The Wild One (9 page)

“Nothing,” Sam said. “When I get restless and can't sleep, I go out and listen to the coyotes, watch the horses in the pasture, and—” Sam told the truth. “I've seen some wild horses at the river.”

Gram still looked skeptical.

“What did you
think
I was doing?”

“Never mind. Sorry I've been such a scold. I do that when I'm worried.” Gram kissed Sam's cheek as Jake honked the truck horn outside. “You run along now, and have a good time.”

Sam bolted out the front door and nearly collided with Dad.

“Gram talk to you?” Dad nodded toward the kitchen.

“Yes,” Sam said. “But I don't know what about.”

Dad gazed toward the river, looking embarrassed. “She thought you and Jake might be up to something.”

“Jake,” Sam said, slowly, “and me?” A blush heated her cheeks.
“Jake and me?”

Why would Gram think she was sneaking out to meet Jake? Jake was like a brother. Almost.

“Guess she was way off base.” Dad pulled at his hat brim.

“I was looking at the horses, Dad. It's the horses I missed while I was in San Francisco.”

Dad smiled and opened the truck door. “It'll be a tight squeeze, but the three of us can fit. Slide on in,” he said, indicating she'd be sandwiched between him and Jake in the truck cab. “And hang on tight.”

 

Jake wasn't a bad driver, but the road to the Willow Springs Wild Horse Center made Sam appreciate her seat belt. The road's surface was like rock-hard corduroy and her teeth hammered together as they swooped through the high desert.

“Dad,” Sam said, suddenly. “I forgot to ask Gram to give Buddy her bottle.”

“I'm sure she'll think of it when that calf starts bawling.” Dad must have thought she looked worried, because he added, “Gram's working out in her vegetable garden. That's not far from the barn. I think she'll hear Buddy just fine.”

“Yeah.” Sam bit her bottom lip. She didn't tell Dad she'd put Buddy out into the pasture, but since it was only a few yards farther from the garden, it probably wouldn't matter.

Suddenly the road slanted uphill.

“This next part's called Thread the Needle. We're almost there.” Jake slowed slightly as the road narrowed, leaving just enough room for the truck as steep cliffs fell away on each side.

“Look hard and you'll see River Bend.” Jake took a hand from the steering wheel to gesture down the cliff.

Sam didn't enjoy looking down, but she saw the river, glinting silver-blue in the distance. Between here and there, a maze of trails marked the steep hillside.

“Antelope paths,” Dad said, his finger showing how they zigzagged through sagebrush and rocks.

Then the road slanted downhill and the Willow Springs Center was spread before them. To Sam, it looked like a patchwork quilt with pipe fencing for stitching.

Sam's stomach tightened as they drove slowly past the pens. On her right horses moved away from the fences. On her left stood an office building and a parking lot for three white trucks with “U.S. Government” stenciled on their doors. Ahead, horses waited as a huge bearded man broke open bales of hay.

Why did she feel nervous, when everything seemed normal? The pens looked clean. The horses weren't crowded. A hill in each corral insured rain would run off before the mustangs stood in deep mud. Nothing was wrong.

Sam noticed two mares standing head-to-tail, eyes half closed as their tails swished flies from each others' faces. Then she recognized what was wrong. These “wild” horses looked tame.

A door slammed and a trim red-haired woman in a crisp khaki uniform left the office building.

“Hey,” she called to a bespectacled man standing at a corral with a clipboard. “We have thirty head
coming in from the Calico Range.”

“Ready,” he answered, gesturing toward three empty corrals.

Sam heard Jake draw a breath. Clearly he'd listened, too. Something the two BLM officials had said surprised him.

“What is it?” Sam asked.

Jake lifted one shoulder in a shrug.

“Since our cattle drive ran right along the Calico Mountains,” Dad said, “I suppose he's thinking the wild band you two saw has been trapped. Is that it, Jake?”

Sam's mind swarmed with images of the Phantom running across the range, with Slocum in pursuit.

“Could be,” Jake said, but before he went on, the red-haired woman interrupted.

“Hello,” she said. “Are you thinking about adopting a wild horse?”

