“Yes. Red, you tell Chaw to do that, too.”
“Harp, I am damn sure ready to head home.”
“Not one drop more than I am to see Katy and my son. Long wants to see some new country and go home by himself. He’s doing that.”
“Only country I want to see is Texas. I keep getting word there are lots of cattle coming this way.”
“Yes, I imagine so, and travel up here will get more crowded over the coming years.”
“Aw hell. There is lots of open land to use,” Doug said, and laughed. “Plus it beats all the crap we had in Missouri last year.”
“Amen. No way we’d have got this many cattle through all that, and I bet people are returning now that the war is over. All those abandoned farms we used to graze have probably been reclaimed.”
“Oh, yeah, that would make it tougher than ever. Well, things to do. I’ll see you later,” Doug said, and left him.
Harp went by the post office and got the mail. He stopped and read Katy’s latest letter. She said:
I can’t hardly wait for you to get home. The mowing machines arrived and the men are using them. They put up the oat hay with hand scythes. These will mow so much grass acreage your dad can’t believe it. I went down and saw the one work at the Diamond Ranch. Those two women were real excited and you got the blame. You watch my words will come true and they’ve nearly worn the hide off Lee.
Be careful my love I so miss you,
Katy
Thinking about Katy, he crossed the busy street and started on the boardwalk for the W. W. Clineflet Merchantable to get some things off a list that Ira gave him earlier.
Two drovers blocked his way. He felt a cold wave of fear run up his spine. They were blocking the way on purpose.
Some women saw it, and they hurried to cross the busy street to escape what looked like an explosion about to occur. Both men were drunk. They didn’t scare him; it was his slow discovery and his lack of being ready for opposition that concerned him.
He stuffed her letter in his shirt pocket, feeling the skin on his face tighten.
“You blocking my way here on purpose?”
“Yeah, you yellowbelly son of a bitch. You breaking the strike is causing us to ride home unpaid. They were going to give us a bonus to go home, and you caused us to lose it and now we’ve got to stay around up here weeks longer.”
Harp flexed his hands at his side. “All I can say is you work for a damn cheap outfit. I pay my men to go home.”
“We think you belong in hell for selling us out.”
“I am not standing here listening to you two drunks for much longer. Stand aside or go for your guns.”
“Yeah. We’ve shot enough polecats you won’t last two seconds—”
While they were talking, Harp had drawn his gun, and now they were looking down the muzzle. “Who of you dies first? I ain’t got all day. Tell me and tell me now.”
They both paled.
“No? Then use two fingers and drop your guns carefully on the boardwalk. Get them out now.”
They did as he said.
“Now step aside of them. Move,” he said, waving them aside with the gun barrel. They about fell over each other to get off the boardwalk. “You have ten seconds to get out of my sight. Run.”
They obeyed. The shorter one ran into a team coming up the street and was knocked down. His buddy didn’t wait for him. The wagon driver cussed him out for upsetting his horses as he scrambled to get away. Harp holstered his own six-gun.
He retrieved both weapons and stood up. Marshal Ryder came from across the street. “You the new town marshal?”
Holding the second pistol, the first was already in his waistband. Harp smiled. “Just keeping the peace.”
“I saw most of it. Busy as the town was I figured someone would’ve got hurt if shooting started.”
“Yes, sir. But I didn’t aim to be gunned down, either.”
“Old man booze brings out the worst in men at times.”
“I don’t know. I don’t drink.”
“Good thing.”
“I was going into the store to order some things we need at camp.”
“Do that later. Let’s go have a cup of coffee in that café since you don’t drink.”
“I can go in the saloon. You don’t have to drink in those places.”
“No, the café is better.”
They went inside and the girl brought them coffee.
“How old are you, Harp?”
“I’ll be twenty next February.”
“Boy general, aren’t you?”
“Marshal, I do what I have to do.”
“No, you are what I said you were. Lots of people had to grow up fast because of the war. You can do whatever you are called on for. I heard lots about the Sedalia drive you made. One man said you were about thirty years old when I asked.”
“Long and I never had much time to be boys. I was fifteen when five of us were attacked by Comanche trying to recover a young girl they kidnapped.”
“Did you get her back?”
Harp shook his head. “Dad later thought she was already dead at the time. But we recovered several others and shot plenty Comanche.”
“Your dad must have been a tough man.”
“He still is. My mother is, too. She was alone one day when some outlaw busted down her door, and she shot him twice with a Paterson Colt in her doorway. Then hitched a mule and drug his body out of her doorway and out of the yard.”
Ryder laughed.
“Dad taught Long and I to do what we have to do.”
“He was not along on the Missouri drive?”
“No. Long and I hired on as cowboys to the man making the drive.”
“How did you get to be in charge?”
“The man he had in charge was a drunk. I fired the sorry cook and sent him packing. Emory came and when he learned I was running the outfit, he fired the drunk. Emory had been discharged from the war because he had a bullet close to his heart. His health was poor but he wouldn’t quit. He lived to learn we sold the herd for eighty bucks a head.”
“That is close to the story I heard. Looks like Joe McCoy will have big successes here.”
