Terror of the Mountain Man Read online

  The others laughed.

  “We would be glad to stay for lunch,” Smoke said.

  “Tell me how you found Sam, Mollie, and our darling little granddaughter,” Hazel said. “It has been so long since we have seen them, and I miss them so.”

  “Oh, they were most gracious to us,” Sally said.

  “And the little girl Ellie Mae was such a delight. I know you must be very proud of all of them.”

  “Yes, I am. I am told that Ellie Mae wants to be a teacher just like her aunt.”

  “Yes, that is what she told us. And from speaking with her, I think she will make a very good teacher.”

  “Kirby, a letter that I got from Sam said that you had come back to Missouri to bury your parents in the local cemetery. I wish I could have been there for that. Your parents were wonderful people.”

  “Yes, it was just something I wanted to do.”

  “And the people of the town were wonderful about it,” Sally said. “So many of them turned out, that you would hardly know it was a funeral for two people who had died over twenty years ago.”

  When they had taken their seats at the dining room table, Cal managed to arrange it so that he was directly across from Katrina. During the meal he found himself looking at her and realized that, in the space of a single meal, she could change from the coquettishness of a young girl to the more haunting promise of a young woman. He found her to be the most charming young woman he had ever met. Beautiful, yes, she was that. But it wasn’t just her beauty that intrigued him. There was much more, there was a depth to her, and there was an unspoken connection between them, as if their very souls were singing in harmony.

  Conversation went on at the table between Smoke and Tom, between Sally and Hazel, but Cal was aware of none of it. He tried not to stare, but he looked at Katrina as often as he could. And often he caught her looking at him, though, shyly, she always managed to look away before he could catch her eyes with his.

  When the meal was finished, everyone else at the table got up but Cal and Katrina. They remained seated so long that it became obvious that the others were looking toward them.

  “Oh,” Cal said, standing quickly. “I’m sorry, I guess I wasn’t paying much attention.”

  “Oh, you were paying attention all right,” Pearlie said with a smile. “It’s just a matter of what it was you were paying attention to.”

  “I, uh, don’t know what you are talking about,” Cal said, flustered.

  “Tom, I thank you very much for your warm welcome,” Smoke said. “But we need to get back into town. I’m going to send the others back on the afternoon train, then we’ll drive the herd out here to your ranch.”

  “If you’re going to send all your wranglers back first, will you need help bringing the herd out? Because, if so, I can send some men in with you.”

  “No, we can handle it all right. By now the horses are used to being driven, and they handle easily. We’ll have them out here before nightfall.”

  “I’m looking forward to seeing them,” Tom said.

  Tom, Hazel, and Katrina came out onto the front porch to tell Smoke and the others good-bye. Before they rode off, Cal and Katrina exchanged a few more looks.

  When they got back to town, Smoke bought train tickets for the men who would be going back to Sugarloaf. Old Mo had already said that he would like to stay here with them, if Smoke didn’t mind. He wouldn’t actually be breaking the horses, but he would be training them, once they were broken.

  “Here are your tickets back to Sugarloaf. Try and stay out of trouble on your way back,” he said, as he paid the men off and gave them the tickets.

  “Why, boss, we’ll be so good that folks will think we’re angels that’s come down to live with the common folk,” Don said as, with waves and good-byes, the four started back to town to catch the train.

  Chapter Twelve

  San Antonio, Texas

  When Rick Isback left the train in San Antonio, he learned that he would have a four-hour wait before the next train that would take him to San Vicente. He decided to spend that time in a saloon and, since this was his first time in San Antonio, he had no specific saloon in mind. He stepped into the Buckhorn Saloon, and was immediately amused by the number of antlers and horns that decorated the walls. Stepping up to the bar, he ordered a drink.

  “Hey, Fancy Pants,” someone said.

  Isback didn’t look around at the first call.

  “You, Fancy Pants, are you deef?”

  The bartender put a beer in front of Isback. Isback paid for the beer, then took a drink of it before he turned toward the man who had called out at him.

