Mustang (A John Cutler Western Book 5)

by H. V. Elkin

  Unfortunately, it was hard to predict the wind direction. But the best bet, based on the corral position and the way the breezes seemed to move within the hills of the location, was to face the eight’s opening toward the southwest. That way the stampeding mustangs’ dust would precede them and help cover sight of the corral until the last minute when they would have no time to veer away from it.

  By the time the sun went down the first day, there was a large pile of small logs nearby to begin the building. And the smell of roasting meat and coffee was in the air.

  Cutler smiled to himself as he watched Ellen making a big show of ignoring him. She had worked hard all day and did not have much energy left for her play acting. But that didn’t matter. It looked like everyone had accepted her as just another one of the boys. She sat, leaning against the chuck wagon wheel, and looked up gratefully as the cook brought a choice cut of beef and dropped it on her plate.

  “Wonder who’s doin’ the cookin’ back at the ranch with both of us here?” the cook asked her, chuckling.

  “I’m no cook,” she told him and tasted the meat. “You are, though. A good one.”

  Baker sat near Cutler. They ate in silence for a while.

  “You wonderin’ how I got myself to join you?” Baker asked finally.

  “Man’s decision is his own business. I’m just glad you’re here.”

  “Suppose you know there’s some here who don’t feel the same way about it, about my bein’ here.”

  Cutler never realized that having Baker along might turn into a problem. He had figured any problems were going to be because of Ellen. He had forgotten that, to the rest, Baker was as different in his way as Ellen was in hers.

  “You sayin’ you want to go, Dave?”

  “No, I’m not sayin’ that. I’m askin’ if you want me to.”

  “I need every hand I got.”

  “Okay.”

  “Anything special you think I should be lookin’ out for, Dave?”

  “Wouldn’t know what to tell you. Things like this’re hard to lay out. Nothin’ you can really put your finger on. Suppose I told you somebody asked me how to use an axe. That wouldn’t sound like anything special to you, would it? But what it says to me is the other fella figures I’m the expert at this kind of labor and not a cowboy like him.”

  “Don’t suppose you get that kind of thing from any of the regular hands.”

  “No, it’s just a couple of those new ones that just come on for the job, the ones I hear Harmon promised regular jobs if everything here worked out all right.”

  “You think they’re gonna cause trouble?”

  “Maybe. Maybe not. It won’t be anything I can’t handle, anyway.”

  Cutler grinned. “Maybe you’d get more respect if you offered them jobs yourself.”

  Baker laughed long and loud. “That’s funny, John. You got any more like that?”

  “Just the one about the cowboy and the boss’ daughter.”

  “Hell, everybody in camp knows that one by now.”

  The next day started like a machine that had not been oiled. Cowboys were used to being stiff in the mornings when they were on a trail drive or during roundup. But this was a morning after a day of hard work they were not used to. They had aches in muscles they never knew they had before. It was a point of honor with them not to complain about it, but they were noticeably irritable, and Cutler figured if there was going to be trouble it would have to be today.

  Cutler figured the smaller the group, the less chance for friction. Everybody needed a little space today. So he split them up into four teams. One to cut down more timber, one to bring it out of the woods, one to start building the corral and one to start digging the furrows leading up to the corral opening. He wanted to put Baker on the digging team because that way he could keep him separate from the two cowboys who might give him trouble. But then he thought putting a shovel in Baker’s hands would not help the way he was seen by the others. So Baker would work on the corral. He would put the two troublemakers on the digging to keep them away from camp.

  Cutler pulled Baker aside. “Dave, you want to point out the two that might give us problems?”

  “No, John, I don’t.”

  So that was that. Cutler was a little embarrassed he had asked. In doing so he had been just as guilty of a sideways prejudice as the man who had asked Baker how to use an axe. “Sorry, Dave.”

  “Happens to the best of us,” Baker said. “Even me.”

  “I just don’t want anything gettin’ in the way of gettin’ the job done.”

