McCulloch made the sign of the snake, which meant Comanches.
The boy grinned and shrugged, which caused him to flinch from the pain in his busted arm.
Maybe we should rest, McCulloch signed.
Wooden Arm’s head shook savagely, and he motioned with his good arm toward the area where the smoke signals had been seen. Perhaps they are Comanche, the boys hands and fingers said, but they could be my enemies. I would like to find our mustangs and get out of these mountains.
“So would I.” McCulloch did not have to use his hands and fingers. Wooden Arm understood those words simply from the tone.
McCulloch tightened the cinches of both horses, and offered to assist Wooden Arm, but the boy shook his head and practically leaped into the saddle. He said something in his own tongue and squirmed around until he managed to find something that might not have been comfortable to a teenage Comanche but was the best he was going to do. If Matt McCulloch spoke Comanche, he figured he might have blushed at the blasphemy Wooden Arm showered upon big Texas saddles.
“Well,” McCulloch said as he swung into his saddle, “If it were the other way around, and I had to sit in a Comanche saddle, my backside would be raw and my huevos would be blue.”
Wooden Arm stared, and McCulloch signed what he had said.
The boy cackled with delight, and kept breaking into fits of laughter for the next five minutes as they followed a deer trail up and over a gentle slope.
* * *
Holding the reins to the black in his left hand, McCulloch broke open the turd and rubbed it with his fingers, which he wiped on his chaps before looking up at Wooden Arm, still mounted. The wide grin that stretched across Wooden Arm’s face was practically a reflection of McCulloch’s own bright smile. He nodded at the entrance to the canyon.
Wooden Arm glanced, his head likewise bobbing, and turned back to the horse trader before dismounting easily despite the heavy splints encumbering his arms. I will go, he signed.
Before McCulloch answered, the boy continued. You smell like a Texan.
Once again, the Comanche noun for Texan was not overly complimentary.
I am Comanche. I smell like a horse. Your stink will scare off this herd.
“All right.” McCulloch nodded toward the canyon.
The boy sprinted like a deer, ignoring the pain that must have shot up and down his busted arm.
Once the boy had disappeared, McCulloch pulled the horses to the edge of the mountain wall, so he would be hard to see if anyone was watching from the ridges above. He had not seen any more smoke, but he figured to play things safe. He hadn’t survived long in this country by being careless. His left hand held the reins to Wooden Arm’s horse. The right kept a firm hold on the reins to the black. The right hand also gripped the Colt revolver.
How much time passed, McCulloch wasn’t sure, for he had never been one to watch the minute hands on a clock, and he had been too busy looking for any signs of danger to get an idea of the location of the sun. But he saw Wooden Arm running lightly out of the canyon’s mouth—and he had not heard a damn thing. That boy, splinted arm and all, would make a damned good warrior. McCulloch certainly wouldn’t want to meet him in these mountains in a couple of years.
Without even needing to catch his breath, despite being bathed in sweat, and his mouth tight from the pain in his busted arm, Wooden Arm started up the conversation immediately. The kid was not one to beat around the bush.
There is a spring. Good water. The boy grinned widely and rubbed his stomach. He continued. More than six herds come here for water. It is hard to read the signs for they have been coming to this spring for a long time.
McCulloch needed Wooden Arm to repeat part of that before he got the gist of what the Comanche was saying, and the boy promised to slow down with his hand and fingers, but it was hard because he was so excited. McCulloch smiled. He had been doing this far longer than Wooden Arm had been alive, but he understood that feeling. He felt his own excitement hard to conceal.
One herd is small. Eight. Ten. Twelve horses. One is huge. Perhaps as many as sixty.
“Sixty.” McCulloch whistled, before he began to shake his head. “That’s too many for the two of us to handle.” He did not sign that, but the disappointment in Wooden Arm’s eyes told McCulloch that the boy understood.
We can set a trap, Wooden Arm signed. For the herd that you say is right for us.
After McCulloch nodded, they reined their horses and went to work.
* * *
Sitting in the trees that lined the canyon’s mouth, Wooden Arm pointed at the Winchester cradled across McCulloch’s lap. Do you use that . . . on the stallion? the boy’s fingers and good hand asked.
