Monte Walsh

by Jack Schaefer

  "Thanks," said Monte. He waited for the cup of coffee. He moved off a brief distance and hunkered down on his heels and started on his first meal in a day and a half.

  Over by the other wagon a thin man with sharp eyes and a small trimmed mustache, new owner of one of the outfits and boss of the day's operations, watched Monte gulping coffee and attacking the plate of food. "Look at him eat," he said to another man beside him. "You can always spot them first sight. Those oldtimers think they can ride in, pick up a meal anytime anywhere."

  "Why not?" said the other man. "It's been going on a long time."

  "Not that I grudge it to them," said the thin man. "But it gripes me how they drift around expecting a handout. I've learned to stay clear of them. Too set in their ways. Too damn independent. Why just last month I had one quit me just because I sold a horse out of his string. Too good a price to miss. `If I'd asked you,' I says, `you'd of said go ahead, wouldn't you?T 'Sure,' he says, `but you didn't ask me.' And he quits me just like that."

  The men were mounting and riding out. Monte handed his plate and cup to the cook and hunkered down again to watch the work in progress. The main herd began to dwindle and two smaller herds to develop, held short distances away.

  One of the men, young and energetic on a horse the same, was well into the main herd driving a lean long rangy cow toward the outer edge. He had her out and headed for one of the smaller herds and she dodged to one side and he jumped to head her and she doubled to the other side and around him and back into the main herd, boring in toward the center. "Damn!" he said, loud and distinct, and started after her again.

  "Hold up!" shouted another young man. "I'll show you how it's done!" He drove in, scattering cattle as he went, and had the cow moving toward the outer edge. She snorted and ducked under the nose of a big steer and was boring into the middle again. A third young one, shouting derisively at the first two, was pushing in, scattering the cattle more. Work was stopping all around as all the other men watched.

  "Quit that!" yelled the thin mustached man from his post by the wagons. "Let that one go for now! You'll bust up everything! Close them up!"

  "My oh my," said Monte to the cook. "Letting one old cow act up like that. Downright scandalous. Ain't there one good horse in the whole bunch?"

  The thin man, twenty feet away, heard. He turned toward Monte. "I suppose," he said, sarcasm edging his voice. "I suppose you think you could do better."

  "Why sure," said Monte. "Nothing to it."

  "You talk big," said the thin man.

  "Big?" said Monte. "Just normal size. Any good horse'd have her out of there in no time at all."

  "I suppose," said the thin man, heavily sarcastic. "I suppose a stove-up drifter like you would be having a good horse? Like nothing." He turned away.

  "Mister," said Monte and his voice snapped the thin man back around and caught the attention of other men further on. "Maybe I will talk big. I'm just going to show you something. If those school kids you got trying to act like men'll stay out of the way, that horse of mine is going to cut that cow out of there and do it all by himself." He strode to the dun, ignoring the voices as the word spread, and swung up and the dun, alert to the mood along the reins, head high and with springy steps, trotted toward the main herd. The other men were silent now, watching.

  The dun eased in, not springy now, quiet and flowing, moving through the herd with scarcely a ripple, and Monte guided it to the old cow and the cow dodged away, slipping between other animals in full knowledge of the game, and he held the reins in command until he knew the dun had her singled and her direction fixed. He looped the reins in a loose knot and dropped them over the saddle horn and he raised his arms and folded them across his chest. The dun moved on, intent after the cow. Dodge and twist as she would always the dun was there, intercepting her, crowding her, shouldering her, driving her toward the outer edge, and Monte swayed and swung, knees gripping, rump flat to the saddle, arms folded, a grim little smile on his face."

  "See that son of a bitch ride," said one of the younger men. "Sittin' there no arms."

  The cow was forced to the edge, forced on out. She was being driven toward the smaller herd of her brand. She had room to maneuver now. Angry, desperate, determined, she dashed to one side and to the other. Always the dun was there, an instant or two ahead of her, blocking, forcing her on. The dun leaped and whirled and leaped, spinning within its own length, a dedicated flash of stout-muscled movement, and Monte whipped about, arms folded, and grinned as his hat went off.

