“Hell, whores make a sight more than cowboys,” Ben kept saying—it seemed to trouble him a good deal. “We don’t make but thirty dollars a month and them two made thirty dollars off us in about three minutes. It would have been forty if Pete hadn’t backed out.” To Newt such an argument seemed wide of the point. What the whores sold was unique. The fact that it exceeded top- hand wages didn’t matter. He decided he would probably be as big a whore as Jake and Mr. Gus when he grew up and had money to spend.
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There were nearly forty soldiers. The ponies in the remuda began to nicker at the sight of so many strange horses. Call and Augustus loped out and met them a half mile away, for the herd was looking restive at the sight of the riders.
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The winter before she had bought Cholo a buffalo coat, an action which shocked Bob. He had never heard of a married woman buying a Mexican cowboy an expensive coat. Then there was the piano. She had ordered that too, although it cost two hundred dollars and another forty to transport. And yet he had to admit he loved to see his girls sitting at the piano, trying to learn their fingering. And the buffalo coat had saved Cholo’s life when he was trapped in an April blizzard up on the Dismal River, Clara got her way, and her way often turned out to make sense—and yet Bob more and more felt that her way skipped him, somehow. She didn’t neglect him in any way that he could put his finger on, and the girls loved him, but there were many times when he felt left out of the life of his own family. He would never have said that to Clara—he was not good with words, and seldom spoke unless he was spoken to, unless it was about business. Watching his wife, he often felt lonely. Clara seemed to sense it and would usually come and try to be especially nice to him, or to get him laughing at something the girls had done—and yet he still felt lonely, even in their bed.
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“I tell you, let’s hang ’em,” he said, strolling over to look at the dead men. Both were in their forties, and both had scraggly beards.
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“We’re here to see you reap what you sow,” Dan went on. “It’ll cost you forty dollars gold, but we’ll deal with the herds when they show up and your crops won’t be disturbed.” “No speaken English,” the man said, still smiling and nodding in a friendly way.
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“Did you come from California, or where?” the trail boss asked. He was an old white-mustached man named Johns, suspicious at first. Not many men came walking out of Texas. But July soon persuaded the old man to sell him a horse. It was the worst horse in the remuda, but it was a horse. July gave forty dollars for it. The Johns outfit had no saddle to spare, but they did give him directions. They tried to get him to stay the night with them—they had been on the trail six weeks and a stranger was a welcome novelty.
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Years had passed since Augustus had done any serious tracking. He rode around all morning, trying to remember the last man he had tracked, just to give himself perspective. It seemed to him that the last man had been an incompetent horsethief named Webster Witter, who had rustled horses in the Blanco country at one time. He and Call had gone after him one day by themselves and caught him and hung him before sundown. But the tracking had been elemental, due to the fact that the man had been driving forty stolen horses.
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Blue Duck hobbled the horses, then came and looked down at her. “I got a treatment for women that try to run away,” he said casually. “I cut a little hole in their stomachs and pull out a gut and wrap it around a limb. Then I drag them thirty or forty feet and tie them down. That way they can watch the coyotes come and eat their guts.” He went back and lay down under a tree, adjusted his saddlebags for a pillow, and was soon asleep.
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But Po Campo had caught a big sackful, and when his grease was hot he sprinkled them into it five or six at a time. When he judged they were done he used the tip of a big knife to flick them out onto a piece of cheesecloth. Soon he had forty or fifty fried, and no one rushing to eat them.
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Tobe Walker looked wistful when they told him they were taking a herd to Montana. “If I hadn’t married, I bet I’d go with you,” he said. “I imagine there’s some fair pastures up there. Being a lawman these days is mostly a matter of collaring drunks, and it does get tiresome.” When they left, he went off dutifully to make his rounds. Augustus hitched the new mules to the new wagon. The streets of San Antonio were silent and empty as they left. The moon was high and a couple of stray goats nosed around the walls of the old Alamo, hoping to find a blade of grass. When they had first come to Texas in the Forties people had talked of nothing but Travis and his gallant losing battle, but the battle had mostly been forgotten and the building neglected.
