by Baxter Black
Table of Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Hey, Cowgirl, Need a Ride?
1 - NOVEMBER 27, 1986: LICK AND AL IN CAMP
2 - NOVEMBER 28: TEDDIE ARIZONA
3 - NOVEMBER 29: T.A. WAKES UP
4 - NOVEMBER 29: THEY GET ACQUAINTED
5 - NOVEMBER 30: F. RANK DISCOVERS T.A. IS MISSING
6 - NOVEMBER 30: LICK FINDS AIRPLANE WRECKAGE IN CANYON
7 - DECEMBER 1: F. RANK, VALTER, AND PIKE PLAN SEARCH FOR T.A.
8 - DECEMBER 1: LICK AND AL CHECK COWS
9 - DECEMBER 2: F. RANK DISCOVERS MONEY MISSING
10 - DECEMBER 2: LICK, AL, AND T.A. TAKE THE AFTERNOON OFF
11 - DECEMBER 2: F. RANK PANICS
12 - DECEMBER 2: LICK AND T.A. TAKE A HORSEBACK RIDE
13 - STILL DECEMBER 2: VALTER AND PIKE REPORT
14 - DECEMBER 3: VALTER, PIKE, AND BUSBY MEET DANIEL BOON
15 - DECEMBER 3: THE CHASE BEGINS
16 - DECEMBER 3: THE CHASE CONTINUES
17 - DECEMBER 3: CONFRONTATION AT GOAT CREEK
18 - DECEMBER 3: ROMANCE IS KINDLED
19 - DECEMBER 3: T.A., LICK, AND AL ON THE ROAD
20 - DECEMBER 4: HORSE THIEF
21 - DECEMBER 4: BEFORE DAWN
22 - DECEMBER 4: THE GOOD GUYS ARRIVE AT SCOTLAND
23 - DECEMBER 4: CONFRONTATION AT THE SCOTLAND STORE
24 - DECEMBER 4: WICKAHONEY DESERT
25 - DECEMBER 4: GOOSE VALLEY
26 - DECEMBER 4: MORNING IN LAS VEGAS
27 - DECEMBER 4: SHERRILL’S HOUSE
28 - DECEMBER 5:SURPRISE
29 - DECEMBER 5: ANOTHER ROMANTIC MOMENT
30 - DECEMBER 5: SHERRILL AND T.A. TALK
31 - DECEMBER 5: THREE STRANDED BANDITS ON HIGHWAY 51, SIX MILES NORTH OF SCOTLAND
32 - DECEMBER 5: LICK AND SHERRILL GET BETTER ACQUAINTED
33 - DECEMBER 6: THE MORNING AFTER
34 - DECEMBER 6: T.A. REFLECTS ON HER LIFE
35 - DECEMBER 6: LICK IN LOVE
36 - DECEMBER 6: THE MINER’S CLUB
37 - DECEMBER 6: T.A. IS KIDNAPPED
38 - DECEMBER 7: GOOSE VALLEY RESERVATION MEDICAL CLINIC
39 - DECEMBER 7: SOUTH FROM GOOSE VALLEY
40 - DECEMBER 7: A CALL TO CODY
41 - DECEMBER 8: CODY ARRIVES
42 - DECEMBER 9: RANCHO SECO
43 - DECEMBER 9: GAS, BAIT, AND GOSPEL
44 - DECEMBER 10: BACK AT THE RANCH
45 - DECEMBER 10: A RANK’S CONFESSION
46 - DECEMBER 12: COWBOYS IN VEGAS
47 - DECEMBER 12: A MASSAGE AND A MESSAGE
48 - DECEMBER 12: T.A. IN THE TOWER
49 - DECEMBER 12: LICK AND CODY GO TO PONCE PARK
50 - DECEMBER 12: THE LIMOUSINE
51 - DECEMBER 12: PASS THE POI, PLEASE
52 - DECEMBER 12: T.A. AND THE TIGER
53 - DECEMBER 12: PARTY CRASHER
54 - DECEMBER 12: A DISAPPEARING-TIGER ACT
55 - DECEMBER 12: TIGER ACT
56 - DECEMBER 12: IN THE TIGER CAGE
57 - DECEMBER 12: CODY AND CHRISANTHA
58 - DECEMBER 13: SEARCHING FOR LICK AND T.A.
59 - DECEMBER 13: PRISONERS IN THE TOWER
60 - DECEMBER 13: LATE-NIGHT RECONNOITER
61 - DECEMBER 13: MORNING OF THE HUNT
62 - DECEMBER 13: PIKE PEAKS
63 - DECEMBER 13: CHARGE!
