The Baron Range

by Jory Sherman

  “I’ll last until the herd catches up,” Jack said, as if reading his son’s thoughts. “But if I don’t make it, you tell Charlie that they got Comanches lyin’ in wait for them yonder this side of the Concho.”

  “I will, Pa.”

  “God, the whiskey ain’t doin’ me no good,” Jack said, and managed to swallow a few drops of the liquor. This time he didn’t choke and held it down. But his face was changing color like the clouds at sunset and Roy’s nerves sang like maddened crickets in a swamp. He jumped at every sound his father made and strained to hear the sounds of the oncoming herd.

  “Pa, I think I hear somebody comin’,” Roy said.

  Jack could not move, but he listened hard. He heard the hoofbeats, too.

  “Might be another damned Comanche,” Jack said. “You get that caplock pistol out and be ready to shoot.” Then his head swam and he passed out for a few seconds. When he came to, the hoofbeats were louder, but he could not, in his stupor, determine which direction the sounds were coming from.

  Jack bit down hard and grabbed the arrow by its shaft. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. Suddenly, it was silent. Then he felt a hand on his wrist.

  “Better not try it, Jack,” said a voice and Killian opened his eyes.

  “That you, Long Joe?”

  “Mr. Goodnight got worried he hadn’t seen you, so he sent me up. Caught you an arrer, did you?”

  “Seems like. I got to get it out, Long Joe. Damned thing’s burrowin’ into my lung.”

  “Ah nah, Jack. Too risky. You wait. We’ll see can Mr. Goodnight pull that arrer fer you.”

  “I wanted to get help for him, Long Joe,” Roy said, “but Pa wouldn’t let me leave him.”

  “You did right. That’s a Comanche arrer, ’thout a doubt.”

  “I reckon,” said Roy. “He just shot Pa out of the saddle and run off toward the Concho.”

  “Likely they’ll be a passel of ‘em waitin’ on us to cross,” Long Joe said. He was one of the eighteen wranglers Goodnight had hired for the drive to the government post at Fort Sumner. He was a pretty good Indian fighter and had the scars to prove it.

  “This’un was a scout,” Jack said, his voice raspy with blood coagulating in his throat. “We ain’t heard a sound since, but you can bet they seen the herd.”

  “I been smellin’ ’em for five, six mile,” Long Joe said. “Hair on the back of my neck’s been standin’ on end for the last two.”

  “How soon will Mr. Goodnight be here?” Roy asked, a quaver in his voice.

  “Directly, directly,” Long Joe said. “Get your hand off that arrer, Jack, and let me take a look-see.”

  Jack released his grip, realizing he no longer had the strength to pull the arrow out, even if he had wanted to. He felt a numbness in his toes that was creeping up to his feet and Long Joe’s head was spinning slowly above him, like a child’s balloon on a string.

  “Um,” said Long Joe as he bent down to look at the Comanche arrow sticking out of Jack’s side.

  “What the hell’s um mean?” asked Killian.

  “Means you got stuck for fair. About a third of the arrer’s in your gut. Could be a damn sight worse.”

  Jack didn’t know Long Joe’s last name. He doubted anyone did. Nor did he know what it meant that Long Joe had never said his last name. Some of Goodnight’s hands thought it meant Joe had been an outlaw. Others thought it meant Joe could stay in the saddle a long time. They all agreed that was true, at least. Joe was a tireless soul, steady and quiet, never saying much unless it had to be said. Long Joe was a good enough name for the man. He didn’t need no handle on it, Jack thought.

  “You got enough cholla stuck in you to make a porkypine jealous,” Long Joe said.

  “It tickles,” Jack said, his mouth curved in just the trace of a smile.

  “Least you didn’t get your sense of humor shot out, Jack.”

  “This ain’t funny,” Roy said.

  “Well, we could just sit around bawlin’ about it, I guess,” said Long Joe.

  “Aw, Long Joe. You know what I mean,” Roy said.

  “Charlie will be along directly. Cows done smelt the Concho and Charlie wants to cross before dark.”

  “Can Mr. Goodnight help my pa?” Roy asked.

  “He’s the boss and he can sure enough tell us what he thinks we ought to do. I been studyin’ that arrer and it’s sure enough in a bad place.”

