The Legend of Perley Gates Read online

  Startled when he realized the old man was set to defend himself, Perley called out frantically, “Whoa, mister! Ain’t no call for that!” When the old man cranked a cartridge into the chamber, Perley suddenly came to the conclusion he was about to get shot.

  The first thought after that initial panic was that his horses were in danger, since he was standing beside them, so he took off running toward a large oak stump thirty yards off to his left. He still had ten yards to cover when the bullets began kicking up clods of grass and dirt around his feet, stopping only after he reached the safety of the stump.

  After a few moments without rifle fire, Perley yelled, “What the hell’s wrong with you? You coulda killed me!”

  “I still could!” the man yelled back. “Sneakin’ up on a man like that . . . whadda you want with me?”

  “I wasn’t sneakin’ up on you,” Perley replied. “You just didn’t notice me passin’ by. That’s why I yelled to you—tryin’ to say howdy.”

  “Passin’ by?” he responded. “Passin’ by? How the hell could you be passin’ by my cabin? You had to follow me down that damn ravine to get here!”

  He had him dead to rights on that one, Perley thought. “You’re right,” he yelled back. “But I was just tryin’ to catch up with you. I ain’t out to cause you any trouble. I just figured you could help me find somebody I’m lookin’ for. Hell, if I was set on doin’ you any harm, I woulda just shot you when you had your back turned to me instead of hollerin’ at you like I did.”

  Evidently, the old man considered the possibility of that being the fact of the matter, for he didn’t reply for a long moment. When he did, he called out, “Who you lookin’ fer?”

  “My grandpa,” Perley answered. “He’s supposed to live around here somewhere.”

  “Grandpa, huh?” It was obvious that he was still wary of the stranger. Finally, he said, “All right, come on out from there, but I’m still holdin’ this rifle, in case you ain’t tellin’ me the straight of it.”

  “I ain’t lookin’ to cause you any trouble,” Perley said. “I’m comin’ out. You ain’t gonna shoot me, are you?”

  “Not if you’re tellin’ me the truth.”

  The man stood watching Perley as he came out from behind the cover of the stump and walked toward him. When Perley stopped beside the carcass of the doe, the old man asked, “What’s your name, young feller?”

  “Perley Gates,” he answered, not expecting the violent reaction it caused.

  “Perley Gates!” the old man erupted, and swung his rifle up again to aim at Perley’s belly. “You got no right to this cabin!” he charged. “You abandoned it for good and all, and I’ve still got the paper to prove it. You might as well git on your horse and clear outta here right now before I put a couple of holes in your belly.”

  Perley suddenly feared he had once again stepped in the cow pie. Convinced he was facing a man with a severe case of mountain fever, he couldn’t imagine what he had said to set him off to rant like a crazy man. “Hold on a minute,” he said as calmly as he could affect. “You’ve got nothin’ to fear from me. I ain’t lookin’ to steal your cabin. The only thing I wanted was to know if you might be able to tell me where I might find my grandpa. He’s got a camp in these parts somewhere. If you don’t know where it is, then I’ll say I’m sorry to have bothered you, and I’ll be on my way. And I’d appreciate it if you’d lower that rifle. It’s givin’ me an itch in my belly button.”

  There was a certain sincerity in the young stranger’s manner that prompted the old man to wonder if he had misjudged him. Still holding the rifle on him, an unlikely possibility suddenly struck him. “What is your grandpa’s name?”

  “Perley Gates, same as mine,” Perley answered.

  The old man slowly lowered his rifle to his side and paused, still wary. When Perley made no move to take advantage of it, he said, “Looks to me like we got off on the wrong foot. My name’s Merle Teague. I never met your grandpa, but I’ve got somethin’ you need to see. Wait on the porch, there, while I fetch somethin’ from the house.”

  Reasonably sure that he was no longer in danger of getting shot, Perley did as Merle asked and stepped up onto the tiny porch. In a matter of seconds, Merle came back from inside, holding a piece of cardboard.

  “Can you read?” he asked.