McCulloch shook his head. Some mustangers would try to shoot the lead stallion of a herd, not to kill it, but to stun the horse. Then they’d capture the stallion and the others. He knew one or two men who were extremely good at that. But it was too damned risky, and more than a few greenhorns who thought they were the best sharpshooter since William Tell had killed many an innocent mustang stallion. McCulloch used his hands to let the boy know that he preferred to capture his horses the way of the warrior. Guns were made for hunting—and for staying alive in this rough world.
The kid nodded solemnly.
They had led their horses up and over the ridge, tucking them in a hollow and securing them so they would not wander off and would be hard to steal without making a lot of noise. As long as the wind didn’t change directions, their horses wouldn’t catch the scent of the mustangs—and vice versa—whenever the wild herds showed.
As both boy and horse trader had expected, the first herd showed up at dusk. The stallion, a proud blood bay, stopped a good distance from the narrow entrance to the canyon that led to the spring. Sniffed. Pawed. Rode this way and that, shaking its head. When a young colt, impatient with thirst, tried to bolt to the canyon, the stallion charged and rammed the young black hard, knocking it down. The horse rolled over, came to its feet, and cowered as the stallion reared, letting its forelegs kick the air with a fury of violence. It was enough to send the black colt back to rear of the herd.
Five minutes passed before the stallion whickered, and galloped toward the entrance. The rest of the horses followed, and both the Comanche and the Texan had to turn their heads from the dust.
Once that had settled, the boy looked greedily at McCulloch, who shook his head. This was the large herd, far too many for a man and a boy with a badly broken arm to handle, even if the boy was a Comanche. Although Wooden Arm could not hide his disappointment, he slowly nodded for he understood. When the mustang stallion led its mares, colts, and fillies out of the canyon an eternity later, Wooden Arm signed to McCulloch, I hope they did not drink all the water.
Laughing, McCulloch picked up his canteen and tossed it to the Comanche teen.
The next herd was too small. The one after that McCulloch dismissed because the stallion, a dun, seemed too old, and the coats of the mares and younger horses did not pass the horseman’s muster. Besides, one of the offspring looked to be more ass than mustang, and the horses were gaunt, easy pickings for a bear or pack of wolves. They let these drink and leave.
By then the sun was beginning to sink, and McCulloch wondered if the other herds had found another watering hole, for this one surely drew a large crowd.
Maybe there were some night herds, McCulloch began to think, and the others would not come until the moon rose—if they came at all.
Both Texan and Comanche raised their heads and stared into the thickening darkness. Both had heard the whinny of a horse. A pinto stallion appeared. It pranced around, sniffing, suspicious, and chased away two thirsty colts. Wooden Arm could not stifle his gasp of amazement. Tensing, McCulloch froze, wondering if the stallion had heard the noise, for horses had amazing hearing. Apparently not. The pinto came prancing forward, but stopped again, turned and ran back to the herd. Biting off his curse, McCulloch waited, sweated, feeling the heart slamming ag
ainst his ribs and chest muscles.
Hell, Matt McCulloch even crossed his fingers.
A long time passed, then the pinto stallion whinnied, reared, and galloped off—the other horses following. Their hooves thundered past and when the last of the stragglers entered the canyon, McCulloch nodded. Quickly, he and Wooden Arm slid one juniper branch across the entrance. Then another. Another. Working furiously until they had made a gate ten feet high.
The noise, however, had alerted the pinto, for it came charging back, head low, eyes blazing, and rammed into the fence the Comanche and Texan had made. The logs quaked but did not break. The stallion went down, came up, shook its head and ran as though it planned to leap over the fence, but there was not enough room for a horse to make that jump. It slid to a stop at the last moment, then turned around, and began kicking the juniper poles with its rear hooves. Kicking, snorting, squealing. An older colt ran to help, but the pinto, furious, bit the claybank’s neck. As leader of this herd, the pinto was not going to let this younger male take over. He had too much pride, too much strength, and too much power. The claybank reared, almost tried to fight, but relented, and trotted back to the water hole.
