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A Boy Needs a Man’s Hand

I’D JUST come home from school, the last Monday in May, 1911, when Mother called to me, “Son, will you come up to my chamber for a few minutes? I’d like to talk to you.”

Since Father had died, Mother sometimes called one of us up to her chamber for a talk. When she did, it was usually because we’d done something bad enough that she couldn’t talk about it before the other children. She never scolded us up there, but she’d give us talking-to’s that counted a good deal more than a scolding.

I put Lady, our horse, in the barn, and went to the house right away, but I didn’t hurry too much. I couldn’t be sure what Mother was going to talk about, and I needed a couple of minutes to sort of go over things in my mind.

In the summer of 1909, when I was ten, I’d worked as water boy on the Y-B spread, a big cattle ranch at the foot of the mountains west of Denver. I’d learned a lot about handling cattle up there, and riding bucking horses; and Hi Beckman, the foreman, had taught me to do trick-riding. That Labor Day, riding together, we’d won the trick-riding contest at the Littleton roundup.

Then, in the summer of 1910, after we’d moved to Littleton and Father had died, I’d found whatever odd jobs I could around town. Sometimes I’d hire other boys, and make a few dollars by helping herders through town with their cattle. And sometimes I’d work a few days for Mr. Batchlett, the biggest cattle trader in town. But I’d made the most money at the race track, where I’d been pretty lucky in winning matched races. Grace, my older sister, had sort of worked that money into the grocery bill and other places, because we couldn’t let Mother find out about my riding at the track.

Just the day before Mother called me up to her chamber, I’d ridden out to the Y-B ranch to see Mr. Cooper about getting my old water-boy job back. He had offered me twenty-five dollars a month, but while I was there Mr. Batchlett had ridden in, heard us talking, and offered me a dollar a day, man’s wages, for a hundred straight days. He said he’d be making trading trips as far south as the New Mexico border, and could use me as a trail cowhand.

Anything better than five-cents-an-hour jobs were pretty hard for boys to get. To have both men wanting to hire me at high wages made me so proud I could have yipp-eed, but I didn’t. I kept my face and voice as steady as I could, and said, “I’d like to work for both of you, but of course I can’t, so I’ll have to think it over. And maybe I can’t work for either of you. Mother might need me at home. I’ll have to ask her.”

That was why I had to think a little before I went up to Mother’s chamber. I hadn’t talked to her about the jobs yet, but I was pretty sure she must have heard about the offers—or that somebody had told her about my riding in the matched races the summer before.

Mother was sitting on the edge of her bed when I went upstairs. She motioned for me to close the door, and said, “Sit down here beside me, Son. I think we should talk things over a little.”

I said, “Yes, ma’am,” and sat down with my hands folded in my lap.

When Mother really wanted something to soak in, she’d always let me sit and wait a couple of minutes. Then she’d clear her throat and begin. That time it seemed as though she waited an hour before she said, “Ralph, Mr. Batchlett called on me this afternoon. I understand you have been talking with him about going away from home to work this summer.”

“No,” I said, “I haven’t. But he was talking to me about it yesterday. I just told him you might need me at home, and I’d have to talk to you about it.”

“That’s what we are up here for,” she said.

I forgot all the things I’d planned to say, and the words just tumbled out in a heap: “Well, it’s a dollar a day and he said it would be a hundred days and I’d be learning a trade and . . .”

“Yes, I know,” Mother said, “but don’t you think you’re a little young for learning to be a livestock trader?”

“Well, I’m the top rabbit-dealer in Littleton now,” I told her, “and I could make more money if I knew how to be a cattle-dealer too.”

Mother put her arm around my shoulders and pulled me close against her. “I’m afraid my little boy is growing up too fast in some ways and not fast enough in others,” she said. “How much do you weigh now, Son?”

“Well, I still weigh seventy-two pounds,” I said, “but I’ve grown nearly an inch taller in the last year.”