  “Were you talking to me?” he asked in a calm voice.

  “Yeah, I’m talkin’ to you. You’re the only one in here wearin’ fancy pants, ain’t you? Where’d you get that getup, anyhow? If you was a woman, folks would think you was a whore, with a getup like that.”

  Another man in the saloon laughed, then stepped up beside the first man.

  “You know what, Toby, maybe he is a whore,” the second man said. “I’ve heered tell that they was men that wasn’t really men, if you know what I mean.”

  “Yeah, Murphy, I know what you mean. Is that what you are, Fancy Pants? Are you one of them men that likes to lie with other men?”

  Isback took another swallow of his beer. “I’m sorry, but if you are looking for a man to have sex with, I’m afraid I can’t accommodate you. If you two are so inclined you might try one of the bathhouses, or, maybe, just do it with each other.”

  “What the hell, Toby! Did this son of a bitch just call us funny men?”

  “Yeah,” Toby said. “I think he just did.”

  Toby drew his pistol and pointed it at Isback. When Murphy saw that Isback made no reaction to the drawn pistol, he drew his as well.

  “I tell you what I’m goin’ to do, mister,” Toby said. “I’m goin’ to take your gun away from you, just to keep it honest. Then me ’n’ Murphy is goin’ to flip a coin, and whichever one of us wins, why, that’s the one that’s goin’ to whip your fancy-dressed ass.”

  “You’re going to take my gun?” Isback asked.

  “That’s right. Take it out now, hold it by the barrel, and bring it to me.”

  “Toby, what are you pickin’ on this fella for?” the bartender asked. “He ain’t done nothin’ but come in here and order hisself a beer.”

  “He called me ’n’ Murphy funny men,” Toby said angrily. “You heard him.”

  “He said no such thing.”

  “I didn’t use the word ‘funny men,’” Isback said. “However, from the way these two were carrying on, I’m quite sure they are both sodomites.”

  “Sodomite? What does that mean?” Murphy asked.

  Isback smiled, which surprised everyone, considering the situation he was in at the moment.

  “It means just what you thought it meant,” Isback said. “It means that I think you two men are probably the kind that prefers other men to women.”

  “See!” Toby said. “The son of a bitch said it again! There ain’t goin’ to be no flippin’ a coin. I’m goin’ to whup his ass myself. Now, give me that gun, mister.”

  “And if I don’t?”

  “I’m goin’ to count to three,” Toby said. “And if you ain’t give me that gun by the time I get to three, I’m goin’ to shoot you dead.”

  Isback started across the floor with his gun in his hand, the butt of it pointed toward the two men who were holding their pistols on him. But before he went half a step, he executed a sudden and perfect border roll. Now the business end of the gun was pointing toward Toby and Murphy, both of whom had let down their guard.

  The quiet room was suddenly shattered with the roar of three pistols snapping firing caps and exploding powder almost simultaneously. The bar patrons yelled and dived, or scrambled for cover. White gun smoke billowed out in a cloud that filled the center of the room, momentarily obscuring everything.

  As the smoke began t
o clear, Isback stared through the white cloud, smiling broadly at the two men who had accosted him. Murphy was down, but Toby was still standing. He opened his mouth as if to speak, but the only sound he was able to make was a gagging rattle, way back in his throat. His eyes glazed over, and he pitched forward, his gun clattering to the floor.

  Isback looked down at the two men for a long moment, a thin wisp of smoke drifting up from the barrel of the gun he still held.

  “What happened? What’s goin’ on in there?” someone shouted from outside.

  The sound of footfalls on the boardwalk could be heard, and several men pushed through the batwing doors. Once inside, they stood under the rising cloud of gun smoke to stare in wonderment at the two dead men on the floor. One of the new arrivals was a sheriff’s deputy, and he saw Isback standing there, still holding the gun.

  “The sheriff’s deputy pointed at the two bodies on the floor. “Mister, I take it from the fact that you’re standin’ there holdin’ a pistol, that this is your doin’. Is that right? Did you do this?”

