by J P S Brown
When Kane had been in Rio Alamos several months Don Eduardo Almada sent a messenger with word that he wanted Jim Kane to come out to his ranch and bid on the cattle. The messenger said the cattle were being rounded up and Don Eduardo wanted Kane to bring enough money in cash to pay for a hundred head. He wanted 600 pesos a head. If Kane didn't get out there the next day Don Eduardo was going to sell to someone else. Kane wanted the Almada cattle. Almada seldom sold big bunches. He, like most of the older ranchers of Southern Sonora, only sold full-grown cattle and only enough of these to meet the barest needs of his hacienda.
The Almada hacienda had been in operation one hundred years. It had its own mezcal plant and its own tannery. The dons that founded the ranch built miles of aqueducts that brought water to the hacienda from all parts of the ranch. The lumber of the original ranchhouse had been brought by ship around the Horn from Yucatan. A hundred peons had worked the mezcal plant, tannery, and the 500 irrigable hectares of the hacienda.
Don Eduardo did not inherit the ambition of his forebears. He had worn out two wives and after the second wife died he never remarried. He lived in a small house apart from the hacienda with two big lazy sons. No one did much work anymore. The vaqueros milked the ranch cows and their women made panelas, and cheese which they sold to make wages. Don Eduardo never paid them a wage. Fences, doors, clothing were patched with rawhide. The hacienda subsisted on beans and vegetables it raised, carne seca, jerky, from deer or javalina or an occasional beef (never its own), and corn tortillas.
Kane arrived at the hacienda at midmorning. The cattle were in the corral just as the messenger had said they would be. Don Eduardo was drunk and asleep on a cot in front of his shack with a liter bottle of mezcal in his arms. He was skinned up. His clothes were torn. His hair was covered with dried blood. His face was covered by a scab that extended from the top of his forehead to the point of his chin.
Kane found some vaqueros and they helped him work the cattle. Kane waited until sundown for Don Eduardo to wake up. He woke up mean. He said, "How long you been here, cabrón?" He was suffering from the cruda, the raw hangover. His hand was shaking so badly he couldn't open the bottle. Kane told him he had cut the cattle and was ready to trade. Don Eduardo didn't get up from his cot. He said, "My cattle are worth six hundred pesos a head, take it or leave it."
He took a big swallow from the bottle and lay hack down, groaning. The cattle were worth what he asked so Kane gave him the cash for 96 cattle and told him he would send the trucks for the cattle in the morning. It was already dark.
"No," Don Eduardo said. "You'll take them tonight. I don't want anything not belonging to me sleeping in my corral." Kane had to go back to town, get the trucks, and load the cattle out that night.
While the men were loading the cattle a vaquero told Kane the cause of the skinned head, the selling of the cattle, and the drunkenness.
Don Eduardo had a brother living nearby. He was the poor brother. He had inherited only a small part of the ranch. He lived more simply than Don Eduardo. He had no sons, no wife. He was all alone. When he needed a little extra cash he stole something from Don Eduardo and sold it. At the time Kane had bought the cattle Don Eduardo had a fine patch of tomatoes and the poor brother was in the habit of stealing a basket of the best tomatoes every two or three days.
Don Eduardo's two sons, having nothing to do, one day dug a six-foot-deep pitfall trap on the trail to catch the poor brother when he came to steal the tomatoes.
The brother did not come as expected. Late in the evening after the brothers dug the trap, Don Eduardo was coming down the trail with a big load of leña, firewood, balanced on his head. He stepped off into that trap. The leña drove him into the bottom of the trap like a hammer. Much later that night when Don Eduardo got home one son was lying in the doorway. The old man kicked him out of the way and said, "Get out of my way, mierda, manure," and went in the house looking for his bottle. The other brother proceeded to tell his father about the trap. The longer the brother talked the more he noticed about his father's skinned-up condition. Don Eduardo stared at the brother until he shut up.