“I’d say he will. I am grateful for all he’s got done. I knew I’d drive cattle up here somewhere but not up the Butterfield Road.”
“What will you and Long do in Texas?”
“We are building a large ranch in Kerrville County. That’s west of San Antonio.”
“I imagine, by the time you two get through, it will be a large one.”
Harp agreed. The coffee was good and he wondered what the big man had in mind—it wasn’t all talk about the O’Malley brothers’ future.
“If you ever tire of ranching let me know. We are looking for U.S. marshals all the time.”
“Thank you, sir. That is flattering, but my plans are to ranch full time and not do these long drives forever. They make a good return and I probably will do it for several more years.”
“Good luck, General O’Malley. I am proud I met you.”
At the mercantile he ordered the things needed, and was promised the supply wagon would deliver them in the next three days. Riding back to camp, it began to rain, so he put on his canvas coat. Lightning streaked the sky and thunder rolled across the land. He pushed Comanche hard for camp. At least they only had a handful of cattle at Chaw’s camp. Heavy rain beat on his hat. This was going to be a stem-winder of a storm.
A cowboy in a slicker took his horse’s bridle while he stripped off the saddle, thanking him for seeing about his horse as he took the saddle and pad into the tent. The lamps were up and the tent struts obviously screwed down against the wind.
“Helluva storm, bro,” Long said, standing up to greet him.
“Yeah a real one. But if it was home I’d be grateful for the moisture.”
Everyone laughed above the roar and drumming going on outside. Someone brought him a tin cup of hot coffee; he nodded thanks and sat down with
the crew.
“Well, two drunk cowboys tried to stop me on the sidewalk and accused me of costing them money. Seems if I hadn’t sold our cattle they’d been paid for riding home, but since their boss sold them for less than the holdout price he wasn’t paying them trip-back money. I got the drop on them and they fled.”
“All right.” Long stood up. “You don’t go back to town without one of us with you. Hear me, men. That is an order.”
“Yes, sir.”
“That is not necessary.”
“The hell it isn’t, brother. We need you alive and kicking and since I am going scouting. All of you remember, he goes, then one of you goes along. We have been betting, ever since we left Texas, with seven thousand head of steers. We lost a few along the way. The bet is how many of them will be in the final count sold?”
“There were twenty short of five thousand after we sold Doug’s herd.”
“Then my bet we are twenty-five short is good,” Long said.
“I got thirty short,” Ira said.
Red said, “I say thirty-two short.”
“Well, if the town didn’t blow away in this storm noon tomorrow, we will have that count,” Harp said.
“How long will it take us to get home?” one of the cowboys asked.
“Four to six weeks, graining those three bell steers and the horses along the way.”
“Can we do that?”
“Damn right we can,” Harp said. “I plan to be home as quick as I can.”
One cowboy laughing said, “And we all know why.”
“Amen, buddy. Amen.”
The rain finally let up, but everyone slept in the tent. Thanks to Ira’s trenching he had them do, the tents stayed dry inside.
* * *
Dawn came and Harp rode back to Abilene with Red and Long. Chaw and his bunch were camped north of town, and Harp hoped they were able to keep the last of the steers together. When they arrived at the depot they learned he had corralled them in the loading pens before the rain struck, so all were there and good.
The last steer loaded they were thirty-two head short of seven thousand head. That meant the total amount came to near $627,000. He had held back $700 to meet expenses going home. The crew voted that afternoon they were going to go on a toot, and they asked for their ten-dollar raise to give ’em hell.
Back home he’d owe each of the hands three hundred bucks, and he didn’t intend to hold out the ten, but they didn’t know that. His headmen would get six hundred for their efforts, the three cooks five hundred apiece.
After he paid each their ten bucks it got real loud as they cut out to shoot holes in the moon—but they’d earned it.
The following morning, Ira and the cooks got everything ready to leave as the men slept off their hell raising. No one landed in jail and that was good. Holy Wars and the other wranglers had their horses culled down to only the good ones going back in one herd.
Long had two packhorses loaded and his own best buffalo horse to ride. He shook everyone’s hand and told them how much he appreciated them all, and his plans were to be back to give them hell before Christmas.
He had plenty of money, he told Harp. The two men were parting, after so long having been each other’s backs. It kind of kicked Harp in the guts to part with him after all the years of having him right there, but Long had this wish to see more country. They shook hands, short on words to say to each other.
Standing on a high place, Harp watched Long ride off leading those packhorses in a good jog. God, watch after him. He’s a strong man but he will need your help, and bring him home to all of us. He slapped his leg with his hat and went back to camp. He’d miss him. And he knew that all too well.
* * *
On the way home Harp made the men a deal. They would push south as hard as they could until they crossed the Red River. Then a skeleton crew made up of the cooks driving their wagons, two wranglers with the horses, and three cowboys would bring everything home. The rest would ride hard, find their own meals, and get home in half the time of the bunch bringing the wagons and horses.
