Kill Crazy (2 page)

Chapter Two

Within three months of that unpromising beginning, Woodward, Martin, and Walker had begun working at Sky Meadow. On this day, almost two years after the three had been hired, they were working the south range of the ranch. They weren't herding—they were just making certain that the cattle, which had a tendency to wander about as they were grazing, stayed within the confines of the ranch. As they were riding up a long, low hill, they heard a cow bawling.

“Listen to that,” Woodward said.

“Listen to what? It ain't nothing but a bawlin' cow,” Martin replied.

“That ain't no ordinary bawlin'. That's a-scared bawlin',” Woodward insisted.

The three cowboys urged their horses into a rapid lope up the rest of the rise and, when they crested the ridge, saw that a pack of wolves had brought down one of the animals.

“The sons of bitches! Look at that!” Martin said. He pulled his rifle from the sheath.

“No,” Woodward said, holding his hand out to stop Martin. “You can't hit the wolves from here. We need to get closer.”

Thinking the newly killed cow would keep the attention of the wolves, the three men rode down the hill as fast as they dared across the uneven ground, hoping to close the distance so they could come within range of the wolves.

Just before they got into range though, the wolves sensed their presence and darted off.

“The bastards are getting away!” Martin said, angrily. Pulling his rifle, he began shooting, though the range was too great and the bullets did nothing but kick up little dust clouds where they hit. The wolves escaped easily.

Dismounting, the three cowboys walked over to the steer. It was lying on the ground now, still alive, even though the wolves had already begun to eat him. Too weak to make any sound, the animal looked up at the three men with big, brown, pain-filled eyes.

“Damn,” Woodward said. “Look at the poor bastard.”

Pulling his pistol, he shot the animal in the head, putting it out of its misery.

“This is the third one we've found like this,” Walker said.

“Yeah, well, now we know for sure what's causing it, 'cause we actual seen the wolves while they was doin' it,” Martin said.

Woodward chuckled. “What did you think was doin' it, Case? Prairie dogs, maybe?”

“No, but I thought it maybe could have been a cougar or somethin'.”

“Yeah, I guess it could have been. All right, come on, let's see if we can find them wolves before they get 'em another one.”

The three cowboys hunted the wolves for the next two hours, but without success.

“What do we do now?” Martin asked.

“We need to tell Elmer,” Woodward said.

“I ain't lookin' forward to tellin' him about a problem that we ain't took care of yet,” Walker said.

“I know what you mean, but it's got to be done.”

 

 

Back at the ranch, Elmer was supervising the half dozen or so men whose duties this day had not taken them out on the range. Cowboys—as Elmer explained patiently, almost patronizingly, anytime he hired a new hand—had to be jacks-of-all-trades.

“You got to be part carpenter so's you can keep the buildings up, and part wheelwright so as to keep the wagons repaired. You need to be some veterinarian too, so's you can take care of the animals, and even a little bit of a doctor to take care of wounds and such, seein' as we're so far from town that it ain't always that easy to get to a real doc.”

At the moment, a couple of the cowboys, Ben and Dale, had one of the ranch wagons jacked up with the left rear wheel off. They were packing the hubs with grease, a job that was so dirty and unpleasant that it was passed around among the men so that one person didn't have to do it all the time. Elmer approached the two men, carrying two glasses of lemonade.

“I thought you boys might like this,” he said, offering a glass to each of them.”

“A cold beer would have been better,” Ben said. “But this will certainly do. Thanks, Elmer.”

The two men wiped as much grease from their hands as they could before they took the glasses.

“How is it goin'?” Elmer asked.

“This here is the last wheel on the last wagon,” Ben replied. “What you got in mind for us after this?”

“I don't have nothin' more in particular for you, today. Why don't you boys just look around and see if you can find somethin' that you know needs doin'. If you do find something needs done, just go ahead and take care of it.”

“All right. Hey, Elmer, after we're done for the day, you don't mind if we run into town, do you? They say there's a new girl at Fiddler's Green,” Ben said.

“I don't mind, if all your work is done,” Elmer said. “New girl, huh?”

“Yeah, and they say she's really a looker,” Dale added.

“She'll just be one more way Biff has of getting money from you boys,” Elmer said. “By the way, have either of you seen Simon Reid?”

“Reid? Ain't he mucking stalls today?” Dale asked.

“He is supposed to be. But he ain't there.”

“He ain't? You mean he's left Earl to muck the stalls all by his ownself?”