  “Yes,” Isback answered. “I killed both of them. But it was a fair fight.”

  “What do you mean it was a fair fight? There’s two of them, and only one of you. Are you tellin’ me it was a two-to-one fair fight, and you beat both of ’em?” the sheriff’s deputy asked, incredulously.

  “That’s right,” Isback replied. “You can ask anyone.”

  The sheriff glanced toward the bartender. “Did you see this, Paul?”

  “Yes, sir, I sure as hell seen it. Damndest thing I ever saw.”

  “Is this feller tellin’ the truth? Was it a fair fight?”

  “It was fair all right. Like I said, it was the damndest thing I done ever saw. Toby and Murphy both had their guns pointin’ at this fella, and he was holdin’ his gun by the barrel, butt first, as if he was goin’ to give it to ’em.”

  “Wait a minute, he was giving his gun to them two?” He pointed to the two men on the floor.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Why was you givin’ your gun to ’em?”

  “Because they both had their guns pointed at me, and they asked for it.”

  “No, I mean why is it they was askin’ for your gun in the first place?”

  “Apparently, they took issue with the clothes I was wearing,” Isback said. “It is my understanding that they wanted to take my pistol from me, then beat me up. I asked them what would they do if I didn’t give them my pistol, and that one started counting. He said when he got to three he was going to shoot me.”

  “That’s it, exactly, Deputy,” one of the other saloon patrons said.

  “So I shot them, before he reached three.”

  “How did you do that? Paul said you was holdin’ the gun by the barrel.”

  “This way,” Isback said. He held his pistol out toward the deputy, presenting the gun handle. But just as the deputy reached for it, Isback flipped the pistol around, doing it so fast that it was a blur.

  “Damn!” the deputy said.

  Isback didn’t offer his pistol again, but he did put it back in his holster.

  “Am I under arrest?” he asked.

  “No, ever’body seems to agree with what you told me. I don’t see no need to put you under arrest.”

  Isback smiled. “That’s good, I wouldn’t want to miss my train this evening. I have an appointment with a man named Smoke Jensen.”

  “Smoke Jensen?” the deputy replied, growing more animated. “You know Smoke Jensen?”

  “You might say that we are colleagues, of a sort,” Isback said.

  “You don’t say. My oh my. Your friend is one famous man, do you know that?”

  “Yes, so I have heard,” Isback replied.

  “What’s your name, mister?” the deputy asked. “Like I said, there ain’t goin’ to be no charges or nothin’, but I’ll need to put your name in the report.”

  “My name is Isback. Rick Isback.”

  Isback waited for the deputy’s reaction of recognition, but there was none.

  On the train that evening, as it pulled away from the depot in San Antonio, Isback thought about what happened this afternoon. There had been several witnesses to the event, and he knew that the story would be told, and retold, many times, gaining more notoriety with each retelling.

  What they didn’t realize was that his performance was just that, a performance, and it was much easier than it looked. Neither of the two cowboys had cocked their pistol, and it was immediately apparent that neither of them were gunmen. But, such events, spectacular as they were, would help to build his name.

  The deputy had not recognized his name, though he had recognized Smoke Jensen’s name.

  That was all right. By this time one week from now, Smoke Jensen would be dead, and everyone would know the name of the man who killed him.

  The Wide Loop

  Pearlie, Cal, and Stan Hardegree, the ranch hand whose help Tom Byrd had offered, began breaking the horses the very next day after the herd was delivered to Tom Byrd’s ranch. After a horse was broken, it would be turned into a different corral and there, Old Mo would start working with them. A good cow horse needed to neck-rein easily and consistently, and it needed to be able to walk, jog, lope, and gallop on a loose rein. The horse also had to be trained so that the rider could stop it by voice alone.

  Because most cattle work involved the use of lassos, that was another, and very important, element of Old Mo’s training. Knowing that horses are often startled by movements in the corner of their eye, he began working with them, getting them used to the rope.