  Jack reached for the whiskey bottle, took another swig. He coughed and he felt the arrow moving against his lung. He held his side to hold his chest steady and drank again.

  53

  CHARLES GOODNIGHT WAS the first to spot the downed horse.

  “Why, that looks like Jack Killian’s mount,” he said to Pete Wiley, one of the wranglers.

  “If so, it has a Comanche arrow stuck in its heart,” Pete said. His face showed the effects of wind and weather. His arms were brown from wrist to sleeve. He rode his horse like a man born to the saddle.

  “Damn. If we could have made it to the Concho, we’ve got help coming.”

  “You think that man you hired will meet up with us?”

  “Pete, I’d bet my life on Juanito Salazar.”

  “Well, it looks like he didn’t make it across.”

  “Wasn’t supposed to. He’ll be riding out from Fort Sumner, and I’ll bet dollars to bear claws he’ll have a good price from the army.”

  “I’ve never met the man,” Pete said.

  “He was partners with Martin Baron, the man I told you about. Knows cattle. Raised them in the Argentine and had stock shipped to the Box B.”

  “I know, I know. I’ll believe it when I see him.”

  “Well, we’ll know soon enough. Can’t be more than a mile or two before we hit the Concho.” Goodnight clicked his teeth, a habit that made men in open country jump the first time they heard it. “I’m going to ride up to that arroyo and take a look.”

  “Keep your eyes peeled,” Pete said. He did not slow the herd as Goodnight rode away, but kept them moving. They had already scented water and the two thousand head were now a moving force, their eyes pitching wildly in their sockets, nostrils flared, bosses low to the ground as if they were set in a slow charge. Only the outriders kept the herd in check or the cattle would have broken for the river a long time back.

  Goodnight rode cautiously up to the arroyo, halted his horse at the rim and looked down.

  “Long Joe,” he called.

  “Better come down and take a look, Mr. Goodnight. Jack’s caught him one in the lung.”

  “I’ll be right down.” Goodnight dismounted and ground-tied his grulla to a creosote bush so that Loving and the others would spot it easily. He walked down into the arroyo on properly bowed legs, his high boot heels making him wobble slightly. His ruddy face was slightly ruddier when he reached the three men.

  “Roy, what happened?” Goodnight asked.

  Roy Killian told him. Goodnight hunkered down next to Jack and observed the arrow jutting from under Jack’s rib cage. Jack’s eyes were reddened from drink and pain. He just stared at Goodnight without blinking, like a man ready to die.

  “Long Joe, you and Roy go up top of this arroyo and keep a lookout for Pete and the herd. And if you see any Comanches sneaking around, you holler real loud.”

  “Yes, sir, Mr. Goodnight,” Long Joe said. He motioned for Roy to follow him. They led their horses out of the arroyo and waited by Goodnight’s grulla. Long Joe pulled out a blade and snapped it open, cut off a chunk of nopal and began to chew it after he raked the spines off with his pocket knife.

  Roy looked down into the arroyo, watching Mr. Goodnight and his pa, his pulse pounding in his eardrum. He watched as Goodnight bent over his father. He seemed to be speaking to him, or listening.

  “Jack, what do you think I ought to do?” asked Goodnight.

  “Don’t know what you can do, Mr. Goodnight.”

  “Hurts pretty bad, does it?”

  “Hard to breathe. Seem
s like the arrowhead is pushing on into my lung.”

  “It looks that way to me, too.”

  “I don’t hold out much hope. That was why I was drinking some whiskey.”

  Goodnight patted Killian very gently on the shoulder as if to reassure him. “That’s all right He paused and touched the arrow. He saw Jack draw back instinctively.

  “Might tender, I reckon, huh, Jack?”

  “Some.”

  “I can push it on through, but I think it would tear you up bad. Or I can jerk it out real quick. Get it out and maybe we can do something about the bleeding.”

  “I seen a man or two die from a Comanche arrow, Mr. Goodnight. Warn’t pretty.”

  “No. I want to try and help you, Jack. But it’s going to be a powerful hurt. And you might die quicker or slower. Your choice.”

  “I reckon I ain’t got a whole hell of a lot to lose.”

