The English Horses

by William A. Luckey

  Katherine Donald

  Chapter Nineteen

  Her fingers trailed over the floral material, a gift from Mr. Meiklejon, sent from England by his fiancée. Her employer would be marrying soon and the question of her continued residence in a bachelor’s house would be resolved.

  Katherine let her thoughts run away while she worked on the final seams of her dress with its fine, smooth finish and tender pattern, and she laughed at herself for her mental indulgences.

  Men had so many freedoms while women could only taste small ones on the sly. It was a poor exchange, marriage for loneliness, independence for security and obedience. My but she was bitter this morning. Katherine knew the source of her anger. Burn English. There had been no improprieties in a physical sense, yet if her moments with him were known, she would be called terrible names for her tenderness.

  Tied to a reprobate father, cooking and caring for him more than fifteen years, refusing the suitors he deemed proper, seeking out men who showed more life, more daring than would make a good husband, she was perceived as less than a middling success, barren and still virginal. And angry at the world pushing her into the mold it preferred.

  The needle slipped, her finger bled two drops to stain the lovely pale green lawn with two small, perfect circles of red. She knew all about blood; she would have to wash the stains before they set. She did not move, composed, erect in the straight-backed chair in its corner of the small back room. Where she had held guard over Burn English. The material spread over her lap, she put the pricked finger to her mouth and slowly laved it with her tongue, sucking gently, tenderly, remembering other tastes and different times.

  So much had revolved around this room through the spring months, so much pain and doubt, so much anger and distrust. She had known, when she looked into those eyes, that it was the core of Burn English, the heart that beat on despite the wounding, it was the strength of soul that had kept life in the wasted body.

  It might be horrible to admit, but she missed her patient, longed for the need he’d had for her. His life and daily comfort had been placed in her hands. It was what she wanted, that terrible need from another human being. Not this soft, endless repetition of cleaning and cooking and smiling and deferring to whatever a man wished.

  She shook her head. There was Davey who had changed so in the past weeks. She had continued to conduct herself in a calm and distant manner around him, very much the lady, and Davey was responding as a reflection of her attitude. This was the explanation of his change, his new remoteness, the absence of his obvious affection.

  She kept a constant internal dialogue to remind herself about Davey, that he had the ability to read her thoughts and guess her feelings. Sincethe morning it was discovered that English had taken the pacing grullo and was gone, Hildahl had looked at Katherine as if he were witness to the raw side of a woman he had held in high esteem. Whatever it was that bothered him, Davey Hildahl had a forward, bitter touch to his words now, and Katherine knew she responded in kind, with a quick, sharp word and a hard stare whenever he confronted her.

  She did not know what was happening to her ordered world, but it was frightening, and exciting, at the same time. Maybe she was being granted the merest taste of an unorthodox freedom.

  Her father, however. She had not been surprised when he had put out the word that he was claiming the mustangs branded with his Bench D. Edward Donald saw a chance to take something to which he had no earned right. Since he had officially put in his claim and had signed a warrant, she had not spoken to her parent.

  Her hands began to play with an escaped lock of hair. Sweeping and cleaning, baking cakes and pies, all were more difficult when her thick hair came unbound and into her eyes. She would cut it but for the weight of it on her neck, the pleasure of throwing back her head and feeling its bounce. Unseemly, her father might say, a sign of wantonness in an otherwise good and righteous woman. But there was so little she could be vain about, so little to please just her.

  She had a quiet, secret memory of one morning finding Burn English with a book out of Meiklejon’s library. A leather-bound copy with faded gold script and an odd dark stain on the cover—Rudyard Kipling. English had sat with his backpropped against the wall, his hands wrapped around the book, working over the words. When Katherine had entered the room, he had dropped the book under his covers.

  Since his departure, there had been no word from English, or about him except that he continued to escape the law’s highly ineffective attempts to take the mustangs from his stewardship. No word from Jack Holden, either, but lots of stories about rustling cattle, scrapes and fights in too many small villages at the same time to be possible. Gossip about him and the Blaisdel girl, which had a nasty turn. And Davey Hildahl, bitter and harsh, barely smiling. Too many men and none of them belonged only to her.

