I would fire you right now, Mr. Ney,” Boyce said, in everyone's hearing. “But with the pastures so full we need hands. Prove yourself worth something, and I'll keep you on. That goes for more than one of you here today. This is a warning against lawlessness. I will not stand for it.”

“Thank'ya, Colonel Boyce,” Frank Yearwood said gratefully. Smith and Higglesworth came up, and they both clapped him on the shoulder. The tension melted as the group of cowboys dispersed. Mr. Matlock tucked the shotgun in the crook of his arm again.

“These men ride for your wagon now,” Boyce told Frank. “This is a bad time to change over, I know, but it
is
happening.”

“Still got a lot of hard-cases need to be run out,” Frank mentioned.

“Keep receiving cattle,” Matlock told him. “Drive some north to the breaks in the Alamositas if you have to.”

“After that,” Boyce added, “I plan on firing most of this whole blamed crew.”

 

Chapter 21

Arkansas River Valley

Colorado

 

“Eyelids all butterflyish,” Granger observed, bending over Vincent who was lying on the ground. “Wake up!”

But Vincent did not wake up — although his eyelids were indeed fluttering like butterflies. Nearby, Bill sat hunched against a gritty boulder.

“I am afraid he won't make it to Poncha,” Bill said with a note of sadness.

The sun had been up for an hour or so. He looked down at his old companion. They had ridden together through many rustlings, robberies and killings. But now, here they were. Vincent was dying. His face had no color, and the skin looked like it was stretched tight. Granger had been quiet for most of the ride. This was because he had been asleep in the saddle. Bill could hear his heavy slobbery breathing quite clearly as they walked their horses through the dark.

Bill always liked traveling under the stars. Summer nights in the high desert were cold. Even though temperatures could get pretty high in the day, it always surprised him how cool it could get once the sun went down.

Bill got to his feet and turned to face the rising sun. His hands were buried in his coat pockets. He sighed. Vincent was in bad shape. He would be dead soon. Probably within a day or so. There was no real point in riding on. Even if they made it to Poncha Springs, it would only get the local law asking questions. Why give them a reason to take interest? Bill squinted and saw a hawk gliding out in the distance. He wondered if there was a Hell. When his ma died, when Bill was just a boy, he listened intently to every word the preacher said at her funeral. He said there were Streets of Gold and Gates of Pearl up where she was going. But down below, on the wrong end of eternity, was a burning Lake of Fire. Bill glanced down at his friend
. Well, Vincent — it's the lake of fire for you, compadre.
 

Granger was pressing Vincent's palm into a prickly pear. The thorns were long and slid right into the soft flesh. It was a new source of amusement for Granger: checking on Vincent's level of awareness. It began with finger twisting the night before. Now he was patting Vincent's palm into a cactus. It was some measure of compensation for the mean delights Vincent had taken in regard to Granger's own misfortunes.

In fact, to Granger, life seemed like a series of misfortunes. Ever since he lost his first tooth to an outhouse door, he spoke with a lisp. One of Vincent's mean delights had been poking fun at Granger's lisp. Then after Will Wyllis banged open the mining shack door, the ribbings got even worse. Two missing teeth made everything he said come out with a whistle. Vincent found that endlessly amusing. It sorely aggravated Granger. He hated to be made sport of. And now, look! Sweet recompense.

It was quite an enjoyable thing. Although it would be much more gratifying if Vincent was just a little bit lucid — so he could feel the pain Granger was inflicting. Maybe he could. Maybe somewhere deep down in there, even though he was unconscious, Vincent could feel the cactus thorns working into his palm.

“We're not riding further,” Bill declared and took a small spade from his saddle. “Put up a rope corral and turn these horses out. Set up camp.”

“Okay, Bill,” Granger said plaintively. He decided not to irk Bill, in light of his sad demeanor. Of course, Granger himself was quite giddy over the fact Vincent was dying. The two had never gotten along. Perhaps, Granger supposed, Bill would be kinder to Granger now — once Vincent gave up the ghost.

“Gonna dig a grave. When I get back, help me move him up there.”

Bill took off his coat knowing he would warm up quickly once he started to dig. Unbuckling his gunbelt, Bill stacked all his gear in the shade of a cedar. He took a canteen, a bottle of whiskey and the spade and made his way up a long low hill.

