Sharpshooter

by Dusty Richards

  “This place is beautiful,” Lisa said, looking over the expanse of the headquarters. “It was to be a hunting lodge?”

  “Some rich guy out of Saint Louis had it built as hunting lodge/ranch. He got mad, never slept here, and dumped it. Spencer found it and we bought it for ten cents on the dollar or less. The main ranch land lies south of here, but that place had no headquarters on it.”

  He noted her biting her lip and he rode in close to her. “Yes, it was here where Miguel died. I am so sorry I forgot. Will you be all right?”

  “Yes.” She swallowed. “I will be fine. I bet he liked it, too.”

  “We all did.”

  Spencer’s wife, Lucinda, came out on the porch, her two children hugging her skirt.

  “Good day. I think you have met my wife, Lisa? That is Jesus, and you know Cole.”

  “Welcome to the Wagon Wheel Ranch. My husband and Fred are off in a cow camp. I will send a boy for him to come home, now that you are here.”

  “We just dropped by to see how you two were getting along. Not to be any bother or interrupt any business.”

  “You are no trouble. Spencer, Fred, and his men are trying to stop some rustling activities. They’ve spent lots of time this summer trying to close the loop on them. All they were able to prove was a butcher shop bought three head with our brand on them. They paid for the cattle but Spencer suspects they weren’t the same rustlers that moved several bunches out of state.”

  “They take some to New Mexico?”

  “He has some letters that he will show you that say they did that. Come in, and my cooks will fix you supper. Those three fine boys will unload your packhorses and put up your mounts. Hitch them. All of you, wash up and come into my casa. I am so glad you all came.”

  Everyone thanked her.

  The woman took Lisa’s arm and led her inside. “I am so glad you came to our ranch. You know I was the wife of a vaquero who was killed at roundup down on the border of the Diablo Ranch. After that I still lived on that large ranch Diablo, with my small children. Bonnie and JD operate this ranch for the Byrnes family. When I met my husband, Spencer, he asked me to marry him. I had the little children. He didn’t care so I married him. I know this ranch has some sad memories for you but its beauty has hugged me ever since Spencer brought me up here. Since this rustling started, Fred’s wife, Josey, and I must keep our own company. Spencer and Fred stay gone all the time.”

  “How are you feeling, Josey?” Lisa asked the quiet pregnant girl.

  “Big, and I still have two months to go.”

  Lisa shook her head and hugged her. “Girl, I’d love a lot to be where you are at today.”

  Josey blushed. “I am grateful to be here and married to Fred. But I do get lonely and feel sorry for myself with no one around, just Lucinda. How have you been doing?”

  “I am doing fine. You two have such a lovely house here, but I understand how you feel. With so few close neighbors. I was lonely, too, when I first came to the Preskitt ranch and lived in a casa. But I was glad to be there. My husband now had brought me back there from Colorado after I agreed to work as a camp helper. At the ranch, I worked in the large house as a maid. When the woman Monica, who ran the house, died of a heart attack, Chet’s wife asked me to try and do her job. Miguel took me horse riding—I thought he was a very smart man and we had a courtship, but I liked my job running the house. Elizabeth told me I could marry him and keep my job. He was killed up here and it broke my heart. Then Chet’s wife, Elizabeth, died suddenly from cancer.

  “Chet and I leaned on each other. We had no immediate family. So we married. And we have had such a great life. I knew we were coming here. I had some dread but my life goes on and needs to. Thanks for your comfort and concern. I will be fine.”

  “Lucinda and I try to cheer each other up. She has become a dear friend.”

  Lucinda crossed herself. “I agree with her. This ranch is far out. When my first husband was killed, if the Diablo Ranch had not been so kind to me, I would be living in the Tucson barrio as a woman of the night. They told me to stay there as long as I wanted and paid me my husband’s wages. I thank all of you and God every night.”

  “And I’d be in the alleys of Preskitt trying to make a living, too,” Josey said.

  Lisa nodded. “Yes, we all owe them.”

