The Abilene Trail Read online

  Ben shook his head ruefully. “Listen, there ain’t no wanting to go home on this deal. It’ll be pure hell most of the time. No complaining, no turning back. Can you swim?”

  Billy Jim squinted his green eyes, looking at Ben with a pained expression. “What for?”

  “ ’Cause they tell me we’ve got forty rivers to cross to get to Abilene.”

  “I can swim.”

  “Can you shoot?”

  “I done shot a twenty-two lots.”

  “I was more in mind of a pistol.”

  The youth nodded; then he cocked his head to the side to look up at Ben. “I can damn sure learn. What I mean is, sir, I can learn real quick.”

  “I’ll keep you in mind, Billy Jim. Tell your mom and daddy I said hi.”

  “Means I don’t get the job?”

  “I’m taking it under advisement.”

  “That like setting a hen on top of hatching eggs?”

  Ben chuckled and so did the youth. “Check with me about Christmastime.”

  He watched the youth awkwardly mount the slab-sided bay, which about fell over in the process. Poor round-bottomed boy—a real miracle he could even stay in the saddle; he bounced all over it when he rode. Billy Jim said thanks and left in a trot, bobbing up and down like a cork with a pan fish on the other end of the line. Ben drew a deep breath up his nose. He needed to fill out the rest of his roster with grown men. There were enough ex-soldiers grubbing a living who could use the work. No, one teenager on the trail with him was plenty. He already had Mark.

  He saddled up his roan horse and headed for Teeville. Hap and Mark were out checking the cows and calves, while in town he’d see who he could get signed up as drovers. Plus he wanted to talk to Ab Bowers about the loan. He’d need some of the money after the first of the year.

  Teeville sat on the banks of Morgan Creek: two stores, bank, saddlery, doctor’s office over it, gunsmith, two saloons, a one-room schoolhouse, and a Methodist church, plus a smattering of small houses around the edge. It was a quiet place with a few curs to announce who came and went. Deputy sheriff Wylie Harold kept the peace; he had a small jail that sat empty most of the time, and he reported to the sheriff over at the county seat.

  Ben checked the post office in Whitaker’s store. A letter had come from Colonel McCoy’s man Blair assuring him there would be plenty of buyers and shipping cars when he arrived with his herd in Abilene next summer. The plowed furrow to mark the way from the Arkansas River crossing to the shipping pens was progressing fine and would be completed before spring broke green on the prairie as a guide for him to follow.

  Ben put the letter in his vest and thanked Mr. Whitaker.

  “You still planning to make a drive next year?” the gray-headed storekeeper asked.

  “Figured so.”

  “Well, me and the misses, we’ve been talking. You buy your supplies from me, I’ll carry them on the books. I figure if anyone can get through that mess of Indian and crazy jayhawk farmers up there, you can, Ben.” Whitaker wiped his hands on his white apron.

  “Ain’t making that offer to many folks, Ben. You know that some won’t ever come back?”

  Ben nodded. “I appreciate your offer. I’ll be thinking on it.”

  “Be New Year’s ’fore you know it,” Whitaker said, and shook his head. “Years get to going by faster.”

  “They sure do.” Ben left the store and headed for the bank. Whitaker’s offer sounded good. It would save him from borrowing so much money that way, even though he’d still feel as obligated to the storekeeper as he would to his banker for the loan.

  Perhaps he needed to go see his cattle buyer on the border. If everyone got the idea they were heading north with a herd, it might make cattle higher to buy down there. He had the grass to winter them and calm them down—most drovers would wait until almost spring, buy them, then drive them up the road. His plan was to settle them, as well as put some weight on his herd. If he could weed out the real spooky troublemakers, perhaps the drive would go smoother.

  At the bank he spoke to Ab Bowers. The bald man with the bushy white sideburns acted pleased he’d dropped in. They sat at his polished walnut desk and visited, with sunlight streaming in the window.

  “How’s things going, Ben?”

  “Like I’ve planned. I’m going to see Martinez and talk about what he can buy down there.”

