Centennial

by James A. Michener

  “You better call it a day,” Person warned, but Coker said, “It’s either him or me.” Finally he managed to stay on, and the lightness of the McClellan saddle must have pleased the pinto after the heavy Texas saddles, for when he felt the man securely on his back he began to move with a new gracefulness, and for the first time in his life Bufe Coker understood what a horse could be.

  When he reined in where Person was waiting, he jumped down with excitement in his eyes and cried, “I want him,” but Nate dashed his enthusiasm by explaining, “Son, in an outfit like this you draw for the horses, and you’ll take your chance with the rest.”

  “But they wouldn’t pick a wild horse like this one ... would they?” Coker asked hopefully.

  “Just the kind of spirit a cowboy looks for in a horse,” Person said, but that night he passed among the others and told them, “At the drawing tomorrow, don’t nobody pick the chalk-eyed pinto. Soldier boy seems to think he can handle him.”

  At dawn the men made their pick of the remuda, by tradition each in turn choosing a horse, then a second, then a third, until every rider had a string of eleven mounts for the trail.

  The Confederate watched with anxiety as Poteet and Person chose first, followed by the men. Ragland, with a sense of comedy, made believe he was going to take the pinto, but at the last moment chose another. So the pinto remained, and when Coker’s first turn came he shouted, “I’ll take that one,” and a rewarding partnership was launched.

  At six Nacho Gómez drove up with four mules pulling the remarkable new wagon. From the front it looked like any standard long-bedded, canvas-covered prairie wagon, except that from its sides hung suspended an unusual array of pans, buckets, axes and canvas bags. It was from the rear that it seemed so striking, for there a boxlike structure had been fastened in such a way that the back could be lowered and made into a stout table, supported by a folding leg. Behind this collapsible table, hidden from sight until it was dropped, nested seven neat drawers, each with a brass handle, each with a store of useful or delicious items. One drawer was reserved for Mr. Poteet’s paper work, one for such medicines as were available, with emphasis on calomel to fight constipation, and various nauseous potions to combat diarrhea. The other five held spices, dried fruits, sugar and the exotic Mexican herbs Nacho intended introducing to his Texans.

  Now came the first test of the cowboys as a team. Before the herd could be thrown onto the trail, each animal had to be branded, horses as well as cattle, not only as proof of ownership but also to facilitate sorting in case the herd should become mixed with other cattle on northern sections of the route or at some river crossing.

  Poteet said, “I’ll get the smithy to make us some irons, but what brand will your ranch be usin’?”

  On this delicate matter Skimmerhorn had been given no instructions, so he said, “Use a V,” but Poteet said, “Can’t. An outfit down the line’s already usin’ that.

  “How about Lazy Vee?” But that too had been preempted. So had Bar Vee and Diamond Vee.

  “Wait a minute,” Poteet said. “Didn’t you tell me Venneford was a king or somethin’?”

  “I don’t rightly know what he is,” Skimmerhorn confessed. “Sometimes they call him an earl, sometimes a lord.”

  “In either case he’d have a crown, wouldn’t he? Poteet asked, and when Skimmerhorn said he guessed so, that was enough. “I’ve got a dandy!” Poteet cried, and off he went to the blacksmith. Next day he returned with irons for making the handsome brand that would became famous throughout the west, Crown Vee:

  Branding day always carried with it a festive spirit, and the testing of the new irons lived up to tradition. Each of the Texans took pleasure in laying his rope over the horns of the cattle or spinning it deftly around their rear legs. Poteet, surmising that Coker had never thrown a rope, forestalled embarrassment by directing him to the dirtiest, dustiest job of all—wrestling with the roped animals and holding them down while the brand was being applied.

  It required three days, from first light till fading dusk, to get through all the animals, and even then the job could not have been completed had not local cattlemen volunteered to help. They did so for two reasons: they loved the excitement of hot iron singeing hair, of cattle bawling in protest, of ropers dragging the next reluctant steer into position, of the hullabaloo caused by six teams working at the same time at the same dusty job; but they also anticipated the feast and the drinking that would come afterward, and as they pitched in to help, they kept one eye on Nacho Gómez and his cook wagon.

