The Cowboy Way

by Elmer Kelton

  One day two cowboys came walking in from the bluffs, leading their half-crippled horses. Finch blew up and left camp, talking to himself. When he came back two days later he brought two mean-looking dogs with him.

  “Cow dogs,” he said, his gloating eyes resting on Dodge.

  Dodge snickered. “Old 7X’ll tear up them pups like a lobo wolf does a jackrabbit.”

  Finch shook his head. “You’re goin’ with us tomorrow, Dodge. I want you to see this.”

  I felt sorry for Dodge as I watched Finch walk out toward the remuda. Dodge had never seen cow dogs work. I had. I’d repped for the Bar J one time when the Rafter D’s had used them to jump outlaw cattle down out of the rough country.

  We quartered north from camp next morning and came upon a wild steer we had missed somehow.

  “Watch him, Dodge,” Finch said. He spoke to the trailing dogs. They went bounding after the steer, faster than a horse could run. It went so quick we hardly saw how it happened. The biggest dog darted in and grabbed the steer’s nose with his teeth. Somehow he swung his body between the animal’s forelegs. The steer went crashing to the grass-matted ground. He got up and ran again, only to be thrown once more.

  For the first time, the confidence began to drain out of Dodge’s face. Worry settled into his smoke-gray eyes.

  The bluffs and the rough, broken country around them had been old 7X’s favorite running grounds ever since his snaky mammy had first stood over him, licking him clean and giving him his first bellyful of warm milk to steady those wobbly legs. There, except for the year he had been a calf, he had showed his heels to cowboys every time they went after him.

  Strange tales about him had grown by the dozen. And a bright light always flickered in the eyes of old cowboys like Dodge Willingham as they told those tales around crackling mesquite campfires, or by dancing yellow lamplight in a smoky bunkhouse. Old 7X represented a time when they had been young like us, when a man could still glory in the wildness of the country and all the creatures on it.

  We found where the big roan bull had been watering in a low swale which always caught the runoff from the rains. Tracks showed there might be a couple of cows with him. Excitement began to flush Finch’s heavy face. His hands kept rubbing his leather chaps as we worked along the edge of the bluffs.

  We rode up on one of the cows first. She was a rangy, high-tailed old sister that showed her Hereford blood only in her markings. Her long legs carried her clattering down a slope with the speed of an antelope. One of the cowboys spurred after her. Finch called him back.

  “Let her go. It’s the bull we want.”

  Old 7X spotted us first. We saw him break from a small clump of mesquite and take out in a high lope for the broken ground that lay to the south. Whatever else his age might have done, it hadn’t slowed his speed.

  Finch hollered like a half-grown kid and socked spurs to the sorrel horse he rode. We fell in behind him. Even Dodge, reluctant as he was, stayed right up with the bunch. We didn’t get within shouting distance of old 7X till he went sliding down the steep side of a hill, taking a shower of small rocks with him.

  Down past the crest of the next hill waited the bluffs. It wasn’t but a minute or two till we had old 7X ringed in. The only way out for him was down the face of a cliff. He stood looking at us in anger and contempt, his long tail arched, his horned head proud and high, jerking from one of us to the other. He decided the foolishness had gone on long enough. He lowered that great head and came charging like the locomotive on a Santa Fe freight. Every one of us except Dodge had our ropes down and our cinches hauled up tight. But the sight of that snorting old bull bearing down on us made us forget everything except to get out of his way. We could hear Finch shouting at us, but he didn’t sound nearly so mean as that bull.

  Old 7X roared through the line and kept going. I wouldn’t have given a plugged nickel for anybody’s chance of catching him.

  But Finch didn’t quit. He sicced the dogs after the old roan. They must have run a quarter of a mile before they finally caught up. He slid to a stop and turned to face them, those sharp horns down. He made a quick pass at the smaller of the dogs. I heard the dog yelp as a horn glanced off his lanky rump.

  The older dog knew his business. He jumped in and clamped his sharp teeth on 7X’s long ear. The bull roared and shook his head violently. The dog had to let go. The bull lunged at him, but the dog scooted out of the way. The younger dog leaped in and tried at 7X’s other ear but missed. Then the big dog got hold of the bull’s nose. The smaller dog tried again, and this time he grabbed the ear.

