The Long Trail (The McCabes Book 1)

by Brad Dennison

  Things will not always be this way out here, Josh thought. Already, the streets of cities like San Francisco and St. Louis were paved with cobblestones, and telegraph wires stretched to many parts of the west. Just nine years earlier a railroad track had been laid clear to the Pacific. Civilization was creeping its way westward, and would one day come to these mountains. But that time was not yet here.

  In a way, Josh hoped it would not be here for a long time. The raw frontier could be a place of violence, but here a man could be truly free. With his horse beneath him, his gun at his side, and his wits, courage and ingenuity, he had all he needed to meet any trouble that might arise. Josh did not need, or want, civilization with all of its restrictions. Its limitations.

  Josh reined up atop a steep ridge. Below him, a thick pine forest trailed away, to meet a flat expanse covered with lush, green grass. Two miles away, straight ahead and due west, the grassy plateau met with pines again, which blanketed another ridge. This was the small valley the McCabes called home. It was fifteen miles along, and at the southern end stood the McCabe Ranch headquarters. At the northern end of the valley was Zack Johnson’s ranch.

  Josh started down the ridge, once again riding Rabbit, letting the mountain bred horse find its footing as it went.

  Pa had always said never to come back the same way you leave, so anyone who might be watching cannot discern a pattern to your habits. It seemed to Josh that Pa lived in sort of a state of war much of the time, almost as though he expected an enemy force to come attacking at any moment. Zack Johnson had explained that comes from having been shot at one time too many.

  Josh had left the valley through a pass at the southeastern corner, the only easily traversed pass on that side of the valley, so he re-entered by climbing straight down Shoshone Ridge at the southern end of the valley.

  He emerged from the pines onto the grassy plateau that was the valley floor, and a quarter mile ahead was a house built of pine logs, standing two floors high. Rising above its peaked roof was a wide chimney made of stones. To one side of the house, a small single-level addition was attached, its roof sloping downward. Josh knew behind the house was another such addition, which contained the kitchen.

  Two hundred feet in front of the house and off a bit to one side was a barn, made of planks nailed into place upright. In a corral, a horse paced restlessly, and further back, where the grassy floor of the valley extended behind the house, a dozen head of mustangs grazed contentedly.

  A man stepped from the barn, wearing coveralls and a wide-brimmed hat. Josh knew this to be the wrangler, Fred Mitchum. Fred raised one hand in a wave, which Josh returned.

  As Josh approached the barn, he gave a tug of the reins to slow Rabbit to a walk.

  “Didn’t expect to see you so soon,” Fred said.

  “Didn’t expect so, either,” Josh said as he reined up before the pole fence of the corral, and swung out of the saddle.

  “Have some trouble?”

  Josh nodded as he gave the rein a couple turns about the fence, then turned his attention to a trough which was half filled with water. Here in the valley, a cool northwesterly breeze was drifting down from the mountains, but out in the grasslands to the east, the early summer sun had been harsh, and the wind hot. Josh’s face was smeared with sweat and trail dust, his hair damp beneath his hat, and there was a streak of wetness down his back and along either side of his shirt.

  He pulled his hat free, submerged it in the trough, filling it to the brim, and turned it over his head, letting out a groaning “Ahhhh!” as the water soaked his hair, and rushed down his face onto his shirt.

  “What kind of trouble?” Fred asked, pursuing the matter.

  Josh did not want to go into detail about the gunfight, as boasting was not the McCabe way. “Had some trouble with Reno and the boys. Had to fire ‘em.”

  “Fire ‘em?” Fred asked incredulously. “Reno was a top hand.”

  “Now he can be a top hand somewheres else.”

  Josh briefly detailed what he had found, the tracks of what looked to be a large body of riders, and they had helped themselves to some McCabe cows. “Reno wouldn’t follow my orders when I told him and the boys to mount up and ride with me to get back the stolen cows. And they were drinking’. You know how Pa feels about that. So I fired ‘em.”