  Their conversation ended, Chet seated her at the table and then took a place beside her. The food came piled on their plates and the fresh coffee aroma filled the air. The kitchen girls swirling around to feed them were all dressed very well and looked very professional under Lucinda’s command.

  Horses were coming in. Lucinda went to the front door. “My husband is here.”

  Chet rose and went to meet him.

  “Boy, boss man, good to see you. I was over at the cow camp trying to put an end to the rustlers.”

  “Lucinda said they were pestering you.”

  “Go back to eating. I can pull up a chair.”

  “Fine. You know my men Cole and Jesus.”

  Spencer nodded. “You fellows come straight up here?”

  “No. We stopped down at the Rustler’s Ranch and spent a few days with Toby and Talley. You leave Fred down there?”

  “Yes. This rustling deal has us both concerned. One of us stays down there in the bunkhouse at all times. He is a great worker and we get lots done but these rustlers have about beat both of us in the ground trying to catch and stop them.”

  “Maybe the three of us can lend you a hand in finding the source of this rustling.”

  “I hope so.”

  “Toby has delivered you enough hay?”

  “Man, he is a hay-mowing-and-moving guy. I offered him some hands at roundup to pay him back but he thanked me and said he had enough. He’s delivered plenty of hay to us for next winter. I am surprised how much he has stored on those homesteads. Of course, unfenced, the range cattle had grazed them down before so there was nothing growing on them. But he has a bunch of them fenced and using the dug well there and windmills to water the range stock. Last we talked he had several ranchers contracting hay for this winter from him.”

  “Those two are workers, both of them. Lucinda told us some about the rustler deal. How does that stand?”

  “According to some letters written to me, they have been slipping out of Arizona with bunches of my cattle. My men are careful and I thought we’d see more tracks of that activity but we haven’t seen a thing that looks like they moved a dozen or more critters off the ranch.”

  “Hey, we have time to check this out. Who sent the letters?” Cole asked.

  “I’ll get them.”

  “Stay there. I know where they are,” Lucinda said, and went for them.

  Cole began to read aloud the first one. “‘Dear Spencer Horne. My name is Ira Brown. I ranch in western New Mexico and rustlers have been driving cattle bearing your brand by my place. In June, I’d bet they drove fifty head over here past my place. July, maybe more. I am seventy years old and I don’t want to tangle with them. But I hate rustlers or thieves of any kind—but please don’t involve me.

  “‘These thieves have many relatives over here who might seek revenge on me if they knew I told you so. Ira Brown.’”

  “I sent one of my men over there but the old man was worried they might make a connection between him and us. So he came back empty-handed,” Spencer said.

  “I understand territorial lines are almost like national borders. But we need to talk to the law over there, not mention Brown, and find out the truth,” Chet said.

  Spencer agreed.

  “A lady wrote this one,” Cole said. “‘Dear Mr. Burns, My name is Nita Rochester and I live close to the Arizona–New Mexico border. Some New Mexico cattle rustlers have been driving your branded cattle across the line and selling them over here. For a small fee, I can give you their names and who they sold them to. But I am a widow and I could be killed for giving out this information. So please keep my name out of this.’”

&nbs
p; “I had not contacted her yet. She lives closer to Gallup.”

  “Well, you have three of us to help you. Let’s get to the bottom of it.”

  “I may even help them,” Lisa said, and they laughed.

  * * *

  The next morning at breakfast it was agreed the men would ride out and check on things across the road, where the bulk of the ranch’s cattle were, and where Fred was staying. Then they’d form a plan with the five of them to check on New Mexico locations and possible thefts. Lisa stayed with Lucinda, Josey, and the kids.

  When the fresh ranch horses were saddled and the men’s legs were thrown across the seats of the saddle, Cole found he had drawn the head-bogging one, and he went off bucking down the short grass-clad open bowl out in front of the house. Chet and Jesus plus Spencer’s men made a great cheering audience. The horse that Cole was on must have had springs on his legs because Chet decided Cole was getting high enough for him to maybe see the San Francisco Peaks a hundred miles west of there.