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“Roscoe, you’re invited to supper,” she said, before he could make up his mind to go. “I bet you can eat better than you chop.” “Oh, I ought to get on after July,” Roscoe said, halfheartedly. “His wife run off.” “I meant to run off, before Jim went and died,” Louisa said. “If I had, I wouldn’t have had to bury him. Jim was fat. I had to hitch a mule to him to drag him out of the house. Spent all day pulling up stumps and then had to work half the nightplanting a husband. How old are you getting to be?” “Why, forty-eight, I guess,” Roscoe said, surprised to be asked.
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“I’m after July Johnson,” he said. “His wife run off.” “I wish she’d run this way,” the woman said. “I’d put her to work helping me clear this field. It’s slow work, doing it alone.” And yet the woman had made progress. At the south edge of the field, where Memphis was tied, forty or fifty stumps were lined up.
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His deputy, Roscoe Brown—forty-eight years of age to July’s twenty-four—assured him cheerfully that the increase in trouble was something he had better get used to.
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“Why, forty dollars and found, I reckon,” Call said. “Of course we’ll furnish the mounts.” That night he slept in a wagon in the Raineys’ yard. He had been offered a place in the loft, but it was piled so high with children that he hardly trusted himself in it. Anyway, he preferred the out-of-doors, though the out-of-doors at the Raineys’ was more noisy than he was used to. The pigs grunted all night, looking for lizards or something to eat. Then there was a barn owl that wouldn’t stop calling, so he had a time getting to sleep.
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Augustus, who had had no chance to examine Call’s big catch, rode into the herd and eased through to the other side, where Deets and Pea were waiting. He took his time about it, giving the animals a critical inspection as he went past. Not more than forty of them struck him as prime mounts. A lot were undersized, some had saddle sores, and the whole bunch of them were skinny from overwork or underfeeding, or probably no feeding. Except for a prize stud or two, Pedro Flores had probably never wasted an oat on a horse in his life.
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“I guess we’ll just go for home,” Call said. “If we wake ’em up we wake ’em up.” He looked at the boy. “You take the left point,” he said. “Pea will be on the right, and I’ll be behind. If trouble comes, it’ll come from behind, and I’ll notice it first. If they get after us hot and heavy we can always drop off thirty or forty horses and hope that satisfies them.” They circled the herd and quietly started it moving to the northwest, waving a rope now and then to get the horses in motion but saying as little as possible. Newt could not help feeling a little odd about it all, since he had somehow had it in his mind that they were coming to Mexico to buy horses, not steal them. It was puzzling that such a muddy little river like the Rio Grande should make such a difference in terms of what was lawful and what not. On the Texas side, horse stealing was a hanging crime, and many of those hung for it were Mexican cowboys who came across the river to do pretty much what they themselves were doing. The Captain was known for his sternness where horsethieves were concerned, and yet, here they were, running off a whole herd. Evidently if you crossed the river to do it, it stopped being a crime and became a game.
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“I assigned that chore to Dish Boggett,” Augustus said. “It’s around forty.” “Not enough,” Call said. “You take two and go back and get the Irishmen.”He took his rope off his saddle and handed it to the boy.
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“This ain’t no hundred horses,” he said, after a bit. “Maybe we got the wrong herd.” “Nope, it’s right,” Augustus said. “Pedro just learned not to keep all his remuda in one place. It’s almost forty horses here.
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But Gus loved to live and had no intention of letting anyone do him out of any of his pleasures. Call finally decided his coolness was just a by-product of his general vanity and overconfidence. Call himself spent plenty of time on self- appraisal. He knew what he could certainly do, and what he might do if he was lucky, and what he couldn’t do barring a miracle. The problem with Gus was that he regarded himself as the miracle, in such situations. He treated danger with light contempt or open scorn, and scorn was about all he seemed to have for Pedro Flores, although Pedro had held onto his stony empire through forty violent years.
