Murder in the Middle Pasture
Page 1
Murder in the Middle Pasture
John R. Erickson
Illustrations by Gerald L. Holmes
Maverick Books, Inc.
Publication Information
MAVERICK BOOKS
Published by Maverick Books, Inc.
P.O. Box 549, Perryton, TX 79070
Phone: 806.435.7611
www.hankthecowdog.com
First published in the United States of America by Maverick Books, Inc. 1984,
Texas Monthly Press, 1988, and Gulf Publishing Company, 1990.
Subsequently published simultaneously by Viking Children’s Books and Puffin Books, members of Penguin Putnam Books for Young Readers, 1999.
Currently published by Maverick Books, Inc., 2011.
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Copyright © John R. Erickson, 1984
All rights reserved
library of congress cataloging-in-publication data
Erickson, John R.
[Hank the Cowdog and murder in the middle pasture]
Murder in the middle pasture / John R. Erickson ; illustrations by Gerald L. Holmes.
p. cm. — Hank the Cowdog ; 4.
Originally published: Hank the Cowdog and murder in the middle pasture.
Summary: When a calf is murdered, Hank, a wiley cowdog and head of ranch security, pursues a gang of wild dogs and a clan of coyotes to find the killer.
ISBN 1-59188-104-8 (pbk.)
[1. Dogs—Fiction. 2. Mystery and detective stories. 3. West (U.S.)—Fiction. 4. Humorous stories.] I. Holmes, Gerald L., ill. II. Title. III. Series: Erickson, John R. Hank the Cowdog ; 4.
PZ7.E72556Mu 1999 [Fic]—dc21 98-41854 CIP AC
Hank the Cowdog® is a registered trademark of John R. Erickson.
Printed in the United States of America
Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
Dedication
This one is dedicated to the Ellzeys of Wolf Creek.
Contents
Chapter One The Case of the Wild Hogs
Chapter Two How Was I Supposed to Know She Didn’t Want Me to Go?
Chapter Three Outlaws on the Ranch
Chapter Four Attacked by a Horned Moron
Chapter Five The Cold Weather Cowdog Blues
Chapter Six Rooster J.T.
Chapter Seven Murder in the Middle Pasture
Chapter Eight Amongst the Buzzards Again
Chapter Nine My Dangerous Mission
Chapter Ten Confused, Captured, and Condemned
Chapter Eleven Locked in a Dismal Cave, Escape Impossible
Chapter Twelve Another Amazing Conclusion
Chapter One: The Case of the Wild Hogs
It’s me again, Hank the Cowdog. On December 19, we got a snow. On December 20, it snowed again. On December 21 the overflow of the septic tank froze up, making it impossible for me to bathe.
By December 22 we had four inches of snow on the ground and fellers, it was cold. It was that morning, at approximately 9:00 o’clock, that I awoke from a deep sleep and noticed something very peculiar.
My bed was shaking.
My bed consisted of two old gunnysacks and under normal conditions it didn’t shake. Something strange was afoot, and it was my job to check it out.
I opened one eye, perked one ear, and I sniffed the air. In the security business we call this a preliminary scan. In other words, at that point I wasn’t using all my sensory equipment. There’s no sense in squandering your gifts, no matter how many you have.
Well, I sniffed and I looked and I listened. I smelled diesel fuel but I always smelled diesel in my bedroom because the tank on the north side leaked and the cowboys on our outfit were too lazy to fix it. Now, if they’d had a fuel leak in THEIR bedrooms, they would have fixed it pronto, but this was only Hank’s bedroom so nobody was worried about it.
Anyway, I sniffed and I looked and I listened. And then I heard it: a strange grunting sound. And my bed was shaking again. I had no choice but to open my other eye and put my other ear into service.
I scanned the area from horizon to horizon and suddenly realized that there was something in my bed—something small, white, short-haired, and stub-tailed.
“Drover?”
“Uhhh.”
“Drover?”
“Huh?”
“Get out of my bed.”
“What?” He lifted his head and stared at me. His eyes were out of focus. “Hank, is that you?”
“Who else would be in my bed at this hour?”
“I don’t know. Oh Hank, I had a terrible dream!”
“You’re fixing to have a genuine nightmare if you don’t get your carcass out of my bed.”
“I dreamed we had snow on the ground and it was bitter cold and I was freezing and . . .” He looked around. “Oh my gosh, my dream’s come true.”
“This is your lucky day, son. Now scram.”
He raised up and stood there shivering. “Oh Hank, I’m so cold and miserable! Let me stay in bed with you where it’s warm.”
“No dice. Did you know that you grunt in your sleep?”
He stared at me. “Grunt?”
“That’s right. You’re worse than a bunch of hogs. A guy can’t sleep with all that nonsense going on in his bed.”
“No, that wasn’t me, Hank, honest it wasn’t. I woke up in the night and I could have sworn I saw,” he rolled his eyes around and dropped his voice to a whisper, “a bunch of hogs—right over there!”