Now that the woman stood closer, Sam saw her name tag read “B. Olson.” She had freckles. The sun lines around her blue eyes said she spent more time outside than in the beige office building.

“Just looking,” Dad said.

The woman glanced away to take in the truck's Nevada license plates.

“We don't get many adoptions from local people,” said B. Olson.

“We have a fair number of mustangs running on our ranch,” Dad explained.

The redhead picked up on Dad's apologetic tone. “Have a look around,” she invited, pointing out which corrals held mares, foals, and stallions. “And if you have any questions about the animals, just ask.”

“Are they all
wild
horses?” Sam blurted.

Dad and the BLM woman looked puzzled.

“Yes, BLM is only charged with protecting free-roaming horses and burros.” The redhead spoke slowly, as if she didn't want to mention Sam wasn't too smart.

Sam felt embarrassed, but she needed a plan before explaining her question.

At the risk of sounding even dumber, she asked another question. “What if a horse was free-roaming but not a mustang?”

“Like a domestic animal turned free?”

“Or one that escaped,” Sam said.

The woman nodded, catching on. “We look for signs of domestication. Marks from the nose band of a halter, maybe.” She sounded so proper, it surprised Sam when the woman rubbed the bridge of her own nose. “And we have a brand inspector with us when we capture horses. Branded animals are declared ‘estray.' A second brand inspector checks horses before they're adopted, too, just to be sure.”

Sam pretended to study a sorrel mare with white socks, but she was thinking,
The Phantom may not have a brand, but he's mine.

“And if there isn't a brand?” Sam heard Dad's
boots shift as he listened.

“No lip tattoo or ear crop, either?” the woman asked, and Sam nodded. “The person claiming the animal might supply registration papers if the horse were a purebred—or convincing photographs.”

Sam's spirits soared, then crashed. She had a photograph taken when her colt was eighteen months old, but she wouldn't call it convincing. In that picture, his coat was coal black.

“What about a scar?” Jake asked. Sam knew he'd remembered the mark from Slocum's rope. “Could someone get a horse back by explaining a scar?”

“Not a chance.” The woman brushed away the suggestion as if it were a pesky fly. “Anyone could tell a story about a scar.” She peered past the three of them toward the road, then turned to Dad. “You must be missing a horse.”

“Not a one.” Dad didn't give Sam a stern look, but she heard displeasure in his voice.

Miss Olson shrugged, then glanced toward an approaching cloud of dust. “That rumbling means it's time to return to work. This drought's caused us a couple of emergency gathers. If you'll excuse me.”

Sam watched the woman go. Sam didn't trust her formality and she didn't like the way Miss Olson kept referring to horses as “animals.” Even though they were.

As everyone turned to see the approaching vehicles, Sam noticed a cowboy who looked familiar. Not
the bearded man she'd started thinking of as Bale Tosser, nor the clipboard man, but another man. His long, drooping mustache reminded her of someone, but she couldn't recall whom.

A huge truck labored up the road, but another truck, smaller than the other one and pulling a roomy gooseneck horse trailer, came first. Miss Olson started to walk away, then paused.

“The stallions are in the gooseneck,” she said. “The mares are in the semi. You might enjoy watching us unload.”

Dad glanced at Sam. She nodded, though something told her it wouldn't be fun.

The smaller truck backed the gooseneck trailer into position for a loading chute. Sam heard horses shifting, stamping, snorting. The stallions demanded release.

Men in cowboy hats checked the chute, tested gates, and unlocked latches. A few held long flexible whips with pieces of paper attached to the tips, probably to hurry the horses along. If they ever emerged.

Sam didn't know whether she longed for their appearance or dreaded it. Especially when she squinted at the horses jostling inside the trailer.

Like most horses, mustangs were usually bays and sorrels, but through the side of the trailer, Sam saw one creamy horse.

Miss Olson joined the man with the clipboard. They stood where they could see each horse appear.

It took forever for the trailer door to swing open. A neigh echoed. Hooves stumbled. More whinnies were followed by the snapping of teeth.

One horse slammed against the side of the trailer. When he tossed his head in distress, Sam saw it was the pale mustang.

Please not the Phantom, please.

