Dead Aim

by Dusty Richards

  “We had lots of snowball fights up there. I miss that here.”

  “We’d get behind on busting stove wood and have to do it on the coldest days of the year.”

  Harp laughed. “That was serious.”

  “Has anything else happened while I was gone?”

  “Nothing important. I think you can go back to buying those ranches that are included in our original purchase.”

  “We’ll start back in two days. I want to study the maps more. And I’ll need two more guards. Johnny and Anthony are going to run that last operation we took over.”

  “Boone asked to do that the next time we need a new rider for you. What about that boy broke his arm?”

  “Ivy Martin’s good but Robbie Boyd has lots of qualities that, I think, make him a better choice.”

  “I thought he was just a cowboy?”

  “He thought you didn’t want him after the drive. Jan will tell you he’s a guy that gets things done.”

  “You say he will work, then we’ll get those two set up.”

  Long nodded.

  “We don’t need a cook and crew,” Jan said. “I’ll do that. We’ll take packhorses and be able to make more places. There isn’t over a half dozen left.”

  “I didn’t want to burden you.”

  “I’m as tough as those men, but thanks anyway.”

  After breakfast and alone, she asked him if she sounded too bossy.

  “No. He was being thoughtful of you.”

  “Good. My way, I think we can get this job over a lot quicker.”

  He hugged and kissed her. “I’m like you. The sooner we get through this deal the more work we can get done on other things.”

  A cold morning faced them when they rode out. She looked warm in her wool-lined coat with a scarf and a knit wool cap. In his long johns and layers of clothing, Long rode beside her warm enough to survive. Boone and Robbie Boyd were outfitted for the cold, they assured him, and breathing steam they laughed when one of the packhorses tried to buck in the four-horse chain.

  They had a planned route to take to the last of the ranches. The HKC Brand outfit belonged to Cash Burnett. Long had met the rancher in Kerrville on several occasions in the past. He was a wiry short man who was very quick about things that concerned him and how he wanted a situation to begin or end. Burnett’s wife remained unseen in public—there was talk that she was yellow, which meant she had black blood in her.

  No one who worked for him ever answered questions or even spoke about her. Burnett must have threatened their lives if they did. Long considered the issue as he rode in the cold air headed southwest with his crew. Both men were excited to be his new aides since they had only heard rumors about the man who had all vaqueros for help.

  They camped that night on a creek they discovered. This pleased Long. Water in the west was critical to any ranch operation. They rode across country after he decided the two-track road was too long a route. He was seeing new country, and even bunches of mavericks that he marked down and counted as theirs. When they got back he’d send men down there to brand them.

  They reached the ranch, and the stock dogs sounded mad they’d come. Long observed as, wrapped in a blanket, the hatless Cash Burnett came out of the adobe house. He shooed the dogs off with a few curt shouts at them.

  “Morning, Cash.” Long stepped off the bay horse.

  “What the hell—oh, hello, Mr. and Mrs. O’Malley. What brings you down here?”

  “You know my brother bought a large part of the land around you?”

  “I heard that.”

  “We want to offer you a fair price for your place.”

  “I am not interested in selling out.”

  “Fine, but sometime in the future it may be we’ll have to fence the land.”

  “We will see about that.”

  “Know that we have title to all the land around your section, and if you’re shut down to six hundred forty acres, you will be out of the range cattle business.”

  “So you came clear out here to tell me to get the hell out of here.”

  “No. I came here to give you a hand to go find a larger place with less restraints that can hurt you down the road.”

  Cash shifted the blanket he wore. “If you rode all the way out here to tell me that, O’Malley, you wasted your gawdamn time.”

  “My offer is good for thirty days. We can work out any problems you have to move if it is your desire.”

  “I won’t be interested.”

  Long felt he had the man’s firm decision.

  Jan booted her horse forward. “Tell your wife I am sorry I did not get to meet her.”

  He never answered her. He turned on his heels, shifted the blanket up on his shoulders, and went back to the house.

  “Come on, boys. He’s set and we won’t change his mind. We have other places to see about.”

  There was a squatter named Hernandez west of there that he planned to tell to leave. There were several such squatters that had to be moved. Lots of them merely stopped and set up a place to exist. Some like Hernandez came from Mexico and hoped to claim a free farm.

  “Do you wonder what his wife looks like?” Jan asked, riding in close to him.

  “I never saw her.”

  “He never answered me about meeting her, did he?”

  “He had to keep his security of hiding her.”

  “I wonder why?”

  “We may never know.”

  “How far is this next place away?” she asked.

  Long twisted in the saddle and asked Boone, “How far away is the next one?”

  “A day’s ride. The cowboys drew me a map.”

  “Do we have all the landowners now?” Jan asked.

  “The rest are squatters. But Harp and I discussed moving and helping them get resettled.”

  “What do we know about this next guy?”

  “He and a few others are farming small plots along a creek and have a spring fenced.”

  * * *

  They camped that night in a nice valley and spotted more unbranded cattle that ran off with their tails over their backs like spooked deer.