“It sure looks like that,” Elmer said.

“I don't like to tell tales on others,” Dale said. “But if you got three men workin' and one loafin' on a job, you can bet the one loafin' will be Reid.”

“I tell you what,” Ben added. “If that son of a bitch ran out on me like he did to Earl, I'd near 'bout lay an axe handle up alongside his head next time me'n him seen each other.”

“And I'd hand you the axe handle,” Ben added.

“If you see him, tell him I'm lookin' for him,” Elmer said.

“Will do,” Dale promised.

Elmer left the two men, mumbling to himself as he started back toward the ranch office. The ranch office was a relatively new addition to the Sky Meadow compound, a small building that sat between the “big house,” as the cowboys called Duff MacCallister's residence, and the bunkhouse. Duff was in the office tallying the latest numbers, compiled from the count the cowboys gave him almost daily.

“Elmer, you're looking a bit peeved,” Duff said when Elmer came into the office and sat down at his own desk, with a disgusted sigh. “Would you be for tellin' me what has you in such a state?”

“It's Simon Reid, again,” Elmer replied. “That son of a bitch is as worthless as tits on a bull. I thought I was a better judge of men than that. I shoulda known from the time I hired him that he wasn't worth a cup of warm piss.”

Duff laughed. “Elmer, 'tis no one I know with a more colorful grasp of the English language than you. Sure 'n' sometimes I wonder if 'tis English at all that you speak.”

“Damn it all to hell, Duff, I'm tryin' not to cuss, I really am. But Reid absolutely makes my ass knit barbed wire.”

Duff laughed again. “Och, mon, now your language has gone from colorful to incomprehensible. How does one's arse knit barbed wire? Never mind, I know the answer to my own question. One's arse would knit barbed wire very painfully.”

At that moment there was a knock on the door.

“Maybe that's Reid,” Elmer said, getting up to answer the door.

It was Woodward, Martin, and Walker.

“We need to talk,” Woodward said.

“Duff is cipherin' an' such. Let's talk outside, so's not to disturb him,” Elmer responded, stepping out of the office, then shutting the door behind him.

“We've got problems, Elmer,” Woodward said. “Big problems.”

“What kind of problems?”

“Losing-beeves kind of problems,” Woodward said. “We found three of 'em down half eaten.”

“Half eaten?” Elmer replied, confused by the comment.

“By wolves,” Walker added.

“You're sure it's wolves?”

“Yeah, hell, they was still workin' on one of the beeves when we seen them,” Woodward said. “Five of the critters they was.”

“Why didn't you shoot 'em?”

“We tried to shoot 'em, but we can't get close enough to the bastards to hit 'em,” Martin said.

“They're too damn smart. They either see us or hear us or somethin'. But we can't get no closer 'n about two or three hunnert yards from 'em before they start runnin'. And you can't hit no wolf from three hunnert yards away. Hell, you can barely see the sons of bitches from that far,” Walker said.

“The bastards started eatin' on that last poor critter even before it died. We had to put it out of its misery,” Woodward said.

“Good, that was the right thing to do,” Elmer said. He sighed. “All right, thanks for tellin' me about it. I'll let Duff know.”

“I agree, Duff needs to know,” Woodward said. “But for the life of me, I don't know what he will be able to do about it.”

“This is Duff MacCallister we're talking about, remember?”

Woodward laughed. “Yeah,” he said. “Now that I think about it, I have no doubt but that he will take care of it.”

“Listen, you boys haven't seen Simon Reid, have you?”

“Reid? No, not since this mornin',” Woodward said. “Didn't you toll him out for workin' in the barn today?”

“Yeah, I did. But he ain't there, and accordin' to Earl, he ain't seen hide nor hair of him since just after lunch.”

 

 

As Elmer, Woodward, Martin, and Walker were having their impromptu conference, Simon Reid, the subject of their conversation and the man who had been the cause of Elmer's earlier agitation, was having a business meeting with three men. The meeting was being conducted five miles away from the ranch compound. It was at the extreme west end of Sky Meadow, and its remote location was by design, for the business at hand was cattle rustling. The cattle being rustled belonged to Duff MacCallister.

“As you can see, I've cut out ten of 'em,” Reid said, referring to the cattle that stood stoically nearby. “They're Black Angus, which is the finest and most expensive cow in the country. Do you have any idea how much these here cows is bringin' at the Kansas market?”