“Do you expect me to believe that?” He nodded. I chuckled. “Well, I’ve got news for you, Drover. I don’t believe anything I hear and only half of what I see, so there’s very little chance that I’ll swallow your story.”
“Well, okay. Sure was a good one though.”
“I’m sure it was. Now, if you’ll just . . . were they wild hogs or domestic?”
“Wild.”
“Nonsense. We don’t have wild hogs around here. What makes you think they were wild?”
“Well, they had big long white things . . .”
“We call them tusks. Go on.”
“And wicked red eyes . . .”
“Hm. Keep going.”
“And four legs . . .”
“That fits.”
“And they were grunting, Hank.”
“Wait a minute, hold it. They were grunting?”
“Yeah, they sure were. Does that mean anything?”
“Possibly so, Drover, but before we jump to any hasty conclusions, I have one last question. It is possible that they released a type of odor from their musk glands that smelled exactly like diesel fuel?”
He rolled his eyes. “I think maybe they did, Hank, I’m almost a hundred percent sure they did.”
“Well, there we are, Drover. Now that I’ve managed to drag the testimony out of you, what we have here is the Case of the Wild Hogs.”
“Wild hogs! Oh my gosh!”
“Yes indeed. They’re armed with enormous tusks and extremely dangerous. You ever go one-on-one against a wild hog?”
“Heck no.”
“Well, let me tell you, they’re bad mocus. They can rip your guts out with one slash.
They can chew your ears off with one bite. They’re fast, they’re quick, they’re utterly heartless.”
“Oh!”
“Our first objective is to find out what they’re doing on this ranch without permission. Our second objective is to run ’em off the ranch without getting ourselves cut up into a dozen pieces.”
“What are we gonna do?”
“I just happen to have a plan.”
“Thank goodness!”
“If you’ll shut your little yap and let me finish.”
“Okay.”
I drew out the battle plan in the snow. “We’re here at Point Abel. Over here we have Point Baker and over here Point Charlie. As you can see, the three points form a triangle.”
“Oh.”
“I’ll proceed to Point Baker, over here, and then sneak over to Point Charlie, right here. We’d best hold you in reserve here at Point Abel.”
“You mean . . . I have to stay here and guard the gunnysacks? You won’t let me get out in the snow?”
“That’s correct. When it comes to tracking wild hogs, we use only the first string.”
“Oh drat.”
“If you see anything suspicious, sound the alarm. You got all that?” He nodded. “All right, that covers it. Good luck. I’ll be in communication.”
At that moment, I spotted Pete the Barncat up by the yard fence. He rubbed up against the corner post and he was purring like a little motor-boat.
How do you suppose a cat does that? I’ve tried it a hundred times and I’ve never been able to purr.
I loped up the hill to check him out.
“Morning, Hankie. Did you find any monsters in the night?”
“Funny you should ask. As a matter of fact, yes, and I’ve got some questions for you.”
“Oh good. I just love to answer questions.”
“Number one, did you see any wild hogs around here in the early morning hours?”
“Hmmm, wild hogs. How many?”
“I don’t know, four, five, six?”
“No. I didn’t see four, five, or six.”
“How many did you see?”
“Seven.”
“Why didn’t you say so?”
“Well, you asked if I saw . . .”
“Never mind what I asked! What we’re after is right answers, not right questions. It doesn’t take any brains to ask the right question, but I wouldn’t expect a cat to know that. Which way were they going?”
“Who?”
“The wild hogs, you dunce.”
“Oh.” He licked one of his paws. “Which way do you think they were going?”
“East.”
“That’s right, Hankie. You’re pretty sharp.”
“You may have been crazy when you got here, cat, but you’re talking sense now. That’s all for the moment, but don’t leave the ranch. I may have some more questions for you.”
He grinned. “Any time, Hankie. Good luck with the wild hogs.” Off he went, twitching the end of his tail back and forth.
I never did like that twitching business. Really gets under my skin, makes me mad.
I headed east and made a patrol. Didn’t turn up any clues, no tracks, nothing. An hour later I arrived back at the command post. I found Drover asleep on my bed. I gave him a rude awakening.
“Wake up, get out of my bed, and listen, in that order.”
“Okay, Hank, what did you find?”
“We had seven head of wild hogs go through here sometime after midnight.”
Drover gasped. “Did you find ’em?”
“Not exactly. Wild hogs are very clever. They managed to hide their tracks, but you’ll notice that they left their scent behind. Smell.”
Drover sniffed the air. “Diesel fuel?”
“That’s what they wanted us to think, but we’re one step ahead of them, aren’t we? The bottom line, Drover, is that they passed through the ranch in a big hurry, probably in fear of their lives. As far as I’m concerned, we’ve solved the case.”
“Whew! Boy, I was scared there for a while.”
“Even I had a few tense moments, Drover. Wild hogs are nothing to sneeze at.”
Drover sneezed. “Oh, I’m so cold!”
I studied the runt for a long time, trying to decide if he was trying to be funny or if this was a clue that might open up a new conspiracy. After much deliberation, I decided that he had merely sneezed.