"Yes, mierda, I know, mierda, because your beautiful trap just swallowed me," he said. "To this level we have arrived.? You have nothing more to do than commit atrocities against your own father, or your old uncle. I disown you both. Tomorrow we begin to gather all cattle on this ranch. Everything male from yearlings to ten-year-olds, if any, will be sold. I will keep only my cows and my herd bulls. You will take the money and remove yourselves from my sight. Go somewhere else to play with yourselves. I don't want to be reminded of your worthlessness, or mine."
16
Brahma
Garrett and March had not given Jim Kane an order for cattle for several months. Kane's note at the bank was overdue again when two steer buyers arrived in Rio Alamos, and sent word to Kane that they would like to see him. He found them in the Alamos Hotel having lunch. Kane knew one of them. He was Shorty Mulligan, a little, sawed-of whiskey-voiced ex-racehorse trainer.
"Hello, Shorty," Kane said.
"Jim, how the hell are you? This is my partner, Fats Potter."
Potter stood up. He was a big man with gray hair that hung in his eyes from under his hat. The tail of his old work shirt was out. He was not too fat. They shook hands.
"Sit down and have something with us," Potter said. "I'm having a beer. I sure like this Meskin beer."
Kane ordered a beer and sat down with them.
"I knew your father, Paul Kane," Potter said. "Where is he now?"
"I don't know," Kane said.
"I knew him when he worked for the Three W's outfit in Arizona. I had a little old store at Divide. Your dad was the best cowboy I ever saw. He couldn't stay away from the booze though."
"Were you at Divide? I don't remember you," Kane said.
"You were a little shaver. That store was the first business I had when I came from Arkansas. I was postmaster and chief bootlegger too. Your dad was my best customer."
"What brings you guys to Rio,Alamos?"
"Fats has a feedlot. He wants to stock some Mexican steers. Terry Garrett said you could help us buy them," Mulligan said.
"Don't try to buy a lot of them. I'll leave you some money and you buy whatever you see that is good," Potter said.
"You can start by buying my cattle. I've got one hundred forty steers out here," Kane said.
"We only want cheap cattle," Potter said.
"These won't cost you much. They are the cutbacks I have left from this year's buying. I've been feeding them for this market but you can have them if you like them."
They got in Potter's air-conditioned car and drove out to Kane's corrals. Potter carried beer with him.
Potter bought 70 head of the cattle. He wouldn't take the rest at any price. They were too thin and Potter wanted a different type of cattle. Kane barely got enough out of them to pay the bank.
By the time they started back to town, Potter was getting drunk.
"How's the girl situation in this town?" Potter asked.
"Same as nearly any town down here," Kane said.
"What do you mean by that?"
"They've got a whorehouse."
"Hell, I'm not going to no whorehouse. I want a skin cover for my room."
Kane looked out the window at the hot day going by.
"Hell, Kane, you are young and good looking. You must have a hundred girl friends in this town. How about fixing two old men up?"
"There's a pimp at the hotel. He's always available, Fats."
"You ain't following old Fats at all, Kane. Disease, man. Disease. You could fix us up better, I'm sure."
"You won't have any trouble, Fats. Just show a little blue fifty-peso bill."
"Hell, you might as well make the fifty instead of some Meskin pimp. Shorty, give Kane a fifty. What the hell, give him a hundred so he'll do his best. "
"Fats, I bet Jim has other business to attend to. He don't need to entertain us."
/> "Give him the hundred," said Potter. `
Shorty handed a 100-peso bill over the back seat. Kane took it. He put it in his money clip.
"Now I want two nice lookers. And clean, Kane, clean. Get that, boy?"
"That pimp at the hotel is the best I ever saw. You tell him early what you want and I'm sure you'll get the best he's got. He gets the best talent in town," said Kane.
"Look, I'm paying you to do it," said Potter.
"The very best I can do is introduce you to the best pimp in town. He's the one I consult. Thanks for the tip," said Kane, laughing.
Potter drank beer and looked straight down the road.