The three men Reid was making his pitch to weren't Sky Meadow cowboys. They weren't even local men. Creech, Phelps, and a third who called himself Kid Dingo, were from Bordeaux, a town that lay twelve miles north of Chugwater.

When none of the three answered him, Reid continued his pitch. “Right now, these cows, at the Kansas City market, is bringin' forty dollars a head.”

“Yeah, well that's interestin' an' all, but you may have noticed that we ain't exactly the Kansas market,” Creech replied.

“And I ain't askin' for no forty dollars, neither,” Reid said. “I'm just tellin' you that so's that you know what a good deal I'm givin' you. I'm only askin' twenty dollars a head.”

“We'll give you five dollars.”

“Five dollars?” Reid replied, reacting sharply in response to the low offer. “What do you mean, five dollars? Come on, Creech, are you out of your mind? I'm takin' a hell of a risk by sellin' these cows to you in the first place. I stole these here cows from Duff MacCallister's herd, and if you don't know much about him, well, let me tell you, he ain't somebody you cross. Besides which, I know you're goin' to get at least thirty dollars a head for 'em, when you get 'em back to Bordeaux.”

“What we sell 'em for ain't no concern of your'n,” Phelps said.

“Come on, fellers, me 'n' you've know'd each other a long time,” Reid said, continuing to plead his case. “You ain't got no call to try and cheat me like that.”

Creech, Phelps, and Kid Dingo moved away a few feet so they could talk privately. They consulted for a moment; then, nodding, Creech turned back to Reid.

“All right, we'll give you ten dollars a head for 'em, but that is as high as we are goin' to go. That's a hunnert dollars for you, and we'll take it from here. All you got to do is put the money in your pocket and ride away,” Creech said.

“A hunnert dollars,” Phelps added, with a smile. “Think of the whiskey and the whores you can buy with a hunnert dollars.”

“All right,” Reid said. “Give me the hunnert dollars and the cows is yours.”

The transaction made, Reid pocketed the money and started back toward the barn. He was supposed to be mucking out the stalls. That was a job he hated, but he smiled as he thought of the one hundred dollars riding in his pocket right now. Having that much money would make the job bearable.

Chapter Three

At the butte where Woodward and the others had told him they had seen the wolves, Duff MacCallister reined up his horse, Sky, then sat in the saddle for a moment as he perused the range before him. Except for roundup, and cattle drives, such as when he would drive a herd down to the loading pens and rail head in Cheyenne, the cattle were never in one, large herd. Rather, they tended to break off into smaller groups, bound to each other within those groups as if they were family units.

Duff saw one such group now, gathered near the water and standing together under the shade of a cottonwood tree.

With a pair of binoculars hanging around his neck, Duff dismounted, then walked out onto a flat rock overhang. Lifting the binoculars to his eyes, he studied the open range below him. That was when he spotted them—at least eight wolves, sneaking up on the cattle.

Duff walked back to his horse, then pulled a Remington Creedmoor rifle from his saddle sheath. The rifle, a recent purchase, had been developed especially for the Creedmoor Marksmanship Club. It had a well-deserved reputation for accuracy, featuring a telescopic sight as well as a device that would allow the shooter to compensate for range and wind.

Woodward had reported that when anyone tried to get close enough to the wolves to shoot them, the crafty creatures would see, smell, or hear them, then dart quickly out of the way. That meant that the only way the wolves could be eliminated was if someone could shoot them from a standoff position that was so far away that the wolves would not even realize they were in danger.

Such a feat would take a rifle with extreme range, as well as a marksman who was skilled enough to take advantage of that superior range. The scoped Creedmoor was that rifle, and Duff MacCallister was that marksman.

Lying down on his stomach, Duff took up a prone firing position on the rock. He cranked in the range, then picked up a few grains of grass and dropped them to estimate the windage. That done, he sighted in on the wolves. The wolves were at least five hundred yards away, so distant that without the magnification of the scope, they could barely be seen.

Because of the great distance, the wolves were totally unaware of Duff's presence. They approached their prey with the extreme confidence of predators who knew that, collectively, they were superior to any creature that might be near.

But Duff was not near, and they were not superior to him.

Duff squeezed the trigger; the gun boomed and kicked back against his shoulder. One and a half seconds later, the lead wolf was sent sprawling by the impact of the heavy bullet. A tenth of a second after the strike of the bullet, the sound of the shot reached the remaining pack, but it came from so far away that they were unable to connect that sound to what had happened to the leader of the pack.