  “Do my best to see that don’t happen.”

  “Okay. But I ain’t askin’ you to let anybody step on you either.”

  “Nobody ever has yet.”

  Cutler did not repeat his mistake with Ellen. “You’ll help with the corral,” he said, as though she was just any hand.

  She nodded, hid her stiffness from him and went to work.

  He took the digging team several yards from camp. Some of the men dragged their shovels behind them like they were hauling skunks on chains. They all felt they had gotten the worst of all the bad jobs. And they had. But no one complained in words.

  Cutler told them, “Nothin’ I can say to make you men feel any better about this. But then I don’t imagine any of you’s the sensitive types who need cheerin’ up.”

  No one would admit to that.

  “Now I reckon most of you know what we’re here to do and why we’re doin’ it. We’re here to dig dirt. Now we could do it maybe faster with a couple of plows, but I guess if it’s got to be done, you’d rather do it this way.”

  “Damn right.”

  “The idea is to dig two shallow trenches about fifteen feet apart. Make ’em go around this hill to the right so the hill’ll hide the corral in case the dust don’t. Then follow on a line over the next rise and on to the next water hole. What we’re doin’ is layin’ out the edges of the road the mustangs’ll run on. Wild horses got a powerful fear of any dark lines on the ground and they won’t cross over ’em.”

  “Just a minute, John,” one of them said. “I know the water you’re talkin’ about, and I’ve heard that band waters at another place about three miles farther to the south.”

  “That’s right. So you can’t go diggin’ up to that spot without bein’ seen by the sentry mule they got now. Once we’ve got it all laid out and ready, I’ll put something near their water so they’ll have to come to the second hole.”

  “What’ll do that?”

  “Anything that’s got the smell of a man on it. Some old saddle blanket probably.”

  “Well, I got just the one for you.”

  “Okay. Come supper I’ll have your horses sent out to you so after all that work afoot, you can at least ride back. Hope you get far enough that your horses get lonely before they get to you.”

  Cutler heard an uproar from the direction of the camp. For the benefit of the men, he did not react. “Everybody know what to do?”

  They all did.

  Cutler rushed back to the camp and came up short behind a rock where he could see what was going on before anyone knew he saw it. It looked like it was the trouble he and Baker had anticipated. Baker was standing by the western edge of the corral being built and facing one of the new men, probably the youngest one who had come along on the job. He had the look of a youngster who had recently worked off his baby fat and did not yet know how to get about gracefully in his new body. Cutler could tell by the young man’s stance that he was out to prove something. It was a very typical situation. The kids who were trying to prove they were men were the ones to watch out for. Most of them just had to be guided and taught about ranch work until they learned how to keep from breaking their necks. But, every once in a while, there would be one who was compelled to prove his manhood in ways less productive than work, by outdrawing an older man or pulverizing a tougher one, the kind of kid who believed what he read in dime novels written by people who had never been west of
the Mississippi.

  Such things were a source of amusement for seasoned men who knew better. And most of the work crew was standing around to see what was going to happen in this showdown out of the wild and wooly west. At the moment, despite the threatening posture of the kid— feet apart, hand held out away from his gun butt, staring directly into Baker’s eyes—things had not progressed out of the talk stage.

  “If you want to take offense, black man,” the kid said, “you know how to do it.”

  Baker stared at the kid and smiled. “Don’t tempt me, kid. You apologize to Ellen there, and we can go back to doin’ what we come here to do.”

  Ellen was fighting mad. “Dave, you stay out of this!”

  “Sorry,” Baker told her. “Can’t do that. Wish I could oblige you, Ellen, but I can’t.”

  One of the other new men—grizzled and paunchy—was off to the side egging the kid on. “What’re you waitin’ for, Bo? I’m gettin’ tired just standin’ around.”