  “I’m going to grab this arrow, Jack, and give it a real hard pull. Do you want a stick to chew on?” Goodnight stroked his immaculate, closely cropped beard flecked with gray. His sweeping moustache curled slightly upward at the ends, like the horns of a Mexican steer.

  Jack put the whiskey bottle up to his mouth. He took a small swallow, then a bigger one. His throat felt raw inside, but numb. This time he didn’t choke. The whiskey burned down to his stomach and he felt a tingle in his veins. Then he gagged as blood rose up in his throat. He gasped for breath and spit out a spray of his own blood. The blood had air bubbles in it.

  “I better have that stick, Mr. Goodnight, or I’ll scream and scare you away.”

  Goodnight smiled slightly, then looked around for a stick to put between Killian’s teeth. He found a thin one close by, handed it to Jack.

  “You watch over my boy, will you, Charlie?”

  “I’ll look out for Roy, Jack. Don’t you worry about that.”

  “Thanks.” Jack put the stick in his mouth, bit down hard. He closed his eyes and held his breath.

  Goodnight didn’t hesitate. He grabbed the shaft of the Comanche arrow and gave it a hard jerk straight downward.

  Jack felt the pain immediately. It shot through him like a bolt of lightning. Sparks danced in the blackness of his mind as the pain lanced every nerve in his body. He could feel his flesh ripping, and it seemed to him that he had been plunged into a fiery bath. The pain was sudden and simultaneously gripped his entire body.

  Goodnight felt the arrow pull free, but it brought an enormous amount of flesh with it as it slid from the entrance wound. Blood gushed from Jack’s side as the arrow cleared the passageway. Goodnight wrenched his bandanna from his throat and thrust it into the hole to stop the bleeding.

  Jack bit the stick in half and his scream broke loose and ran up the scale to a high pitch. Blood bubbled up in his throat and choked him. He gasped to pull in air and writhed with the pain. Goodnight held him down, kneeling on one of Jack’s knees and pressing downward on his chest. The bandanna fell away and more blood gushed from Jack’s open wound.

  “Hold still, Jack,” Goodnight said tightly, “or for dadgummit sure you’re going to bleed to death.”

  Jack stiffened, and Goodnight stuffed the soaked bandanna back into the opening the arrow had made.

  Just then Goodnight heard the sound of the herd breaking for water, the deafening pound of hoofbeats drowning out the sounds of Jack’s labored breathing.

  A moment later, he heard gunfire from the direction of the Concho and men shouting. He looked up at the rim of the arroyo, but Roy was no longer there. Dust crept over the rim and rose to the sky as the herd pounded past in a rush to get to the river.

  Goodnight steadied Jack and checked the bleeding wound. The bandanna seemed to be soaking up the blood, but Jack’s face was pale beneath its week-old beard, and his eyes were fluttering. Not a good sign.

  “Do you want more whiskey, Jack?”

  No answer.

  Goodnight turned Jack over so that he lay flat on his back. And then he waited.

  The sounds of the herd subsided and the shouts in the distance faded as Goodnight hunkered over the dying Jack Killian. He put a finger to Jack’s neck. The pulse was weak, thready. He waited some more.

  Then he heard hoofbeats again, coming from the direction of the Concho. He looked up, dreading what he would see.

  Two men rode down into the arroyo. One of them was Roy Killian. The other was a man he had come to know well and to respect.

  “Do you need some help, Mr. Goodnight?” Juanito Salazar asked.

  “How’s my pa?” asked Roy.

  Goodnight looked down at Jack. Killian’s eyes were closed. He seemed to be sleeping. Goodnight bent over and listened for Jack’s breathing. He raised his head and looked at Roy.

  “I’m afraid he’s gone, son.”

  Roy’s lips flattened as he pressed them together tightly. “God,” he said.

  Juanito stepped out of the saddle and walked toward Goodnight. He took off his sombrero and held it at his side.

  Roy sat astride his horse, staring blankly at the man who had been his father.

  “I am sorry,” Juanito said.

  “He just lost too much blood,” Goodnight said. “I think a lot of it was already broke loose inside him. I couldn’t save him.”

  “You did your best.”

  “What was all the shooting about?”

  “We cleaned out some Comanches on the other side of the Concho when the herd came up. The cattle all crossed safely, all but two or three, I reckon.”