For four hours, the mustang stallion fought until it was blooded and defeated. But the juniper posts remained, and the defeated animal snorted, turned, head down, and walked wearily back to the water hole.
It was too dark to read hand signs now, so McCulloch spoke quietly, “Let’s get our horses back over here.” He walked toward the path that led over the hill, and Wooden Arm understood. He followed.
An hour later, they sat in a cold camp, gnawing on jerky and drinking water from the canteens, staring at the gate they had built.
Other herds arrived with the moon’s rise, but saw and smelled the humans, and galloped off toward Limpia Creek or some other water hole.
McCulloch looked at the moon, then at the gate he and Wooden Arm had managed to build, and finally at his Comanche partner. “Tomorrow, the fun begins.”
He didn’t need to use hand signs or speak Comanche for the boy to understand.
Wooden Arm’s head nodded with a solemnity that was erased by his gleaming smile.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha!” Wooden Arm’s laughter bounced across the canyon rocks like a ricocheting bullet and went on and on that McCulloch wondered if the echoes would ever die down. When they finally did, he brushed the sand off his gloves and chaps and tried to get most of it off his beard-stubbled face.
The Comanche boy laughed again, pointing with his good hand at the horseman, whose bones, joints, and innards were starting to remind him of his age. The kid said something in that throaty tongue of his, which McCulloch figured went something along the lines of You ride a horse damned funny.
McCulloch watched the pinto circling around the round corral he and the boy had managed to fashion. He shook the cobwebs out of his head and told Wooden Arm, “You were a lot more fun to have around when you just talked with your hands.”
But he knew this had to be done. Break that pinto stallion, and the rest of the horses would fall in line. Oh, he knew with all certainty that the colts, especially the older ones, those beginning to think they might be able to challenge the pinto for leadership of the entire herd, would require breaking. Gentling any of these mustangs would mean more bruises. He spit out blood from the cut in his bottom lip. And more blood. But it might be worth it.
Texas cowboys and ranchers were prejudiced against pintos, but this more black than white piebald was special. Solid, sturdy, with a keen mind. He could run like nothing McCulloch had ever seen. And the way that mustang stallion fought? Hell, this horse had more guts than all the defenders of the Alamo.
He had been at it since dawn, and a glance at the sky told him it wasn’t yet nine in the morn, though he felt like he had aged fifteen years in those few hours, and had damned near broken his neck six or seven times. That horse had bucked him off nigh a million times. At least, that what it felt like to McCulloch. He found his lariat, shook out a loop, and on his third try, made his throw over the feisty mustang’s neck. He fought like hell to get the squealing, bucking son of a gun to the center post, and saw the smoke and felt the heat as the horse pulled the rope tight across the piñon post. Once McCulloch had it tight and the devil on four legs stopped fighting, Wooden Arm was there to throw a blanket over the pinto’s head.
That had a way of calming every wild mustang McCulloch had ever had to break. When an animal like this fighter couldn’t see, it settled down.
“Keep it there,” McCulloch told the Comanche, then tightened the cinch, checked the riggings to the stirrups and bridle, shook his head and wondered just how addled his brain must be. Nodding at the boy, he removed the lariat gently from around the horse’s neck, pitched it to the ground, took hold of the reins, tried to screw his rear end all the way through the leather of the saddle, the wool of the blanket, and the hide and muscle of the pinto all the way to the horse’s spine.
Another nod, and Wooden Arm used his good hand to jerk the blanket off the mustang’s head.
Instantly, hellfire ignited, and McCulloch felt his backbone being smashed up and down so hard that he figured he would leave this canyon a good four inches shorter than when he had entered it.
He lasted seven jumps before he felt himself sailing into the air like one of those hot-air balloons he had seen at a fair one time in Austin during an election.
* * *
At noon, McCulloch drank some coffee but didn’t think his stomach, jostled as it had been, could handle any solid food. Hell, he wasn’t sure he’d even be able to keep the coffee down. One cup, that was all he wanted, and he pitched the empty tin container into Wooden Arm’s lap, and walked back to the center post and the sweaty, nasty, sand-coated black and white mustang.
