Bias Villegas took the chuck wagon ahead to the railroad pens while Hewey and the other hands followed with the herd. Hewey rode point, ahead of the dominant steers that had taken it upon themselves to move into the lead. Afar, Hewey could see the smoking locomotive, and he wondered how Biscuit was going to take to it. Biscuit was a ranch horse, not used to the commotion that went with being in a big town like Alpine.
Hewey had been riding a couple of the new broncs, but he thought it advisable to use Biscuit for the last stage of the drive because Old Man Jenkins would almost certainly be waiting at the pens. He would remember, even if Hewey had chosen to forget, his admonition that the broncs be left to the younger hands. Hewey did not want to risk raising the rancher’s blood pressure; that could be dangerous for a man of his age.
He noticed a truck bumping its dusty way toward the herd, following the ruts of a rough wagon road that led from town. To him, a truck in cow country still looked badly out of place.
The driver honked his horn and spooked Biscuit. Skip Harkness’s bronc began to pitch. One stirrup flopped free, and the surprised kid saved himself only by grabbing the saddle horn. Hewey thought the truck driver was probably Old Man Jenkins’s high-toned car jockey, badly in need of a stern lesson in cow-camp etiquette. As the truck pulled to a stop, Hewey reined toward it, rehearsing the
lecture in his mind until he saw that the man behind the steering wheel was a stranger.
A passenger stepped out on the right-hand side. Hewey blinked in surprise, for he recognized the tall, thin figure of his brother, wearing denim overalls, a farmer’s brogan shoes and a floppy felt hat that offered only limited protection to a face used hard by the elements.
“Walter,” Hewey shouted. Biscuit sidestepped, wary of the clanking motor until the driver cut it off. When the noise stopped, the horse moved closer but remained like a coiled spring, ready to jump away at the least provocation. Walter turned to offer a big, rough hand to the woman who had been sitting in the middle. She stepped to the ground and dusted herself the best she could. She wore a slat bonnet that almost covered her face, but Hewey knew she was his sister-in-law.
He had been about to dismount, but he decided to remain in the saddle until he determined which direction the wind blew. With Eve Calloway, he never could be sure whether it would be a warm, pleasant one from the south or a cold one from the north. She could change quicker than West Texas weather. Their last parting had been amicable, but he remembered others that were frosty as a February morning.
Walter walked slowly toward Hewey, careful lest he cause the nervous Biscuit further fright. “Big brother,” he said, “when’re you goin’ to give up tryin’ to be twenty years old? You need to quit ridin’ these skittish broncs.”
“When I’m a hundred and six.”
“You’ll never get that old. Some fool horse’ll kill you first.”
“Many a good one has tried. But anyway, it’s been years since Biscuit was a bronc.” Hewey gripped his brother’s calloused hand, which felt like dry rawhide. He tipped his hat to Eve. She said only, “Hewey.”
At least she did not seem angry. Hewey decided to step down from the saddle. He ventured, “You’re lookin’ good, Eve.”
She wasn’t, really. She had always tended to be on the skinny side, but her long, plain gray cotton dress hung loose as if she hadn’t been eating lately. She was moving along toward forty and showed every year of it. The lines in her face indicated deep worry as she stepped close to give Hewey a perfunctory peck on the cheek. He held his hands up awkwardly, never knowing for sure if he should hug her or not. He decided against it.
“Hewey,” she asked quickly, “where’s Tommy?”
He blinked in confusion. “Tommy? Where’s he supposed to be?”
“At home, but he’s not. We figured he’d be here with you.”
Hewey looked in surprise at Eve, then Walter, then Eve again. “I ain’t seen him. Or heard from him either.” He had not seen his two nephews since the last time he had been to Upton County. That had been three … no, four years ago, or pretty near. It was hard to keep track of time, busy as he had been.
Anxiety pinched Walter’s eyes. “He left home. Took a little dun horse Alvin Lawdermilk gave him, and he rode off without sayin’ anything. We thought it was likely he came up this way lookin’ for you.”