  Jack rode in to town to see her. Just her. After two months of being deliberately ignored, Rose had resolved not to respond to him. But he rode to the back of the hotel, where he had first found her midwinter. And she was there again, getting vegetables from the root cellar for one of Mama’s heavy stews. Nothing had changed about their meeting except the time of year. The humid sweetness of late summer replaced the bitter wind, but that was all.

  Jack leaned on the low cellar door, and, when Rose turned around, a basket full of carrots and onions on her arm, he was there watching her. She hugged the basket to her belly like a child and felt her heart pound. He was as handsome as she remembered—the smile slightly vague, the eyes still blue. He had come in just to see her, he said. Here was her power, her strength. An outlaw wanted by the law, hated by everyone, and he risked his life to come to her.

  There was little tenderness in his hands. She was casual, breaking away from the urgent caress to put the basket on the damp cellar floor, and then pat her hair, work at the buttons of her skirt. She did not want his lovemaking here; she hated the smell of the place, the crawling insects and other varmints.

  He came back with his hands to raise her skirt, and, when she tried to cry out, he covered her mouth with his hand. She stared into his eyes, which mocked her as he finished his labored, dispassionate act.

  They separated and did not look at each other. Rose attempted to clean herself while Jack did nothing but stare out past the cellar’s heavy posts to the bright air beyond them.

  She revolved slowly, brushed against Jack, and brought his attention back to her. Then unexpectedly he leaned down and kissed the top of her head and Rose knew the man she loved had returned.

  “Rose Victoria, you are a pretty thing.”

  She didn’t want this, as if she were nothing more than a child. Then her mother’s shriek called for her, and she sighed deeply, again aware of the gesture and what it accomplished. Jack leaned over her as she sorted out the vegetables and wiped the last of the dirt from her hair and face. He picked a twig from her curls, put his face to her bosom, and kissed her skin in a loving, long, delicious kiss. Rose quickly rebuttoned her shirtwaist and went out into the misery of the noon sun. When she risked a look back, Jack Holden was gone.

  Chapter Twenty

  Gayle Souter and Davey Hildahl rode up to Quemado where Melicio Quitano wanted to know if he would ever get his fee for having returned Meiklejon’s pacer. Souter paid him, then got a tidbit of old gossip for his troubles. Burn English was riding the dark colt branded with Donald’s brand, and Jack Holden had another Liddel mount, a stocky paint this time.

  They were also told that Stan Brewitt had come in one night and offsaddled his badly lamed red dun. Said the horse had stepped in wire and panicked. He’d been up checking on the Red Durham bull, and said there were wild mares in the fenced-off pasture.

  Souter looked sideways at Davey, but neither man spoke of the mares after that.

  The wire cut had turned sour, and, despite three weeks of care, the only answer was a bullet between the ears for the red dun, and a meal for the coyotes out in a distant wash. Brewitt moped around. The dun had be
en his best mount, but he perked up when Souter brought in a rugged buckskin and let Brewitt have the horse.

  One day Eager Briggs rode in on a scrawny palomino gelding. His broken leg was still wrapped in a hard cover and stuck out to one sideof the horse. Briggs, as usual, had some gossip. Said that Edward Donald was pushing a warrant on Burn English for horse theft. The old man stared at Davey while giving out the information, as if Davey would naturally have something to say. Briggs would make his rounds and soon enough the whole territory would know about Donald’s greed.

  Briggs had more news: two corpses had been found near Jewitt. A man and a horse. The man was a Mex, buried in a shallow grave with a rude cross near his head. Powder burns said the killing was done close and after the injuries. Only one eye remained in the skull. That last bit of information upset most folks, Briggs told his audience.

  Other riders came through after Briggs’s first visit, passing on more information, looking for late strays. Briggs came by often toward the summer’s end. It seemed like the whole southwest corner of New Mexico was fired up about Jack Holden and his thieving and Burn English and his damned horses.