  “Best brandin’ I been to in a long time,” one old-timer declared the last night as he chewed on one of Nacho’s thickest steaks, set aside for this celebration. “Good whiskey, too,” Canby added, drawing on a bottle of Tennessee mash which Skimmerhorn had bought from a Jacksborough bar.

  “Drink up,” Poteet encouraged the men. “Last whiskey you’ll have for months.”

  So the Crown Vee animals were branded, eighteen hundred and ten cows and heifers ready to breed, one hundred and forty-two good bulls eager to breed them, and eight hundred and twenty-six steers, a herd of twenty-seven hundred and seventy-eight, all marked on the left hip, plus one hundred and thirty-two remuda horses and six mules branded lightly on the left shoulder by Nacho and the wrangler. These were the animals on which Oliver Seccombe’s dream of riches depended.

  On the fifteenth of March, 1868, Mr. Poteet indicated with a wave of his hat that the massive herd should move westward, and the full complement of men, horses and cattle started forward. (See Map 08 – The Skimmerhorn Trail 1868) Far in the lead rode Mr. Poteet, accompanied for the moment by Mr. Skimmerhorn. Behind them rode eight cowboys so spaced that they formed a permanent floating box around the herd. At the front rode the two points, Person to the left, Canby to the right. About a third of the way back rode the two swing men. Two-thirds of the way back rode the two flank men, whose special job it was to see that the main body of cattle did not bunch up and become overheated, for cattle moving close-bunched generated a tremendous heat which could actually melt off fat. And in the rear, where the dust was thickest and the cattle most difficult to handle, for stragglers must be made to close up, rode the two drags. To the left, in the humblest position of all, rode Bufe Coker, so stiff he could hardly stay in his saddle, his bandanna pulled over his face to repel the incredible dust. To the right, escaping some of the dust, rode Lasater.

  Far to one side and slightly ahead of even Mr. Poteet, rode Nacho Gómez in his cook wagon, and well behind him, in a spot where the dust from the herd could not annoy his horses, came Buck with his hundred and thirty-two animals. In this established formation the men and animals would move for four months.

  They could average fifteen miles a day if conditions were normal, and that took into account a two-hour break in the hot middle of the day. On this first break, when the cattle were grazing quietly and Nacho was making coffee, Mr. Poteet spoke to the men as a group.

  “The points and the drags will remain the same throughout the run. The four men at swing and flank will rotate mornin’ and afternoon, clockwise. There will be no gamblin’, absolutely none, for it breeds discontent and I intend this to be a peaceable trail. There will be no drinkin’, and if I catch anyone with a bottle anywhere along the trail, he gets paid off that instant, less the cost of one horse, which he can take with him in addition to his own. There are some trail bosses who even forbid swearin’, but I don’t see how we can handle twenty-eight hundred bastards like these without it. But keep it down.

  “Well, that’s the law, easy to understand, easy to keep. Oh, two more things. Keep your guns in your belt. I want no gunfire, not even in stampedes. For heading off steers, wavin’ a hat is much better. If the time comes we need guns, you’ll know it. And don’t abuse the cook. He’s got somethin’ you ain’t seen yet. Nacho, lay off them beans and show us your dragoon.”

  Leaving his Dutch ovens, the Mexican went to his wagon, rummaged among his blankets and came back with a fea
rsome weapon. Basically it was Samuel Colt’s 1848 Third Dragoon, .44-caliber, rounded-trigger-guard, seven-and-a-half-inch barrel, six-cylinder revolver, heavy and handsomely tooled. Nacho had picked it up in Mexico, where it had been lost by some army officer serving with a force left behind by victorious General Taylor, but what made it especially lethal was that it had been fitted with a special shoulder stock, which converted it from a pistol into a carbine. Thus adapted, it could be swept from side to side like a handgun but still controlled like a rifle.