“If he did, he hasn’t found me.” Hewey began to share their concern. “I understood why Cotton wanted to leave home when he came of age. He had his sights set on other things besides the hoe and the plow. But Tommy was a farm boy at heart. I thought he’d be content to stay there all of his life.”
Walter shoved his hands into his pockets and stared at the ground. “We thought so too, but lately he’s taken an itch to see other places, do other things. Eve says he’s a lot like you.”
Hewey gave his sister-in-law a sideward glance, knowing she would not have meant it to be complimentary. When anything
threatened the stability of home and family, Eve found it easy to blame Hewey’s wayward influence. Much of the blame was justified.
He detected a hint of that blame as Eve said, “I don’t reckon you intentionally enticed him, but Tommy’s always looked up to you. I just hoped he wouldn’t pick up your roamin’ ways.”
Hewey replied, “You’ve made it plain many a time that you’d be a sight happier if I gave up ridin’ and taken to the plow.”
“We’d all be glad if you did, but we decided a long time ago to quit tryin’ to change you. You’ll be Hewey Calloway as long as you live.”
“I’ve tried bein’ somebody else, and it never worked.” He had taken Walter’s place one summer when Walter’s leg was broken. For a while he had forced himself to become a farmer and bring in Walter’s crops, but he had hated every day of it.
He saw disappointment in Eve’s blue eyes before she turned and touched a handkerchief to them. He wished Tommy had shown up here so Walter and Eve could take him home and stop worrying. Now Hewey had something to worry about, too.
He wanted to change the subject. “How about the farm? You-all makin’ it all right?”
Walter said, “We stay ahead of Old C. C. Tarpley and his bank, if that’s what you mean. Fact is, CC.’s softened up considerable. His health has been failin’.”
Eve said, “He may be startin’ to worry about whether they’ll let him into heaven or not.”
“I’d say he’s got a right smart to worry about.” Hewey looked toward the steers. The herd had moved past him while he was talking to Walter and Eve. “Chuck wagon’s camped on the far side of the shippin’ pens. We’ll be havin’ dinner after we’ve penned the cattle.”
Walter said, “Can’t stay. One of Blue Hannigan’s truck drivers had a load of freight to deliver to Alpine, and we caught a ride with him. He’s got to be back in Upton City tonight.”
Hewey was surprised again. “That’s Blue Hannigan’s truck? He’s always done his freightin’ with mules and wagons.”
“He’s bought two trucks since you saw him last. Says a man has got to keep up with the times or they’ll roll over him and leave him layin’ in the road.”
“They’ve rolled over me, all right. Just about flattened me out. But I can’t feature Blue Hannigan drivin’ a truck. I always figured he was half mule.”
He had never had a better friend in the world than Blue Hannigan unless it was Snort Yarnell and the late Grady Welch. They were kindred spirits, cowboys to the core, even though Blue had eventually married and turned to freighting to make a better living. Grady had died beneath the hooves of a two-bit bronc.
He said, “If Tommy shows up, I’ll send him home.”
The lines deepened in Walter’s face as he put his arm around his wife’s shoulder. He seemed to read something in her sad eyes that Hewey could not see. “No, let him stay if he’s set on it. Maybe he’ll work it out of his system. But let us know, and watch out for him, won’t you? Don’t let him get himself hurt or into any trouble.”
“I’ll do what I can.” Hewey tried to hide his reluctance. He had turned down Old Man Jenkins’s offer of a good-paying job because it would give him responsibility he did not want. Now, like it or not, he would be considered responsible for his nephew.
Walter gripped his hand. “Obliged, Hewey. Come see us when you can.”
Eve gave Hewey a silent hug. The tears in her eyes told him why she did not trust herself to try to speak. She turned away, letting Walter give her a boost up into the truck.
Hewey called, “Walter, just a minute.” He had to work up nerve to ask the question. “How’s Miss Spring Renfro?”
“She’s still teachin’ school over at the Lawdermilks’.”
“Has she … has she gotten herself married yet?”