  Summer turned quickly to fall in the mountains. The San Agustin plains became muddy and dangerous with late rains. Three cows got bogged down, two were saved, one was shot before it choked to death. Red Pierson got thrown from a rank mustang and broke his wrist, but was out hunting L Slash strays two days later.

  Stan Brewitt learned his buckskin gift was a better mount than the old dun, and bragged on the horse, mostly about its speed, until a course was set up and bets made, all on Sunday. Stan was more than $50 ahead, a real high roller, until a passing Mex beat the buckskin racer on a flea-bitten gray.

  New trouble started, so the ranchers held a meeting at the Morely place. The rains had come late, but soon enough for the grass to green up before winter. Patches of the best graze were being eaten; hoof prints of a small band of horses could be read in the damp earth. Attempts to follow the horses led up narrow cañons and impossible trails where no sane man would ride. The ranchers were angry. This was their grass, their feed, and they depended on it for the wintering. Horses were stealing their grass. But there was no solution, and the meeting ended in anger.

  English’s name wasn’t spoken around the L Slash Ranch. Miss Katherine got thinner and quieter, and Meiklejon was caught in his barbed-wire hell. Then he got called back to England. His parting orders to Gayle Souter were to pursue any leads that might finish the reign of theft perpetuated by Jack Holden.

  Katherine was able to lose herself in ironing, a task she rarely enjoyed. Today it used her energies and calmed her thoughts. Until a noise outside the window distracted her. She blinked, looked out, and saw Davey Hildahl riding in.

  She watched Davey dismount, groaning softly with him as he took those first steps in the awkward walk achieved from being in the saddle too long. Katherine knew Davey was searching for Burn English as well as Jack Holden. She blamed her father’s unconscionable act for Davey’s exhaustion. Davey still harbored a burden of guilt, believing himself responsible for any trouble chasing the mesteñero.

  Katherine stopped reflecting as another horse raced into the yard. She opened the kitchen door and went outside. No man who rode for Gayle Souter treated a horse in such a manner unless something terrible had happened.

  Red Pierson’s face was flushed, his voice high. “They’ve cornered Jack Holden on Slaughter Mesa, near Indio Cañon. He ain’t been in Arizona…he’s holed up with a lot of cattle got changed brands.” He spat, took a drink from an offered canteen. “They sent for Lawman Stradley. Word come down English is with Holden. He’s thrown in with the rustlers and been stealing cattle all summer.”

  Katherine’s hands shook and she held them together.

  Then Stan Brewitt appeared on a spent horse. Behind him came the new man, Spot, on an equally tired mount.

  In less than ten minutes the men had roped and saddled fresh mounts while Katherine prepared food. Now she sat at the kitchen table, cradling her hands around a cup of warmed coffee, taking an occasional small sip to keep herself occupied. These men, who had talked shyly to her of their dreams and their distant families, their small hopes, would ride out and kill two men she loved.

  She buried her face in her hands, tipping the coffee. She was close to crying, something Katherine Donald did not ever do. The sack of supplies waited on the table, a plain, matter-of-fact token of what was about to happen.

  It took her several moments to realize Davey Hildahl stood next to her, dusty hat clenched to his belly, fingers turning the brim endlessly.

  “Miss Katherine, I don’t believe it’s English neither. I know the man…not like you maybe…but he ain’t that kind. Holden and him, they couldn’t get along. Ain’t nothing in English that’d let him steal another man’s cows. You take heart, ma’am, I’ll make sure they don’t hang English…if they even find him to the mesa, and I don’t think they will. Don’t you worry, it won’t come to hanging the man.”

  She smiled to thank him. He’d promised nothing about Jack Holden. No one could stop that massacre once he was caught. Jack lived the life, now he would die the death.

  Davey half opened the door, held it, and found the courage to say the rest that had been on his mind. “You know, Miss Katherine …you heard ’bout some horses loose-herded on good grass…kind of stealing graze from all the ranchers. Me, I think that’s the only kind of stealing Burn’d ever do. Getting his mares fat on other folks’ graze now that we got good rains . . . stealing something that’ll grow back.”

