The Chuckwagon Trail Read online

  He had a barrel of yeasty dough he used to prepare the daily bread. Keeping it through the entire six weeks of the drive had worried him, but Carson assured him this was done all the time. His only worry had to be running out of the dough and having to start a new batch. Lacking the yeast, that would mean buying more from a town along the trail.

  “Shawnee Trail,” he said. He had tried to follow their tracks on a map he’d found in the chuckwagon. The trail snaked up from way south to Waco. He ignored that part. What lay ahead interested him the most. He’d asked why they weren’t following the Chisholm Trail, but Carson hadn’t given a definitive answer.

  Truth was, he hadn’t given any answer at all.

  “I pick the route. You follow me and feed the men. Then you follow me some more,” Carson had said in a tone that brooked no argument.

  Mac had quickly decided he wasn’t going to question anything after he saw how hard the men worked. They used eight- or twenty-foot whips, cracking them above the steers’ heads to keep them together and moving. He had tried to crack one of the shorter whips and almost yanked his arm out of its socket.

  Night herd was the least desirable chore, so the men rotated the duty. Three days as drovers, three as wranglers, three as night guards. The wranglers provided him with helpers, those who weren’t tending the huge remuda of horses or taking care of the gear. He was four days into the drive before he found Rattler and had him take apart and oil his S&W.

  “Good pistol,” Rattler had said. The man was gaunt to the point of starvation, but Mac never saw anyone eat more chow than Rattler when they lined up for meals. He had deep, sunken eyes and hands so tiny they might have been a woman’s. But the strength in them belied any femininity. Rattler, like most of the cowboys, walked bowlegged from so many years in the saddle and still stood an inch taller than Mac.

  “It was my pa’s. He left it to me when he died.” Mac forced the memory away. His family had been loving, and both his ma and pa worked hard to raise him right, but he was on his own now with them six feet under in a cemetery in southern Missouri.

  “You any good with it? As a marksman?”

  “Can’t say that I am.” Mac hesitated to mention the time he had spent in front of a mirror, practicing his quick draw. He had fancied himself a gunman for a while, then realized he had no money to buy ammunition and actually learn to hit anything, even if he was lightning fast clearing leather.

  “You should get Flagg to give you some lessons. Never saw a man who shot straighter than him.”

  “Aren’t you better?”

  “Naw, all I do is tinker. You need something fixed, ask me. But I get the fantods thinking about facin’ down someone intent on killin’ me. This here hand would shake like a wet dog, yes, sir.” Rattler held out his hand. It was as steady as a rock.

  Rattler wandered away, leaving Mac with his freshly oiled revolver. Somehow, the gun fit better in his hand, and he felt more competent. That was crazy, he knew, but it was the truth. He took off the gun belt and stowed it away in his chuckwagon. There was always something to do, and he got to starting the hundreds of smaller chores that needed to be attended to before getting down to fixing another meal for the entire crew.

  As he worked, he heard loud voices, then the rush of men not tending the herd as they circled around.

  “String him up!” That cry built until most of the Rolling J cowboys were shouting it as they waved their fists in the air.

  “Settle down. Let me through. Get back.” Lem Carson pushed his way through.

  Curious, Mac went to the ring of men, shouldered his way forward, and saw three men in the middle. Carson stood between two other men, a hand on each hombre’s chest to push them apart. Mac recognized Deke Northrup, a hothead who had been in a couple of fights since they’d left Waco. From all he could tell, Northrup wasn’t good enough at his job for Carson to put up with such behavior, but he had a following with some of the others that made Mac scratch his head.

  “He tried to steal one of our longhorns.” Northrup shoved Carson’s hand off his chest, balled his fist, and started to punch the other cowboy.

  “You got some explaining to do, son,” Carson said sharply. “What were you doing sniffing around the Rolling J herd when you got stock of your own to tend to?”

  “I got turned around riding night herd,” the second cowboy said. He was young, and a little on the scrawny side. “I thought I saw a couple stragglers from the H Bar H herd mixed in with yours. I was wrong.”