  Old 7X pitched and bellowed, the dogs staying with him. The two were trying to pull him down, but he was too heavy.

  We reined up and watched, hardly knowing whether to believe it or not. Even as 7X fought his hardest, we knew he was licked.

  Old Dodge was licked too. Never had I seen the hopelessness that had sunk into his wind-carved face. I wished I could help him. But what was there a button could say?

  Cruel pleasure glowed in Finch’s face. His eyes fairly glittered with the pride of doing something nobody else had done.

  “For God’s sake, Finch,” Dodge pleaded, “call them dogs off of him. Ain’t you got a drop of human blood left in you?”

  “We’ll call off the dogs when we get our ropes on that old hellion.”

  Finch rode in close and dropped a small loop over the outlaw’s horns. “Somebody else tie on,” he said. “We don’t want him bustin’ our ropes loose.”

  Johnny Tisdale dabbed another loop over 7X’s horns. A third rider worked around and heeled the bull. They rode off in opposite directions. Stretched out, the old roan fought for balance, then heaved over onto his side with the solid thump of a boulder smacking into mud. The dogs let go. They moved off and faced around to watch, their lank sides heaving, their tongues lolling out.

  Finch turned his horse over to another cowboy to keep the rope tight. He swung down, his big Chihuahua spurs jingling. He cut his grinning eyes toward Dodge, then away again. He was taking his time, letting Dodge get the full benefit of this. Finch walked to a mesquite tree and whittled off a limb to about three feet in length. Notching one end, he tied it to the bull’s huge right forefoot with a pigging string.

  “Now, old bull,” he said, “let’s see how you run with this clog on you.”

  Finch trotted back to his horse. The moment the bull felt the ropes slacken he jumped to his feet, head down in challenge. He tried to paw dirt and felt the clog drag. He shook the foot, but the long stick still hung there.

  With a bellow he charged at one of the horses. The first long step shook the heel rope off his hind feet, but two ropes were still fastened around his horns. He tripped on the clog and plunged to the ground. He got up again, shaking his head. It was then that I noticed for the first time that his left eye was gone. He had probably lost it in some bruising battle here among these bluffs.

  Old 7X tried to charge again, but the same thing happened to him. Time and again he would get up, hind feet first, and once more the clog would send him crashing down. Finch would let the dogs rush in and grab him to add to the bull’s misery.

  Feeling humiliated myself, I knew how this must be affecting Dodge. “Come on, Dodge,” I said, pulling my horse around. “What say we go back to the wagon?”

  He shook his head, anger building in his eyes.

  Old 7X gave up at last, his muscles quivering from fatigue. I expected him to sull, to refuse to move. But that in itself would have been a form of surrender.

  Finch said, “All right, boys, let’s take him in.”

  Ropes still on his horns, they started the bull toward the wagon. Every time he faltered, the dogs grabbed at his heels. Every time he tried to run, the clog stopped him. Finch had won.

  As we rode in we found the rest of the hands working the day’s gather in the plank corrals. The roan bull began to bellow at the sight and sound of the other cattle. Finch and Johnny led him through a gate. Finch pulled up and
grinned.

  “Here you are, you old scorpion. Next stop’s a sausage grinder.”

  They had to heel him and throw him down again to get the ropes off. Then Finch left him in a tiny pen with a bunch of long-age steers and gave us all plenty to do. The last I saw of old 7X for a while, he was hooking irritably at the unlucky steers that had to share the small space with him. If it weren’t for the clog, he would go over that fence like it wasn’t there and be back in the bluffs before the dust was well settled.

  After we ate supper, we went to the corrals to brand the calves dropped since the last roundup. Catching my breath while waiting for a heeler to drag up another calf, I sighted Dodge slipping around behind the corral where old 7X was. The bull had quieted down and stood beside the plank fence. I saw Dodge look around quickly, then take a knife out of his pocket, kneel down and reach under the bottom plank. In a moment he came bowlegging it back, satisfaction in his grizzled face.