The sky was blue and cloudless. It was going to be a hot day. Once Bill hiked up the hill, the ground leveled into a wide plateau that stretched off towards several low, broken bluffs. Bill spotted a lone piñon tree ringed by cholla, not too far out there. The cactus had little yellow flowers budding on its tips. With all the pretty yellow flowers, Bill figured this would be as nice a place as any.

At least there was a little shade under the tree to work in. Bill set the whiskey and the canteen in the hook of the roots. He stuck the spade in the ground and was glad to find the soil was not too dense. It was a little rocky, but he managed to dig down. The grave needed to be several feet deep at least, to keep the wild animals from digging him right back up.

As he shoveled, Bill really began to feel blue. This could just as easily be his own grave. He stopped digging and used the spade like a crutch, resting in the morning sunlight. Bill was getting tired. Tired of the lawlessness which had been his life for so long. It was starting to seem like the right time to turn his life around. He didn't want to die in an unmarked grave in the high desert of Colorado — like Vincent, anonymous and forgotten. It wouldn't take much to change things. All he had to do now was get loose of Granger. Perhaps he would dig two graves.

 

Chapter 22

 

“Don't grab my waist, Mary,” Charley Crouse said, irritated. “Hold onto the cantle or you'll be afoot.”

“Don't call me Mary,” Caverango retorted. “This caballo es bumpy.”

Caverango was sitting behind the saddle, straddling the gelding's spiny croup and rocking uncomfortably with each step. He found it was much more effective to cling to Charley's waist than it was to pinch-grip the cantle or hold onto the tie strings. He had experimented with both, but when the trail got rough he realized it was safer to just grab onto Charley. But Charley Crouse did not like it when another man rode behind him. It made him feel awkward — and made him want to harm that person. Which was how he felt right then.

They were last in the line. They were following two other horses, which were also doubled up with riders. Peter Mulock sat behind his older brother Edson on an unlucky quarter horse. A lemon-faced ranch hand named Whitey Jones rode unhappily behind the eldest Mulock son, Parker, on a big Percheron cross. The haunches on the draft were beefier than a regular sized horse, and Whitey was feeling all stretched out. It wasn't natural and he was not enjoying himself. Whitey felt it was an indignity to have two cowboys ride on one horse. That morning, he started out on foot…until the sun came up and the temperature soared. It got too hot to walk.

In the lead — alone on his own horse — rode the family patriarch, Mr. Mulock.

And his face was grim.

“Shut the hell up, would you!” Parker shouted over his shoulder. He rode directly behind his father, studying the man's posture. He was worried his father was about to erupt. The man had a violent temper, and Parker knew what they were in for, should he erupt.

The Mulock boys had been raised under that temper and learned early to watch their step in times like this. Edson and Peter were keenly aware of the situation, too, and only muttered to each other in whispers. And of course Whitey knew his place in the pecking order, which happened to be near the bottom.

They had to wait for the sun before they could follow the tracks. It had not been too difficult once it was light enough to see. The hoofprints were of course unique and easy to spot. Every shoe was different to begin with and left its own distinct impression — but things were even easier since Mulock had employed the same blacksmith for the past twelve years. The blacksmith always punched the same kind and number of nail holes. In addition to all this, no one had been on this part of the trail except the horse thieves. Mulock was confident they would recover their stock before noon.

As it was, it was nearing noon. Whitey Jones had a look of extreme discomfort on his face and held one hand over his crotch. Over the last hour he had taken to moaning gingerly about his “bull scrote.” Parker tried shushing him but found it increasingly difficult.

The tension Parker was feeling had started when they woke up to three horses missing. Between his father's mercurial brooding, Charley's complaints and Whitey's sensitivities, Parker wished mightily he had stayed home the day before.

His father's bank, The Cañon City Bank, was on the brink. But no one knew it yet —certainly not the clientele or the investors. It was a house of cards, Parker realized, and just a matter of time before it all fell down. As the firstborn, it was his lot to take the reins when his father got too old. So he was learning the business. Unfortunately, what he was learning was not good. And it had become clear to Parker that his hard-handed father was not interested in doing right by the bank.