Case closed.
Chapter Two: How Was I Supposed to Know She Didn’t Want Me to Go?
Solving a major case in an hour was nothing out of the ordinary for me. I mean, when you get into your higher echelon of cowdogs, brains and breeding and dashing good looks are standard equipment.
Your common unpapered ranch mutt might have one quality out of the three, but not all three at once. Where I solved the Wild Hog Case in an hour’s time, your ordinary mutt would spend a day and a half on it.
Your sub-ordinary mutt, such as Drover, might take a month and a half to crack the case.
Well, I had cracked the case and felt that warm glow of satisfaction that comes when a dog knows he’s done his job, yet the investigation had taken its toll and I was ready to throw up a long line of Z’s.
I kicked Drover out of my bed, fluffed it up, and was in the process of turning around in a tight circle, looking for the perfect spot to land, when I heard the sound of a motor.
I froze. My ears shot up. A snarl came to my lips. I looked to the left. I looked to the right. And then I saw it. A pickup was pulling into the gravel drive behind the house, and the gravel was popping under the weight of the tires.
The intruder parked beside Sally May’s car, which may have been a significant clue. On the other hand, it may have meant nothing. A guy doesn’t know until . . . you get the idea.
“Get up, Drover, that pickup hasn’t been cleared.”
“But Hank . . . do we have to run in the snow?”
I gave him a withering glare. “Unless you can fly, son, you’ll have to run in the snow. Come on.”
With a look of agony stamped on his face, Drover ventured one foot into the snow. I streaked past him and headed up the hill to check the tires on that unidentified pickup.
Turned out to be Slim’s rig so there was no real emergency, but just to be on the safe side, I restamped his right front tire. There’s no sense in taking chances.
High Loper and Sally May came out the back door. Loper had two suitcases in each hand and a playpen under his arm. Sally May carried the baby and several packages wrapped in colorful paper and tied with ribbons.
I sat down beside the gate and hung around to see what was going on. Drover had made it up the hill by that time. He stood shivering in the snow with his feet together.
Loper appeared to be in a foul mood and Slim started joshing him. “Gosh, Loper, I sure wish I was going someplace for Christmas. You sure y’all got enough stuff. You forgot the dinner table and the commode.”
Sally May gave him the evil eye. “Slim, this isn’t the time for your brand of humor. When you get married and have kids, you’ll understand about traveling.”
“Yes ma’am.”
When Sally May wasn’t looking, Loper shook his head at Slim and his mouth formed the words, “No you won’t.”
Slim shoved his hands into his jeans pockets and grinned at Loper. “Reckon that stuff’ll fit into the car or do you want me to hook up the stock trailer?”
Loper muttered under his breath, something about “your Sunday britches.” I studied Slim’s jeans. They looked normal to me—kind of worn and dirty, actually, and I sure wouldn’t have described them as church clothes. But cowboys are a strange breed. They don’t always think like the rest of the world.
I was waiting beside the gate when Sally May came out. I wagged my tail and gave her a big cowdo
g smile. She looked down at me with narrowed eyes and said, “Get away, you nasty thing!”
What . . . ? How . . . ? Hey, I didn’t jump up on her, I didn’t lick her in the face, I didn’t lick her on the leg. I didn’t do anything but smile at her!
All right, maybe she was still sore at me for jumping up on the dinner table and eating those T-bone steaks, or for running into the utility room after I’d been sprayed by a skunk, but heck, that had been months ago.
I was perfectly willing to start over with a clean slate and try to make something of the friendship, but Sally May had always been bad about carrying a grudge. Over little things too.
So she walked past me with her nose in the air, and then you know what she did? On her way to the car she saw Mister Pitiful, Mister Half-Stepper, Mister Sleep-Till-Noon—meaning Drover, of course—and instead of saying “Get away you nasty thing,” she bent down and rubbed his neck.
“Poor puppy’s cold.” She straightened up. “Oh Slim, why don’t you let Drover sleep in the utility room while we’re gone. Poor little thing doesn’t have a warm coat like,” she looked at me and her lip curled up, “like Hank McNasty.”
I wagged my tail.
“Hank can stay out with the skunks and the sewer, but Drover needs a warm bed.”
Let me intrude here to make one small point. Drover had very little promise as a cowdog, but even if he’d had papers and instincts and the rest of the program, that kind of mollycoddling would have ruined him.
The worst thing you can do to a ranch dog is spoil him. Let him stay inside in the winter and you’ve ruined him. For the rest of his life, he’ll expect a warm bed.
Maybe I’m old-fashioned, but I still believe that a cowdog ought to be just a little tougher than your ordinary breeds, and you’ll never catch me sleeping in a warm house, no matter how cold it gets outside.
So there you are, a little insight into the price we pay for being special, and also a little insight into why Drover would never go far in the business.
In addition to being dumb and chickenhearted, he had a weakness for comfort.
Sally May opened the back door of the car. Then she opened the front door too and put the baby into the baby seat. I watched from the gate.