Sam hadn't spoken aloud, but she realized her fingers were clenched in fists when Jake grabbed one of them. He unfolded her hand, gave it a squeeze, and held it, as the first stallion bolted out of the trailer and into the sunlight.

T
HE FIRST STALLION
was the color of orange sherbet mixed with whipped cream.

He was not the Phantom. Not even a gray. Sam sighed as if a metal band had been cut from around her chest.

The stallion had the thick neck of a mature horse, but he stood only a little taller than a pony. His long forelock swept back from his eyes as he charged into the empty corral. Then he trotted along the fence line, anxious for the company of other horses.

When he was joined by a leggy bay, taller but younger, they circled the pen together, forming a herd of two.

With all eight stallions penned, the truck full of mares began unloading into a larger corral.

The stallions seemed to ignore them, until the bay veered too close to the side of the pen nearest the mares. At once, the cream-colored stallion charged,
reared, and came down to give the bay a savage bite on the crest.

Surprised and hurt, the bay fled to the opposite side of the corral. He stood trembling among the other stallions, while the pony-sized bully held his ground.

“It happens once in a while.” Miss Olson stood next to them again. “But not often. Sometimes there's one horse just itching to prove he's in charge.”

“Just like people,” Jake said.

Sam thought of Slocum.

“Precisely,” said the woman. Then she glanced at Sam. “We've got a vet who'll check that bite.”

Sam held her breath. Miss Olson must have noticed Sam looked worried, but she couldn't know why—Sam was imagining a fight between the cream stallion and the Phantom. She had a feeling it wouldn't end so quickly or quietly.

The Phantom was used to surviving in the wild and fending for himself. In a place like this, challenged by other stallions, surrounded by fences and unfamiliar humans, he might believe he was fighting for his life.

Sam ducked her head a little, hoping to hide her eyes. It didn't matter, because Miss Olson's attention had moved on.

“Don't all those horses, loaded with potential, make you want to go on a shopping spree?” Miss Olson asked and Sam realized she was trying to sell Dad a horse.

“Not hardly,” Dad said, but he looked amused.

“What about that black mare with white socks?” Miss Olson turned toward Sam and Jake. “Don't you kids think she'd be just right for your mom?”

Their voices overlapped, in response.

“He's not my dad,” Jake corrected.

“My mom's dead,” Sam said.

“I'm sorry,” the woman said. She took a while to put together an explanation. “A man with two teenagers—” she began.

“Understandable,” Dad said, but Sam thought he let the woman off the hook too quickly.

Sam couldn't believe Miss Olson didn't just slink off to her office. She didn't. She hadn't finished trying to find homes for the horses. Next, she sized up Jake.

“That buckskin filly is quick as a cat. I bet you could school her into a fine cutting horse.”

Jake shook his head and the woman sighed.

“If I didn't have two mustangs and a wild burro already, I'd take her home with me.”

Sam considered the woman's freshly pressed uniform and short, scrubbed fingernails. Sam couldn't imagine her working in a dirt corral with dust settling on her perfect French braid.

Dad squinted toward the corral, not the woman. When he nodded, Sam considered the horses again.

The buckskin had clean lines, a sloping shoulder for smooth gaits, and she wanted to belong. Separated from other mustangs, she might allow a human
to substitute for her herd.

Grudgingly, Sam admitted to herself that Miss Olson had some horse sense. And she was trying to get these mustangs out of their pen and into real homes.

Sam scanned the newly arrived mares. If she were going to pick one for her own…

Then she caught herself. She had a horse. Besides, she didn't approve of the BLM. Wild horses should be running free.

Dad looked restless. Sam checked her watch and found they'd left home nearly two hours ago. Dad never spent this much time just hanging around.

“Best be going,” Dad said. “Sam, Jake,” he nodded toward the truck.

“Before you leave, I should introduce myself.” The redhead extended her hand. “I'm Brynna Olson, director of the Willow Springs facility. Bring a horse trailer, next time you visit, Mr.—”

“Wyatt Forster,” Dad said. As he shook the redhead's hand, Sam thought his tone was too friendly for a man who criticized the BLM so often.

Miss Olson leaned toward Sam. “Call me if you have more questions.” Her voice dropped, as if the two of them might conspire against Dad. “Willow Springs is in the phone book under ‘U.S. Government.'”

