Gallatin Canyon

Cowboy

The old feller made me go into the big house in my stocking feet. The old lady’s in a big chair next to the window. In fact, the whole room’s full of big chairs, but she’s only in one of them, though as big as she is she could of filled up several. The old man said, “I found this one in the loose-horse pen at the sale yard.”

She says, “What’s he supposed to be?”

He says, “Supposed to be a cowboy.”

“What’s he doin in the loose horses?”

I says, “I was lookin for one that would ride.”

“You was in the wrong pen, son,” says the old man. “Them’s canners. They’re goin to France in cardboard boxes.”

“Once they get a steel bolt in the head.” The big old gal in the chair laughed.

Now I’m sore. “There’s five in there broke to death. I rode em with nothin but binder twine.”

“It don’t make a shit,” says the old man. “Ever one of them is goin to France.”

The old lady didn’t believe me. “How’d you get near them loose horses to ride?”

“I went in there at night.”

The old lady says, “You one crazy cowboy go in there in the dark. Them broncs kick your teeth down your throat. I suppose you tried bareback.”

“Naw, I drug the saddle I usually ride at the Rose Bowl Parade.”

“You got a horse for that?”

“I got Trigger. We unstuffed him.”

She turns to the old man. “He’s got a mouth on him. This much we know.”

“Maybe he can tell us what good he is.”

I says, “I’m a cowboy.”

“You’re a outta work cowboy.”

“It’s a dyin way of life.”

“She’s about like me. She’s wondering if this ranch supposed to be some welfare agency for cowboys.”

I’ve had enough. “You’re the dumb honyocker drove me out here.”

I thought that was the end, but the old lady said, “Don’t get huffy. You got the job. You against conversation or somethin?”

We get outside and the old sumbitch says, “You drawed lucky there, son. That last deal could of pissed her off.”

“It didn’t make me no never mind if it did or didn’t.”

“Anymore, she hasn’t been well. Used to she was sweet as pudding.”

“I’m sorry for that. We don’t have health, we don’t have nothin.”

She must of been afflicted something terrible, because she was ugly mornin, noon, and night for as long as she lasted, pick a fight over nothin, and the old sumbitch bound to got the worst of it. I felt sorry for him, little slack as he ever cut me.

Had a hundred seventy-five sweet-tempered horned Herefords and fifteen sleepy bulls. Shipped the calves all over for hybrid vigor, mostly to the south. Had some go clear to Florida. A Hereford still had its horns was a walkin miracle and the old sumbitch had him a smart little deal goin. I soon learned to give him credit for such things, and the old lady barking commands off the sofa weren’t no slouch neither. Anybody else seen their books might say they could be winterin in Phoenix.

They didn’t have no bunkhouse, just a LeisureLife mobile home that had lost its wheels about thirty years ago, and they had it positioned by the door of the barn so it’d be convenient for the hired man to stagger out at all hours and fight breech birth and scours and any other disorder sent down by the cow gods. We had some doozies. One heifer had got pregnant and her calf was near as big as she was. Had to reach in and take it out in pieces. When we threw the head out on the ground she turned to it and lowed like it was her baby. Everything a cow does is to make itself into meat as fast as it can so somebody can eat it. It’s a terrible life, and a cowboy is its little helper.

The old sumbitch and I got along good. We got through calvin and got to see them pairs and bulls run out onto the new grass. Nothin like seeing all that meat feel a little temporary joy. Then we bladed out the corrals and watched em dry under the spring sun at long last. Only mishap was the manure spreader threw a rock and knocked me senseless and I drove the rig into an irrigation ditch. The old sumbitch never said a word but chained up and pulled us out with his Ford.

We led his cavvy out of the hills afoot with two buckets of sweet feed. Had a little of everything, including a blue roan I fancied, but he said it was a Hancock and bucked like the National Finals in Las Vegas, kicking out behind and squalling, and was just a man-killer. “Stick to the bays,” he said. “The West was won on a bay horse.”

He picked out three bays, had a keg of shoes, all ones and aughts, and I shod them best I could, three geldings with nice manners, stood good to shoe. About all you could say about the others was they had four legs each; a couple, all white-marked from saddle galls and years of hard work, looked like maybe no more summers after this. They’d been rode many a long mile. We chased em back into the hills and the three that was shod whinnied and fretted. “Back to work,” the old sumbitch tells em.