  Each of the three men who were breaking horses could break four horses in a day, which meant twelve per day. That figured to be a stay of from fifteen to twenty days for Smoke, Sally, Pearlie, Cal, and Old Mo. Smoke and Sally stayed in the guest room of the Big House; Pearlie, Cal, and Old Mo found room in the bunkhouse.

  Word of the horse breaking moved all through town, so several, thinking that watching cowboys riding bucking horses made a good show, would go out to the ranch each day, just to watch.

  Ramiro Vargas, who had been sent by Keno to monitor the progress of the horse breaking, went out to the ranch as well. There was nothing in Vargas’s demeanor that would suggest to anyone that he was a soldier in Keno’s Ejército Mexicano de la Liberación. On the contrary, he looked like a Mexican peasant trying to eke out a living by selling sopaipillas to the crowd who had come to watch the bronco busting.

  In this guise, Vargas all but disappeared, and nobody paid him any attention at all. Because of that, no one was aware that he was keeping a very close account as to how many horses had been broken.

  “They’ve got damn near fifty of’em done, already,” a cowboy said to the barber who was cutting his hair.

  “That’s quite a few,” the barber replied.

  “I reckon it is, but them three boys that’s doin’ all the bronco bustin’ is good. They’re real good. Sometimes you’d swear they was glued into the saddle. But I’ll tell you who is the best.”

  “Who would that be? Stan Hardegree?”

  “No, sir, not by a long shot. Now, don’t get me wrong, the Hardegree boy is good all right. He’s damn good. But he ain’t the best.”

  Of the three broncobusters, Cal was recognized not only by the cowboy who was getting his hair cut, but by the other two riders as well, as the most skilled. Then, on the fifth day they encountered a horse that neither Pearlie, nor Hardegree, wanted anything to do with.

  The job fell to Cal, and at two o’clock that afternoon, the entire ranch, including every ranch hand, Smoke, Sally, Tom Byrd and his wife, and Katrina—at least twenty people—were gathered around the breaking corral to watch Cal work.

  The horse was tied to a pole in the center of the corral, not by Cal, but by one of the ranch hands. Not until the horse was already secured, did Cal approach him.

  “Hello, horse,” Cal said, quietly, soothingly, reaching up slowly to pet the horse gently on his neck. “Me ’n’
you are goin’ to be great friends.” Cal chuckled. “I meant to say that you and I are going to be great friends, but don’t you tell Miz Sally what I said. She would be upset, and friends don’t tell on friends.”

  All the time he was talking, he continued to pet and stroke the horse.

  “Would you like a carrot?” he asked, offering it to the horse.

  The horse stared at him with suspicious eyes.

  “Come on, let’s be friends,” Cal said, and he stuck one end of the carrot in his own mouth, then offered the other end to the horse. The horse took it.

  “See, I knew we could be friends.” Cal squeezed the horse’s ear, gently, then he attached a lead line to the horse’s halter.

  “What do you say I untie you from that post, and let’s take a little walk?”

  Cal untied the horse, then led him around the corral, all the while talking quietly and soothingly to the animal, getting it used to responding to the tug on its reins.

  Next, he put a saddle on the horse, and now it began to grow a bit more skittish. Then, with the saddle in place, he mounted the horse.

  The horse immediately began to buck, but Cal stopped it, pulling the horse’s head hard to the right until its nose touched its right foreleg. The horse couldn’t buck in that position, all it could do was turn in a very tight circle.

  Cal kept the horse in the circle for a moment, then he released the pressure on the reins. When he did the horse started to buck again, arching its back, leaping up and coming down on all four legs, then lowering its head and kicking up its hind legs.

  Cal rode with the bucking horse, keeping his shoulder back and his feet well in the stirrups.

  The cowboys and others who were watching shouted and cheered as Cal took everything the horse had to offer. Finally, when the horse realized that it would not be able to throw the rider from its back, it stopped bucking and galloped around the corral a few times. Cal bent low, leaning over the horse’s neck and let it run full-out, finally slowing it to a trot, then to a gentle walk.