  “Wrong?” Northrup sneered. “You’re not wrong, you’re lying. You’re a rustler looking to steal our cattle!”

  This time, when he pushed forward, he got past Carson and took a swing at the H Bar H cowboy. The punch missed by scant inches but provoked a response.

  The H Bar H wrangler lurched forward and grabbed Northrup. The two grappled, nothing much happening, until Carson grabbed them both and again separated them.

  “You head on back to your herd,” Carson ordered. “Tell Compass Jack to keep better track of his own cows.”

  “Ain’t the trail boss’s fault I got lost. And I wasn’t tryin’ to rustle your no-account animals. Why would I want to? Anybody figuring to eat a steak carved from one of them would choke on the gristle!”

  “Enough of that. Get out of here.” Carson shoved the cowboy away. With ill grace, he left, the ring of Rolling J hands parting for him.

  Deke Northrup stood there for a second, his face dark with anger, then suddenly he clawed his revolver out of its holster, evidently intent on shooting the H Bar H cowboy in the back anyway.

  “Look out!” Mac cried without thinking.

  Carson moved again, this time putting his own life in jeopardy. He stepped around swiftly, blocking the shot with his own body. Mac caught his breath when it looked as if Northrup would shoot anyway, not caring if he gunned down his own trail boss.

  “You up to pulling the trigger, Deke?” Carson spoke in a low voice, but every word cut Mac’s senses like a knife. “Put the smoke wagon away.”

  Northrup gritted his teeth. His hand trembled the slightest amount, but he finally relaxed and slipped the gun back into his holster.

  “Don’t cross me, Carson. Don’t ever do it again.”

  “I can say the same thing about you, Northrup. Don’t forget who’s in charge here and who’s only a cowboy riding herd.”

  Northrup grumbled and turned away, stomping off. Carson watched for a moment, then called, “The show’s over. Get on back to work, all of you. Do it now!”

  Mac had never seen the trail boss this angry. He looked fierce enough to chew nails and spit tacks. As the cowboys drifted away, Carson stormed off. With a deep sigh of relief that no one had died, Mac returned to his chuckwagon and the work ahead of him.

  As he prepared yet another meal of steaks and potatoes for the men, he tried to figure how much longer the potato supply would last. Eating on the first part of the drive proved to be high cuisine. He worried about the vegetables rotting in another week. Then he would have to find more by rooting around the countryside or going into nearby towns to buy more. Which worked best depended on how much money Carson would give him. Being such a tenderfoot forced him to depend on advice from others, and that made him look like he wasn’t doing his job.

  Above all else, Mac wanted to do his job well. Despite his early misgivings, he found he liked working as a cook. Without him, there wouldn’t be a trail drive or men willing to ride endless hours to move the herd north. So far, he hadn’t gotten any complaints about what he fixed. And José’s way of baking biscuits still kept the men smiling.

  “You want to learn to use that gun you lug around?”

  Mac jumped at the voice behind him. He had been lost in planning for the next meal.

  “Howdy, Flagg,” he said as he turned around. “You must have been talking with Rattler.”

  “Have.”

  “What will it take? To learn how to use the gun, I mean.”

  “You got a couple b
oxes of ammunition. I remember you agonizing over buying them back in Waco.”

  “Mr. Jefferson paid for them, true. I haven’t had any call to fire even one round, so it seems to me that I kinda did him out of the money.”

  “Learn to hit what you aim at,” Flagg said. “If it comes in handy later on, he’ll have gotten a bargain. You have a minute or two?”

  Mac saw that he did. The chores were endless, and they would wait for him. What he had on the fire cooking wouldn’t require anything more than occasional stirring on his part.

  “I can spare the time.”

  “We’ll start easy so all you’ll need is a loaded gun. Six rounds.” Flagg looked around the chuckwagon and picked up an empty tin can. He tossed it a few inches into the air, caught it, and then walked some distance from the cooking fires.