“She’s been waitin’ for the right man to come along, I guess. We all thought you were him, once.”
“So did I, once.” Hewey looked away, clearing his throat. “Tell Cotton hello for me, next time he’s home.”
“And if we see Spring Renfro?”
Hewey could only shake his head. He did not know what to tell her.
The locomotive backed the empty cattle cars along the spur track to the shipping pens as Hewey and the rest of the crew brought up the J Bar steer herd. Old Man Jenkins’s touring car was parked to one side, out of the path of the cattle. The driver leaned against the automobile, goggles pulled up over the broad-billed cap he wore. Jenkins was opening the gate to the largest pen. He could have delegated that job to his driver, but Hewey guessed the old man wanted to see it done right, as if there were any wrong way to open a gate.
Hewey rode up a little ahead of the herd and stationed himself just past the opening so the steers would not pass it by. He hazed the leaders in, then backed away so those that followed would not shy aside. Most of these cattle did not often see men on horseback, and those few occasions were usually associated with unpleasantness of one kind or another.
The pens were dry and dusty, for the hooves of earlier herds had already stirred the bare ground after a long winter of relative inactivity. Skip Harkness rode up on the bronc that had come near throwing him off when the truck’s horn sounded.
Hewey said, “Caught you asleep, didn’t he? You’ve got to learn to stay awake every minute when you’re sittin’ on a bronc.”
Defensively Skip declared, “He never even come close.”
Hewey wondered why he felt duty-bound to nursemaid every green farm kid who wandered onto the J Bar. They should be the foreman’s responsibility, not his, but somehow most of them seemed to gravitate toward Hewey. The gringo kids anyway. The young Mexicans drew toward Aparacio Rodriguez, who, at thirty, give or take a little, was sort of a big-brother figure to them.
Watching Skip, wishing the boy were a little smarter and a lot less sure of his invincibility, Hewey thought of his nephew Tommy. Where the hell has that kid got off to? He could be anyplace from here to El Paso.
A trainman signaled the engineer to back the wooden cattle cars slowly until the one nearest the coal car was evenly aligned with the slanted loading chute. The foreman, Bige Saunders, rode to where Old Man Jenkins waited on an elevated walkway beside the chute. There they could look down upon the steers and count them as they ascended into the cars.
Hewey tied Biscuit to an outside fence and beckoned with a jerk of his head for Skip to follow him. The boy dismounted carefully, for the hissing of the steam locomotive made his bronc step sideways, its ears nervously pointed forward and its eyes rolling.
Climbing over fences to reach the loading chute, Hewey and Skip pried the car door open and slid a platform forward to bridge between the end of the chute and the sand-covered floor of the car. Hewey jumped on it to be sure it was set solidly. A collapse under the weight of the steers would be a small calamity. He motioned for Skip to help him swing the side gates forward and complete a closed corridor that would prevent cattle from jumping to freedom between the chute and the car.
Jenkins shouted for the cowboys to bring the steers on. Hewey picked up a long pole propped against the fence and took a place on the elevated walkway where he could lean over and prod any animals reluctant to pass through the door into the darkness of the car. This is why they call us cowpunchers, he thought
Jenkins and Saunders both counted the cattle as they ascended, Jenkins calling a halt when the proper number had passed to fill the car without overcrowding it. Hewey turned back the extra animals and put his shoulder against the car door, sliding it into place and closing the latch.
The trainmen had not helped with the loading. Hewey could not blame them for standing back, for the railroad did not count that among their duties. But he wished he could see Jenkins’s car driver lending a hand. For a man paid fifty dollars a month, he didn’t seem to be doing much. Remaining well out of the dust, he stood by the automobile as if afraid it might decide to run off like a horse left untied.
Following signals made by one of the trainmen, the engineer moved the train forward to spot the next empty car into place, aligning the door with the chute.
Skip asked, “Is the grass really greener where these steers are goin’?”
“They’ll think they’ve died and gone to heaven. Them Kansas Flint Hills look like a wheat field when it rains.”