64 - DECEMBER 13: THE HUNT BEGINS
65 - DECEMBER 13: THE CHASE CONTINUES
66 - DECEMBER 13: T.A. STOPS QPID D’ART
67 - DECEMBER 13: LANCEL LOTT AND DUNE BUGGY TIGER
68 - DECEMBER 13: BUSBY AND THE CONDOR
69 - DECEMBER 13: HAFIZ AND THE GORILLA
70 - DECEMBER 13: GUINEVERE’S FINAL RIDE
71 - DECEMBER 13: GORILLA SHOWDOWN
72 - DECEMBER 13: PONCE GETS HIS
73 - DECEMBER 13: THE NATIONAL FINALS RODEO
Acknowledgments
Also by Baxter Black
Copyright Page
TO ALL THE OLD COWBOYS I’VE KNOWN,
LIKE AL BELCHER AND JON MCCORMICK AND CASEY TIBBS,
WHO STARTED WITH NUTHIN’AND ENDED UP EVEN.
THEY GOT THEIR MONEY’S WORTH.
Hey, Cowgirl, Need a Ride?
You can talk about the glamour and the love of rodeo
The challenge and the heartbreak of the dally and the throw
Of the guts and luck and glory the leather and the sweat
The gristle and the power of the bull that ain’t rode yet
And the get up-in-the-morning and the miles-down-the-road
And the bronc that stands awaitin’ and the rope that ain’t been throwed
The vision of the buckle worn by superhuman champs
And paid for in contusions, broken bones, in aches and cramps
And mothers in the bleachers and spouses back at home
Who keep the home fires burning while their darlin’ loved ones roam
The siren’s call of rodeo that beckons one last ride
The gamblers itch, the mountain top, the pinnacle, the pride
The reason they give all they have is measured in a score
A crowd, a millisecond, flag and timer, judge and roar
But for some the lure is simpler, the attraction that still pulls
Like me . . . just gettin’ girls was the reason I rode bulls!
1
NOVEMBER 27, 1986: LICK AND AL IN CAMP
Lick looked around. There wasn’t nobody there. Of course there wasn’t nobody there. Just him and the old man on a winter camp somewhere north of the Nevada line in the wilds of Owyhee County.
The camp was a twenty-year-old, sixty-five-foot single-wide New Moon house trailer that the company had pulled out here in the middle of a piece of high desert called Pandora’s Thumb. Good enough for two cowboys to bach and take care of four hundred cows on winter range.
The old man had a car. An old four-door Ford sedan that hadn’t had a current emissions sticker in ten years and seldom ran without tinkering. The ranch manager brought them groceries every Wednesday from Bruneau, Idaho, a good two-hour drive. No phone, no fax, no electricity. No Kwik Chek, Wal-Mart, Denny’s, Backyard Burger, Pizza Hut, roping arena, therapist, or tanning salon. No contact with the outside world except that weekly visit.
“What’s the matter with you, Al? Ain’t nobody here.”
“Git my gun, kid. I think they’re fixin’ to overrun the bunker! Them Huns kin sure fight. I know. I’ve played cards with ’em. Drunk their whiskey, danced their women, and done their polka. And kid”— Al lifted his head conspiratorily—“I never did like beer. Took too long to git drunk. Like enterin’ the Dixie 500 in a Ford Pinto. Ya spend all yer time just gettin’ there.
“Did I ever tellya ’bout the time I shot down one of our own planes?” Al paused. A curtain pulled over his eyes. The old man’s head crashed back onto the bunk and within five breaths he was snoring like a diesel.
Lincoln Delgado Davis, or Lick, as he was known, was a long way from his college degree, his failed marriage, and his fizzled attempt at rodeo. Thirty-four, single, and beholden to no one, he was ambivalent about his future. The word “career” wasn’t part of his vocabulary. He’d signed on with this outfit because he wanted to do some ranch cowboyin’. He’d spent time in feedlots and figgered this would be different. It was.
Bein’ stuck with the old man wasn’t so bad. In the two months they’d been together, first at the headquarters and now here, the old man had been through several hallucinatory spells like tonight. Wuddn’t no big deal. Lick didn’t know exactly how old the old man was. He was cagey about tellin�
��. Maybe he didn’t know himself, but Lick assumed he was long past retirement age.
One thing for sure, he did look old. Al’s gray hair was thin and about gone on top. His bare head had probably seen less sun than a Carlsbad Caverns bat. In the facial latitudes south of his hat brim his skin was as soft and supple as a welding glove. Years of toasting his ups and downs had left a road map of broken veins across his rosy cheeks and nose.