  “And I’ve seen him use it,” Poteet said “Three things no sensible man fools with. A rattlesnake, a skunk, and most of all, a cook.” “Or women,” Ragland added in a whisper. Nacho smiled as he replaced the slaughter-gun, but halted in mid-action when Poteet called, “Wait a minute, Nacho! Let me see that dragoon.” When the Mexican handed it to him, Poteet deftly opened a secret lock at the base of the stock, tilted it until a few drops ran out, which he tasted as they fell onto his fingers. Then he replaced the fitting and handed the gun back to Nacho. “On the ride north with Mr. Skimmerhorn,” Poteet explained, “Nacho kept that filled with whiskey.”

  The hands cheered the Mexican, and he responded by pointing to the coffee, which was now ready. It had been made according to the standard Texas recipe: “Take two pounds of Arbuckle’s best, pour in a little water, boil for two hours, then test by tossing in a clean horseshoe. If the shoe sinks, it ain’t quite done.” The meeting ended when Nacho produced a Dutch oven filled with unexpected biscuits.

  The cattle were now starting to lie down, which meant they had grazed enough, so Mr. Poteet prepared to hit the trail, but before he did he told the men, “We have a lot of younger fellows with us this time, so maybe I better remind everybody what a cowboy is. Sometimes he has to fight Indians, and sometimes he requires fancy ridin’ and tricky rope work, which I’m sure you can do. At other times, especially in Kansas, he has to protect his herd against outlaws. And when we come to towns, which we don’t on this trail, he’s supposed to drink his weight in likker and throw his money to the girls.

  “All that’s to one side, necessary but not important. For me a cowboy is a man who tends cows. All day, every day. Those cows yonder are the reason you’re here. And gettin’ them up north in one piece is your only responsibility.

  “Let’s move ’em out!” and the cowboys slowly and with skill got the longhorns onto their feet, back on the trail and properly spaced for the afternoon journey.

  That day they made less than nine miles. Not only had they got off to a late start, well after the sun was up, but also Mr. Poteet wanted to have conditions as near perfect as possible for the first night. “If we can get them safely through these first days and nights,” he told the hands, “we’ll stand a good chance of keepin’ ’em from stampedin’.” Knowing that the cattle would be eager to turn back to their home pastures, a very strong instinct, he found a small creek and led them to the other side. There he sought out a meadow which had a well-defined mound between it and the creek, so that any longhorn that might want to run home would first have to climb the little hill. He then had his men quietly circle the meadow, their horses keeping well out from the cattle, so that when a cow or a steer started to edge away from the central mass, some horseman would be there to nudge it gently back.

  Silence was essential during this first critical night. There must be no noise from the camp, not even the sudden dropping of a spoon onto a tin plate or a loud sneeze. The remuda must be kept well away, so that no clatter from the horses could alarm the jittery cattle. Poteet, looking at the sky, was thankful that there were no signs of thunder or lightning, and he trusted that this far south no Comanche would infiltrate to stampede the herd intentionally, with the aim of stealing two or three hundred cattle in the melee.

  Poteet stayed up all that night. So did Nate Person. The rest were assigned regular two-hour watches. Two men, riding in opposite directions, circled the herd, singing softly as they went. On each round they would meet twice, dark and silent shapes looming up from the night, nodding as they passed, keeping their horses at a steady walk. In a well-run outfit, it was said, a night rider would move off a hundred yards even to spit, while the lighting of a cigarette or a sudden cough was intolerable.

  Within one second after an unusual noise, an entire herd of longhorns could be on its feet, dashing in some arbitrary direction, trampling anything that got in its way. Unmindful of ravines or rivers, of horses or men, they might rush insanely for three hundred yards, then mysteriously subside and sleep the rest of the night, or they might run for thirty miles, nearly killing themselves from sheer exhaustion. Little wonder that a stampede was something to be avoided, for its consequences no man could foresee, and for some, overtaken by a trampling herd or thrown by their horses down some gully, it was the end of the trail.

