"This'n here's two thousand pounds," Pete said as they reached the bull, seemingly growing larger as the four of them drew closer. "Stands just under five feet at the shoulder, and pretty as a picture." Pete reached up and scratched the curly hairs on its forehead. "This'n here's name is Cooksin."
Jake nudged Py a bit. "Quite a lookin' animal, isn't he?"
Py seemed awestruck. "It's the most beautiful thing I ever seen in my life," he said. "How'd you get him?"
"Providence," Pete said, like it was gospel. "A couple years back I had me a little trouble with gall stones: liked to killed me and I spent a week in the hospital over in Denver. I met this English fella there – rich guy. He'd come over on one of those luxury liners just after the war and was in Colorado settin' up business with some cattle companies." Pete seemed to relish telling this story, obviously regarding it with the respect someone else might reserve for evidence of higher order in this world. "He was kind of a stuffy old guy, grumpy, but he told me all about this breed they were trying to get goin'; said he was lookin' for investors. Most of the people he talked to around Denver didn't think much of the notion. There's few people in the world got real vision," Pete said, poking two fingers at his eyes, to emphasize the point. "I could see the possibilities and at the time I happened to have some money. So, I give it to him." Pete looked at Jake, nodding toward Tory. "This is the kinda thing that wouldn't happen now. Anyway," he said to Py, "the guy went on back across the ocean and I didn't hear anything and didn't hear anything... I was just about to give up on the deal, figuring I'd never see my money again, when I got a cable from New York sayin' this animal had arrived for me – from Scotland! He'd been quarantined for months. They shipped him across country by train and he finally showed up in Denver. I took a truck down to the stock yards and picked him up. And here he is."
Py's awe and respect was now even larger. "I'll be dogged," he said. "What are you gonna do with him?"
"Gonna start a new herd," Pete said.
"A herd of these things?" Py asked.
"Well, not exactly," Pete said. "The idea is to get a commercial cow-calf operation started, breeding Cooksin here with regular Herefords, crossin' 'em for size. We won't get no more Charolais outta the deal – no two thousand pound beef cows – but what we do get'll be bigger than a standard Hereford cow. And it don't cost no more to get 'em, either, so for the same investment you get a better return at the auction house." Pete gave a sharp nod of his head, putting an exclamation point on his plan. "Cooksin here is gonna save this place." Then he grinned. "Providence," he said.
* * * * *
"So Py, you want to have a hit off this?"
Jake produced a fifth of whiskey from beneath the front seat, as he steered Pete's old pickup along the field road that followed his pasture's fence line to the south. When he held the bottle up to eye level to examine it, Py could see that three-fourths of its content was already gone.
"No, thanks," Py said.
Jake excused him with a shrug. Holding the bottle in his right hand, he adroitly worked his fingers to unscrew the cap, all the while keeping his left hand on the steering wheel. He swigged half of what was left and grimaced as the dosage landed on his stomach, and then he expelled an apparently involuntary column of hot air. "I probably should envy you your discipline," he said, talking through his short-lived, self-imposed distress.
"It's just a little early in the day for me," Py explained, not wanting to seem unpleasant. It was, after all, still morning. Then he added – "They found a bottle under the seat of the truck yesterday." The comment was little more of an absent mention without purpose, an accidentally triggered remark, but Jake frowned when he heard it. "That one I had there?" Jake asked. He suddenly felt the rash of responsibility for having contributed to Py's troubles. "They didn't expect it was yours, did they?" Jake asked, with concern.
"The deputy asked me about it – smelled my breath. I hadn't drunk none of it," Py said.
Jake looked worried. "I never thought nothin' about leavin' that bottle there," he said. "Damn, I feel bad about that. I'd never mean to cause you any problems."
"You didn't," Py assured.
Jake seemed uncertain. He looked at Py then looked down at the bottle in his hand, examining it as if it had suddenly become suspicious. He raised it to his lips, took another quick slug, and then tossed it out the open window, looking at Py after doing so as if they'd only narrowly escaped an encounter with Satan.