  “Good plan you’ve got.” Bowers tented his hands in front of his nose, palm-to-palm, and nodded in approval. “You’re the only one I know with a real design to this drive business. Getting those cattle up here and sorting out the wild ones . . . Yes, sir—good thinking. Most drovers come in here scoff at the notion. Want to gather them and head out, trail-break them on the way.”

  “Wild cattle lose weight,” Ben said.

  “Exactly!” The banker pointed his clasped hands at him. “Exactly.”

  “I may need that money in the next few weeks.”

  “It’ll be ready, Ben, any day you need it.”

  He left the bank satisfied that part of his business was in place and went across the street for a beer and the free counter lunch in the Cattleman’s Saloon. Earnie nodded from behind the bar and held up a schooner for him to approve.

  “I’ll take one,” Ben said, looking around as he took a place at the bar.

  “Been staying busy, Ben?” the short, swarthy-faced man asked, working the tap and filling the glass.

  “Busy enough. Ernie, you let out the word I need about four good cowhands next spring.”

  “Going north,” the man said with whimsical shake of his head.

  “Taking a herd up.”

  “I’ll do that. Shouldn’t be any problem getting hands. Not much paying work around here,” Ernie said.

  “I need men that will work.”

  “I know. I won’t send you no lazy ones.”

  “Well, if it ain’t Captain Ben Mac, hisself,” someone said behind his back.

  He turned mildly at the woman’s voice. Millescent Burns stood a few feet away, her steel-blue eyes taking him in. She wore a dress of layered lace, low-cut so that most of her bare, flat chest bones were exposed between her breasts. In her twenties, she let her hair hang loose in long, dishwater-blond curls that looked a little matted to him. The knife scar down her right cheek she kept hidden most of the time with her hair. Teeville’s leading shady lady appraised him.

  “How’ve you been, Milly?” he asked, considering the beer.

  “Not worth a damn. You ain’t been to see me.”

  He looked at her hard. “I’ve not been to see you in over a year, Milly.”

  “Well, so what?” She threw a strip of lace over her shoulder as if to free herself of it. “Looks to me like we need to change that. You ain’t no stick-in-the-mud churchgoer now, are you, Captain?”

  He turned back, rested his elbows on the bar, and watched her in the mirror. Slow-like, he took another swallow of the cool beer. She moved in and joined him with her back to the bar and twirling the strip of lace, close enough that her familiar perfume and musk soon filled his nose.

  “You afraid you might like me again?” she asked softly.

  “I’m afraid of lots of things.”

  “Oh, no, Captain, I seen you throw that drunk out the door one night who was slapping me. I mean, he took bird-flying lessons from that toss.”

  “I didn’t hold with him slapping a woman.”

  She twisted around, raising her arms up to put them on the bar. Less than five feet tall, the dove had trouble reaching the counter with her elbows. “I could sure pay you back for doing that, Captain.”

  He shook his head, finished the beer, and put down a dime to pay for it. With a tip of his hat to her, he headed for the bat-wing doors.

  “You know a woman scorned can be dangerous, Captain.”

  He paused before pushing outside. “You have nice day, Milly.”

  “Go to hell!” she shouted after him. “I can have any man I want. And I gawdamn sure don’t wa
nt you.”

  Her words stung him. He stood in the shade of the saloon’s false front on the boardwalk. Whatever they’d had together was over—he’d learn to not go back in there for another horsewhipping. Millescent did what she wanted, and no one man was ever enough for her.

  He checked the cinch and swung up on the roan. He’d better get home—he wanted to be on his way to the border before daylight. One more picture of the defiant Milly swinging the strip of lace over her shoulder made his guts churn—it was all over. She could have any man she wanted, and she would before the day was over. He set the roan to a long trot and left Teeville.

  “Supper’s ready, if you two varmints aim to eat tonight,” Hap announced from the kitchen doorway.

  “We better get in there,” Mark said, on his feet. “I’d hate to miss it.”

  “Me too,” Ben said, getting up from the stuffed chair.