  When Perley said that he could, Merle handed the cardboard to him and watched him while he read, Whoever finds this place is welcome to it. This is a good warm cabin. I bilt it and it has served me good. I won’t be back. It was signed Perley Gates.

  Merle continued to study Perley as he read it again. “Like I said, I never had the pleasure of meetin’ your grandpa, so I ain’t got no idea where he was headin’ when he left here. But you found his cabin, all right.” He hesitated before adding, “My cabin now. I wish I could help you, but I can’t.”

  Reading the obvious disappointment in Perley’s face, Merle offered an invitation. “You any good at skinnin’ a deer?”

  Perley said that he was fair to middling.

  “If you ain’t in a big hurry, why don’t you help me butcher this deer, and we’ll roast us up a mess of it?”

  “That sounds to my likin’, for sure,” Perley said, a smile now replacing the frown the news of his grandpa had brought. “I wasn’t figurin’ on eatin’ breakfast till it was time to rest my horses, but I can’t see myself passin’ up fresh-killed deer meat.”

  “Good,” Merle replied. “It’ll be a pleasure to have some company for a change. I’d offer to boil us up some coffee, but I’ve been out for a spell, now.”

  “I reckon I can bring that to the feast,” Perley said, thinking of the extra coffee beans he had just bought from Dewey Brown.

  Perley couldn’t deny a feeling of closeness with his grandfather once he realized that he had found the old man’s cabin, the cabin that he had no doubt built himself. After Perley had taken care of his horses, he helped Merle hang the deer carcass from the limb of an oak tree that looked to have been used for that purpose many times. Merle built a fire outside in the yard, and before long, there was freshly butchered venison roasting over the flames. While they worked, Perley took special note of everything about the camp—the cabin, the corral, the shed that substituted for a barn—and he imagined his grandfather’s existence there. He thought that he could almost feel his presence.

  While they ate, Perley told Merle the purpose of the quest he had undertaken, to tell the original Perley about the death of his only son.

  “Now that you found out he ain’t here no more, whaddaya gonna do, go on back to Texas?” Merle asked.

  Perley hesitated only a moment before answering, because he suddenly realized that he wasn’t ready to return to the ranch. Maybe he had more in common with his grandfather than just the name. There were a lot of places he hadn’t seen, and he felt a hankering to see what was beyond the horizon. He was at once mindful of what his brother Rubin had told him, and he knew the obvious thing to do was to get on his horse and head back home. He was needed on the cattle drive, but Perley was reluctant to give up after the first setback. It seemed a lot of bother to ride all the way up there only to turn around without looking any further.

  “No, I reckon not,” he answered, “but danged if I know where to go from here. My pa told me that Grandpa had always regretted that he had never gone to see the Rocky Mountains before he settled down with a wife. Maybe he took off to go there, but the Rockies cover a lot of territory, and they’re a helluva long way from here. I wouldn’t know where to start lookin’.”

  “I don’t know how old your grandpa is,” Merle said, “but I’d guess he must be about my age, don’t you reckon?” Perley shrugged and Merle continued. “I figure I’m too damn old to set out to see the Rocky Mountains, but if I had the itch so bad I couldn’t stand it, I reckon I’d head to Denver. Maybe he felt the same way. Maybe he set out for Colorado Territory, someplace like that. That’s still a far piece—about two weeks of hard ridin’ from here, I
expect—but it’s closer’n Montana.”

  He studied Perley carefully, as if truly interested in what his decision might be. It was obvious that Perley was thinking hard about it. “If I was a little bit younger, I’d think about goin’ with you. I ain’t never seen the Rockies, myself.”

  “Hell,” Perley finally blurted, reminding himself that he had obligations to his family. “I can’t go ridin’ off to the Rockies. I’ve gotta help my brothers push a herd of cattle up to Ogallala.”

  “Well, I reckon that settles that,” Merle declared. “Cut you off another slice of that meat.”

  Perley ate his fill of the roasted venison and drank a couple of cups of coffee before he thanked Merle for his hospitality and prepared his horses to leave. He left the rest of the sack of coffee beans with him, for which Merle was extremely grateful and apologized for shooting at him. Perley assured him that he hadn’t taken it personally. They shook hands, Perley gave Buck the signal to start with a gentle nudge of his heels, and he rode back up the ravine to retrace his tracks. He felt like he now had a friend in Merle Teague, which was not unusual. Perley made friends easily.