“You’ve seen that country?”
“Spent a season up there once, takin’ care of summer cattle for a feller who lived down at Uvalde.”
“Is there anyplace you ain’t been?”
“Never been to California yet, or Nevada or Utah, but me and Biscuit’ll visit all of them before we’re done.”
“Think the two of you have still got time enough?”
“Time don’t mean much to Biscuit. He wouldn’t know a calendar from the United States Constitution.”
As the loading progressed, Hewey counted the empty cars and realized there were a couple more than were needed to carry all the Jenkins steers. The trainmen called a halt, claiming some sort of difficulty with the locomotive that had to be fixed before work could continue. Sitting on the fence, rolling a cigarette, Hewey noticed a string of horses pushed by four cowboys approaching the loading pens. He recognized one of the riders and walked down to open the gate to a pen that had been emptied of cattle.
“Howdy, Hewey,” a lean and lanky puncher shouted jovially as the horses rushed past him into the corral. The sun caught a glint of gold where a front tooth should have been.
“Snort Yarnell!” Hewey shouted back. “Somebody told me you was dead. Guess you just smelled like it.”
Snort reined up and looked at the Jenkins outfit’s horses, tied along the outside fence. His gold tooth gleamed in a broad grin. “When did you J Bar punchers start ridin’ burros?”
“About the same time you Slash R waddies commenced ridin’ camels.” Hewey shut the gate as the last of the loose horses passed through. “Or are those goats you just brought in?”
Snort dismounted and thrust his big hand forward. Hewey took it. Each man tried to squeeze hard enough to make the other holler, but it came out a draw. Hewey slapped Snort on the shoulder, raising a puff of dust from the cowboy’s blue work shirt. “I didn’t think you could get any uglier, but damned if you ain’t managed.”
“Ain’t much a man can’t do if he makes up his mind to it.”
Snort was accompanied by three eager young cowhands, none of whom looked to be out of their teens. His loud talk and boisterous manner attracted a youthful following wherever he went. Most of the kids would eventually outgrow him and pull away as maturity
overtook their playful spirits and they realized Snort would remain an adolescent forever except in years.
He knew how to have a good time, though. Hewey could hardly remember when he had not known Snort and welcomed his company, for a little while at a time.
Snort peered through the fence at the remnant of steers in the next pen. “I’m surprised you’re still workin’ for Old Man Jenkins. He’s tighter than the bark on a tree.”
“Old Bias cooks good, that’s the main thing. If I had more money, I’d just spend it. What you doin’ with the horses?”
“Fixin’ to load them on that train and ship them to Fort Worth for the horse and mule auction.”
“Scrubby-lookin’ bunch. Looks to me like they got burro blood in them.”
“You think so? I wisht you’d look at that black yonder, the one with the white stockin’ foot. Throwed every cowboy on the Slash R payroll. Even me, and I’m the best bronc rider this country ever seen.”
Hewey was not impressed. The black horse stood hipshot, its head down as if asleep. “He’s got feet the size of a number two washtub. The Slash R must have a bunch of sheepherders workin’ out there.”
Hewey should have been warned by the calculating gleam that came into Snort’s eyes. Snort licked a tongue across that gold tooth and spat a brown stream of tobacco. “I guess you think some J Bar hand can ride him.”
“I’ll bet any hand on the place can ride him except maybe Old Bias. He could too if he wasn’t crippled up.”
“You got some money to go where your mouth is at?”
“I will have when we get the cattle loaded. Mr. Jenkins is due to pay us.”
“I’ll take credit. Bet you thirty dollars, but I’ll pick the J Bar hand to do the ridin’.”
By this time the two men were surrounded by cowboys, including the three who had come with Snort and most of the J Bar hands. Skip Harkness declared, “Let me ride him, Hewey. I’ll turn his hide inside out.”
Hewey shook his head. Skip was not half as good as he thought he was. “That’ll be up to Snort. It’s his choice who makes the ride.”