Back at the truck, Dad held the door so Sam could slide inside. As she climbed up, Sam saw Dad
look back toward the corrals. Something told her he wasn't picking out a mustang.

“She only mentioned ‘our mother' to find out if you were married.” Sam couldn't believe the sneering voice was her own.

Still, she knew she was right. And even though Mom had been dead for eight years, she didn't like strangers bringing it up.

Dad's face turned crimson, and his expression looked more angry than embarrassed. Dad didn't speak to her, though; he just looked across the truck cab at Jake and said, “I'll drive.”

Jake glared at Sam as if it were her fault he'd been demoted to the position of passenger. Once inside, he leaned against the door, as far from her as possible.

As they rattled along the road back to the ranch, Sam felt ashamed. If Brynna Olson
had
been flirting with her dad, why should she care?

Sam looked sideways at him. Dad's amused expression had turned into a frown. His hands gripped the steering wheel, hard, and his hat brim cast his face in shadow. He didn't look her way, even when Sam sucked in her breath as they drove through the narrow, dangerous pass Jake called Thread the Needle.

She glanced to her right. Jake wouldn't meet her eyes, either. He had one arm on the open window, and his face leaned into the wind.

As soon as the truck reached pavement and they picked up speed, Dad let her know he hadn't liked her remark.

“It wasn't a museum or a movie, but I thought you'd get a kick out of those horses,” he said.

“I did.”

She sure hadn't acted like it, his silence told her.

Sam knew she owed Dad an explanation. Just because she felt worried and confused over the Phantom, she didn't have to drag Dad down with her.

She thought of the quicksand. That afternoon, she'd acted like an adult. She'd given Dad a reason to be proud of her. It was time to do it again.

“Please pull over, Dad,” she said. “We need to talk.”

 

Sam told Dad and Jake everything. She listed each time the stallion had come to her and described the way he'd acted. She revealed everything except the hidden valley of wild horses and the Phantom's secret name. By the time Sam finished, even Dad suspected she was right.

“So you think it's Blackie,” Dad said.

“It has to be.”

“Jake, you've had a look.” Dad stared past Sam to Jake. “What do you think?”

Jake looked uneasy with the burden of Dad's trust.

“Couldn't say, based on the look I got. But if even
half of what Sam says is true, I'd bet my college fund on it.”

“Are you exaggerating?” Dad asked.

Sam thought hard. “I can't read his mind or be sure he recognizes me, but he's come to the river twice. And I saw him two times on the cattle drive.” She remembered the magical night ride with Ace and the Phantom racing side by side. “Once, he was almost close enough to touch.”

“At the ranch and out there, it was the same horse,” Dad said. “You're sure?”

“The same exact horse,” Sam insisted. “Silver-white with gray dapples and a scar on his neck.”

“I rarely see mustangs. Once in a while around the water hole, and then I run 'em off,” Dad mused.

Sam felt startled, until she reminded herself that Dad might like wild horses, but he was a cattleman first. Every meal on the table and tank of gas in the truck depended on fat, healthy cattle. River Bend would die without them.

“If you've seen the same horse four times in a couple weeks,” Dad continued, “that's just too often to be chance.”

They all sat quietly. The smell of hot sage blew in the truck window. A meadow lark caroled liquid notes. A minivan from Vancouver rushed by and a crow jabbered as it hunted among weeds at the roadside.

“And there's not a darn thing we can do to get him back,” Dad said.

“Not according to Miss Olson, but maybe some BLM hotshot could help,” Jake suggested. “Do you know anyone, Wyatt?”

“Never had much use for the BLM,” Dad said, then threw Sam a guilty look. “They're all just doing their jobs, but they make it tough to keep doing mine.”

“I don't want him back,” Sam blurted.

“What?” The word erupted from both Dad and Jake.

Sam had even surprised herself. She'd never thought it through, this far. But suddenly, Sam knew it was true.

“That's right,” she said. “I don't want to tame him. I've got Ace to ride. I had a chance to make Blackie mine and I blew it. Now, he's learned to be free.”

Sam smiled at Dad, too worried about sounding sappy to wonder why Jake's eyes closed as if she'd socked him in the stomach.