A second shot killed a second wolf, and within less than a minute, Duff had killed every one of them. His work done, he picked up the remaining shells, returned to his horse, replaced the rifle in its boot, mounted Sky, and started back home.

 

 

When Duff returned to the compound, he could hear the blacksmith's hammer ringing, and outside the machine shed, he saw Ben and Dale painting a wagon. He could also hear his foreman's voice coming from the barn. The voice was loud and angry, and Duff heard Reid's name being spoken.

“I gather Elmer has found the errant Mr. Reid,” Duff said to the two men who were painting.

“It ain't as much Elmer findin' him as it is Reid just come ridin' back in without so much as a by-your-leave,” Ben said.

“He told Elmer he thought he was finished with the work he was give to do,” Dale added.

“And Elmer took issue with that, did he?”

“Yes sir, he sure did, an' ol' Elmer's been givin' Reid hell ever since.”

 

 

“Keep the damn stalls clean!” Elmer's voice said loudly. “You wouldn't want to be sleeping ankle deep in horse shit, would you?”

“They're horses,” a voice replied. “This is only natural for them. Horses is supposed to live in shit.”

“It ain't natural at all,” Elmer said. “If we was doin' things natural, the horses wouldn't be in stalls in the first place. They'd all be runnin' free. We're the ones that's got 'em all cooped up, so the least we can do is give 'em a clean place to be. Now get it done.”

“I didn't sign on to clean horse shit out of a stall,” Reid said. “You want the shit cleaned, you clean it yourself.”

“I've had about enough of you, Mr. Reid,” Elmer said. “You've been slacking off way too much here, lately. You lollygagged around all mornin' long, and after lunch you wasn't nowhere to be found. You left Earl to do the work all by himself.”

“I told Earl where I was goin'. Yesterday, my rain slicker fell offen' my saddle, and I went back to look for it. Then, while I was lookin' for it, I seen some cows drifting off the ranch. I figured savin' them cows was more important than cleanin' up horse shit.”

“Did you now? Well, here is the thing, Reid, how do I know you was actually roundin' up wanderin'-away strays? Or even lookin' for your rain slicker for that matter? I mean, you lied about greasing the wheel on the hay wagon last week, and because it didn't get no grease, the axle got so wore down that it's out of round and we're goin' to have to put on another one.”

“Then why don't you have me doin' somethin' important like that, instead of shovelin' shit out of a stall?”

“I tell you what, Reid. You don't have to worry about cleaning out no more shit because you ain't a-goin' to be working here no more. Get your tack and get out of here. You're fired.”

“You can't fire me, old man. The only one who can fire me is the man that owns this place.”

Duff had been just outside, listening in on the discussion, and he chose that moment to walk in to the barn.

“That is where you are wrong, Mr. Reid,” Duff said. “Elmer Gleason is the executive administrator of this operation, and as such, has full authority to fire anyone he deems needing fired.”

“He's the what?” Reid asked.

“I'm the ramrod,” Elmer said. “Now, get.”

“Someday you are going to regret this,” Reid said.

“That wouldn't be a threat now, would it, Reid?” Elmer asked. “Because if it is, well, by God, me 'n' you can just settle this out here and now.”

“I'll leave, but I ain't goin' nowhere without drawin' my pay,” Reid said.

“How much are you owed?” Duff asked.

“I'm drawin' forty dollars a month.”

“Reid, you do know that Mr. MacCallister is payin' more than any other rancher in the valley, don't you? Most anyone else is paying is thirty dollars and found.”

“Here's twenty dollars,” Duff said.

“You're bein' awful generous, Mr. MacCallister,” Elmer said. “The most we owe him right now is ten dollars, and we don't even have to settle up with him for that until the end of the month. “

“If I am for understanding the way you feel about him, Elmer, the more distant he is from Sky Meadow, the better things will be.”

“I guess that's true, all right.

Duff smiled. “Then let's just say he can get farther away on twenty dollars than he can on ten.”

Reid took the twenty-dollar bill, then glared for a moment at both Elmer and Duff.

“You got your money, Reid. Now get,” Elmer ordered.

Reid walked outside where his horse, still saddled, stood tied to a hitching rail.

About half the cowboys employed by Duff owned their own horses, while half rode horses that belonged to Sky Meadow. Reid was one of the cowboys who owned his own horse, and from the very first day that had given him an attitude of superiority over those who did not. Now, as he rode away from the compound, a few of the other cowboys turned out to watch him leave.