We shod three cause one was going to pack a ton of fencing supplies — barb wire, smooth wire, steel T-posts and staples, old wore-out Sunflower fence stretchers that could barely grab on to the wire — and we was at it a good little while where the elk had knocked miles of it down or the cedar finally give out and had to be replaced by steel. But that was how I found out the old sumbitch’s last good time was in Korea, where the officers would yell, “Come on up here and die!” Said they was comin in waves. Tells me all this while the stretcher pulls that wire squealin though the staples. He was a tough old bastard.

“They killed a pile of us and we killed a pile of them.” Squeak!

We hauled the mineral horseback too, in panniers, white salt and iodine salt. He didn’t have no use for blocks, so we hauled it in sacks and poured it into the troughs he had on all these bald hilltops where the wind would blow away the flies. Most of his so-called troughs was truck tires nailed onto anything flat— plywood, old doors, and suchlike — but they worked alright. A cow can put her tongue anywhere in a tire and get what she needs, and you can drag one of them flat things with your horse if you need to move em. Most places we salted had old buffalo wallers where them buffalo wallered. They done wallered their last, had to get out of the way for the cow and the man on the bay horse.

I’d been rustlin my own grub in the LeisureLife for a good little while when the old lady said it was time for me to eat with the white folks. This wasn’t necessarily a good thing. The old lady’s knee replacements had begun to fail, and both me and the old sumbitch was half-afraid of her. She cooked good as ever but she was a bomb waitin to go off, standin bowlegged at the stove and talkin ugly about how much she did for us. When she talked, the old sumbitch would move his mouth like he was saying the same words. If the old lady’d caught him at that they’d a been hell to pay.

Both of them was heavy smokers, to where a oxygen bottle was in sight. So they joined a Smoke-Enders deal the Lutherans had, and this required em to put all their butts in a jar and wear the jar around their neck on a string. The old sumbitch liked this okay because he could just tap his ash right under his chin and not get it on the truck seat, but the more that thing filled up and hung around her neck the meaner the old lady got. She had no idea the old sumbitch was cheatin and settin his jar on the woodpile when we was workin outside. She was just honester than him, and in the end she give up smokin and he smoked away, except he wasn’t allowed to in the house no more nor buy readymades, cause the new tax made them too expensive and she wouldn’t let him take it out of the cows, which come first. She said it was just a vice, and if he was half the man she thought he was he’d give it up for a bad deal. “You could have a long and happy old age,” she told him, real sarcastic-like.

One day me and the old sumbitch is in the house hauling soot out of the fireplace on account of they had a chimney fire last winter. Over the mantel is a picture of a beautiful woman in a red dress with her hair piled on top of her head. The old sumbitch tells me that’s the old lady before she joined the motorcycle gang.

“Oh?”

“Them motorcycle gangs,” he says, “all they do is eat and work on their motorcycles. They taught her to smoke too, but she’s shut of that. Probably outlive us all.”

“Oh?”

“And if she ever wants to box you tell her no. She’ll knock you on your ass, I guarantee it. Throw you a damn haymaker, son.”

I couldn’t understand how he could be so casual about the old lady being in a motorcycle gang. When we was smokin in the LeisureLife, I asked him about it. That’s when I found out him and the old lady was brother and sister. I guess that explained it. If your sister joins some motorcycle gang, that’s her business. He said she even had a tattoo—Hounds from Hell — a dog shootin flames out of his nostrils and riding a Harley.

That picture on the mantel kind of stayed in my mind, and I asked the old sumbitch if his sister’d ever had a boyfriend. Well yes, he said, several, quite a few, quite a damn few. “Our folks run em off. They was only after the land.”

By now we was in the barn and he was goin all around the baler, hittin the zerks with his grease gun. “I had a lady friend myself. Do anything. Cook. Gangbusters with a snorty horse and not too damn hard on the eyes. Sis run her off. Said she was just after the land. If she was, I never could see it. Anyway, went on down the road a long time ago.”

Fall come around and when we brought the cavvy down, two of them old-timers who’d worked so hard was lame. One was stifled, the other sweenied, and both had cripplin quarter cracks. I thought they needed to be at the loose-horse sale, but the old sumbitch says, “No mounts of mine is gonna feed no Frenchmen,” and that was that. So we made a hole, led the old-timers to the edge, and shot them with a elk rifle. First one didn’t know what hit him. Second one heard the shot and saw his buddy fall, and the old sumbitch had to chase him all around to kill him. Then he sent me down the hole to get the halters back. Liftin them big heads was some chore.