Snort’s youthful companions offered side bets, and some of the J Bar cowboys took them up, betting five, ten, fifteen dollars apiece. Old man Jenkins and Bige Saunders noticed the commotion and came down to see what was causing it. Jenkins frowned at the hands’ eagerness to bet. “I never did approve of gamblin’ unless it’s on cattle.” He took a long look at the black horse in question. “But it don’t appear to me like there’s any gamblin’ to this. If these Slash R boys want to contribute to you-all’s fortunes, I don’t see any harm in it.”
He did not put up any of his own money, nor did Saunders. Hewey figured they were too old to have any sporting blood left. He said, “All right, Snort. Pick your man.”
Snort let his gaze drift over the J Bar hands, quickly dismissing Aparicio Rodriguez because the good-natured vaquero had a reputation all over the Davis Mountains country as being puro jiñete, a bronc rider of exceptional ability. He lingered a little longer on Skip than the others, and Hewey feared he was about to choose the kid.
Snort took his time, coming back finally to Hewey. Hewey smiled, knowing he was by all odds the best rider in the outfit, by his own estimation better even than Aparicio. He could ride that black and darn his socks at the same time. But Snort turned and walked to the fence. He pointed at Jenkins’s driver, who stood on the outside looking in, his goggles turned up over the top of his cap. “I pick him,” he said.
Hewey sputtered. “But he’s not a hand. He just jockeys that automobile.”
“He works for Jenkins, don’t he? He’s on the J Bar payroll, ain’t he?”
Hewey looked to Jenkins for support, but the old rancher offered him no help. Hewey protested, “That don’t count. He ain’t paid to ride.”
“You’re the one agreed to the deal. Either he rides or you forfeit the bet.” The gold tooth gleamed. Hewey thought Snort looked like a fox eating watermelon.
Hewey, for his part, felt like a coyote with both forefeet in a trap, being rinkydooed by a sly old sport like Snort Yarnell. It wasn’t that he would mind seeing the driver get thrown halfway to the moon, but Jenkins might fire the whole outfit if he was left without the services of his chauffeur. The old man probably couldn’t even crank the motor, much less handle the wheel.
Disgusted with himself, Hewey said, “Looks to me like we’ve got no choice but to forfeit.”
The driver took off his duster and laid it across the fence. “You ain’t lost yet.”
Hewey gaped. “You would try to ride that bronc?”
“Why not?”
“You couldn’t ride a kid’s stick horse. You’d be about as much use as teats on a boar hog.”
“What’ve you got to lose?”
“Mr. Jenkins stands to lose a driver.”
“Then maybe you’d have to learn to operate an automobile yourself.” He climbed into the corral and began unlacing his high-topped boots. “Your feet look to be about the same size as mine. Lend me your boots and spurs.”
“What for? You won’t make it past the first jump.” But Hewey
could see that the man was serious. He sat in the sand and removed his boots, leaving the spurs on them. He pulled off his socks to keep from getting them full of dirt. Not for a hundred dollars would he put on the dude’s lace-up boots. He would look almost as ridiculous as the driver did with that combination of jodhpur britches and cowboy boots.
The chauffeur had to pull hard to get his feet into Hewey’s boots, and his pained expression indicated that they pinched his toes. “All right, who’s goin’ to catch that horse?”
Hewey looked at Jenkins, hoping the old man would put a stop to this, but the rancher only muttered something about fools and their money and stomped off to see if the trainmen were making any progress fixing their locomotive.
Bige Saunders warned, “If you-all get Mr. Jenkins’s driver killed, the old man won’t be fit to live with.” He trailed after Jenkins.
Doesn’t want to watch the massacre, Hewey thought glumly. He had rather be somewhere else himself.
Snort’s companions seemed only too happy to catch up the black horse. The animal appeared unperturbed. It stood calmly while the hackamore was slipped over its head and the saddle girted down tightly. Snort turned to the driver, his voice condescending. “Ready any time you are, Marmaduke.”
“The name’s not Marmaduke. Friends call me Peeler.”