Py smiled slightly, satisfied to see temptation gone, then refocused his attention, watching the fence line that passed just a few feet to his right. After a brief period of meditative silence, during which both men seemed happy to watch for damage and analyze the task ahead, Py asked – "So what do you think, Jake? You think Pete can make a go of it with that big white bull?"
"I think he's got a chance," Jake said factually, repositioning himself so that he had one hand on the wheel, one arm out the window. He drove slowly along in first gear, but parts of the road were deeply rutted and the ride was rough. Py was holding on to the door on his side, trying to avoid being bounced off the seat. Jake was doing his best to look casual, but he was being buffeted around just as badly, so it was a difficult act. "That's a hell of an animal he's got. If he's a good breeder..." Jake shook his head. That was the question, wasn't it? It wouldn't make any difference how strong the bloodline was if Cooksin couldn't pay his way.
"So you're planning to stay?" Py asked. Then he thought of Jake's other motive. "Of course, you got Tory here."
Jake smiled. "I plan on stayin' for a while anyway."
Py could sense that Jake had arrived at a decision about old Pete's run-down ranch and his rejuvenation project: he had decided to invest himself. Obviously Tory being part of the deal was the thing that had cemented Jake's typically wandering interests, but Py was still a little surprised. Jake had always seemed to be on his way somewhere, and he hadn't seemed anywhere near ready to stop. Now Py was getting the feeling that Jake had undergone some sort of transformation. He was talking about fence mending as if the idea was to get ready for a big herd. Py didn't figure a guy would be thinking like that unless he was planning on digging in for a while.
Py looked out across the countryside to a distant arroyo. The grass on the high plateau grew long and golden, but in the ravines below the earth was carved to the bone, cut into a sharp "V" of bare brown dirt. For a moment he imagined seeing a calf lost there, bleating, crying out for its mother, and a cowboy leading his horse down the steep grade, coming to get it.
"I like Tory," Py said, pulling himself out of his dream. "She likes you too," Jake said.
"She sure is nice." Py seemed for a moment to think back to this morning and what his situation had been before he met up with Tory and Jake.
Jake looked at Py for a moment. "You know, there is something you could do for her.”
Py got serious. "What?"
"You could stay here and help us get this place back in shape," Jake said. "You and I together could do a lot. It'd sure take care of some problems for you while you're getting this thing sorted out with Walker: give you a roof over your head, three squares a day." Then Jake gave him the bad news. "The thing is, that'd be all you'd get out of it, at least for a while. Old Pete doesn't have any money, so there'd be no pay. That's the way it is for me, too. Of course, if we can get a herd started, there'd be lots of money. After that a guy would at least do as well as he would workin' for somebody like Frank Walker. And Pete wouldn't shake you down either. He's a standup guy."
"He seems like a fine man," Py said, completely in agreement. "I'd be pleased to work for Pete." Then he hesitated. "Are you sure this is okay with him though? And what about Tory? I can't see why she'd want me around. That house is gonna be pretty crowded."
"Don't worry about her," Jake said. "She's fine with it."
Py rested on that for a moment, and then asked, "So how does old Pete pay for groceries?"
"Tory says he's got a little money
left from selling farm land," Jake said. "Exactly how much I don't know. I don't expect to see any money comin' in from the cattle operation anytime soon, because he's too late this year to get any light cattle to spring auction. He's talking about buying thirty head right away and wintering stockers on wheat or oat pasture, which means he'd have to rent some space from somebody. He can summer 'em on his own grass and sell 'em at feeder weight next fall, and that'll give him some cash to work with. To get Cooksin started, though – that's gonna mean buying some brood cows, and I don't know where the money for that is gonna come from. But, if he can make it happen, and if Cooksin can get half of them started, well...there'd be money year after next. Then old Pete would be in the commercial cow-calf business, which is what he wants. I don't know what that big white bull's gonna do until next summer though." Jake slowed the pickup to a crawl and leaned way across the seat, over toward Py, so he could look at the fence they passed by on the right. "Thing is," Jake said, "we got plenty of work on our hands before we can put any cattle out here anyway, so we can use the time to get this place into shape."