  They finally all rode south out of the great bowl that held the corrals and buildings that made up the home place. Chet always enjoyed himself when the other feller’s horse bucked that powerfully. Cole rode in beside him and Chet asked him, “You call that pony Wings?”

  “No, worse than that. Boy, he got sky-bound on me. Spencer, you need to promise me a pony to ride for tomorrow.”

  “I have to apologize, too,” Spencer said.

  Cole was shaking his head. “He was like that wild Apache that Chet gave me as a prisoner that time. I shot him and was thinking the same of this horse, too.”

  Chet laughed and then to explain it to Spencer, said, “That was out on our first drive to feed the Navajos over at Gallup and we’d never have made it out here without that contract all these years.”

  Cole agreed. “But you have fulfilled that contract with sound animals. That stuff they feed the Apaches down at San Carlos was horrible. It is no wonder that they’re mad and running around—Old Man Clanton and that Tucson Ring deliver some damn sorry stock for them to eat.”

  Chet agreed “Oh, we’ve had some real breaks, but all in all it wasn’t because we didn’t try hard, too.”

  “Yes, we did, and I love working here even with your bucking horse. When I quit the stage line, Valerie asked me if I was ready to take off on my own. My share of the telegraph-stage deal would have set us up. It is in the bank untouched but I told her no, that I was having too much fun working for Chet and his outfit. Plus, we may find another Spanish cave.”

  They had to tell Spencer about the cave in the Grand Canyon cliff wall.

  “I never knew Arizona had rubies,” Spencer said.

  “Yeah, if we could have found the source we’d have it made.”

  Jesus spurred his horse up beside them. “They have them in Mexico, even. But I never saw that many. Spencer, they hauled up a big bucket of them. I thought at first it was only red broken glass. But the half bucket of emerald stones made me the most excited, and then gold nuggets, many bigger than my fingernail.”

  Chet said, “And they’d done some gold melting, too. I had to buy two teams and horses to haul it all out.”

  “Who went over the edge to look in the cave?”

  “Cole and a new guy named Salty. He’s half monkey anyway. I stayed up on top,” Jesus said.

  “Spencer, Jesus translated their writing. They had all this stuff in a safe cave twenty feet or more below the lip of the North Rim and three men waited there to be pulled up and load all those treasures on pack mules and go back to Mexico and live like kings.”

  “One in desperation fell to his death by jumping out. The other two waited and died. We don’t know what happened to the rest who never came back or where they found the rubies.”

  “Indians probably killed them and they never knew they had treasure in a cave like that,” Spencer said.

  “Chet saved a few things. An old Mexican man who lives on the ranch is cleaning it for him. One great find is a real old flintlock rifle. He may need to make a stock for it. It is amazing that that cave was so dry.”

  “There were a few rubies showed up in the Bill Williams area west of Preskitt,” Spencer said. “A prospector showed me a handful he found in that region.”

  “Not a bucketful.” Cole said. “And some were bigger than my thumbnail.”

  Fred joined them at the bunkhouse and they went out and spent the day looking at tracks. Eating a sandwich lunch, Chet talked to a few of Spencer’s hands who were also trying to see where anyone drove off stock. But not much sign of any kind of a cattle drive made in the area showed in the great rolling grass prairie. From the bunkhouse Chet was surveying all the grass. He considered his bargain ranch a real place to run beef cattle on.

  Chet saw the rustler business had Fred about as worn down as Spencer was. Both men, no matter how tough they were, needed a break.

  Midafternoon Chet and his men, along with Spencer, went back to headquarters. Fred stayed with the cowboys.

  “What next?” Spencer asked.

  “Break up to going in twos and ride over into New Mexico in working clothes. Talk to those people who wrote the letters, pay them a little money, and see what else we can learn. Where there are some sparks there can be fire.”