“Peeler?”
“Like in bronc peeler.” The driver handed his cap and goggles to Skip Harkness. “Try not to let these get dirty.”
One of Snort’s friends held the black’s ears, though the horse looked as if it might be asleep. Peeler gripped the hackamore rein, a handful of mane and the saddle horn as he swung up. It occurred to Hewey that Peeler was doing this properly. He had probably watched somebody sometime.
The cowboy released the ears and stepped back out of the way. For a moment the horse seemed not to notice. Then with a loud bawl and a breaking of wind, it made a violent leap forward and came down solidly on all four feet. Hewey imagined he could feel the ground tremble under the impact. It should have been enough to bust the rider’s teeth, but Peeler was still in the saddle as the horse made its second jump.
Hewey stared in amazement. The rider seemed to anticipate the bronc’s moves and meet them halfway. Very little daylight appeared between him and the saddle, and never for long. Pitching, twisting, spinning half around, the horse failed to shake him. Its long jumps dwindled into crow hops as it tired, and finally it ran in slowing circles around the corral. Peeler drew on the hackamore rein and brought the bronc to a stop, stepping off to the ground.
He handed the rein to Snort Yarnell. “Thought you said this pony could buck.”
Snort made a resigned smile. “Thought they said you was just an auto jockey.”
“I am, but I wasn’t always.” Peeler sat in the sand and began struggling with Hewey’s boots.
Snort turned to Hewey. “Looks like you-all ran a ringer in on us.”
“Like you done with that sleepy-lookin’ black? Anyway, you chose him. I tried to get you to pick somebody else.”
Snort laughed. “That’s when I ought to’ve known you had somethin’ up your sleeve. You’re a licensed and certified liar, Hewey Calloway, the only one I know that can hold a candle to me. So we’ll pay up like men and try to get you the next time.”
The locomotive’s whistle blew. Old Man Jenkins waved his hat over his head, meaning they had all better get back to work if they wanted to have a job tomorrow.
Hewey put on his socks, then his boots. He shook hands with
Peeler. “I’ve never been mistaken but two or three times in my life. Reckon this was one of them. You’re entitled to share my winnin’s.”
“Forget it. This helped remind me why I learned to drive an automobile.”
Hewey sat at a table in a corner of the saloon, staring down at a blank sheet of paper. The J Bar cowboys and the Slash R hands were spread out along the bar, Anglo and Mexican all mixed together. Racial lines were easily blurred by a little whiskey. Snort Yarnell motioned. “Come on, Hewey, you’re fallin’ behind.”
“I’ll catch up. Got to write this letter first.”
He was momentarily distracted by an elderly swamper, dragging a stiff leg as he swept up glass from a bottle that had rolled off a table and broken on the floor. He was another old cowboy too broken up to ride anymore and reduced to a demeaning job to earn his grub and sleep in the dry. Hell of a way for a good man to end up, Hewey thought.
He touched the sharp end of the stub pencil to his tongue and began a slow and halting effort.
Alpine, Texas
May 21 1910
Dear Walter & Eve—
I take pencil in hand to tell you I have not seen Tommy. I have just come into a little extra mony and am sendin it to you to put against your dett on the farm, like I have done before. Dont worry, I dont need it. If Tommy shows up I will let you no.
Yours very truly,
Hewey Calloway
P. S.—If you see Miss Spring Renfro
He could not think how to end the last sentence and tried to erase it, but it would not all come off the paper. He addressed an envelope to Walter and Eve Calloway, Upton City, Texas, and tucked the letter into it with fifty dollars in paper money. He licked the envelope, sealed it and handed it to the bald-headed bartender along with a quarter. “I don’t have a penny stamp, but I’d be obliged if you’d put one on this and see that it gets to the post office. Keep the change.”
“You’re a generous man, Hewey Calloway. It’ll be the starvin’ of you someday. You ready for another drink?”
“Ready and rarin’.”