  “You boys have a good day?” Ben asked, ducking through the doorway and straightening to look at the food spread on the table.

  “Call it good, if you like,” Hap grumbled. “We rode our butts off and finally found most of the cowherd up in the canyons.”

  “You’ve got six new calves,” Mark said.

  “That helps,” Ben said in approval. “Oh, Hap, Mark and I are going to the border in the morning. I want to be certain Martinez is going to have those steers.”

  Hap looked at the two of them and shook his head. “You boys better be careful down there.”

  Ben shared a private wink with Mark. “We will be.”

  Seated at the table, and fixing their plates, they listened to Hap gripe about having to get up so early and fix them breakfast, with them leaving at that time.

  “Bet that beats going up the trail with a greasy-sack outfit,” Ben said, and passed the plate of biscuits on to Mark.

  “Greasy-sack outfit! I ain’t going up no trail with one of them!” Hap blustered about that for several minutes.

  “What’s that mean—greasy sack?” Mark asked.

  “Means an outfit’s too cheap to have a wagon,” Hap explained. “Means they got all their cooking gear and grub in tow sacks slung over a horse. Now, wouldn’t a cook fix real good meals for working hands? Land’s sake, that would be worse than eating mud pies.”

  “Guess we’ll have to take a wagon, Mark, or cook for ourselves.” Ben laughed.

  Amused, Mark nodded.

  “Cook for yourselves, huh? You two ain’t a threat to no one about cooking. The dang flies would have a pie supper to raise money to screen out your kitchen. And another thing: I ain’t driving no damn dumb oxen to Kansas either. So you’d better start looking for mules or a new cook.”

  “Mules?” Ben frowned at him.

  “Mules!” Hap pointed his fork at him.

  Ben noticed that Mark kept his head down to conceal his amusement.

  Before daybreak, the two rode south. Ben had given Mark a small .30-caliber Colt and holster to wear on the trip. The gun belt fit the youth, and he nodded in approval after he strapped it on.

  “It’s loaded,” Ben said. “Don’t never draw it unless you need it. When you need it, then use it. Sometime it will be the difference between you living or whoever wants to kill you doing the same.”

  Mark nodded that he understood, and they went for the horses.

  Ben decided an older man like himself couldn’t tell everything about life to someone like Mark; some things the boy had to learn on the way. The notion went over and over in Ben’s mind, because the next day they’d arrive in a land where life was cheap and not much emotion was shed over the dead, save how their few valuables would be divided by those living when the gunsmoke cleared.

  In Harper, they ate supper in a café after sundown. The dark-eyed girl who waited on them took a shine to Mark. She even brought him some extra sopapillas and thick, dark honey in a small white bowl. He acted more pleased with the treat than the tail-swishing young woman who served it. The whole matter amused Ben.

  “I’d sleep in a bed here tonight, but they usually have bedbugs that bite,” Ben said. “Let’s ride out of town and sleep under the stars tonight.”

  “Fine with me.”

  They left the café and stood on the boardwalk in the night. Ben thought about going into a bar for a beer, then reconsidered as they rode out of town. Along a creek they found a place to hobble their horses and spread out their bedding.

  “Ben, I guess this is as far as I’ve ever been away from home,” Mark said from his bedroll beside him.

  “Bet it is,” Ben agreed, thinking about the war and his nights away from home in the cold and the rain. This would be a good one by that comparison.

  They crossed the Rio Bravo into Aqua Fría beneath the noon sun. Coming out of the knee-deep water, their animals clambered with wet hooves over the smooth rocks onto the Mexican side. Adobe hovels covered the hillside, and several topless woman, young and old, were bent over washing clothes in the river’s edge. A few of them spoke to the two men in Spanish about other services they provided besides washing.

  Ben tipped his hat and told them good-day, but he didn’t fail to notice the embarrassment on Mark’s face.

  “Going into a new world. But take notice: There are folks down here would sell you for ten cents and kill you for the same amount.”

  Mark swallowed hard and nodded that he had heard his words of caution. They started up the narrow street, dodging noisy oxcarts. A young girl shouted to Mark from a balcony.