  Cutler figured the paunchy man and the one he called Bo were the two Baker had referred to. And the situation was clear. The two men were a team. The older one enjoyed baiting the younger one into tight situations like this one. Probably the older one had put the kid up to insulting Ellen in some way and Baker had stepped in where Ellen did not want him. It was the older man who was the source of the trouble and the one who really had to be taken care of to rid the camp of dissension. Cutler wondered if he should step in. But he knew Baker would not want that any more than Ellen did. If Baker could handle himself well now, a lot of problems would be eliminated at once. There was no chance of that happening unless Cutler, the boss, stayed out of sight.

  “That sidearm you’re wearin’,” Bo said, “ain’t an axe.”

  “That’s right,” Baker said. “I don’t have to get so close to use it.”

  The older man laughed. “Watch out, Bo, or he’ll throw it at you.”

  “Think so, Dan? Think I ought to get ready to duck, do you?”

  “Don’t know,” Dan said. “How far up your hat does your head go?”

  “Now I’m gettin’ impatient,” Baker said. “Anybody standin’ behind the kid better step out of the way.”

  Bo looked uncertain. He never thought, when all this started, that Baker would not back down right away. He had probably been brought up on stories about subservient Negroes and, like all arrogant cowboys, put Baker into a neat category based on the color of his skin. It did not add up that Baker should just be standing there without his knees shaking. The man who was intended to be the butt of the joke was not doing anything he was supposed to. Bo was even more uncertain when he sensed some of the men behind him, the ones who worked this range and probably knew Baker, were in fact stepping out of the way.

  “Well now,” Bo said, “I don’t want to have to shoot you.”

  “Oh, I can see that,” Baker said. “Can see you never shot anything more dangerous than a soda pop bottle in your whole life, what little you’ve had of it. Now, I can see you’re short on experience so I won’t go too hard on you. This being your first time, I’ll let you decide. Exactly where is it you’d like me to shoot you?”

  Neither man had made a move toward his gun yet. But Bo’s fingers began to twitch, and he flexed them to show he meant business. Baker did not move a muscle.

  “Don’t let him buffalo you,” Dan encouraged Bo. “He’s only augurin’. He don’t believe you mean it.”

  “Well then,” Bo said. “Guess I’ll have to show him how serious I am.”

  “That’s what I’m waitin’ for,” Baker said. “But you ain’t told me yet where you want to get shot. Gonna leave that up to me, are you?”

  Bo was beginning to sweat. If he could get out without losing face, he would. But it had gone too far and too many men were watching.

  “I changed my mind, Dave,” Ellen said. “You go ahead and finish it if you want to. He wouldn’t even be decent practice for me.”

  Bo’s mouth was a tight line, and his eyes seemed to get smaller. He had to see it through. “You talk a good fight,” he said. “Make your play.”

  “Lots of time,” Baker said. “I live alone on my spread, so sometimes there’s not much to do but shoot. I get tired of it. Gettin’ tired of you, too. I was gonna offer you a regular job, but you’re startin’ to irritate me, just standin’ there wastin’ time, just soakin’ on the boss . . .”

  Being accused of throwing off on the job was about the worst insult one cowboy could throw at another. It was the last straw for Bo, and his hand started for his holster. But the movement was never completed. Before he could even touch his gun there were five shots around him, kicking up the dust at his feet, knocking off his hat and grazing his right shoulder. Bo flinched away from the bullets around him and thought he was a dead man. Then he was left standing there, egg on his face, as he came up from a crouch, his gun still in its holster.

  “That was five,” Baker said. “Now maybe I always leave an empty chamber and maybe I don’t. Want to find out?”

  Bo stood straight and waited. At this point he would rather be killed than live out the disgrace of what just happened to him. He folded his arms across his chest and waited.

  Baker walked up to him, slowly, methodically, and took the gun from Bo’s holster and threw it off to the side. He told the kid quietly so no one else could hear, “You’ll get over this. And when you do, you’ll be alive to know it. You just picked the wrong teacher, that’s all. He’s more to blame than you are.”