After a while he grinned. "Yah, yah, yah, yah, yah," he shouted as he steered the car into the hotel driveway. "Shorty, find that pimp and send him up to my room. Kane you come up and I'll pay you for those cattle."
Kane followed Potter up to his room. Fats opened a big, stuffed briefcase and took out his cattle drafts. He paid Kane for the 70 head. "Now Kane," he said. "I want you to buy anything that is cheap around here. Stick to young Brahmas and Brahma crosses. Don't buy any young corrientes like you've got left in your corral. If you buy those natives, make sure they have good horns so we can sell them to the rodeo producers."
"All right, but at what price are you going to receive these cattle?"
"I'll receive them at cost. You get two dollars a head commission. "
"Are you going to leave me some money?"
"I just paid you $3500 dollars, didn't I?"
"That's my money for my cattle. I'm talking about your money for your cattle I'll be buying. "
"Use your money until you need more, then I'll see about fixing it so you can draft on me."
"You going to pay me commission on cattle I buy for you with my money? I can't do it. I owe every penny you paid me. I owe it yesterday to my banker. You put it all up and I'll buy for you."
"OK I'll fix it so you can draft on me. Right as soon as you can, go and see old man David Brajcich and see if you can buy his cattle. I bought them five years ago. He's got good Brahmas. You can give three pesos a kilo and no more. Try to get calves and yearlings. I particularly don't want any of those big old outlaw steers and bulls of his. Too wild."
"Three pesos won't buy the cattle. He always wants three twenty-five or three thirty, and he won't sell calves or yearlings. He's probably got five hundred of those big cattle," said Kane.
"Well, see what you can do."
Kane got up to leave. "Come on," Fats said. "Stick around a while. Let's party. We got a lot done today and I'm not leaving until in the morning. There's a bottle of whiskey in my suitcase over there."
"Get the son-of-a-bitch out then," Kane said.
Fats got out a bottle of good American bourbon, split the seal, and poured two big shots in the hotel water glasses.
"Kane, I like you. I think you are going to make me money. Here's to that," Fats said, raising his glass.
When Kane got back to the room at sunup the next day, there were girls, clothes, empty bottles, pieces of Shorty Mulligan, and several managers and guests, complaints scattered in the room. Fats Potter was sitting up on the back of an easy chair, his feet in the seat, his hair in his gray-white eyes, both hands holding a bottle of whiskey, shouting, "Yah, yah, yah, I'm King of the Drunkards."
Kane worked half the morning and then went to see David Brajcich. He was a Slav who had come to the United States as a young man. He spoke good English. He was a wine maker. He had immigrated to Mexico and learned to . make mezcal. His ranch had big maguey groves on it from which he distilled the mezcal he called Tigrillo, little tiger. It had made him a rich man.
On this same ranch he had released good Brahma bulls with native corriente cows. He sold only when the huge ranch got so overstocked even a wine maker could tell it. His cattle were wild as deer but the difference was they could kill a man when he caught them. They should have been hunted with guns.
David Brajcich thought that because his cattle were half Brahma they were half made of gold. He priced them accordingly. He never sold young cattle. He figured the bigger they were the more money they would bring. He never figured on the amount one big steer ate or how many weaker animals starved while that big steer grew bigger, had to range farther for his feed, grew wilder until he wasn't merchandise any more than a wild bear is merchandise.
Kane tried to convince Brajcich of a buyer's point of view but still he couldn't buy the cattle. Brajcich didn't ever have to sell. He would wait until his cattle was worth plenty money. There was a gringo asking for his cattle so they must now be worth plenty money. All gringos were rich. He never put up anything to support the cattle. They never cost him anything. He only took from them when he felt like it. He never visited the ranch except to arrive at the distillery. His cowboys were allowed to milk the range cows and make cheese. The sale of the cheese paid half their wages.