He had had several already, but not enough to make him overlook the risk of falling over the edge, splurging the wages Old Man Jenkins had paid him and the bet he had won from Snort, most of which he was sending to Walter and Eve.
Jenkins had been in the saloon earlier and had enjoyed a drink at cowboy expense. After he left, Snort had demanded, “Don’t he ever buy any himself?”
Hewey replied, “How do you think he got rich?”
Now Snort had his arm around Peeler’s shoulder. “Where in the hell did a car jockey ever learn that kind of ridin’?”
Almost everybody in the room had bought Peeler a drink. His cap and goggles lay on the floor where he had dropped them without realizing it. Hewey picked them up and placed them on the bar so nobody would step on them. Peeler said thickly, “I was raised in Callahan County, helpin’ my old daddy break horses and mules. Rode awhile with Booger Red Privett’s bronc show ’til I got tired of them outlaws bustin’ my back. Figured herdin’ an automobile ought to be easier than stompin’ broncs.”
“Pays better, too,” Hewey put in. He had never been apt at figures, but he knew the difference between thirty dollars a month and fifty.
An out-of-tune piano stood in a back corner. A kid from the Slash R was playing it in a heavy-handed and discordant way. Nobody seemed disposed to criticize his musicianship.
Hewey did not know where the girls came from, but three appeared, dancing with the cowboys. One of them took Hewey in her arms and did a reel with him, though the kid at the piano was playing a waltz. Hewey’s head was spinning by the time they finished. He collapsed into a chair, leaned back too far and fell heavily. He struggled to free himself from the overturned chair but hung a spur in one of its braces. He floundered like a turtle on its back.
He saw someone hovering over him and heard a youthful voice. “Need a little help, Uncle Hewey?”
Hewey blinked, trying to bring the face into focus as it swayed back and forth like a pendulum. It was somehow familiar, yet he could not see clearly enough to identify the features.
“It’s me, Uncle Hewey. Tommy.”
“Tommy?” The voice was his nephew’s, though it sounded deeper and more mature than he remembered. Hewey said, “Don’t you know a saloon ain’t no place for a self-respectin’ Calloway?”
He did not expect the strength his nephew showed as Tommy took his hand and helped him to his feet. Hewey kicked his spur loose from the chair, which fell back with a clatter, almost tripping Skip Harkness and the young woman he was dancing with. They did not seem to notice.
Hewey leaned against the table for balance and scolded, “Your mama’d be awful disappointed to find a boy like you in a place like this.”
Tommy said, “She’d be disappointed in both of us. And I ain’t a boy anymore. You just ain’t seen me in a long time.”
Tommy still seemed to sway from side to side. “Hold still,” Hewey told him, “so I can get a good look at you.”
Tommy righted the chair and held it steady. Hewey seated himself,
careful not to knock the chair over again. Funny, he thought, how much a kid could change when you weren’t watching. Tommy appeared broader in the shoulders and a foot taller than Hewey remembered. He looked much like his older brother, Cotton. Hewey could see a lot of his father in Tommy’s features and some of his mother in the eyes. “You’re not a man yet, though, not quite. Why ain’t you at home, in school?”
“I finished all the schoolin’ there was two years ago. I decided to come lookin’ for you.”
“How’d you find me?”
“Just asked around. Anywhere you’ve been, they remember Hewey Calloway.”
Hewey tried to sound severe. “You ought to be helpin’ your daddy right now. Plantin’ time, ain’t it?”
“Me and Daddy ain’t gee-hawed too good lately. I want to learn to be a cowboy like you.”
“You’re too late. They ain’t makin’ no more cowboys like me, hardly. The times have gone off and left us.”
“You always said I was a natural hand. I’ve been breakin’ horses and mules for Alvin Lawdermilk the last couple of years when Daddy could spare me.”
“Then why don’t you stay home and work for Alvin?”
“I’ve learned all there is to learn around Upton City. I want to see different country, different people.”
“People are pretty much the same wherever you find them, most of them good, a few not worth hangin’ with an old rope.”
“I thought maybe you could get me a job where you’re workin’.”