  “What’re you gonna do now?:”

  “Not much I can do, except ride into town tomorrow and see if I can hire a couple new hands, then ride back out to the line shack. Them riders will be long gone by then, but on the way back I discovered Reno had been letting his work slide for more than just one day. I found cattle roaming all over creation. We will have our work cut out for us.”

  Josh repeated his story for Aunt Ginny and Bree, again omitting the part about the gunfight. He also decided not to tell them about the riders stealing cows. No sense to worry them unnecessarily, he thought.

  Aunt Ginny matched Josh in height, and at sixty-six, had somehow managed to avoid developing that matronly, portly figure that plagued so many women on the late side of middle age. Her hair was steel gray with a streak of white at each temple, and usually tied back in a bun. Her eyes were blue, with lines beginning at each corner and gently trailing away. Perched upon her nose were tiny, metal-rimmed spectacles.

  She now gazed at Josh over the top of those spectacles. “I know you have a temper, Joshua. Are you absolutely certain you gave those men every chance to get onto their horses and join you in rounding up those strays?”

  “Yes’m. I surely did. I gave them every chance. Firing ‘em was the last thing I wanted to do. Reno is a top hand when he ain’t drinkin’.”

  “Isn’t drinking.”

  “Yes’m. Isn’t drinkin’. It’s gonna be almighty hard to replace him. Cowhands like him don’t come along every day.”

  “Well, when your father comes back, he can figure out what to do.”

  “I don’t mean no disrespect, ma’am, but by the time he comes home, I intend to have hired two or three new hands, and to have them cows all rounded up.”

  “Those cows.”

  “Yes’m.”

  The following afternoon was barely an hour old when Josh walked out to the meadow and dropped a loop over the head of a buckskin gelding. He had decided not to ride Rabbit into town, as the horse had covered a lot of miles the previous day, and Josh intended to be riding Rabbit when he returned to the line cabin in the morning. The mustang had two white stockings and a splash of white on its nose, and while it could not run as fast or as long as Rabbit – few horses could – it was a good cutting horse. Josh had used it before on round-ups, and thought this might be a good horse to bring along as an extra mount when he returned to the line camp.

  He had thought of giving the horse a name, like Buckskin, but then Bree might decide to override it with something cutesy, like she had with Rabbit. There was something perverse about his sister’s sense of humor, he thought.

  He led the horse back to the corral, where he slipped a bridle over the buckskin’s head, then dropped a blanket onto its back, followed by his black leather saddle. Fred Mitchum walked up while Josh was tightening the cinch.

  “Saddling’ up a little early, aren’t you? The Saturday evening’ crowd isn’t due for hours. You won’t find anyone worth hiring until then.”

  Saturday night was the traditional night for a cowboy to howl. Cattle ranches paid once monthly, and on those nights, the town really caught fire. But even on these Saturday nights between paydays, many of the local cowhands would drift in, have a few drinks at Hunter’s, play some faro, and some might wander down to Miss Summers’ establishment.

  Cowhands were a restless lot, especially the younger ones, never remaining with one employer long. Josh was sure he would be able to find a couple, maybe three, willing to sign onto the McCabe payroll and join him for a week of hard riding at the line shack, rounding up strays and patrolling the perimeter to make certain those riders didn’t return.

  “I thought
I might ride in a little early,” Josh said to Fred. “A cold beer just might hit the spot.”

  Mitchum gave a chuckle. “It does sound appetizing’, I’ve got to admit.”

  At forty-five, Mitchum’s face was lined beyond its years, like that of every man who had lived most of his life outdoors. Fred was thin, his shirt and coveralls bagging on him, but despite his spindly appearance, there was strength in his back, which became evident when he would heft a saddle to his shoulder with more ease than Josh could muster.

  “Saddle up and ride in with me,” Josh suggested.

  Fred shook his head. “I’ll be in later. Got me some things to finish up here, first.”

  Josh nodded. He pushed a foot into a stirrup and swung into the saddle. “See you in town, then.”