It shocked him years later when he learned that his vaqueros had for a long time been selling his unbranded calves to a neighbor. This came as he was about to die and he never felt the loss of the cattle. He did, of course, feel the loss of his vaquero friends whom he had always vaguely admired. He had never really understood why they worked for practically nothing in the sun and thick brush with the beasts. Nor why all the cowmen he knew who lived on their ranches always looked so burned, worn, and tired, and always seemed so broke. Then on learning about his cattle, which had never been anything but precious, like jewels to him, mercifully to him and to everyone concerned, he died.
When Kane got back to the hotel that afternoon he found Potter and Mulligan had checked out.
He shipped the cattle he had sold Potter to Potter's ranch on the northern Sonora desert. The train passed through Potter's ranch and the headquarters had a siding where the cattle were unloaded.
Kane had bought two loads of cattle for Potter and was working them in his corrals one day when Shorty Mulligan drove up. He climbed up on top of the fence and watched Kane work. When Kane finally turned and said hello he told Kane he and Potter had bought the big Brajcich outlaws.
"When in the hell did you do that?" Kane asked him.
"The night after we left here. We made the whole trade over the telephone," Shorty said.
"How much did you give for them?"
"Three-forty pesos laid in your corrals."
"I thought you said you didn't want those big cattle. I didn't offer that much for the calves. I only offered him three-twenty-live pesos for the calves."
"I know, but Fats got a wild hair and decided he wanted those big steers, so he called Brajcich and bought them," said Mulligan.
"He meant to buy them when he told me he didn't want them, I bet," said Kane.
"Well, he bought them and wants to know if you'll receive them for us here and ship them to the desert, " said Mulligan.
"Shit."
"Come on. That's the way you've got to sneak up on these rich Mexicans. You got to fool them into thinking their cattle are cheap."
"Fool me, you mean. I never got any cattle bought and Brajcich got more than he would have taken from me for those big unmerchantables. You hotshots fixed it so I'll never be able to buy those Brajcich cattle. He'll never believe what I tell him now.
"Well, there are five hundred cattle coming to your corrals and Fats authorized me to give you a quarter a head to receive them and ship them to the desert for us, if you want to."
That sure saves giving me two dollars a head commission.
"Take it or leave it, but if you don't take it tell me so I can have the trucks unload someplace else"
"When do they start coming in?" asked Kane.
"I'll be back in time to cut the cattle at the ranch. I'll let you know. Will you help us?"
"OK."
"How many cattle have you bought for us?" Mulligan asked.
"Two loads."
"Well, that's all we want for now. So don't buy any more. I guess you can ship them this week while you are waiting for t
he Brajcich cattle."
''Yeah."
"Draft on Fats for freight and feed and your commission on the two loads. Oh, another thing. We'll take the rest of your little cattle to the desert, if you want. If it will help you any."
"You want them?" asked Kane.
"No. We'll pay the freight and feed on them and market them for you. You price them, and then when we sell them we take back the freight and feed, give you back your price, and we split the profit."
"Guarantee me forty dollars a head sixty days from now and I'll ship them to you. I can't wait longer than that. Then you can pay me half of the profit whenever you feel like it."
"That's OK. We ought to be able to guarantee forty dollars easy enough."
"I'll ship them with the rest, " said Kane.
"Just a minute, Jim. There are some of those little rats I don't want under any condition."
"They'll all work, Shorty. "
"Some of them are too weak. Let's just ship a load."
"Well, cut them then."
Shorty got down off the fence and walked among the cattle in the corral. They were so gentle he could handle them afoot. He cut out 26 head of the smallest, thinnest cattle.
"Those are the cutbacks of the cutbacks of the cutbacks," Kane said. "The last of the ten thousand, of the great empire."
"They are pretty sorry, " Mulligan said. "If I were you I'd turn them out someplace where it won't cost to keep them and I'd just forget about them."
"I've got some sorghum grass, just enough for twenty-six head. I'll irrigate it and turn them out on it. "
"You can ship the other forty-four to us. We'll pay you when we sell them."
They were walking back to Shorty's pickup. He got in.