“Old Man Jenkins runs a pretty tough outfit.”
“I can make him a hand if he’s got any openin’s.”
Hewey knew that a couple of the J Bar cowboys had ridden the caboose when the train pulled out, committed to seeing after the steers when they reached the Flint Hills. They would not be back
until fall, and maybe not then if they stumbled onto some good-looking Kansas girls bent on getting married. Hewey had known it to happen.
He said, “We’ll talk about it in the mornin’. Maybe you’ll see things a little plainer in the light of day.”
Tommy smiled. “I’ll bet you will.”
The bartender came over, eyeing Tommy with suspicion. “Hewey, this boy don’t look like he’s shavin’ regular yet. They got a town ordinance …” He had been nervous all evening because many of the hands from both ranches looked under age.
“We was fixin’ to leave.” Hewey pointed his chin toward Snort Yarnell. “You-all let too much riffraff in here anyhow.”
Snort took that as a compliment and saluted Hewey with a whiskey toast.
“Here’s to the boys that labor and sweat,
And thirty a month is all they get.”
The Jenkins driver had a death grip on the edge of the bar, his eyes wide and glassy. Hewey hoped the old man didn’t need to go anywhere tomorrow.
Hewey beckoned to Tommy and walked outside, where a dun horse was tied to a post. A couple of rolled blankets were tied behind the cantle, and a war bag of miscellaneous belongings hung from the saddle horn on the left side, opposite a coiled rope. Tommy asked, “Where we goin’?”
“Biscuit’s in the wagon yard. Chuck wagon’s camped at the shippin’ pens. You had any supper?” It was an idle question, for Bias would have crawled into his blankets hours ago, and his cookfire would be down to a few lingering coals at best.
“Ain’t hungry. I shared supper with a sheepherder out east of town.”
“Mutton, I’ll bet.” Hewey could eat almost anything if he had to, but he could stay happy for months on end without eating any mutton.
“It ain’t bad atall. Daddy’s bought him a little bunch of sheep. Looks like they’re goin’ to be moneymakers.”
“Don’t you let them J Bar cowboys hear you say that. Or worse, Snort and that bunch from the Slash R. It’d be a chaps offense.” That was a form of punishment in which a cowboy had to bend over and let somebody lash his backside with a pair of leather chaps. It was performed more in the spirit of fun than in seriousness, but it did nothing to enhance dignity.
Tommy led his dun horse to the wagon yard and waited while Hewey retrieved Biscuit. He had a little trouble getting the saddle on the brown and afterward stirred a couple of dogs into a barking fit. Hewey wondered why he always seemed to have that effect on dogs. He had never harmed one in his life, but they never quite trusted him. Horses, on the other hand, usually came around to his way of thinking after he had ridden them awhile.
He saw the flickering light from a lantern Bias had set atop the chuck box to guide the cowboys back to camp when their night of celebration was over. He said, “Stake your horse out here and be right quiet. Last thing you want to do is wake up the cook. He’d burn the breakfast biscuits sure as hell.”
Hewey found his own bed. Knowing he was likely to be somewhat impaired on his return, he had had the foresight to roll it out before he left camp for the night’s entertainment.
Tommy spread his blankets. Hewey noted that he had no tarp to repel rain. It did not rain often in these mountains, but on those rare occasions the downpours could be heavy. If Tommy stayed, Hewey would have to see about getting him a tarp to cover his bedroll.
Tommy was likely to come up short in other ways too. Breaking horses and mules for Alvin Lawdermilk at home was a far cry from
working on a big outfit like the J Bar in the Davis Mountains. Without even trying, he could think of twenty easy ways a green kid could get himself skinned and bloodied. Hewey would have to watch over him like a mother hen. Best thing was to try to talk him into going home. That would take the responsibility from Hewey’s shoulders, and he avoided responsibility like he avoided measles and chicken pox.
He drifted off to sleep rehearsing the speech he would lay on Tommy to hasten his return to the farm.
Next morning he could not remember a word of it.