  The cow made a frantic spurt and was behind a clumped juniper, racing around. The dun was there to meet her. She doubled back around and again the dun was there. She was blocked--but so was the dun. It could not get around either side after her without her dashing around the other. The two of them stopped, the cow panting behind the juniper, the dun in front of it, facing each other through the branches.

  "Why doggone," said Monte. "You going to let a mangy old cow buffalo you?"

  The dun waggled an ear. Suddenly it plunged straight forward, leaping right through the juniper with thrashing of branches, and rammed into the startled cow. Its jaws, open, smacked on the cow's shoulder and closed with a wicked snap on a fold of hide and muscle. The cow bellowed in surprise and pain and sudden fear--and pulled loose and dropped her head and shuffled in weary resignation toward the smaller herd.

  Monte paid no attention to the shouts of the other men. "Well, well," he murmured, patting the dun's neck. "You keep right on and someday maybe you'll be almost as good as old Monkey Face himself." He turned the dun and headed for the wagons and leaned down from the saddle to scoop up his hat as he went.

  "That was quite a stunt," admitted the thin man, grudging, as if the admission was not wholly pleasant. "Now was there any particular reason why you came by here?"

  "I could use a job," said Monte.

  "Too bad," said the thin man. This seemed to please him a bit more. "We have all the men we need. But I'll give you a hundred dollars for that horse."

  Monte's face hardened. "No," he said.

  "Two hundred."

  "No."

  "Two hundred fifty and something to ride away on and that's final."

  "Mister," said Monte. "You can push it up till the number's so goddamn big you can't even say it and this horse he ain't for sale." A wry grin showed on his lips as he swung the dun to ride on. "We drifters," he said, "we got to be drifting. See you. I hope never."

  Drift with the years, here and there and wherever the big land still finds a need for a man and a horse and the old simple unthinking acceptance of danger and duty and trust as' part of a day's work and the stern hard-won skills that are less and less important as open range becomes fenced pastures and ranching becomes more and more merely another form of farming . . . working hard and playing hard and standing up to the consequences of any act because that is the way it was and the pattern set by the past ... and now and again, maybe every other year, never when broke, always with some money in a pocket, wander back to a little town that is no longer quite so little, growing, growing . . . once for the christening of a baby boy whose parents, after long argument, have compromised on a name, Clark Montelius Rollins ... again to help lower into the ground the body of a lean old man who was imprisoned all the last years in a wheelchair yet who once summed in himself the full strong flavor of the old days . . . or perhaps simply to sit on the porch of a fine new house with the ever more dignified and ever more prosperous proprietor of a combination livery stable and feed store whose dignity and prosperity fade into meaningless additions to the man himself in talk in the slow leisurely southwestern manner with long friendly gaps between of things that have been and never will be again ...

  * * *

  They came around the side of the house, Monte Walsh and a round-faced six-year-old boy who held Monte's hand and looked up from under a wide-brimmed jauntily creased little hat bought the day before by Monte.

  "Look at me," said the boy. "I'm
as big as your belt already."

  "Growing like a weed," said Monte. "Have to tie a brick on your head one of these days."

  The boy thought about this and gave it up with a little shrug of shoulders. They reached the street and started along the middle of it toward the plaza.

  "Where's your gun?" said the boy.

  "Shucks," said Monte. "Those things are out of style around here."

  "But you've got your spurs," said the boy.

  "Why sure," said Monte. "Without them I'd feel plumb naked. Think you can keep a secret?"

  "Course I can," said the boy.

  "I like to hear 'em jingle," said Monte.

  The boy saw a small stone in the street and kicked it on ahead. They moved up to it and Monte gave it a kick. They moved to it again, swerving so the boy could have his turn.

  "Monte," said the boy, looking up. "My dad says you're the best man that ever--that ever--had a leg on a horse."

  "Plumb impossible," said Monte, taking his turn. "I couldn't be that."

  They moved on. "Why not?" said the boy, taking his turn. "Because he is," said Monte.

  They moved on, swerving all over the street to keep the stone ahead of them. They reached the plaza, promptly forgot the stone, and turned right.