His eyes were faded blue and his fighting weight, which he claimed to have maintained since coming of age, was 146. We can assume that was fully dressed. He stood five foot eight when he enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1943. Out of kindness, one might characterize him as wiry, maybe spry. In the cowboy vernacular, he was just a pore doer.
Lick drew the covers up around the old man, turned down the propane lamp, and clanked into the kitchen. The wind whistled through the window edges where the duct tape had come loose. He put on his hat, coat, and gloves and headed out the back door to do the nightly check on the dogs and the horses. October had been mild. Fifty degrees during the day, twenties at night. But yesterday November had kicked Indian summer in the butt with a cold front that brought out the long johns. Low bruised clouds, sleet scraped off God’s windshield, and wind that penetrated like taco grease on a cheap paper plate.
Lick looked up at the ugly night sky. The dogs were curled underneath the trailer on the leeward side where the skirt was broken. Gonna be nasty tomorrow, he thought to himself, but so what, I ain’t goin’ nowhere. He checked the two saddle horses standin’ hipshot and dozin’ up against the windbreak. They had three more horses in a fifty-acre trap down by the creek. Brownie and Bill, the old man’s dogs, came sniffin’ outta their hole beneath the trailer to help Lick make his rounds. He chopped a little ice in the horse tank with a short post and stood with his back to the wind, lookin’ east. I been worse, thought Lick. I been worse.
A shot rang out! And it could dang sure ring out where the nearest neighbor was twenty-two miles away. The initial blast was followed by four more rounds. Lick raced back to the trailer.
“I think I got one of ’em!” the old man said as he stood in the doorway, obviously revived from his alcohol-induced blackout. He held a smoking .30-30 in his hands. “Rustlers, I reckon, or car thieves,” he said.
Lick looked at the old faded turquoise Ford with renewed interest. It still sat like a tilted tombstone on the flat front tire. He thought he noticed a new bullet hole in the front fender.
“How ’bout some coffee, Al,” suggested Lick.
The old man levered out a spent shell and pulled the trigger. The hammer fell on the empty chamber. “Might as well,” he said. “I’m outta bullets.”
“Don’t forget the Milnot,” reminded the old man when they were back in the kitchen.
Lick dug a can of evaporated milk out of the fridge door. “Got it right here.” The fact that it was Pet milk and not Milnot never caused a problem. They sat at the Formica table with its sixties-modern aluminum tubular legs.
“Ya know, kid, I been thinkin’. Maybe I oughta go see some of my old friends. My old rodeo buddies, some of them fellers I cowboyed with. I used to ride bulls. It’s a fact. I never won Pendleton or Calgary, nuthin’ like that, but I had some good rides.
“Anyway, I ain’t married to this oufit, although they’ve always treated me good. But I’ve got a sister somewhere. Washington, maybe, or Wisconsin, one of them ‘W’ states, I can’t remember. But maybe I should just pop in and surprise her. I ain’t seen her for twenty or thirty years. And I reckon I oughta do it ’fore I git too dang old to travel. Hell, you could go with me. I could be your guide. I got a little money, ya know. Lewis has been puttin’ half my paycheck in a bank for me ever’ month for however long I been here. Fifteen years, I think. Or twenty, or maybe it’s fourteen. Anyway, it’s a bunch.”
Lick leaned back and let the old man talk. He himself was makin’ eight hundred and fifty bucks a month plus board, food and horses furnished. He figured the old man to be making more. Maybe over a thousand. Lewis Ola, the ranch manager, always officially treated the old man like he was in charge. Lick did what he could to help and didn’t worry about it.
He pried off his boots and propped his feet up on the extra kitchen chair. The winter wind and extended exposure had given his olive skin a sculptured look. He needed a haircut again. His thick black hair and his coloring were a gift from his Spanish grandfather on his mother’s side. The heavy black moustache showed no gray but was looking ratty. He was an inch taller than the old man and twenty pounds heavier. He relaxed and tuned out the old man’s ramblings.
Last payday they’d taken the old Ford and driven to Elko, Nevada, three hours to the south. The old man told him he’d gone to Elko every payday, once a month, since long before Lick had come on board. “Like ‘clarkwork,’ ” he’d said, “if the car’s runnin’.”
Lick had spent his last ten years on the rodeo circuit, so he’d had plenty of harrowing experiences on the road. He was better prepared than most, but he did get his eyebrows raised more than once riding in that old car with the old man driving. He found himself with his hands pressed against the dashboard more times than he could count. The track out to the highway was nothing but ruts and boulders for the first four miles. It had taken an hour. The next three or four miles wound through several hairpin curves and drop-offs before it leveled out and continued fifteen miles onto the blacktop.