  The men left in a tight bunch at a long trot, and Katherine felt the edge of despair again. She would like to ride with these men to Slaughter Mesa and the craggy, rugged depths of Indio Cañon. She would like to hold off the rustlers and chase the bandits, herd the bawling cattle. Any work a man could do, she wished to try. But she had been hired as a housekeeper, a civilizing woman on a ranch full of men, and she must do what was expected.

  Katherine returned to the table and stared at the coffee stains, studied the shape they took as they soaked into the scoured wood. She rested her head in her cupped hands and watched the sun’s reflection on the glass window disappear, saw the light day air turn to dark.

  The rebellion was growing, and she reveled in its bitter freedom.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  The new man called Spot rode in two days later. Katherine warmed him a plate of stew and poured out fresh coffee. Spot ate fast, then packed a lot of ammunition in two saddlebags and caught out a fresh horse for the return ride to the mesa. He offered no new words on what was happening.

  Spot’s quick departure left Katherine alone and more aware of the ranch’s isolation. Few visitors came by on their way to another place. She tried to concentrate on cutting up the old hens and setting them to stew, then she attacked the few vegetables she’d grown in the poor summer garden.

  Next she set bread to rising, covered with a heavy cloth, and placed it near the stove, as out of drafts as she could manage. The hens were well seasoned and started in their broth, simmering more slowly now, cooking into a semblance of tenderness. The knowledge weighed on Katherine. The men on Slaughter Mesa would shoot or hang a man, and return to her kitchen hungry and tired, expecting her to feed them even though they had become killers. She would fulfill her duties, knowing these ranch hands turned killers were children under the guidance of older but not wiser men. She would not think about the consequences, she would make her pies and cakes to please them, she could not envision murder. It was a hard land, a hard way of life. Survival here was insured by measures that were strict, sudden, and of necessity without mercy.

  What she did after the hens were boiling and steaming on the stove, the bread was covered and rising, was something she had only dreamed of doing. She went to the corral and the only animal that came up to her was Davey’s bay. She petted the bay’s face, and slipped on a neck rope, then twisted the end around the long nose, spending far to
o much time fashioning a way to lead the horse. Men had always caught and saddled an animal for her. She put her hands on the bay’s neck and spoke firmly until the horse was quiet. Her courage returned, and she laid the blanket on the horse, lifted the saddle to her thigh, then heaved it up and over. The bay accepted the familiar burden with a deep sigh.

  She had witnessed the rigging of saddles, so, when she pulled on the latigo and the bay distended its belly, Katherine brought up her knee into the animal’s gut and the bay blew air that smelled of fresh grass and sweet grain. Katherine laughed, and patted the bay neck. Success.

  The bridle was another matter, but in the end she was satisfied that, if the bay tried to run away, she would have some control. The metal hunglow in the bay’s mouth but the animal could not spit out the bit. She decided it was time to climb aboard, after retightening the cinch as she had seen the men do.

  Katherine pulled, and heaved, and cursed, and eventually found herself in the middle of the saddle before the horse walked away from the fence. Having been witness to the many contests between horse and rider, she was delighted that the bay was so quiet. This happened, she supposed, from its having been ridden hard over the past days. She would not ask much from the horse; this ride was meant solely for pleasure.

  A side-saddle held a woman captive, left her awkwardly hanging to what was called a leaping horn, legs dangling, supported while strangled by the saddle’s confinement designed to insure her female safety. Riding astride was forbidden, unmentionable, a daring act no respectable woman would consider. For visits and chores, a woman more often chose the utility of a sensible horse and a fine wagon, harnessed and brought to her, of course, by one of the ranch hands.

  Eventually, finding her balance easier with legs placed on both sides of the horse, Katherine began to study her surroundings. She was already well away from the ranch, seeing only grass and tall trees, the shadowed mountains, the overwhelming sky. This was a freedom she had longed for. She let the reins slide loose and kicked the bay, and it was as if a force propelled her backward. She needed to open her mouth wide to inhale gulps of air. Her eyes watered and the tears blinded her, but she was fearful of loosening her grip on the saddle horn to wipe them away.