  When he got back to the Fort Smith road, he turned Buck to the west, thinking he still had plenty of time to return to Texas. He might as well go home by a different way, just in case he had a streak of good luck and ran into someone who had seen his grandfather—maybe as the old man was on his way west. According to what Dewey had told him, this road would lead him to Atoka. He could cut back south from there. He had asked Merle how far it was to Atoka, and he had said about sixty miles, so Perley figured to make it by midday tomorrow.

  Common sense told him that if his grandpa had gone to Denver, he would most likely have taken the road to McAlester instead of going through Atoka. But although Perley didn’t know much about Atoka, he did know it had a railroad station, so there might be someone who could recall an old man on his way to the Rockies. Even as he thought it, he knew the odds of that were zero. As he was about most endeavors, however, he started out with a positive attitude and an expectation for good luck.

  The road he traveled took him in a steady southwest direction through a range of high hills that might even be considered low mountains. It was evidently an often-traveled trace, judging by the tracks of hooves and wagon wheels, but he met no one along his way.

  Since there seemed to be frequent streams, he decided to ride on after the sun began to sink on the horizon before finally making his camp beside a slow-moving creek. Guiding Buck along the creek bank, he rode about twenty-five yards from the road before settling on a wide patch of grass that offered grazing for his horses.

  With plenty of wood for a fire, he unwrapped the cloth holding a piece of venison that Merle had insisted he should take with him. As he held it over the fire to cook, he thought about the gray-haired little man in buckskins and his remark that if he was a little younger, he’d go to see the Rockies. Perley could understand that urge, and he wondered if he would one day find himself lamenting the fact that he had never gone when he was young enough to do it. Maybe not, he thought as he turned the piece of venison over when it began to sear.

  CHAPTER 4

  He rode into the town of Atoka close to noontime, sooner than he had expected to, a result of having pushed Buck and the sorrel a little farther before making camp the night before. He crossed the railroad tracks at a slow walk, then rode the length of the short street to look the town over. There wasn’t much to see—a few stores and shops, a general store, stables, and at one end, close to the shack that served as a train station, there was a rooming house. His interest was caught by a building next to it, proclaiming itself to be Mabre’s Diner.

  “I might wanna do a little business there,” he said to Buck. “But first I’ll stop at the general store in case Grandpa stopped there on his way through here.” The big bay gelding seemed not to be impressed one way or the other, so Perley said, “Then I’ll let you rest a bit while I sample the victuals in that diner.”

  “Good day to ya,” Tom Brant called out from behind the counter when Perley walked into his store. “What can I do for you?”

  “Good day to you,” Perley answered. “I don’t reckon I need any supplies. I was just wantin’ to ask you if you mighta noticed an old man passin’ through town a few months ago. His name’s Perley Gates. He’s my grandpa, and I’m tryin’ to catch up with him.” As soon as the question left his lips, Perley realized how foolish it was, and he was not surprised by the answer he got.

  Brant didn’t reply immediately, as he took a brief moment to think how to respond without sarcasm. “I can’t rightly say,” he started. “We get strangers passin’ through town right along. Not a whole lot of ’em, but too many for me to see every one of ’em. So, I don’t remember seein’ anybody with a name like that. I think I mighta remembered that. Anything else I can help you with?”

  “No, sir,” Perley replied. “I’m sorry to have bothered you.” He turned and walked back out the door.

  Brant’s wife, Eva, walked to the end of the counter, having caught a glimpse of Perley as he went through the door. “Who was that?” she asked her husband.

  “Damned if I know,” Tom said and chuckled. “Just some fellow looking for his grandpa. I’ve never seen him before.”

  She went to the front window in time to see Perley climb into the saddle. “Nice-looking young man,” she commented.