  Mac strapped on his gun belt and made sure the Smith & Wesson slid easily in the holster as he trailed Flagg outside the camp. For a second, he thought Flagg was going to toss the can high in the air and expect him to hit it on the fly. He had seen a traveling sideshow with a lady marksman able to do that very thing for hours on end, but it was beyond him and would only waste ammunition. Flagg made it easy on him, balancing the can on a stump.

  “Don’t jerk on the trigger,” Flagg said. He motioned for Mac to shoot the can and then backed off.

  “Should I draw and—”

  “You’ll blow a hole in your leg doing that. Be gentle. Take the gun from the holster. Point it at the target. Cock. Pull back real gentle on the trigger.”

  Mac felt a little put off by not practicing his quick draw, but he wanted to learn, and Flagg was the teacher. He drew, held the pistol at his side, then raised it slowly, cocked, and fired. When the can didn’t jump off the stump, drilled smack dab in the middle, he frowned and tried again. Once more he missed.

  “Sun’s in my eyes.”

  Flagg lifted his Colt and fired. The can flew into the air, reflecting sunlight as it spun. He never said a word when he retrieved the can and put it back in place.

  “Try again. You got four more tries to hit it, or at least scare it a little.”

  Mac held his temper down. Flagg insulted him. He held the six-gun level, aimed, and fired. The can teetered but did not fall over.

  “Closer. The air whistled past it. You’re turning your wrist before you fire.” Flagg came over to him, grabbed his arm, and held his hand straight. “That way.”

  Mac squeezed off another shot. The can flew sideways.

  “Still turning your wrist. Might try practicing with a splint to hold yourself in line. That’s enough for now.”

  “I’ve got one more shot,” Mac protested.

  “Save it for next time. We got to chow down and—” Flagg turned, lifting his head like a wolf sniffing the night breeze.

  Mac smelled nothing, but he felt the vibration coming up through the ground.

  “Is that an earthquake? I remember one back in Missouri.”

  “Stampede!” Flagg yelled. “We’ll need every hand to turn it. Get on a horse and get your ass out there!”

  Mac started to reply but found himself staring at thin air. Flagg had hightailed it faster than Mac had ever seen him move. He wasted no time, running after the cowboy for all he was worth.

  Mac got back to the chuckwagon in time to see Flagg galloping away. It took him a few minutes to saddle a horse from his team. The mare didn’t take kindly to this change in job, going from harness to saddle. Mac fought the animal at every stage.

  Then he realized the horse didn’t mind the saddle. It was frightened of the stampede. The ground now shook so hard the pots and pans hanging from hooks along the sides of the chuckwagon rattled.

  “Come on,” he told the horse when he finally got mounted. “We got work to do.”

  Mac galloped after Flagg, not sure what to do but certain he would understand once he reached the herd.

  He slowed the closer he came to the herd. The prairie had been covered with the longhorns as they walked along all peaceable-like. Now they kicked up a cloud of choking dust that obscured everything but the danger of being in their way as they mindlessly ran themselves into the ground.

  To his amazement, he saw the cowboys trying to get in front of the herd, using their whips to snap above the heads of the cattle in the lead, trying to turn their direction.

  It didn’t matter which way they moved the herd, as long as they forced them to turn. This caused the ones at the back and far edge to run extra distance. Tiring out the leaders was the goal, and the cowboys, with their whips, made it sound like a war had started. Then Mac realized he heard gunfire over the herd’s pounding hooves. Those without whips fired into the air to force the cattle away from their headlong plunge across the rolling land.

  Almost as quickly as it started, the stampede petered out, and within minutes, the two thousand head were milling about, looking for clumps of buffalo and grama grass to eat. He heard more than one cowboy cursing the stupid beasts. He had to agree. It almost made him afraid to eat one of the longhorns for fear he might swallow some of the stupid.

  He did what he could to get stragglers back into the main herd. That few minutes of effort convinced him the life of a cowboy wasn’t easy. A great deal of skill went into riding and herding.