  After the branding, Finch sent most of the hands out to push the herd far back on to the south end of the ranch. That way the freshly worked cattle weren’t so apt to get caught again in the next few days’ gather. Most of the outfit gone, Finch walked to the small corral where 7X was. “Turn him out in the trap with the steers,” he said. “He ain’t a-goin’ to do much with that clog on him.”

  Johnny Tisdale opened the gate to let the steers out of the little pen into a bigger one. Old 7X waited until the rest of the cattle were out before he budged. Then, with resignation, he moved slowly toward the gate.

  Suddenly he stopped and shook his right forefoot. The clog was gone. He stood there as if he was trying to puzzle the thing out. Then he shook that great head, lowered it, and came on the run.

  Finch just had time to let out a startled yelp and hit the fence. He climbed it three planks at a time. The rest of us weren’t far behind him. I glimpsed Dodge standing off to one side, laughing fit to bust. The bull made a beeline for the outside gate. He tried to jump it but splintered the top two planks like matchsticks.

  Our horses were tied outside, up and down the fence. At the sight of that monster of a bull bearing down on them they snorted in panic and popped bridle reins right and left. In seconds every horse was loose, and every one of us was left afoot. Unable to move, we just stood there and watched while old 7X headed for the bluff country in a high lope.

  A mule skinner would have blushed if he could have seen Finch tear the hat from his head and stomp on it and could have heard the things Finch said. When he finally ran out of cusswords in English and had used up the few Spanish ones he knew, Finch walked over and picked up the clog. Anybody could tell it had been cut. He stomped out of the pen, his raging eyes fixed on Dodge. His fists were knotted, his jaws bulging out.

  “You damned old reprobate, you’ll wish you’d left this country ten years ago!”

  Dodge didn’t back away. When I saw Finch was going to hit him, I stepped between them. I was getting mad myself. “Better take a dally on that temper, Finch,” I said. “Lay a hand on Dodge and you’ll have to whip me too.”

  Dodge caught my shoulder and roughly pushed me aside. “Keep out of it, button!”

  My feelings were hurt by the old man’s rebuff. Finch’s eyes brimmed with fury. “You’re fired, the both of you, and I don’t care what Old Man Johnson says about it. Either I’m the boss here or I ain’t.”

  Dodge just shrugged. “I’d done decided to quit anyhow. This is no place for a man to work.”

  We stayed there that night because it was too late to leave the wagon. All Dodge would say to me was, “You sure ripped your britches, boy.”

  Next morning we watched the hands rope their horses out of the remuda. Finch was taking about half the crew to the bluffs. He swore he was going to get that bull today and get him alive. He stopped for one last dig at Dodge.

  “He won’t get away this time. We’ll use the dogs again. And once we catch him, he’ll tame down quick. I’m goin’ to take the pride out of him.” He pulled out his knife, holding it up for Dodge to see.

  Dodge brought up his gnarled fist and drove it into Finch’s face. A trickle of blood worked down from Finch’s nose. Dodge crouched to do it again, but I caught his arm. Finch brought up his fists, looking first at Dodge and then at me. He turned around, climbed into the saddle, and led out in a stiff trot, his back arrow straight.

  We watched the riders move away as daylight fanned out across the rolling short-grass country. Dodge saddled his horse, jerking at the cinch harder than was necessary. Finished, he led him toward the chuck-wagon. Grim purpose came into his face as he wrapped the reins around a mesquite limb a proper distance from the cookfire. He reached up into the wagonbed and pulled out a rifle that the cook kept there.

  The cook’s jaw sagged. “Good God, Dodge, they’ll hang you!”

  The same thought had hit me, and the pit of my stomach was like ice.

  Dodge shook his head. “I ain’t after Finch. He ain’t worth what it’d cost me.” Sadness settled over him. “Looks like old 7X has finally got to go. But he deserves better than what Finch’ll give him. At least he ought to be allowed to die respectable.” He turned to me. “Comin’, boy?”

  Dodge swung into the saddle and spurred out in the lead, rifle across his lap. We skirted east a ways, to be out of sight of Finch and the other punchers. Then we moved into an easy lope and held it. After a while we knew we were ahead, for even in anger Finch would keep his horses in a sensible trot to save their strength.