  His next stop was at the stable, where he negotiated with Stanley Coons to leave his horses there to rest and water. Coons quoted him a reasonable price for a full portion of oats for both horses as well. When asked what brought him to Atoka, Perley simply said that he was trying to track his grandpa, without going into detail. Coons didn’t recall anyone named Perley Gates and wasn’t interested enough to pursue the subject. He left Perley to unpack the sorrel and pull the saddle off the bay. After he turned the horses out in the corral, Perley walked back up the street to the diner.

  “Howdy, young fellow,” Lottie Mabre greeted him when he walked in. “You lookin’ for some food?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Perley answered. “Something smells mighty good in here.”

  He glanced at the long table in the center of the room. There were half a dozen men seated at the table. All paused momentarily to eyeball the stranger before resuming a concentrated attack on the plates before them.

  “I reckon I’d better take a seat before it all gets ate up.”

  “Don’t you worry,” Lottie said. “I’ll make sure you get fed.”

  “Thank you, ma’am.” Then, in an effort to be friendly, he asked, “Are you Mable?”

  She responded with a puzzled look. “No, my name’s Lottie. Who’s Mable?”

  “I don’t know,” he fumbled. “I mean, I was just readin’ the sign out front, and I figured you were the owner, or something.”

  “I am the owner,” she said, still curious. Then it occurred to her. “The sign! Did you think it said Mable’s Diner? It’s Mabre’s Diner. I’m Lottie Mabre. My husband and I own this diner and the rooming house next door. We used to call it the Atoka Diner. Maybe I shouldn’t have changed the name on the sign.” She favored him with a benevolent smile before going to the kitchen while the diners at the table chuckled.

  “I reckon I didn’t take a close enough look at it,” he mumbled.

  Feeling much like a backward child, he nodded politely toward a man and woman seated at a small table on the side wall who were also smiling at him. Then he sat down, to be confronted with several smiling faces from the men at the table.

  In a few moments, Lottie was back at the table with a plate filled with stew for him. She picked up the empty bread plate from the center of the table.

  “I’ll be back with some more bread,” she said, then paused. “I believe this is the first time you’ve eaten with us.”

  “Yes, ma’am, first time,” he replied, already over the embarrassment for having bungled her name. “This is fine stew,” he said after one bite.
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  “Best in town,” she replied with a wide smile.

  “Only stew in town,” one of the other diners said.

  “You’d best watch your mouth, Rob,” she came back at him, “else I might have to refuse your business. You eat too much for the price anyway.” She looked back at Perley. “What’s your name, honey?”

  “Gates,” Perley replied. Having already embarrassed himself, he thought to avoid any more discomfort over his name.

  “Well, Gates, I appreciate your business,” she said. “I hope we’ll see you in here again.”

  “Thank you, ma’am. If I’m back this way again, I’ll surely stop in to see you.”

  Feeling he was in friendly company, he finished his meal. Just to make sure he didn’t miss any possible clue, he asked Lottie if she’d seen an old man named Perley Gates. She hadn’t.

  After saying so long to his diner friends, he paid for his meal and returned to the stable. When he was saddled up and ready to leave, he asked Stanley Coons for some help.

  “I never got up this far in this part of the Nations, but I have come up a little north of Durant on Clear Boggy Creek. I’m on my way back to Lamar County in Texas, and that’s southeast of here. Instead of riding on south to Durant, I’d make a shorter ride if I follow Clear Boggy Creek back to the Red River. What I’d like to know is, how far south of Atoka do I have to ride before I strike Clear Boggy Creek?”

  “Clear Boggy is about ten miles south of Atoka,” Coons said. “You’ll know it when you strike it. It’s a pretty good-sized creek.”

  “Much obliged,” Perley said and started out on the road along the railroad tracks to Durant.

  He had ridden for what he estimated to be at least ten miles when he came to the creek. As Coons had predicted, it was easily recognized, wide enough to have a railroad bridge across it.

  Perley left the road and took a game trail following the creek to the southeast. It was almost dark and past time to rest his horses when he reached the confluence of Clear Boggy and another large creek. He figured it had to be Muddy Boggy Creek, and he made his camp there for the night. Suppertime the next night should find him back home on the Triple-G Ranch.