The system worked fine. At the Red River he left Ira a hundred dollars for expenses. The rest going home fast got five dollars each and they left for Kerrville riding hard. Doug, Chaw, and Red rode with Harp. They pushed, grained their horses, and in eight days Harp and his party rode up the lane to his father’s house.
His mother saw them coming first and shouted, “Harp’s here! Oh, my God, he’s back, Katy.”
With the baby in her arms Kate ran down the steps to greet him. “Oh, thank God you’re home and safe—where’s Long?”
“He’s gone off on an adventure, he called it.”
“Where? Why?” his mother asked.
“To see the white elephant. He told me he wanted to see more country and left us in Kansas. He promised to be back here by Christmas.”
His mother shook her head in a scowl. “That boy doesn’t ever write.”
“Mother, you know your eldest son.”
She frowned, concerned. “No one went with him?”
“That was the way he wanted it.” He held his son up in his hands. “Damn, cowboy, you have lots of growing to do before you can go back to Kansas with me.”
“One is enough going that far away. I am so glad you’re finally back,” Katy said, hugging him.
Harp handed the baby to his mother and kissed Kate. He was sure glad to be back home, holding his lovely wife in his arms at long last. What a bright warm day to be home with Katy. How wonderful this was.
“Have you men eaten?” his mother asked.
“Not a whole lot lately, ma’am,” Chaw said, laughing and slapping his leg with his once fine, now dusty, Boss of the Plains hat. “We’ve been riding hard to get back here, and that reunion right there was worth it all to see.”
“I am simply glad to see Harp in one piece. Come on, I can whip up some food for all of us.”
“We are coming and happy as all get out to be here. Where is Hiram at?”
“Oh, checking on things. I expect him back by dark. We had no idea you were coming in this soon.”
Chaw explained how they left the supply wagons, horses, and bells steers to come along behind them, and they rode like they were on fire from the Red River crossing. Harp heard her familiar laughter taking the men inside. Damn it was great to be home with them, his wife, and son.
He closed his eyes. There was still lots to do. He hoped Long was all right wherever he was, this sunny day, him home with Katy and his boy, Lee, in Texas.
CHAPTER 28
Hiram O’Malley rode in that evening and shouted at Harp when he saw only him. “Well, where is your brother?”
“Dad, you know Long. He gets an idea and you can’t shake him off it. He told me not to worry that he wanted to look at some new country and didn’t need anyone. He promised me to be back here by Christmas.”
“Yes. He’s hardheaded enough when he makes up his mind; we both know that.”
“Dad, he’s as tough as any guy but numbers can over-swarm you.”
“Well, I know you tried. I heard from your letters, and I can’t believe those drovers were holding out for that much for cattle worth ten cents in Texas. You did great. I am so proud of you and what you accomplished for our friends and our family.”
“Any problem here?”
“Nothing recent. Of course fall is the season the Indians leave the plains to raid us. There are no rangers. They abolished them. The state police are not that effective, and I fear there’ll be lots of trouble out here on the frontier.”
“I am taking some time to be here with Katy and Lee. I sent my men out in pairs to check on things and to see what we need to do to get back into gathering cattle.”
“There is more activity by several outfits to hire men and go after the wild cattle like you did, but no one has taken on big herds like you gathered. It will be harder to get the numbers you need as we get further into this game.”
“It was bound t
o happen,” Harp said.
“Were there lots of herds on the road going when you were coming home?”
“Yes, and there will be lots more.”
“What are your plans?” his father asked.
“Find mavericks, gather and brand them, and take them north. Also, sign up more people who have cattle they need moved.”
“The sisters?”
“I will go see them in the next two days. Bless them. I think they have at least that many more steers for next year’s drive.”
“Well, I know you’re glad to be home. And we can hope your brother survives his searching.”
His dad slung his arm over Harp’s shoulder. “The O’Malley brothers did it again.”
“By damn we did.”
CHAPTER 29
Doug and Red went to investigate the number of wild cattle left up at the Underground Ranch. Harp told them to take a quick look at things and then they could decide if it was worth their time to set up and brand the wild cattle there or go elsewhere.
Katy, with baby Lee and Harp, rode over in the buckboard and buckskin team to see the sisters. They were excited about everything.
“This is a miracle,” Josie said.
“More than that, we need to talk very seriously to you about the state of this ranch. You have met our foreman Estevan Montoya. He is having lots of pain in his joints and he would like to retire, but he won’t do that until we find someone,” Edna said. Her sister nodded.
“Would you consider running our ranch and hiring a foreman? Josie and I are getting older. We have a sizable fortune and more than we will ever spend. We think this ranch is well run, but times change, like what the mower did for us. We’d never seen a mower before the one you ordered came. That clacking machine is something else.”
“I have some men capable of being a ranch foreman. How would this work?”
“You put this check in a bank account. That will be your money to manage this ranch. You give us quarterly reports of your plans, needs, what is happening, how much things will cost, including you.”
“I will let you be the judge of our pay. When Long gets back he will share this job with me and we will have a foreman here. I see some things, already, like the house needing painting, and other repairs. We can get it done,” Harp said, looking toward Kate, then back at the sisters.
The O'Malleys of Texas Page 24