  Baker put his six-gun back in its holster and looked around at the others, his gaze settling on the man called Dan.

  “Want to try that with a man now, do you?” Dan asked.

  Baker started walking toward Dan in that same bored manner. He got two feet away and stopped. Then without any warning, Baker shot a fist into Dan’s potbelly and then another to his chin. Dan was surprised by the suddenness of it and was totally unprepared. With the wind knocked out of him by the first blow, he crumpled forward, and the second blow sent him backwards, falling against the men around him.

  The men backed away to let things get finished without interruption. This was more of a show than they had hoped for. Dan stumbled to his feet, and as soon as he got up, Baker repeated the punches with the same reaction from Dan.

  The next time Dan got up, he crouched to protect his belly and sent two punches to Baker’s ribs. Baker let him do it and in the meantime raised folded hands above Dan’s head and brought them down hard on his neck. Dan fell forward and did not move. There was a silence, and then a cheer from the crowd. Baker turned his back on Dan and walked away.

  Before Baker got back to the spot where he had been working on the corral, a shadow hit the ground in front of him, and he veered away and turned. One of the rails intended for the corral went whizzing over his head and just missed him. Dan was holding it and preparing to swing again.

  Baker put an exaggerated look of fright on his face, and that made Dan smile as he swung again. But Baker ducked the blow and came in under it and threw a hard uppercut to Dan’s chin. Dan wobbled on his feet and the wood fell from his hand. Baker hit him again and he went down. He lay on the ground, dazed. And when he got enough consciousness back to see what was happening, Baker had his foot on Dan’s chest. Baker held his gun pointed at Dan’s head.

  “You awake now?” Baker asked.

  “What?”

  “Figure a man ought to know what’s happenin’ to him,” Baker said and lined the barrel up with his eye toward Dan. Baker pulled the trigger and the gun clicked, empty. Baker laughed.

  “You’re crazy!” Dan said.

  Then everyone else laughed.

  “You’re all crazy!”

  Cutler came around the rock and pretended he had just got there. The laughter faded. Baker took his foot off Dan’s chest.

  “What the hell’s goin’ on here?!” Cutler shouted.

  “Just havin’ a little fun,” Baker said.

  “On my time?!�
�

  “Sorry, boss. We had some business to get cleared up, and I guess we’re finished with it. Least I am.”

  “How about the rest of you?” Cutler shouted. “Anybody else here got any unfinished business that don’t have anything to do with buildin’ a corral?” His eyes flashed angrily around at all of them, looking at one man at a time, then at Dan on the ground. “How about you? Your business finished?”

  “Yeah.”

  Cutler looked at Bo. “You?”

  “I’m just here to work.”

  He looked at Ellen. “You?”

  She nodded her head.

  He turned back to Baker. “I figure you started this, Baker.”

  “Hard to say. Might’ve.”

  “I don’t want any more of it. Do you hear me good?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “All right. Now let’s see if anybody here knows how to work! Any more problems from anybody and he can roll his blankets!”

  It was a matter of bringing the camp together by setting himself apart. And that night no one sat down near Cutler at supper. But he could see around him the good results. He wondered if Ellen would understand that there might be times when a man had to stand by and watch things happen, not for his own amusement, but to let problems work themselves out naturally. The greatest contribution of Cutler’s not interfering was in the way Baker was now regarded. He did not eat alone, and to Cutler’s great surprise, one of the men who sat near Baker was Bo. They were joking about it now.

  Cutler had to give Baker a chance to show the stuff he was made of, and Baker did that very well. When Cutler did come on the scene, he was able to give everyone hell because, as far as they knew, he did not know what had happened to start the fight. He was able to treat Baker like everyone else and give Baker the chance to show he would not tell tales. It had also been a chance to include Ellen as though she were as much of a potential troublemaker as any of the men. Tonight everyone was equal. Except for Cutler, the boss.