I enjoyed eatin in the big house that whole summer until the sister started givin me come-hither looks. They was fairly limited except those days when the old sumbitch was in town after supplies. Then she dialed it up and kind of brushed me every time she went past the table. There was always something special on town days, a pie maybe. I tried to think about the picture on the mantel but it was impossible, even though I knew it might get me out of the LeisureLife once and for all. She was gettin more and more wound up while I was pretendin to enjoy the food, or goin crazy over the pie. But she didn’t buy it — called me a queer, and sent me back to the trailer to make my own meals. By callin me a queer, she more or less admitted to what she’d been up to, and I think that embarrassed her, because she covered up by roaring at everyone and everything, including the poor old sumbitch, who had no idea what had gone sideways while he was away. It was two years before she made another pie, and then it was once a year on my birthday. She made me five birthday pies in all, sand cherry, every one of them.

I broke the catch colt, which I didn’t know was no colt as he was the biggest snide in the cavvy. He was four, and it was time. I just got around him for a couple days, then saddled him gentle as I could. The offside stirrup scared him and he looked over at it, but that was all it was to saddlin. I must of had a burst of courage, cause next minute I was on him. That was okay too. I told the old sumbitch to open the corral gate, and we sailed away. The wind blew his tail up under him, and he thought about buckin but rejected the idea, and that was about all they was to breakin Olly, for that was his name. Once I’d rode him two weeks, he was safe for the old sumbitch, and he plumb loved this new horse and complimented me generously for the job I’d did.

We had three hard winters in a row, then lost so many calves to scours we changed our calving grounds. The old sumbitch just come out one day and looked at where he’d calved out for fifty years and said, “The ground’s no good. We’re movin.” So we spent the summer buildin a new corral way off down the creek. When we’s finished, he says, “I meant to do this when I got back from overseas, and now it’s finished and I’m practically done for too. Whoever gets the place next will be glad his calves don’t shit themselves into the next world like mine done.”

Neither one of us had a back that was worth a damn, and if we’d had any money we’d of had the surgery. The least we could do was get rid of the square baler and quit heftin them man-killin five-wire bales. We got a round baler and a DewEze machine that let us pick up a bale from the truck without layin a finger on it. We’d smoke in the cab on those cold winter days and roll out a thousand pounds of hay while them old-time horned Herefords followed the truck sayin nice things about me and the old sumbitch while we told stories. That’s when I let him find out I’d done some time.

“I figured you musta been in the crowbar hotel.”

“How’s that?”

“Well, you’re a pretty good hand. What’s a pretty good hand doin tryin loose horses in the middle of the night at some Podunk sale yard? Folks hang on to a pretty good hand, and nobody was hangin on to you. You want to tell me what you done?”

I’d been with the old sumbitch for three years and out of jail the same amount of time. I wasn’t afraid to tell him what I done, for I was starting to trust him, but I sure didn’t want him tellin nothin to his sister. I trusted him enough to tell him I did the time, but that was about all I was up to. I told him I rustled some yearlins, and he chuckled like everybody understood that. Unfortunately, it was a lie. I rustled some yearlings, all right, but that’s not what I went up for.

The old man paid me in cash, or rather the old lady did, as she handled anything like that. They never paid into workmen’s comp, so there was no reason to go to the records. They didn’t even have the name right. You tell people around here your name is Shane, and they’ll always believe you. The important thing is I was workin my tail off for that old sumbitch, and he knew it. Nothin else mattered, even the fact we’d come to like each other. After all, this was a goddam ranch.

The old feller had several peculiarities to him, most of which I’ve forgot. He was one of the few fellers I ever seen who would actually jump up and down on his hat if he got mad enough. You can imagine what his hat looked like. One time he did it cause I let the swather get away from me on a hill and bent it all to hell. Another time a Mormon tried to run down his breeding program to get a better deal on some replacement heifers, and I’ll be damned if the old sumbitch didn’t throw that hat down and jump on it, until the Mormon got back into his Buick and eased on down the road without another word. One time when we was drivin ring shanks into corral poles I hit my thumb and tried jumpin on my hat, but the old sumbitch gave me such a odd look I never tried it again.

The old lady died sittin down, went in there and there she was, sittin down, and she was dead. After the first wave of grief, the old sumbitch and me fretted about rigor mortis and not being able to move her in that seated position, which would almost require rollin her. So we stretched her onto the couch and called the mortician, and he called the coroner and for some reason the coroner called the ambulance, which caused the old sumbitch to state, “It don’t do you no never mind to tell nobody nothin.” Course, he was right.