  “Sounds like a winner. I owe Cole a better horse tomorrow. I’ll ride with him,” Spencer said.

  “Fine. We need to take some gear along and stay a few days. Someone will know something about this rustling deal over there, I bet, if there is anything going on.”

  Jesus jobbed his horse up closer to the two of them. “And don’t you find me one of those winged horses tomorrow, either.”

  Spencer laughed. “I swear on a stack of Bibles that horse never bucked that hard in all his life.”

  “Just remember that.”

  Later that night in bed Lisa asked him, “How long will you be gone?”

  “I hope only a few days. But say five. You be all right here?”

  She snuggled against him. “I will miss you. Yes, I will be fine. Lucinda is an intelligent enough person and her children are smart. Josey can use the company—she’s in a hard place mentally. I understand that rustlers need to be run down and stopped, but know I treasure every day I am at your side and I worry when I am not there. You see what marrying you has done to me?”

  He rolled over to face her in the bed. “Yes. You’ve lost some of your personal freedom.”

  “Exactly,” she said. “But I will look forward to your return.”

  So would he.

  “I worry about Josey being pregnant and having any trouble to need a doctor. In another month or sooner I want her at our house. Being her first child she might have problems.”

  “Once we get past these rustlers, Fred can move her carefully over there.”

  “Good. Do that.”

  “I will.” He kissed her and held her close.

  CHAPTER 12

  They crossed the border into New Mexico and rode on into Gallup. They stabled their horses, found rooms, and went out to eat. Over a great Mexican restaurant meal of beef, flour tortillas, and enchiladas they laughed and planned the day.

  Chet and Jesus would look things over around town. Spencer and Cole would ride south and find the letter writers, maybe take three days, and meet back in town on Saturday. By then they should all know something. If they needed help they’d send Chet a telegram at the hotel.

  The cantina music was loud, and several people stopped by the table. A young man who once worked for Cole on the stage line, Kenny York, had not heard about any rustling but promised to leave word at the hotel for Chet if he learned anything.

  A Mexican woman about thirty by the name of Rita Miranda, who worked at the Navajo Agency, recognized Chet and spoke to him. When he told her they were secretly looking for rustlers she told him she would also leave word at the hotel if she learned anything. A widow woman in her thirties, she took the opportunity to dance with each of them.

  Before she left
Chet, she whispered, “Next time you come to Gallup bring some single hombres. I need a man, too.”

  Laughing with her, he promised to do that.

  Going back to their room, Jesus said, “I remember going places with you and meeting these women—all kinds. But I am so glad I have Anita now and the baby. I can go home and be in heaven, huh?”

  “Amen.”

  The next day they went around to several butcher shops. None had seen the Wagon Wheel or the Bar K brand on cattle they’d bought. But Chet figured they wouldn’t tell if they had butchered some, because telling might get them involved in a felony.

  Chet knew having someone like Jesus speaking fluently in Spanish was an advantage in a town like Gallup. Day one came and passed without any leads. They ate in the same cantina and the man who owned it joined them while they ate the rich, well-prepared food again.

  “You learn anything today?” Fred Orr asked.

  “Not much. Most say they never saw that Wagon Wheel or Bar K brand around here. But I figure they would have to play dumb so they don’t become a suspect.”

  “I know a man who might know something for a few dollars. He would not lie to you.”

  Chet nodded. “What does he charge?”

  “Oh, say, for twenty dollars he may have some very good pointers.”

  “Where will I find him?”

  “Before breakfast tomorrow in that little park up the street. He will wear a yellow bandanna. His name is Yeffie.”

  “Yef-fee?”

  “That is close enough. Good luck, my amigos. The food was okay?”

  “Terrible food,” Jesus said in Spanish to tease him.

  He left laughing.

  Chet didn’t fall asleep very fast that evening. Lisa had spoiled him. For certain she wasn’t the only one missing someone who wasn’t in their bed. Were Spencer and Cole doing any better? He and Jesus would meet Fred Orr’s man in the park before breakfast.