  The sun had warmed the day, and the fire that was cooking the beans radiated more heat as they relaxed—seated on blankets—waiting.

  “Hey, I think you two are great aides, but you have noticed the number of mavericks still unbranded out here?”

  “I told Boone we needed men to round them up and brand them,” Rob said. “He agreed that a good crew could make a good showing of rounding them up, and drive the branded cattle off the holding.

  “I have a spare notebook in my saddlebags. Start a list of what you need, and when we get back, if you want, we can get you two going with a team to do that.”

  Boone said, “I told Rob yesterday we could show you what kind of foremen we’d make.”

  “I chose you two because I saw foreman qualities in both of you working as a team. Before we’re through moving folks off the ranch, we may find a setup for you two.”

  “Sounds good to me.”

  “Boone and I have been talking about Gladys, Jan.”

  “What about her?”

  Rob kind of ducked his head and then said, “I know you didn’t think much of her. But she takes good care of Missy. They say she works hard for Long’s mom as a helper. She ain’t ugly and she kinda shocked us as being respectable. I’d kind of like to court her.”

  Long heard what was said. “Jan and I don’t care, but Mom might not want to lose her.”

  “Well—my intentions right now are honest ones. I’m not afraid of that guy who dumped her coming back.”

  “Well, good luck,” Long said.

  “Yes, we hope something works out,” Jan said. “Those biscuits in the Dutch oven must be done.”

  “I can get them,” Boone said, and told her to stay seated.

  They ate supper and went to sleep. Someone shouted for them in the night.

  Long, with the pistol in his hand, sat up in th
e blankets and pressed her to stay down. “I don’t know who it is.”

  The intruder in Spanish said, “I must talk to the patron.”

  “He must mean you, Long. You savvy him?”

  “Keep your guns ready.” He rose and went to see what the man wanted.

  “The señora asks you come back to the ranchero. A bad thing has happened. Our patron has taken his life.”

  “Cash killed himself?”

  “Sí, señor.”

  “Oh, Long that is terrible. What will she do? What can we do for her?”

  “Right now I don’t know. One of you stay here with our camp. The rest of us will ride back and see what we can do for her. Whoever stays needs to load up and join us there in the morning.”

  Boone said he’d be along with their outfit.

  Long thanked him and horses were saddled. The man who came told them his name was Randle. He led the ride back to the ranch under the stars.

  Around the house, the vaqueros, their wives, and children were wrapped in blankets praying and crying in the starlight.

  Randle had the ranchmen hitch the horses, then Long, Jan, and him made their way to the house and inside the door where the silent Cash had entered several hours earlier.

  Another vaquero rose from his knees on the living room floor. Cash’s body was laid out under a blanket, and a woman stood wearing a black veil beside him. Long could not tell anything about her.

  “I am so sorry to call you here, but I don’t know what to do. My husband has taken his own life despite my pleas not to do it. He spoke so bitter that you had told him to move—”

  Long shook his head. “We didn’t tell him to move. We told him we’d buy him out and help him move. We told him he might be fenced in by fences on his boundaries in the future.”

  “I could not change his mind. Now what can I do?”

  “My name is Jan. I am Long’s wife. Would you rather talk to me? We did not come today to make him that wrought up.”

  “My name is Eve Burnett. I have a marriage license from the Indian Territory signed by a judge. I was born a slave in Mississippi, ran away, and made my way as a teenage girl to where the Seminoles lived. They took me in and I met Cash up there. He promised me no one would ever find me on his ranch in Texas. Up till a year ago, agents of my owners could’ve taken me back. I was grateful to have lived here in seclusion.”

  “They can’t come get you now.”

  “Cash was afraid Texas had a law against marrying a black woman.”

  “I don’t know anything about that.” Jan shook her head.

  Long said, “If you wish to leave here we will move you and help you get settled, pay you for your ranch, and get you into a new life.”

  “But, Eve, you can stay at our ranch until you feel ready to meet the public.”

  “I am not good at business.”

  Jan hugged her. “We will help you.”

  She squeezed Jan’s hand on her shoulder. “I will be brave.”

  “Do you want him buried here?” Long asked.

  “Yes, he would want that. Why did he get so worked up?”

  Long shook his head. “That we may never know.”

  Cash was buried. All the vaqueros and their families were told to remain. He told them Boone would stay there while they found a place for Cash’s wife. He would be there and Rob would come back, and they would be the bosses and the ranch would pay them.

  He told Rob he should make a list of anything he and Boone would need. They would be on the ranch list as the buyers from there on. They should verify the pocketbook they found on Cash, which stated the numbers of cattle and horses he owned. He wanted them to look for farmland to put up hay on. This place was so distant from everything that sometimes they would need reserves of forage to support the cattle during droughts or unusual snows.

  Boone came the next morning and Rob told him all that had happened.

  The two men were excited about their new job and thanked him. Boone promised him he’d have the men start counting cattle in the morning.

  “If you could hire a dozen vaqueros down here, could you round up those mavericks?”