  "Why can't I go with you?" said the boy. "Yesterday you said I could."

  "Shucks," said Monte. "It ain't going to be much. I'm just going to try out a couple horses old Mac picked up somewheres cheap."

  "I want to go," said the boy.

  "Quit that," said Monte. "I heard your mother say you wasn't to go into the stockyards."

  "She doesn't want me to do anything," said the boy.

  "Women," said Monte. "Peculiar things, women. Tell you what. We'll ask your dad."

  They turned in through the big open doorway of the livery stable. Monte stepped to the little door into the inside office, opened it. "Hey," he said to a gangling loose-jointed man who was shuffling papers at an old desk. "Where's the boss?"

  "Gone out a while," said the man. "Trying to collect a bill."

  "Goddamned businessman," murmured Monte, closing the door. He moved back along the stalls and entered one, ignor­ing the boy, who stood near the wide doorway watching him. He led out a deep-chested leggy dun, stripped off the halter, slipped on his bridle, heaved his old saddle into position.

  "I want to go," said the boy.

  "Sure you do," said Monte without looking around. "That don't mean you're going." He pulled the cinch tight, swung into the saddle.

  "I want to go," said the boy, rubbing hard at one eye.

  "Tell you what," said Monte. "Suppose I was to fix it so you wasn't exactly in the stockyards but you could see all right." He held a hand out and down.

  The boy ran to him and grasped the hand and Monte pulled up and the boy was on the dun with him. Monte sat well back on the cantle and settled the boy in front of him behind the horn. "Here," he said, putting the reins in the boy's hands, "you take those."

  The dun turned its head, inspected the arrangement on its back, saw the reins in the boy's hands, decided to pay no attention to them, responded to the nudge of Monte's spurs and the message of his legs down its sides. They ambled out the doorway, Monte ducking a bit, and around one end of the plaza and jogged seven blocks down a dwindling street and came to the array of low jerry-built buildings and pens which passed for the town's relatively new stockyards. As they approached Monte looked ahead and saw by the gate in the back side of the first and largest pen half a dozen men and among them the big gray-mustached figure of Sheriff MacKnight. Inside the pen two horses, a medium-sized solid bay and a long-barreled rawboned buckskin, were neck-roped to rails in a corner. Along the street side of the pen ran a long shed, flat roof sloped streetward.

  "Made for us," said Monte, taking the reins. "Regular grandstand."

  The dun moved in close along the shed and stopped midway. Monte stood in the stirrups and took hold of the boy under the armpits and hoisted so the boy could scramble onto the roof. "Go on," he said, "and sit down where you can see over. Don't go too near the edge. Got that?"

  "Course I have," said the boy.

  By stretching Monte could peer over the near edge and he watched the boy go up the gradual slope and sit cross-legged about a foot from the other edge and look back at him.

  "Now stay there," said Monte, "and don't go trying any tricks or I'll paddle you good. Personal." He sank down into the saddle and sent the dun at a fast lope back around the shed and the pen to the group by the gate. He swung down and looped reins around a rail and began to unsaddle.

  "I see you brought an audience," said Sheriff MacKnight. "Does his mother know he's here?"

  "Shucks," said Monte. "She don't want him in the yards. Well, I got you for a witness that maybe he's somewheres hereabouts but you can take an oath he ain't in the yards."

  "That's right," said one of the men. "He ain't."

  "He's on a roof," said another. "An' he's at the yards. But by jingo he aint in a one of 'em."

  "Same old Monte," said another. "He don't never change."

  "All right," said Monte. "What's with those two things in there?"

  "They come into the territory from somewheres," said Sheriff MacKnight. "Nobody knows about 'em. Brands blotched so they don't mean anything. Somebody picked 'em up over by Chico and brought 'em to the auction here last week. Feeling foolish I bought 'em and now don't know what to do with 'em. They'll lead, after a fashion. But they shy away from saddles. Scared out a couple of the boys here. Maybe you'll tell me if they're worth trying to work."

  "I get a leg over," said Monte, "I'll know."

  "Better take the bay first," said Sheriff MacKnight. "We've had a time with that other one."