  With his stetson resting atop his yellow hair and his Navy Colt at his side, Josh turned the cutting horse through the open corral door and down a wagon trail that led to town.

  Josh admired Fred’s dedication to his job. Here it was, Saturday afternoon, a time when most cowhands were having their weekly bath and shave, and thinking about beer or whiskey and possibly spending part of the evening with one of the girls who worked for Alisha Summers, the only businesswoman in town, and whose name when simply mentioned could cause Aunt Ginny to almost growl with anger. And yet he was thinking about work.

  Pa had hired Fred specifically because he knew what kind of man Fred was, and Pa wanted a man with that kind of dedication to oversee the Circle M remuda. At most ranches, the wrangler was either a boy breaking into the cattle business but not yet experienced enough to earn his place alongside the cowpunchers, or an older cowhand no longer able to ride herd. Not so at the McCabe Ranch. Pa felt a cowhand was no better than the horse beneath him. In many parts of the west, the land was rugged and the civilization sparse, and a man’s life often depended on the quality of his horse. Pa had scouted out the best man he could find to care for his horses, and offered him top pay. To be wrangler for the McCabes was one of the most sought-after jobs in the territory. And Fred took this job very seriously.

  Josh rode across the valley to a trail that began in a small depression between two ridges. He followed it as it wound its way through a small canyon, then between two more ridges, through thick stands of pines, then out onto a gravely plateau just beyond the valley. This plateau was where a small town was in the process of forming.

  The town was nothing more than a scattering of buildings, roughly conforming to the shape of a street, near the mountain pass known as McCabe Gap. Pa had named it. He sort of liked the old-school terminology.

  When Pa had been a child, his grandfather, the first John McCabe, had been a trailblazer and scout, back when the Pennsylvania mountains Pa hailed from had been a frontier. He had dressed in buckskin and lived among Indians, and had many adventures to recount to his wide-eyed grandchildren. He had hunted and fought alongside frontiersman with names like Daniel Boone and Simon Kenton. Some of these stories might have been exaggerations, for the sake of entertainment, but Pa and his brothers and cousins didn’t care. The old man had been one of Pa’s early heroes. And in the time of the first John McCabe, the term mountain pass hadn’t yet developed. An opening between mountains large enough to ride a horse through was called a gap.

  This little town, the only one within a five-day ride of the McCabe ranch, was not organized, and had no name, but was coming to be called by the name of the pass. Or sometimes McCabe Town.

  The saloon was a structure of upright planks nailed into place with a narrow strip of wood covering the gap between each plank. The roof was sloped, and swinging doors faced the street. A sign bearing the words HUNTER’S SALOON drawn in black paint, was nailed into place over the doorway. The establishment was owned by a burly, bearded man who had ridden for the McCabe Ranch until two years earlier, when he built this place and went into the saloon business.

  “I’m getting too old for those long days in the saddle,” he had told Pa and Josh one night. “I always wanted to run a barroom. Since there ain’t one around here, I guess I’ll have to build one.”

  At the time it was built, Hunter’s was the only building on this little plateau. News of the existence of a saloon spread like proverbial wild fire, and very shortly there was standing-room-only in Hunter’s on a Saturday night. It was also not long before an entrepreneur arrived by covered wagon and built a hotel fifty yards from the saloon. A stagecoach trail had been bringing travelers bound for Helena to within a couple miles of McCabe Gap for years, and the stage company contracted with the hotel owner, and soon was bringing customers directly to the hotel’s front door. Many walked over to Hunter’s for a cold beer after a day of sitting inside a stagecoach, swallowing trail dust.

  Cold beer was a rarity on the frontier. Pa claimed to have tasted it once down El Paso way, in a saloon made of adobe where the barroom was cool even on the hottest days. At Hunter’s, in a room behind the bar, which Hunter used as his living quarters, was a trap door leading down to a fifteen-foot deep cellar, which was where Hunter stored his beer kegs. A rope, which ran through a pulley driven into a timber overhead, was used to lower the kegs into the cellar once they arrived by stagecoach, and Hunter would climb down into the cellar to pour a draft when a customer ordered a cold one. Hunter also kept a keg tapped behind the bar, and charged the customary nickel for a mug of room-temperature beer. But for the labor of fetching a cold beer, he charged a full dime.