Mother let me sit up straight again, and squeezed one of my legs. “My! You’re nothing but bone and sinew,” she said. “I do wish you could put on a little flesh.”

“I’m stouter than most any of the other fellows in my class at school,” I said. “I can lift more and squeeze tighter with my knees and ride . . .”

“I know, I know, Son, but let’s talk about this summer. A twelve-year-old boy is entirely too young to be away from home all summer with a crew of cattlemen. Particularly when they will be moving from place to place, and when there will be no woman who could take care of him in case he were sick.”

It didn’t look as though there was very much use in trying to argue, but I wanted to go with Mr. Batchlett so much that I said, “There wasn’t any woman at the Y-B mountain ranch when I worked up there two years ago.”

“Yes, I know, but you came home every week end then. And you were never so far away that they couldn’t have brought you home in a few hours.”

“But I never get sick,” I told her. “When have I ever been sick—except when I had the measles?”

“Suppose you let me finish,” Mother said. “As I was saying, a twelve-year-old boy is too young for such an undertaking. But I do realize that circumstances have given you a great deal more experience than most boys of your age. And I am sure that you are enough like your father that you will not be influenced by the roughness of the men you will be with, so I have told Mr. Batchlett you may go. However, I have told him that you can’t go until after your school is out for the summer, and that you must be home when school opens in the fall.”

If she hadn’t dropped it so quickly, I could have acted more like a grown-up man. I didn’t, though; I hugged my arms around her like a little kid. Mother didn’t cry, but she had tears in her eyes, and before she told me to run along, she said, “I shall worry about you, and I realize that I may be criticized for letting you go, but a boy of your age needs a man’s steadying hand on his shoulder.”

Mr. Batchlett had a big ranch just north of Colorado Springs, and corrals and cow barns at Littleton. Lots of the people who lived on the outskirts of Denver kept a cow, but when her milk began to dry up they’d trade her to Mr. Batchlett—along with five or ten dollars—for a fresh one. In that way he got both the boot money and the calf, and everybody said he was getting rich.

The trading with the Denver people was done from Littleton, usually during the fall and early spring. At the end of the seasons Mr. Batchlett took the dry cows to his ranch, kept them there until they’d had calves, or were about ready to, then brought them back to Littleton for the Denver trade. In the summers he made his headquarters at the ranch, sending trading teams far to the south and up into the mountains to trade steers, bulls and young stock for more milk cows.

Mr. Batchlett had the reputation around town of being hard and tough, and some pretty rough men hung out around his corrals, so I was surprised that Mother had said I could go away to work for him. I think there were two or three reasons why she let me do it. One was that Mr. Batchlett had grown up in Texas with Hi Beckman, the foreman at the Y-B ranch. Hi came to our house often, and I’d heard him tell Mother, “Batch, he’s hard on the outside because he’s in a hard business, but he’s just as soft as a woman on the inside.”

Another reason was that she had known Mr. Batchlett only around his own home. The Batchletts lived within a block of us, the children were small, and Mrs. Batchlett was a frail little woman. Mother used to nurse her when she’d be sick, and once when she came home from there I heard her tell Grace, “In spite of what people say, I’m sure Hi must be right about Mr. Batchlett. It’s wonderful to see how tender that big, rough man is with his wife and children.”

As soon as I’d had my talk with Mother, I went right down to the corrals to see Mr. Batchlett, and found him getting ready to make his spring trip to the ranch. “I aim to get away from here bright and early on the first of June,” he told me, “but your maw says you can’t take off till your school’s out. When’ll that be?”

“Well, Friday’s the last day,” I said, “and that’s June second. But on the last day we only have to go long enough to get our report cards. I’ll be able to start out by half past nine.”

“Fair enough!” he said. “I’ll be taking fifty dry cows out to the home ranch, along with three men and a chuckwagon. Don’t aim to push ’em too hard, and if you travel light you could catch up with us between Castle Rock and The Monument. I won’t need you bad till we head off into the brush country.”