"What if it don't work out though?" Py asked. "Workin' for room and board... I got no money at all."
"Well I got a little," Jake said, which caused Py to hit him with a look of surprise. "You do?" he asked. "I got a little stowed away," Jake said. "I can help you out a little if things go bad. But they won't."
"Where'd you get money?" Py asked, still stunned by the notion that Jake would have financial underpinnings.
"I keep a little in a bank in Denver," Jake said. "When I get a little bit ahead I always send a little to my account. In fact, that's how I met Tory. I was downtown at the bank arranging to have some money wired to me from my account and I saw her there. It was right after Walker let me go..."
Py looked nervous. "There's something I want to ask you about that, Jake," he said. Jake raised an eyebrow which urged Py to continue. "Well, Walt told me that Frank Walker fired you because you stole some money – and because you was doin' his daughter."
Just for a moment, Jake looked hard at Py, and then he grinned. "I didn't take none of his money," he said. "I did take some of my own."
"Walt says you got caught taking payroll money out of the desk in Walker's office," Py said.
Jake kept his eyes on the section of fence they were passing, making mental notes on work that needed to be done. "Walker was withholding my pay, charging me for things that got broke around the ranch. It was all bullshit. He keeps records, you know. Anything breaks, he writes it down. He's got ledgers full of that crap, and he's always writing down the names of people who he figures are responsible whenever anything happens. Then if somebody gets on his bad side he's got reasons why he ought to be able to do 'em however he wants." Jake seemed to snarl a little as he did a quick nod of his head. "He's a wicked old bastard, that Frank Walker." Then Jake looked directly at Py. "I never took nothing that wasn't comin' to me," he said. "I never stole from nobody."
Py sat quietly watching out the window at the passing panorama, trying to think how Jake's story fit with his own experience with Frank Walker. The partial admission satisfied him at least enough that Py could feel justified in having discounted Walt's wild accusations; he had never believed that Jake would thieve off anyone. Py rode in silence for a time, letting the relief of his good instincts wash over and relax him. Then, having won the right to a more pleasurable field of inquiry, he asked – "You think maybe Pete'll get him a horse or two? I mean, if he's gonna work cattle..."
Jake glanced over at Py and grinned, then refocused his attention on the fence row. "I 'spect he might," he said.
Py gazed off across the field toward the far arroyo. "I always wanted to be a cowboy," he said, mostly to himself.
CHAPTER 6 – Renewed Hope and Expectation
"Here you go, guys. Let's do a little toasting to renewed hope and expectation." Tory carried four glasses of straight whiskey into the living room and passed them out to Py, Pete and Jake, then took the last one for herself. She raised her glass in tribute. "And to Py, too," she said, "and to fresh starts."
The quartet clinked their glasses against one another's and then drank them down. "What's a matter, Py my boy," Jake said, noticing Py's expression as he downed the mash. "Nothing," Py said, barely able to regain his breath. "It's good." The contradiction between his words and his reaction brought a chuckle from his drinking buddies.
Py wasn't really much for liquor, but tonight was worth celebrating no matter what it took. He looked around at the faces, glowing in the warm, yellow light of an old kerosene lamp that sat on an end table to the side of the sofa. Tory was beautiful in the soft glow, ethereal as she smiled at Jake and her dad and cracked jokes, spiritually orchestrating the high spirits of the evening. He noticed the way Jake looked at her, the way he sometimes stared, forgetting himself as he watched her. Smitten, thought Py. He hadn't known Jake for a long time, but this was the first he'd seen of this side of him.