  When we got to the bluffs we climbed up high and looked behind us. We saw no sign of Finch. That gave us a little time to find old 7X first. We needed it. It took us the better part of an hour before we finally saw the old patriarch trying to hide himself in a clump of mesquite brush. We eased down toward him, our horses alert, their ears poking forward like pointing fingers. Seeing that we had spotted him, 7X bolted out of the thicket, popping brush like a buffalo stampede. But there was a bad limp to his right forefoot.

  “Damned clog done that to him,” Dodge muttered. He spurred up. The bull saw he couldn’t outrun us, and he faced around. He tossed his head.

  Dodge’s Adam’s apple worked up and down as he levered a cartridge into the chamber. He raised the rifle to his shoulder, held it there a moment, then slowly let it down. His hands trembled.

  “I can’t do it. I’d sooner put a bullet in Finch.”

  Right then old 7X decided to fight his way out. He charged. Dodge whipped the rifle up, but panic had grabbed his horse. The big gray boogered to one side, and Dodge tumbled out of the saddle. The rifle roared. The bullet exploded a brown puff of dust from the ground.

  My heart was in my mouth; 7X was almost upon Dodge, and there wasn’t any place for the old puncher to jump. I spurred up beside Dodge and grabbed at his shoulders. In desperation he dug his fingers into my leg, trying to pull up beside me. I managed to swing my horse around to protect Dodge. But 7X’s huge head plowed into my dun’s haunches. The horse fell.

  I landed on top of Dodge. We both jumped to our feet, but we were too late to grab the bridle reins. My horse ran away. We stood there with our backs to the steep bluff. Not a solitary thing could we see to grab onto or a place to climb.

  As old 7X whirled around to fasten his good eye upon us, I saw Dodge’s rifle lying in the dust. So scared I could hardly breathe, I grabbed it. Somehow I managed to lever another cartridge into place as the great roan bull bellowed and came at us.

  There wasn’t time to aim. I jammed the rifle butt to my shoulder and squeezed the trigger, my teeth biting halfway through my lip. Old 7X went down on his knees. The bullet had glanced off just above the right eye. He staggered to his feet again. He stood shaking that huge head in pain. Blood trickled down from the wound.

  Dodge saw the trouble as soon as I did. “By George, that blood has blinded him.”

  Hearing Dodge’s voice, the bull stopped shaking his head. In one last wild charge, he lunged blindly at the sound of the man he hated. We jumped out of
his way, and he kept running.

  At the edge it seemed he stopped dead still for a second. Then he was gone, plunging down off the sheer face of the bluff. I heard Dodge gasp. From below came the crashing sound of impact.

  It took us a while to catch our boogered horses and work our way down to the base of the bluff. We found the mossy-horned old bull lying there just as he had landed. Life was gone from the battle-scarred body. I saw the glistening in Dodge’s gray eyes. The old puncher knelt and traced with his finger the dim outline of an ancient 7X brand on the roan hip.

  “I put that brand there myself, a long time ago.” He was silent a while, remembering. “But times change, and things that won’t change have got to go. Old 7X and me, we stayed beyond our day.” He straightened and gazed a long while across the rolling short-grass country to the south of us, the old 7X range. “He went out in a way that was fittin’ to him. He fought every last step of it.”

  I held my silence as long as I could. “We better be movin’ on, Dodge. Finch’ll be along directly.”

  Dodge squatted stiffly on his spurred heels and began rolling a cigarette, making it plain he was going to wait. “Old 7X left here a-fightin’. So will I.”

  “But you don’t really think you can whip Finch, do you?”

  Dodge shrugged. “I’ll never know till I try.” He turned up his tough old face and glanced at me with that brimstone look in his eyes. “If it turns out I can’t whip him, I expect you’re man enough to.”

  I knew then that I wasn’t just a button anymore.

  MAN ON THE WAGON TONGUE

  One of the first things Hall Jernigan did after he joined the West Texas wagon crew of old Major Steward’s M Bar outfit was to develop a strong dislike for Coley Dawes.

  The reason? Well, it wasn’t anything a man would be proud to admit, but the dislike was real, chafing like chapped skin rubbing against a saddle. Maybe the main thing was just that Coley Dawes was there, and his presence was an affront to a man of Hall’s upbringing. Besides, Coley was just too blamed good at everything.