  The first night went peacefully, and Mr. Poteet slept in the wagon part of the morning, while Nate Person used it in the afternoon.

  On the second night there was a scare when a poorwill swooped over the restless herd, uttering its mournful cry. Several steers leaped to their feet and at some distance from any of the riders.

  “Quick!” Poteet called in a low voice to Lasater, who was riding guard, and the lanky Texan spurred his horse toward the trouble, but he was not needed, because a rugged old steer with a horn spread of fifty inches, named Stonewall by Poteet, muscled his way into the midst of the troublemakers and his resolute presence seemed to settle them.

  “A steer like that is worth three cowboys,” Poteet said.

  “Where’d you get him?” the cowboy asked.

  “I used him twice before,” Poteet said. “You can trust him ... like the general.”

  “He knew his business,” Lasater said, and the rest of the night went without incident.

  On the trail Stonewall pretty much took charge. He was a canny beast, experienced in trail routine, so that no matter where he might be grazing when Mr. Poteet waved his hat, he automatically worked his way to the front, ready to set the pace. By the fourth day the routine seemed well established.

  However, it was broken that morning when a young boy, who had been following the cloud of dust thrown up by the cattle, galloped into camp, asking to see Mr. Poteet. Lasater led the boy to the trail boss and listened as the young rider said, “Mr. Poteet, my mom says please to ride over and see her.”

  “And who is your mother?”

  “Emma Lloyd.”

  “Tom Lloyd your father?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “How is he?”

  “Dead. Didn’t get back from the war.”

  Poteet looked across the grasslands, and once more the terror of the southern war assailed him. But he also looked much further back, to the happier days of peace when he and Tom Lloyd were courting Emma Staller, half-heartedly, as cowboys do, and one day Tom had said, “R. J., I’m gonna marry Emma,” and Pot et had said, “You’re gettin’ a great girl.” The Lloyds had settled down and homesteaded a section with good water. Then the war.

  “How far is the ranch?” Poteet asked, but before the boy could reply, he added, “What’s your name, son?”

  “Jim.”

  “Take the herd on, Mr. Person,” Poteet said, preparing to ride with the son of his old friend.

  As they came over the hill Poteet saw a sight only too familiar these days: a Texas ranch with good prospects but on the shabby side because it had no man to tend it. A decent effort had been made, that was obvious, but things were run down. Young Jim, for example. He was clean, but his clothes were ragged. His horse was cared for, but his saddle should have been oiled. And the house. How it needed a carpenter!

  Seeing Emma Lloyd in these circumstances was painful, but he dusted off his hat and rode up to the house. “Hi, Emma,” he called easily.

  “R. J.! Well, bless me, you look just fine!” she said, wiping her hands on her apron.

  “What can I do for you?” Poteet asked. “Jim here told me Tom didn’t get back.” />
  “Him and many others,” she said. “I need you to buy my cattle, R. J.”

  “I’ve pretty well got my string, Emma.” he said.

  “So Jim told me when he came back from Jacksborough. I sent him there to offer ours.”

  “I didn’t see him.”

  “He got there too late,” she said, and R. J. had to turn away and look at the low hills to the south. He could visualize the boy riding hard through the night and getting there after he had left. In some families the rider always arrives too late, no matter how soon he starts.

  “Emma, we have every head we need.”

  “I’m sure of that, R. J. But we haven’t had a cent of spendin’ money in more’n a year. I just got to sell these cattle.”

  “How many children you got, Emma?”

  “Three boys. Jim’s the oldest.”

  “I’d like to see ’em.” When the boys were assembled he lit into them. “Why don’t you clean up this place? You’re men now, those cattle over there should be in lots better shape. You, Jim, do you ever do the chores to help your Maw? You’re men now, and you gotta begin to act like men.”