Jake's reputation was that of a cavalier, but this was a different Jake now, and Py knew it was because of this woman. Jake was in love and it showed. He'd fallen under her spell, which was easy for Py to understand because he'd fallen himself, though clearly the way Tory acted toward him was different than the way she was with Jake. She wanted to mother Py, while there was real fire between her and Jake. Py could almost see the sparks in the dimly lit room.
"Me and Py took a good look at your fences this afternoon," Jake told Pete. "We got a lot of work ahead of us."
"Is it just repairs, or is it gonna take new material?" Pete asked.
"I think we can rebuild what's out there, for the most part," Jake said. "There's a whole section over there on the south side that's down flat on the ground. We may have to replace a few posts there..."
"There's a pile of old bodark out behind the Quonset," Pete said. "It'll be tough to drive staples into, but it'll last a good long time."
"I bettcha we can work with it," Jake said. "With old Py's help here we can get it all back in shape in a few weeks."
"That'll be great," Pete said, smacking his lips. "You know, after that I'd sure like to get the yard here lookin' better. Maybe fix up the fence around the house, put a little paint on it..."
"Oh that would be wonderful, Pop," Tory said. "And this house, too. This place could look so nice with a little work." She paused for a moment, seemingly picturing the property in her mind, all rejuvenated and restored to its earlier condition. "I remember how it used to look when Mom was still alive. It was beautiful, Jake. It really was."
"As sweet a spread as you'd ever hope to see," Pete said, supporting Tory's contention. "Tory's mother used to ride herd pretty hard on us to keep the yard up. Used to make me mow the grass – we had grass, then – and keep the place all white washed." Pete seemed to be hit by a thought, then he got up out of his chair and went over to a little writing desk, from which he took a picture album. "Look here," he said to Jake as he carried the album over to him. "Here's a picture of Tory's mother."
Py moved over next to Jake so he could see the photograph. "She looks just like her, don't she?" Pete said.
The lady in the photograph could have been Tory, except that the clothes were from another time. The eyes, the fine line of her nose...it was all Tory. Jake looked up at Pete. "She sure was beautiful," he said, glancing then at Tory to see that she got the compliment, which she confirmed with a slight smile.
"She'd sure be pleased to know that somebody's takin ' an interest in the place again," Pete said. "She wouldn't have wanted to see it run down like it is."
"Well, we'll fix that," Py said confidently. "Won't be long before it's as good as new again."
"She used to dream that one day this place would be crawling with grandchildren – and that Pa would have a hundred head of prime beef at pasture." Tory radiated in her child's memories. "She was so proud of everybody, all the people in her life. This house right here was the ve1y center of her world – her safe ground.
"
"Home," Pete said.
"That's right," Tory said. "She just wanted a big home for everyone. I sure think it's a beautiful idea. I wish she could have seen it."
Pete moved uneasily in his chair, effectively breaking the mood Tory had spun. "Your mother had the misfortune of living in hard times," he said sadly. "It wasn't that her dreams were so big."
"It looks like you did pretty good for yourselves," Jake said. "You still got a pretty good spread here, leastwise compared to what most people have."
"I shouldn't complain, we've had it pretty good for the most part," Pete said. "Right away after we got married we got land from her family and we got a pretty good herd started. Had some good crop land – and we got this house built and put a yard in. And then she got pregnant with Victoria here. It all seemed to be in place, but then the damned depression hit." Just the word seemed to cast a pall over the room. "She got sick." Pete's face seemed to sag. "We started to get whittled down little by little."
"Well, the depression's over," interjected Tory, smiling broadly. She raised her glass in a second toast. "To the end of the depression!" It was a sentiment well accepted and everyone touched glasses.
"I got a picture here..." Jake fumbled in his billfold and in the time it took for him to find the photo Tory exchanged surprised looks with Py. This was a rare moment, Jake willingly revealing something about himself. He was loathe to talk about his past, where he came from, who his people were. Neither Tory nor Py had thought it likely that he carried anything so indicting as a family picture. "Here it is," he said. Jake looked at the photo briefly, and then rubbed it face down on his jeans, polishing it up before handing it to Tory.
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