Thursday at dawn I took my saddle, war bag, boots and chaps down to the corrals and put them in the chuckwagon, so Lady would only have my weight to carry the next morning. But we didn’t get away next morning. The eighth grade had a graduation exercise, and school didn’t let out until it was over. It was nearly noon before I got home, and Mother wouldn’t let me start out that late in the day. “You may go just as early as you wish in the morning,” she told me, “but you wouldn’t be able to catch up with Mr. Batchlett this afternoon, and I won’t have you sleeping out alone.”

I figured it would be morning any time after midnight, so I said goodbye to the younger children when they went up to bed, and to Grace and Mother when I went a few minutes later. Before I crawled into bed beside Philip, I laid out my shirt, jumper, and overalls, and put a silver dollar in my overalls pocket.

I put the alarm clock where the moon would shine on it, but didn’t set it. The third time I woke up it was five minutes after twelve, so I pulled my clothes on quietly, crawled out the window to the woodshed roof, and slipped to the ground. King, our dog, came out whining to go with me, but I stopped only long enough to tell him he was a good dog, and that I’d see him Labor Day. Then I shut him in the woodshed and went to the barn for Lady. I walked her on the grass till we were well away from the house, then let her into a swinging canter.

I don’t know any more beautiful music than the beat of a cantering horse’s hoofs on a crisp moonlit night, and Lady had one of the smoothest gaits of any horse that ever ran. The moon seemed only a few yards above the jagged outline of the mountains when we turned onto the Colorado Springs highroad. And there wasn’t a sound in the world except the music of Lady’s hoofs. I didn’t push her, but let her take an easy swinging gait until she’d caught her second wind, then jogged her a mile, and let her lope again.

I suppose it’s funny, but I could always visit with Lady better than I could with most people. I didn’t have to be afraid I’d say something that would sound silly, and I didn’t have to be ashamed of bragging a little bit if I wanted to. I guess I talked to Lady most of the night. I told her that I’d bet Mr. Batchlett would never be sorry he’d hired me at a full cowhand’s wages, because I could ride as well as most of them, and because I’d make myself do anything they could do. And I told her a lot of other things I wouldn’t have told any person. I don’t remember them all, but I do remember telling her that when I grew up I was going to have a big ranch like Mr. Batchlett’s, with a big brick house on it, and good cattle, and a pretty wife, and lots of children.

The moon set as we left the Platte Valley and climbed the long divide. There were no ranch houses up there, and the coyotes came out to sing their goodnight song to the moon. It was a lonely, sorrowful song, and I tried to tell myself I was sorry to be going away from home for a whole summer, that something might happen to Mother or one of the children while I was gone. But I could only keep it on my mind for a few seconds at a time. Then, before I knew it, I’d be thinking again that I was almost a man, and that for the first time I was going to be doing a man’s job and getting a man’s pay for it.

The top of the sun was just peeping over the hills when the houses at Castle Rock came into sight, and the general store opened as we came into town. Lady was going to need grain unless I stopped to let her graze for an hour or two, and I was getting pretty hungry myself. So I went into the store and bought two quarts of oats, a five-cent loaf of bread, and a can of deviled ham.

While I was eating my breakfast, the storekeeper told me that Mr. Batchlett’s outfit had gone through town about noontime of the day before, and he asked me nearly a hundred questions. He seemed to hate all cattle, but milk cows most of all.

“Ain’t no wonder Batch has to go to hirin’ little kids for cowhands,” he told me. “Ain’t no wonder he has to take on them as nobody else would hire. Wouldn’t no self-respectin’ cowhand hire out to wrangle a mess of ornery milk cows. Might as leave try riding herd on the Ladies’ Mish’nary Sassiety as on a parcel of breechy milk cows. Oh, Batch, he’s doin’ all right; he ain’t no fool, but you got to be a fool to work for him.”