Lewis always paid the old man the unbanked half of his check in cash. When they arrived in Elko, Lick cashed his check at the bank. The old man went directly to the Stockmen’s Casino bar. Lick did a little shopping and a lot of looking at Capriola Saddlery. An hour later, he wandered into the Stockmen’s looking for the old man. He wasn’t hard to find. He was leaned against the bar in conversation with another cowboy and a woman.
“Hey, kid,” barked the old man. “You need a drink!” It wasn’t a question. He turned to the barkeep. “A whiskey and water for the kid and another for me and my friends.”
Lick glanced at his watch. It read 1:00 p.m. Which meant it was noon, Nevada time. For the next three days they only left the bar to play blackjack, eat the occasional scrambled egg, and venture across the railroad tracks. The old man would drink till he got tired. There was a corner booth with a padded bench where they’d lay him down sometimes. On at least two occasions Lick and Al slept in the car.
On the fourth morning, the old man reached over from the backseat and shook Lick awake. “Kid,” he said, “I reckon we’d better head back, I’m outta money. I hope you got enough to get gas.”
The old man pushed his chair back from the table. The scraping of chair legs on the floor brought Lick back to the present.
“Time for a little shut-eye, kid. I done checked the horses.”
2
NOVEMBER 28: TEDDIE ARIZONA
The next day came in like a dump truck full of wet motel laundry. This particular sorry morning had stirred a few stinging raindrops into the brisk breeze. Yesterday’s storm had blown through in a fury and left the dregs of an all-night party. The sky looked like somebody had spilt a lakeful of battleship paint on a glass ceiling. Lick and the old man were hunched against the wind riding to check the cows in Slippery Canyon. The cows had scattered bad. It was miserable work.
Lick was wearing a cap with earflaps. He had on long johns, a down coat, chaps, five-buckle overshoes, and ski gloves—and was freezing to death. The old man was wearing his usual “workin’” cowboy hat. Never covered his ears. As it got colder, he would add more shirts or vests under his jean jacket. On really chilly mornings, he would stuff wadded-up newpapers in the sleeves and around his middle. “Insulation,” he’d explain.
They tipped over the edge of the canyon rim with the old man in the lead. As soon as they started descending, the wind gave up tormenting them. Stopping to rest their horses, they scanned the canyon that fell clear to the Bruneau River four hundred feet below and three-quarters of a mile away to the east.
> “Not much movin,’ ” said the old man. The navy could have been landing Phantom jets on the USS Enterprise a hundred yards away and the old man wouldn’t have heard them. But he still had keen eyesight, particularly at a distance.
Lick continued to look for some movement or four-legged shadow that would indicate the whereabouts of the cows.
“Al, there’s somethin’ down there. At the bottom of that bluff just above the river. Somethin’ movin’, but it don’t look like a cow. It looks like . . . maybe a person. Can’t tell. Might be a horse, no, it’s . . . yeah, I think it’s a person.”
“You mean a hiker?” said the old man. “Wouldn’t surprise me. Doin’ a nature hike. Lookin’ for birds or cow pies. I don’t know any fishermen dumb enough to try it this late, but they’re not known for their good judgment and it’s for sure no BLM guys would be out here on a day like this. Besides, it’s too early in the day. They’re still havin’ their morning meeting.”
“Well, let’s ease on down and check it out,” said Lick.
The old man kicked his horse down the cow trail and Lick followed. They lost sight of the figure several times as they crossed rims and washes along the canyon side, but every time they topped a crest, Lick could still see the person. After twenty minutes, they reined up with a clear view.
“Al, he seems to be workin’ his way up the canyon but meanderin’ a lot. I think we could cut across here and come down on his side. Whattaya think?”
“You reckon it’s a rustler?” asked the old man warily.
“A fairly stupid one, if it is,” observed Lick. “He’s twenty miles from the road and afoot.”
In a few minutes they rode up on the wandering pilgrim. When they were within twenty yards, they both reined up their horses.
It was a woman. She was wearing designer jeans, black rubber-soled boots, and a bulky, long-sleeved blue sweater. Her short, streaked-blonde hair stuck out crazily, like muddy wheat stubble with deer tracks in it.
The boys had made a lot of rock-clattering noise as they approached, but she paid no attention. They sat and waited, which was both their styles. She got within ten yards of the silent horsemen, then started to veer off again.