“You ain’t gonna win this fight,” he whispered into the horse’s ear while checking the bridle. “You know that as well as I do. And someone’s gonna catch you if I don’t, but he won’t be as good to you as I will. So me and you need to come to an understanding, and that means this. I’ll never break you. No one could. But I can make you trust me, and I damned sure will trust you. You’re that kind of hoss.”
The horse threw him into the trees on that ride.
“That’s one black-hearted devil,” McCulloch said, spitting out juniper berries after Wooden Arm fished him out of the mess. The horse circled around, and McCulloch noticed one of the black markings in the middle of the coat of white running down the horse’s neck to his underside between the front legs was shaped just like a heart. A black heart.
“Black Heart.” McCulloch sighed. Then he laughed. “That’s your name from now on.” He laughed again, and when he looked at Wooden Arm and saw the confusion on the Comanche kid’s face, McCulloch laughed even harder. So hard, he reckoned the boy figured McCulloch’s mind had been jarred so much by all the rides that he was now feeble-minded, loco, a mindless wonder.
McCulloch summoned up enough endurance to make his hands and fingers move, and he told the Comanche what he had named the pinto.
Wooden Arm laughed at that, too, then they went back to that back-breaking monster of a horse.
* * *
By three that afternoon, McCulloch had worn the horse out. Oh, he wasn’t gentled—not by a damned sight—but with a few more rides, a lot of hours, and maybe just a sugar cube or two, McCulloch would have that horse the way he wanted him. Hell, if Black Heart could change his colors, become either all black or all white, Matt McCulloch might keep that hard-rock, determined son of a gun for his own. Use him to breed other relentless, stubborn, strong-willed horses.
He swung out of the saddle and rubbed his hand over Black Heart’s neck. “Good boy,” he told the horse, but left the saddle and bridle on so the mustang would continue to get used to the feel.
He staggered over to the smokeless fire Wooden Arm had built, and the kid filled a cup with coffee, which he handed to McCulloch.
Is it good? the Comanche signed, meaning the horse, not McCulloch’s coffee.
“Good enough,” McCulloch answered, sipped the coffee, and turned around, nodding at the horse as it trotted through the opened gate into the other pen with the other thirty-nine horses. McCulloch lowered himself to the ground, feeling every bruise, cut, ding, and knot he had endured this day. He stretched out his legs and wondered how the devil he would be able to get his boots off. By thunder, he wouldn’t even try. He drank more coffee before turning to his Indian partner.
“We’ll rest here tonight. Get an early start in the morning.” Then he remembered he had to use sign language to communicate to Wooden Arm, so he translated his words with hands and fingers. I have a place north of here he signed. With luck, you and I will be able to get these horses to my ranch. Then we’ll see who wants to buy them.
Wooden Arm signed, Not Black Heart. You must not sell him. He is too good for anyone but you.
McCulloch’s hands replied, What about you? We are—he paused trying to figure out how to sign the word partners. When he could not think of anything, he signed, brothers.
The kid’s face brightened. Brothers, he signed. Yes. But his head shook, and he pointed back to the pinto. Facing McCulloch again, Wooden Arm managed to say with one hand, He belongs to you. I say so. He will respect only you, my brother. And this you know is true. I have spoken.
The conversation was over, which was fine with McCulloch. He could sleep for two days straight, but he only had tonight.
* * *
With only one good arm, the Comanche teen was something to behold. Matt McCulloch had gone through his share of partners in his years catching and raising horses—thoroughbreds, quarter horses, mustangs. He figured Wooden Arm might be the best pard he ever had in this line of work.
Half that morning, after they got the mustangs out of the canyon and on their way to McCulloch’s ranch outside Purgatory City, McCulloch spent time watching the boy in amazement. Whenever a colt or older horse, male or female, got enough courage to try to break out of the line, the boy managed to head the runaway off, and send it loping back into the string. He would raise that busted arm with the wooden splints over his head, which had to hurt like blaze, and that probably frightened the devilment out of those horses. How the kid could ride like that . . . well, a man, even a Texan, had to respect an Indian—a Comanche—for his ability on horseback and with horses.
Stand Up and Die Page 9