  Five minutes later the bay stood, bridled and saddled, and two men held it by the cheek straps. Monte took the reins, winked at the boy on the roof, and in the single flowing motion was aboard. The two men jumped back and the bay soared upward, coming down hard, thrusting for head-play, and felt the iron grip on the reins and grunted in exasperation and plowed forward, bucking and crow-hopping.

  "Shucks," said Monte, serene in saddle. "You're not much more'n a small-scale firecracker." He waved at the boy and pulled the bay around and it bucked back toward the gate­side and he swung down and away, holding to one of the reins, and the horse stood, snorting but obedient to the taut rein. "Broke," said Monte. "Likely at about four and been running wild a few years. Take that out of him and you've got a good horse. Moves nice. If Chalkeye's still around he'll smooth him out for you."

  Twelve minutes later the buckskin stood, bridled and saddled, blindfolded, legs braced, one man hanging his weight from its ears, two men holding the cheek straps.

  "Mean," said Sheriff MacKnight from outside the gate. "Too damn mean. Forget 'im, Monte. You ain't as young as you used to be. I got one good one out of the deal."

  "Shucks," said Monte. "It's a horse, ain't it." He waved at the boy, pulled his hat down tighter, and was in the saddle. The men jumped away, making for the fence, and he flipped off the blindfold and the buckskin shot forward, high-rolling, twisting and wrenching in concentrated fury. Fast action, wild and whirling, seemed to fill the pen. Minutes passed and it seemed even to gain in momentum. Suddenly the horse stopped, shuddering, gulping for air, and Monte was erect in saddle, gasping, hat gone, a few drops of blood dribbling from one nostril.

  "Leave him!" shouted Sheriff MacKnight.

  "Leave him ... hell," gasped Monte. "I'll show . . . the son of a bitch." He raked the horse with his spurs and it squealed and shot forward again and whirled, around and around, dizzying, and snapped into a series of frenzied buckings, blind with rage, straight for the shed.

  Monte caught a glimpse of the boy, almost due ahead, forward on the very edge of the roof, legs hanging over, staring in frightened fascination. "Get back!" he yelled and the horse crashed into the shed wall, shaking it, and he saw the boy, in the act of trying to get legs up and crawl back, be
shaken loose and falling, falling, down almost under the plunging hoofs, and he pulled back on the reins with all his strength and the horse rose, up, up, tottering on hind legs, and he pulled heaving with his whole weight and the horse toppled backwards and he tried to push out and away and the shed wall cramped him and he went down between the dropping horse's body and the wall. He struggled up, battered and limping, as the horse scrambled to its feet and he leaped at the horse's head, waving his arms, an animal snarl sounding in his throat, and he drove the horse back and away from the small limp fallen body and he turned and picked this up and as he did he saw the one small arm dangling at an odd angle ...

  He sat on the steps of the back porch of the fine new house and stared at a bumblebee busy at a lilac bush and all unaware of the movement he rubbed gently along his left leg that was scraped and discolored from hip to knee under the worn cloth of his old pants.

  "Quit sniffling, Mary," came the aging voice of Doc Frantz through an open second-story window. "It's nothing but a broken arm. A nice clean break that'll heal in a matter of weeks. Good for him. Kind of like a badge. Shows he isn't a baby any more. He's a boy."

  He sat still and quiet and stared at the bee and faintly he could hear the sound of Doc Frantz going downstairs to the front door.

  "I did it to a leg," came the voice of Chester A. Rollins through the window. "At about the same age. I was kind of proud of it. And do you know, I don't think there's a piece of Monte that hasn't been cracked up one time or another."

  "Monte," came a woman's voice close to tearful anger. "All the time it's Monte, Monte, Monte. He doesn't talk about anything else and neither do you when he's here. It's all his fault."

  "The hell it is. Mac says he damn near got killed saving the kid."

  "Yes. After he took him there and caused it all. It's his fault and you needn't swear at me. For the life of me I can't see why you keep encouraging him to come back here. Oh, you were friends once but now you've gone way past him and it just doesn't-"

  "Past him!" The voice was flat, hard, uncompromising. "I'm not even up alongside him and I never have been."