  “Come up here and see me, gringo.”

  Mark glanced up, then ducked his head and tried not to look.

  “She’s just trying to make herself a living,” Ben said, and booted the roan around a line of burros loaded with dead ironwood and mesquite sticks for firewood.

  “Not from me,” Mark managed.

  “I know. We’ll stable the horses ahead; then we can go find Señor Martinez, if he’s in town.”

  “Good,” the youth said, as if he were pleased by all the soliciting females.

  Señor Martinez was a small man in a black suit with a pencil-thin mustache. A young woman in gauzy clothing sat upon his lap; she got up and bowed to them, then left.

  “Have a seat, mis amigos.” He indicated the stuffed chairs across from his own.

  “Good to see you. How is the cattle-selling business?” Ben asked settling into one chair, Mark in the other. “This is Mark, my man.”

  “Nice to meet you, Mark. Ah, the cattle business—she is very rough these days. Hard to find those big steers you want. A year ago I had many herds to sell; now I have few big cattle. But I can find smaller ones.”

  Ben shook his head—he needed the bigger ones to top the market in Kansas.

  “In thirty days I can have you four hundred head here,” Martinez said, pointing at the scarred tabletop with his index finger.

  “How much per head?”

  “Three dollars.”

  “No culls in them and I’ll pay you two-fifty,” Ben said, leaning forward toward the man to make his offer. When he finished he sat back.

  “This girl, I think, wants to know if you want something to drink, Ben,” Mark said.

  “Tell her later,” Ben said, wondering what Martinez would say to his counteroffer. That was fifty cents higher than they had spoken of in the fall. He’d promised him eight hundred head of big steers for two dollars, with delivery after Christmas and the New Year. Ben wanted to swear over not having done this buying sooner. Already news of the new Kansas market had reached the border and inflated the prices—but it was a long way to Kansas, and Martinez damn sure couldn’t drive them up there. Ben doubted he could drive milk cows to a pen.

  “Ah, mi amigo, you are so hard to trade with. I will lose much money on such a deal.”

  Ben reminded him of his promise.

  “Ah, yes, but that was then and this is now, mi amigo.”

  When would he have the other half of the herd he needed? He couldn’t head out with only four hundred head and make any mo
ney for the risk and expenses he faced.

  “When can you get me the rest?”

  “I will scour the country for them. I will have the rest of them here at Aqua Fría by the first of February.”

  “Good,” Ben said, and waved the bar girl over. “Bring us both beers and some food.”

  “What would you like to eat?” she asked.

  He looked over at Mark. “Enchiladas, some beef?”

  “Sure,” he said.

  “Bring us a nice platter of food,” he said to her. She agreed and left them. “This is your son?” Martinez asked.

  “No, he is my foreman.”

  “Ah, for such a young man he seems a good one.”

  Ben agreed with a nod. The first half of the herd would be there and ready to take north to his place in three weeks. He’d have to hire some help for the drive, which would take them ten days at least. It would be a good time to try out Hap’s new wagon. Damn, he’d have to find some good mules to pull it too. Mexico was not the place to look—they had more hinnies than mules down there, and somehow claimed they were the same. Wrong—a hinny was not the same as a mule. A hinny was out of a stallion and a jenny, and never met the quality of a mule. No, he needed to find a Comanche to get him a real set of mules. They bred more of them than anyone save Missourians.

  After they ate, Ben checked the two of them into the hotel and they took their things to the room. He felt much better with half the deal he’d made. Surely Martinez could find him four hundred more big steers in forty-five days—it was the man’s business.

  “Are all these women in Mexico selling their bodies?” Mark asked when they were in bed with the lights out.

  “No, you’re in their district.”

  “Oh, then all Mexican women aren’t . . . whores?”

  “No.”

  “Good,” Mark said, then rolled over, and their conversation was finished.

  “There’s some pretty ones, though, ain’t there?” Ben asked, smiling at the ceiling in the room’s darkness.

  “There sure are.”

  “We’ve got to get up early and get back home.”