  “Damn right,” Boone said.

  “I bet the guys here could get us a crew in a week,” Rob said, equally excited.

  Long herded the two of them aside. “Rob, what will you do about Gladys?”

  “I told Boone I’d ask her to marry me.”

  “What did you say, Boone?”

  “I told him to do it. I have a gal, Marsha Kelly, up at Honey Springs who will marry me now I have a real foreman job. Rob and I can share the house.”

  Long was laughing. When he caught up with his wife she asked what was so funny.

  “I caused two weddings coming down here.”

  “Who?”

  “Rob is going to ask Gladys to marry him. Boone has a girl up at Honey Springs he’s going to ask to marry him now he has a foreman’s job.”

  “You and Harper are going to have lots of married foremen.”

  “We will also have some hard workers in place.”

  “I think you guys are lucky to find these men. You get to test them and I bet those two do a great job.”

  “First, we take Eve back to the ranch and then find two more men to guard us. We still have squatters.”

  “Eve is a lovely woman, and he didn’t want her taken back to slavery did he?”

  “Just like me. I wouldn’t let them take you away, either.”

  She was laughing. “You may be getting over being so stoic.”

  He laughed some more. “Yes, I am. How did you—”

  “I am taking a word a day to catch up with you.”

  He hugged and kissed her. “Now I have competition.”

  They headed home, with Jan driving the buckboard and Eve beside her. Long led the packhorses.

  Things were going right again.

  CHAPTER 27

  Eve wore a veil as they rode through the main street of town out to their ranch. Long knew some people saw her, but he didn’t mind that—she could be the mystery woman.

  At the ranch Easter saw they had a passenger and hurried out to meet her and welcome her.

  “Mother, this is Eve Burnett. She is Cash’s widow and needs some support.” Easter and Jan got Eve off the buckboard and got her inside as Harp arrived.

  Long headed him off. “We had a tragedy out there. Cash Burnett committed suicide over our offer to buy him out, so we brought his widow here with us.”

  “You didn’t threaten him?”

  “Harp, I explained all the details. Stay, do what he wanted, but she said he was so upset he took his own life.”

  “That is bad news for us. Word will spread that we threatened him, and it will put the remaining ones on their guard.”

  Long shook his head. “The rest are squatters. They may have homestead claims, but he was the last one who owned the land inside that block.”

  “Hey, you two have been busy and I wasn’t complaining,” Harp apologized.

  “We have been. The lady is black. I think that was his secret. He married her in Indian Territory. She is his heir and wants to sell to us. I made my two aides the foremen for that place. They are counting cattle and then gathering all the mavericks. It’s pretty isolated, but I bet there are a thousand head of unbranded cattle there. We saw lots of them when we were coming and going.”

  “That was a helluva job you two got done.”

  “We still have the squatters. They won’t be easy. This suicide made me do lots of mind searching, brother. But I never threatened him about it.”

  “I believe you. The sisters, again, left this year’s cattle money in the ranch account that we handle for what they said would be repairs.”

  “Whew. That’s a hundred sixty thousand. They say what they want us to do?”

  “Keep up the good work. They have that much money and much more. They call it the ‘repair the ranch fund.’”

  “Could we use it to buy another place?
”

  “I never asked but that with the money already in there we could buy another large ranch in their name for them.”

  “Are you and I going to present a plan to them? And, brother, we need to look hard at this cattle drive business for next year. We need to do it, but we also need to separate our cattle drive business from our ranching.”

  Harp agreed. “Ranching is too important to take our leaders away north every summer, and while we have not had any big losses while gone we are exposed.”

  “I love to go but it is not something a foreman can’t handle. One of us can go up and sell the cattle when they get there.”

  “Long, you’ve done lots of thinking on these trips of yours.”

  He smiled and nodded. “You get a mountain to move, you need to start shoveling.”

  “Hey, we can get a job to drive some steers to Sedalia this next year. Pays fifteen bucks a month if we can get there.”

  “It was a job all right. Right off you got to be night guard boss. And I recall saying they could shove it.”

  “We have come a long ways.”

  “Harp, did you even dream we’d get this much done?”

  “No. I couldn’t have thought that big. I’ll run into town and talk to our agent about another land deal. He sent me a note there were two men to talk to, and we can plan something maybe with the sisters?”

  “I think it is time to strike while the iron is hot. Places are increasing in price fast enough with all this cattle money available.”

  “I agree.”

  After lunch Long went and talked to Red about who would be his new guards. Not because he felt threatened but he’d promised everyone he would not go around alone. Red wanted to sleep on it.

  “I sent you the best two guys I had and you hired them to run that ranch.” Red was laughing hard and pounding him on the shoulder.

  “They really were good, and now they are both looking for wives.”

  “I heard that. I wish them well and will help them.”

  “Good. They are two smart guys. I learned that on my trip home.”

  “If they need help on the roundup of those mavericks, I can spare them some men.”

  “Red, they may hire some vaqueros out of Mexico. We’ll see. There’s plenty to do up there.”