“You want him to stay on the range,” Dad said.

“Unless Slocum—”

“Call him
Mr.
Slocum,” Dad said. “Or
Linc
Slocum, at least.”

Sam couldn't believe it. Just when she got to thinking how cool Dad was, he reverted to some code of the Old West. On this issue, she could not go along with him.

“Slocum doesn't deserve my respect,” Sam insisted. Then, in spite of the confinement of the
truck cab, she folded her arms.

Dad prepared to wait her out. His eyes stayed steady and Sam folded her arms even tighter.

Not for a second did she wonder which of them would win the stare-off. They might be equally stubborn, but she was
right
.

She would have outlasted Dad if Slocum's flashy tan Cadillac hadn't appeared just ahead. Honking a long blast, it swerved across the street's white center line and stopped beside Dad's truck.

Western music thumped from the car, even though the windows were closed. Then the driver's window slid down, releasing a blast of air-conditioning into the high desert heat.

Linc Slocum's slicked-back hair and toothpaste-commercial grin reminded Sam of the day she'd met him on her arrival home. This time he wore mirrored sunglasses and held a cigarette in one hand.

“Been up to Willow Springs?” He shouted over the music, instead of turning it down, and he didn't wait for an answer. “Find any range rats worth the drive?”

Range rats.
Oh, sure. If that's what Slocum thought of wild horses, why had he spent two days chasing the Phantom?

Sam glanced out the truck's back window. Black asphalt stretched off to a heat-wavering horizon. They'd come a long way since they turned off the dirt road from Thread the Needle and the BLM corrals.
How could Slocum know where they'd been?

“'Fraid we're coming home empty-handed,” Dad said. “Just wanted to show Samantha what the government's built since she's been gone.”

“There's nothing up there I want,” Slocum said. “Even if they bring that white stud in—”

“Gray,”
Sam muttered to Jake.

“—I'm not sure I'd buy him. Although,” Slocum took off his glasses and settled back in his seat, “there might be some Quarter blood in him. And maybe some Arab.”

Sam felt a pang of surprise. Slocum was right. Blackie's sire, Smoke, had been a full-blooded mustang with the build of a Quarter horse. His mother Princess Kitty had been a racing Quarter horse, but she'd had the fine-boned head of an Arab. Somehow, she hadn't expected Slocum to know that much about horses.

Even though Smoke had been Dad's horse, even though he knew Slocum was right, Dad didn't encourage the man's speculation.

“Hard to say.” Dad's response sounded like a dismissal, but as he started the truck's engine, Slocum kept talking.

“Not that I'd put him to my registered mares,” Slocum mused.

Dad shifted uncomfortably.

“Still, he'd be good for breeding cow ponies. Those mustangs have good hard hooves, don't they?”

“Yeah,” Dad said.

Why didn't Dad speak up and say there was more than hard feet to admire in a mustang? Why didn't he ask why Slocum needed cow ponies when he had more land and fewer cattle than any rancher in northern Nevada?

But even if Dad didn't want to chat, Slocum did.

“You heard what I'm doing, just before school starts?” Slocum rambled on, as if Dad had begged for details. “I'm getting both my kids new horses.”

Sam made a mental note to ask Jake about Slocum's kids. How old were they, she wondered, and did they take after their dad?

“Yes sir,” Slocum continued. “An Irish heavy hunter for Ryan and an English thoroughbred with blood lines from Queen Elizabeth's own stables for Rachel to use in dressage.”

“That's great, Linc,” Jake said. “But I thought Ryan was learning to rodeo.”

“Not if his mother has anything to say about it. And, she does.” Slocum frowned.

Did Slocum scowl because of the topic, or because he didn't like talking to Jake, a teenager who'd stood up to him?

Aunt Sue had always advised Sam to give people a chance. The better she got to know Slocum, though, the worse he got.

“…keep that jug-headed range rat away from the real horses—” Slocum sneered.

“If ‘jug-headed' means dumb, Mr. Slocum, I can't help thinking how much smarter a mustang would have to be.” Sam kept her voice sweet, not mentioning how often the Phantom had outsmarted Slocum. “A mustang has to provide food, water, and shelter all for himself.”