  Not long after the hotel was in operation, with the stage line bringing customers to its front door, a general store was built, and then a livery stable went up beside Hunter’s, and the street began to take shape. Now, two years after Hunter had opened for business, there was a handful of houses, and a seamstress’s shop. There was talk of building a jail and maybe hiring a town marshal. And a bank would soon be going up, to serve the needs of the growing community and the ranches and farmers in the surrounding area. There was also a small church that also served as a school house during the week.

  Josh swung out of the saddle in front of Hunter’s, and tethered the buckskin to a hitching post mounted by the front door, and pushed through the swinging doors to find three men sitting at a table. The three he had fired the day before. Tarley’s shirt pulled tightly over a bandage at his right shoulder, and his arm was in a sling. Reno glared at him with eyes glazing over from too much whiskey, and Tarley turned painfully in his chair for a glance at Josh.

  “You’re a brave man, ridin’ into town alone,” Tarley said.

  “I let you ride away the first time,” Josh said. “You won’t be so lucky a second time.”

  Tarley fixed his gaze on Josh for a moment, trying to muster some bravado, but then apparently decided to count himself lucky to still be breathing, and turned away.

  Josh smiled to himself and continued on to the bar, which was nothing more than two long planks laid across upended beer kegs. He decided to let Tarley and his friends believe Josh had intended to wing Tarley, and not kill him. If they believed Josh had put the bullet exactly where he wanted it, they would be less likely to challenge him again. It also wouldn’t hurt Josh’s attempts to build a reputation of his own, and maybe step out from the shadow of Johnny McCabe.

  Hunter stepped from the back room as Josh tipped his hat back on his head and leaned an elbow on the bar.

  Hunter stood taller than Josh, with wide shoulders housing strength gained from a lifetime of hard work. He wore a pinstriped shirt, and an apron tied over a flat stomach. His hair was thick and black, with strands of silver sprinkled throughout, and his beard was long and bushy.

  “Howdy, Hunter,” Josh said. He had never known Hunter’s first name.

  Hunter had ridden onto the ranch thirteen years earlier, and asked for a job. He had given his name simply as Hunter. He offered no other, and none was ever asked. Such was the way on the frontier. Many a man was running from something, a noose or a woman in most cases, Josh figured, and you took his name as he gave it.

 
“Well, well,” Hunter said with a smile. “You’re in town a little early, aren’t you?”

  “I heard one of them cold beers callin’ to me all the way from the ranch house. And I’ve got some hiring to do, and thought I might get an early start.”

  Hunter nodded. “I heard about what happened. It’s all over town. All over half the territory by now, I reckon. Them three in the corner rode into town late yesterday claiming you run ‘em off McCabe range, and outdrew Tarley and put a bullet in his shoulder.”

  “Couldn’t be avoided. They were spending their time with a bottle instead of in the saddle, and wouldn’t follow my orders. It was no less than Pa would have done. A group of riders cut across our range and helped themselves to a few head of cattle, and I couldn’t get Reno and the boys to ride after them with me. And thanks to them, there’s now cattle straying probably as far as Crocker’s spread. When I fired them and ordered them off our range, Tarley drew on me.”

  “Riders, huh? How many?”

  “Hard to guess by their tracks. I didn’t actually see any of ‘em. They were long gone by the time I got there.”

  Hunter smiled, and nodded. “Well, it appears the name of Josh McCabe is going to become known in its own right, not just as his father’s son.”

  Josh had long wanted to build a name for himself, not to simply be known as the son of a great man. But now that it appeared to be actually happening, he found himself surprisingly embarrassed to hear about it.

  He thought he might change the subject. “Well, I got me ten cents here that I would gladly exchange for some cold brew.”

  “Do you really think I’m going to accept your money?” and Hunter started for the back room. “I’ll be right back.”