Reid's air of superiority and his lack of cooperation with the others who worked on the ranch, as well as his general laziness, had not engendered strong friendships. As a result, those who had turned out to watch him leave did so with a sense of satisfaction that he was gone. A few even called insults out to him.

“Ha! I'll bet this here is the first time anyone ever seen a bag o' shit ridin' a horse before,” one of the cowboys called.

“Look there, boys. That's somethin' you don't see all that often,” another said. “Two horse's asses at the same time, one at the horse rear end, and the other sittin' in the horse's saddle.”

There were other insults and derisive comments shouted until Reid, who urged his horse into a gallop, moved out of range.

“It looks as if your decision to fire Mr. Reid is being well received by the others,” Duff said.

“It looks like it, don't it?” Elmer replied. “It turns out there didn't nobody like the son of a bitch. So tell me, Duff, did you see any wolves?” he asked.

“Aye, eight of the creatures I saw,” Duff said.

“Good. I'll get someone out there to bury them.”

“Sure now, 'n' how is it that you know I killed them?” Duff asked.

“How do I know? Because you seen 'em, that's how I know. You ain't a' goin' to tell me they run off now, are you?”

“They're dead,” Duff said.

“Uh-huh. Like I said, I'll get someone out there to bury 'em. If we leave 'em to lay around and rot, next thing you know the water could get bad.”

“I'm going into town this afternoon to check the mail and collect a few items at the store,” Duff said. “Would you be for wanting me to pick something up for you?”

“Better get some coffee,” Elmer said. “You bein' an Englishman, you always remember tea, but don't always remember coffee.”

“Och, 'tis a Scotsman I am, and nae an Englishman,” Duff corrected. He smiled. “Sure now, and have you nae corrected me anytime I refer to you as a Yank?”

“Lord, no, don't do that,” Elmer said with a wince. “You know damn well I ain't no Yankee.”

“Aye, I know well, Elmer Gleason. 'Tis a pair of rebels we both be, but in differing ways.”

 

 

When Elmer walked back out to the barn, he saw the wagons painted and glistening, with the wheels greased and reattached.

“Good job, men,” he said.

“Al, Case, and Brax are goin' into town. Since all the work you give us to do is done, can we have the rest of the afternoon off to go into town with them?”

“I reckon so,” Elmer said.

Ben smiled, broadly. “Come on, Dale. Let's get washed up some.”

 

 

Ben, Dale, Woodward, Martin, and Walker lived in the bunkhouse. Long and relatively narrow, the bunkhouse was one of several buildings that now occupied the compound. It had seven beds on either side. Each individual bed, and the area immediately around it, became the personal domain of the cowboy who slept there, his space as inviolate as if it were his home. And, in fact, it was his home.

The cowboys used different forms of expression to personalize their “homes,” which not only established them as their private areas, but gave them a sense of belonging and identity.

Dale had a picture of a fancy saddle that he had cut from a Sears and Roebuck catalogue pinned to the wall above his bed. Ben had a blue ribbon he had won in a foot race in Cheyenne the year before. There were other pictures and bits of memorabilia tacked to the wall above other bunks, from a calendar featuring a picture of a passenger train roaring through the night, to more than one “lucky” horseshoe.

Ben and Dale filled a number-two washtub with water, then flipped a coin to see who got to use the water first.

Ben won the coin toss and was now sitting in the tub in the middle of the floor, scrubbing his back with a long-handled brush.

“Dale, you ever been to a big city?” Ben asked.

“I been to Cheyenne.”

“No, I mean a big city, like maybe Denver, or San Francisco, or St. Louis, or someplace like that.”

“Well, I was borned in St. Louis, but I don't remember it.”

“I ain't never been to no big city either, but I'd dearly love to go someday.”

“Why?”

“I've heard tell that in San Francisco they got a whore standin' on near 'bout ever' corner.”

“They got whores in Chugwater.”

“Yeah, but most of the whores in Chugwater are so ugly they'd make a train take five miles of dirt road. The ones in the city is all real pretty, and 'cause they got so many, it don't cost you hardly nothin' at all to go to bed with 'em.”

“Maybe someday me 'n' you can go to San Francisco,” Dale suggested.

Ben climbed out of the tub then and started toward his bunk.

“The water is all your'n now,” he said.

Dale walked over to look down into the tub. “What water?” he asked. “Looks to me like I'm about to climb into one of them bog holes we sometimes got to pull the cows out of.”