  “You done good, Mac.” Rattler drew alongside, took off his hat, and used his bandana to wipe away sweat from his forehead. “Then again, if you hadn’t helped turn them damn fool critters, they’d have stomped your chuckwagon into the ground. That was the way they were headed.”

  “I never noticed.” Mac looked around and saw the cowboy was right. “What started them running?”

  “Who knows? They take it into their heads to run, they do. It only takes one to get spooked and the rest follow. Why, one time I—”

  “Wait. There’s a commotion over there.” Mac pointed to where a dozen of the cowboys had formed a circle. They were all looking at something on the ground.

  Rattler settled his hat onto his head and began swearing a blue streak. He wouldn’t tell Mac why but galloped toward the tight knot of drovers. Mac followed as fast as his horse would take him. His heart sank when he saw a man lying on his back, staring up at the sky.

  Lem Carson would never see another cloud or star again. He was stone dead.

  Flagg and Northrup knelt beside the fallen trail boss. They stood and faced off. Mac thought they were going to throw down on each other from the way they stood. He hit the ground and ran forward, ready to do what he could.

  “It was that son of a bitch from the H Bar H,” Northrup said. “It had to be. No other reason for the herd to stampede.”

  “Cows don’t need a reason,” Flagg said. “Did you see him?”

  “The H Bar H hand? Hell no, but I didn’t have to. He was trying to steal our cows before. When I caught him, he decided to take some revenge.” Northrup looked down at Carson’s body. “He was a damned fool to let the rustler get away scot-free like he did. We can take care of that, though, can’t we, men?”

  An angry cry went up. Several turned their horses in the direction of the H Bar H herd, maybe five miles distant.

  Suddenly, silence fell when a shot rang out. Mac jumped. Flagg had pulled his gun and fired into the air to get their attention.

  “Lem’s dead. Don’t go starting a range war for no good reason. He wouldn’t like it.”

  “He got killed in the stampede started by that H Bar H hand. We can’t let that go unpunished. Why, it’s nigh on murder!” Northrup started to mount, but Mac’s voice froze him in his tracks.

  “It may have been murder,” Mac said. “Carson’s got what looks to be a bullet hole in his head. He was tromped on by the longhorns, sure, but he might have been shot out of the saddle before they ran over him.”

  He knelt and rolled Lem Carson onto his face, then pointed to the tiny hole in the back of the trail boss’s skull. Blood and bone hid the wound until he pushed back enough hair to show it.

  “The bullet
went in here but never came out the front.”

  “That means it was fired from a long ways off,” Northrup said. “It must be them H Bar H punchers. They set up a sniper to shoot Carson and—”

  “Might have been shot close by with a small-caliber gun,” Flagg said. “What’s the caliber of that piece hanging on your hip, Northrup? I seem to remember you carrying a .24.”

  “It coulda been an accident,” another cowboy chimed in. “I was firing my six-shooter after I lost my whip in the stampede, and I can’t account for any of the rounds. I think they all went into the air, but I couldn’t swear to it. None of us can. Lem might have got unlucky where his head was at when a bullet came down.”

  “He might have been hit by any of us,” Mac said, seeing the logic in what was said. He had no love for Deke Northrup or the way the man acted, but even if the bullet in Carson’s head matched that from Northrup’s gun, that proved nothing. Flinging lead all around in the middle of a stampede meant some of it went where nobody intended. Northrup might have shot the trail boss, and it might have been accidental.

  What bothered Mac was the possibility that it hadn’t been an accident. Carson had humiliated Northrup when he had backed him down earlier over letting the H Bar H cowboy return to his herd.

  “Some of you, get a grave dug and plant Carson in it,” Northrup ordered. “We’ve got to bed down the herd for the night and—”

  “Who made you trail boss, Northrup?” Flagg stepped over Carson’s body and stopped a couple feet from the cowboy.

  “Nobody made you trail boss, either, Flagg.”

  “I’ve been with the Rolling J for three years. You just signed on.”

  “So working for Jefferson longer means you’re in charge? Hell no, it don’t. I know more about cattle than you can ever learn.”