  “Good. The army ready for the herd?”

  “They’ll pay you eight cents the pound when you get to Fort Sumner.”

  Goodnight grinned. “A pretty fair price.”

  “I wish I could have seen Jack again,” Juanito said. “I am sure his life changed much.”

  “Well, just look back yonder at his son,” Goodnight said solemnly.

  Juanito turned his head to look at Roy Killian.

  “Good-bye, Pa,” Roy said softly. And then he began to cry.

  54

  CAROLINE NO LONGER grieved for her lost child. For she had found another to take her dead son’s place in her heart. But he was her secret, and one other’s, the woman who had brought the blind boy to the Box B one night when the stars were hidden by somber clouds and the moon shed no light on the trail between the Rocking A and the Baron ranch.

  The woman who brought the boy to Caroline was Esperanza Cuevas, an old widow who had helped raise the boy and teach him to speak Spanish and a little English. She had feared for the boy’s life when she found him wandering alone and weeping a few yards from her casita on the Aguilar ranch. At least he had known where to come, and God had brought him near so that she could help him. She knew he would never be safe as long as Matteo Miguelito Aguilar was alive, so she had come to the only place she knew where she and the boy might find a home.

  Caroline carried a basket on her arm, the warm food inside covered by a checkered cloth. She walked from the house to the little adobe on the other side of the barn where one of the Baron hands had once lived. It was a warm, pleasant evening, with the aroma of wisteria and daffodils wafting lightly on the spring air, the stars just beginning to spark silver sprays in the aquamarine sky, the first few lightning bugs winking on and off in the fields of alfalfa and clover behind the Baron house.

  Anson was off to La Golondrina, branding the last of the spring calves, before going on his first big drive to Fort Sumner in New Mexico. But Caroline was still circumspect as she walked through the broad square shadows of the barn and around to the back, where the twilight lingered in a faint pewter afterglow. She looked both ways before crossing the broad expanse to the little adobe house where Esperanza and the boy waited in semidarkness for her to come. She knocked softly on the door.

  “Entra,” said a woman in a familiar voice.

  Caroline opened the door and slipped inside, slightly breathless. “Abre la luz,” she whispered, and Esperanza struck a match and lit the lantern hanging f
rom a beam. The room gradually lightened as the Mexican woman turned up the wick, bringing a soft golden glow to the small Spartan room.

  “Mama,” crooned a boy sitting at the table next to Esperanza.

  “Lázaro,” said Caroline and rushed to him, placing the basket on the table and taking the blind boy in her arms.

  55

  THE SOUNDS OF hammering and the flat-toned slap of whipsawed boards came through the open window in Ken Richman’s office in the main section of Baronsville. His desk was a clutter of documents, deeds, bills of sale, promissory notes, rental agreements, and letters of intent. He seemed a busy but happy man. He grinned as Anson Baron came through the open door, a tall, lean man of nineteen with curly black hair, an engaging, mystical half smile seemingly permanent on his face. Anson had to duck to keep from hitting the top of the doorway.

  “Good morning,” Ken said. “I was hoping you’d stop by before you made the gather.”

  “A few more days,” Anson said. “We ’bout got all the calves branded.”

  “Rest your bones.”

  “Naw. I won’t be but a minute, Ken. I need a favor and I need it fast.”

  “Favor, yes. Fast, I don’t know. Maybe.”

  “I want you to find Juanito Salazar. Wherever he is. I need him. I want him on this drive.”

  “So happens, I know where Juanito is. I think.”

  “Where is he? Can you get him out to the Box B right away?”

  “In a few days, yes. He’s been dealing with that Capitol Company over in Austin, but he’d probably be back up in the Palo Duro by now. I think they hired him to look over land they had surveyed up there. Might be A. C. Babcock wants to raise cattle there. Heard of him?”

  “I’ve heard of Capitol. And Babcock, from Charlie Goodnight. Will you get word to Juanito? I want him bad.”

  “Sure. But I want a favor, too.”

  “Oh?”

  Ken kicked his boot off the table and stood up. “I want to go on the drive for Fort Sumner with you.”

  “I could use you, but from what I hear from Charlie Goodnight, it’s no supper on the grass. ’Sides, I heard you were sweet on a gal that works in the mercantile.”