Once the funeral was behind us, I moved out of the LeisureLife once and for all, partly for comfort and partly cause the old sumbitch falled apart after his sister passed, which I never suspected during the actual event. But once she’s gone, he says he’s all that’s left of his family and he’s alone in life, and about then he notices me and tells me to get my stuff out of the LeisureLife and move in with him.

We rode through the cattle pretty near ever day, year-round, and he come to trust me enough to show how his breedin program went, with culls and breedbacks and outcrosses and replacements, and he took me to bull sales and showed me what to expect in a bull and which ones was correct and which was sorry. One day we’s looking at a pen of yearlin bulls on this outfit near Luther, and he can’t make up his mind and says he wishes his sister was with him and starts snufflin and says she had an eye on her wouldn’t quit. So I stepped up and picked three bulls out of that pen and he quit snufflin and said damn if I didn’t have an eye on me too. That was the beginnin of our partnership.

One whole year I was the cook, and one whole year he was the cook, and back and forth like that but never at the same time. Whoever was cook would change when the other feller got sick of his recipes, and ever once in a while a new recipe would come in the AgriNews, like that corn chowder with the sliced hot dogs. I even tried a pie one time, but it just made him lonesome for days gone by, so we forgot about desserts, which was probably good for our health as most sweets call for gobbin in the white sugar.

The sister had never let him have a dog cause she had a cat, and she thought a dog would get the cat and, as she said, if the dog got the cat she’d get the dog. It wasn’t much of a cat, anyhow, but it lasted a long time, outlived the old lady by several moons. After it passed on, we took it out to the burn barrel, and the first thing the old sumbitch said was, “We’re gettin a dog.” It took him that long to realize his sister was gone.

Tony was a border collie we got as a pup from a couple in Miles City that raised them, and they was seven generation of cow dogs just wanted to eat and work stock. You could cup your hands and hold Tony when we got him, but he grew up in one summer and went to work and we taught him down, here, come by, way to me, and hold em, all in one year or less, cause Tony’d just stay on his belly and study you with his eyes until he knew exactly what you wanted. Tony helped us gather, mother up pairs, and separate bulls, and he lived in the house for many a good year and kept us entertained with all his tricks.

Finally, Tony got old and died. We didn’t take it so good, especially the old sumbitch, who said he couldn’t foresee enough summers for another dog. Plus that was the year he couldn’t get on a horse no more and he wasn’t about to work no stock dog afoot. There was still plenty to do, and most of it fell to me. After all, this was a goddam ranch.

The time come to tell him what I done to go to jail, which was rob that little store at Absarokee and shoot the proprietor, though he didn’t die. I had no idea why I did such a thing, then or now. I led the crew on the prison ranch for a number of years and turned out many a good hand. They wasn’t nearabout to let me loose till there was a replacement good as me who’d stay awhile. So I trained up a murderer from Columbia Falls; could rope, break horses, keep vaccine records, fence, and irrigate. Once the warden seen how good he was, they paroled me out and turned it all over to the new man, who they said was never getting out. Said he was heinous. The old sumbitch could give a shit less when I told him my story. I could of told him all the years before, when he first hired me, for all he cared. He was a big believer in what he saw with his own eyes.

I don’t think I ever had the touch with customers the old sumbitch did. They’d come from all over lookin for horned Herefords and talkin hybrid vigor, which I may or may not have believed. They’d ask what we had and I’d point to the corrals and say, “Go look for yourself.” Some would insist on seein the old sumbitch and I’d tell them he was in bed, which was nearly the only place you could find him, once he’d begun to fail. Then the state got wind of his condition and took him to town. I went to see him there right regular, but it just upset him. He couldn’t figure out who I was and got frustrated because he knew I was somebody he was supposed to know. And then he failed even worse. They said it was just better if I didn’t come around.

The neighbors claimed I’d let the weeds grow and was personally responsible for the spread of spurge, Dalmatian toadflax, and knapweed. They got the authorities involved, and it was pretty clear I was the weed they had in mind. If they could get the court to appoint one of their relatives ranch custodian they’d have all that grass for free till the old sumbitch was in a pine box. The authorities came in all sizes and shapes, but when they got through they let me take one saddle horse, one saddle, the clothes on my back, my hat, and my slicker. I rode that horse clear to the sale yard, where they tried to put him in the loose horses — cause of his age, not cause he was a bronc. I told em I was too set in my ways to start feedin Frenchmen and rode off toward Idaho. There’s always an opening for a cowboy, even a old sumbitch like me, if he can halfway make a hand.