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“Yeah, and you’re as fond of risk as Jake is of women,” Augustus said. “Suppose we get away with the horses. What then?” “Sell Wilbarger forty and keep the rest,” Call said. “Pick up some cattle and head north.” “Head north who with?” Augustus asked. “We don’t exactly add up to a cattle crew.” “We can hire cowboys,” Call said. “There’s plenty of young cowhands around here.” Augustus sighed again and stood up. It looked like the easy life was over for a while. Call had idled too long, and now he was ready to make up for it by working six times as hard as a human should work.
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Wilbarger just needs forty, and we can’t find that many anyway. What will we do with the other sixty if we was to find them?” “We’ll need a remuda ourselves, if we go to Montana,” Call said.
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“You men won’t disappoint me, will you?” he asked. “I’m mean as a torn turkey when I’m disappointed.” “We’ve always been taken at our word,” Call said. “You can count on forty horses at sunup, thirty-five dollars a horse.” “We’ll be here,” Wilbarger said. “You won’t have to hunt us up.” “Wait a minute,” Call said. “What’s your horse brand, or do you have one?” “I have one,” Wilbarger said. “I brand HIC on the left hip.”“Are your horses shod?” Call asked.
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“In fact some dern Mexicans stole our horses,” he added. “I had heard you men hung all the Mexican horsethieves when you was Rangers, but I guess you missed a few.” “Why, hell, we hung ever one of ’em,” Augustus said, glad to see that their visitor was of an argumentative temper. “It must be the new generation that stole your nags. We ain’t responsible for them.”“This is idle talk,” Wilbarger said. “I happen to be responsible for three thousand cattle and eleven men. If I could buy forty horses, good horses, I’d feel happier. Can you oblige me?” “We expect to have a hundred head available at sunup tomorrow,” Call said. Gus’s talkativeness had one advantage—it often gained him a minute or two in which to formulate plans.
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“Oh, we cow a little,” Pea said. “How much cowing are you likely to need?” “I need forty horses, which it says on that sign you sell,” Wilbarger said. “A dern bunch of Mexicans run off dern near all of our remuda two nights back. I’ve got a herd of cattle gathered up the other side of the Nueces, and I don’t plan to walk ’em to Kansas on foot. A feller told me you men could supply horses. Is that true?” “Yep,” Pea Eye said. “What’s more, we can even chase Mexicans.” “I’ve got no time to discuss Mexicans,” Wilbarger said. “If you gentlemen could just trot out about forty well-broke horses we’ll pay you and be on our way.” Newt felt a little embarrassed. He was well aware that forty horses was out of the question, but he had hated to come right out and say so. Also, as the youngest member of the outfit, it was not his responsibility to be the spokesman.
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“Why, I don’t know,” Augustus said. “I’ve never given the matter no thought, and so far as I know you haven’t either. I do think we’re a shade old to do much Indian fighting.” “There won’t be much,” Call said. “You heard Jake. It’s the same up there as it is down here. The Indians will soon be whipped. And Jake does know good country when he sees it. It sounds like a cattleman’s paradise.” “No, it sounds like a goddamn wilderness,” Augustus said. “Why, there ain’t even a house to go to. I’ve slept on the ground enough for one life. Now I’m in the mood for a little civilization. I don’t have to have oprys and streetcars, but I do enjoy a decent bed and a roof to keep out the weather.” “He said there were fortunes to be made,” Call said. “It stands to reason he’s right. Somebody’s gonna settle it up and get that land. Suppose we got there first. We could buy you forty beds.” The surprising thing to Augustus was not just what Call was suggesting but how he sounded. For years Call had looked at life as if it were essentially over. Call had never been a man who could think of much reason for acting happy, but then he had always been one who knew his purpose. His purpose was to get done what needed to be done, and what needed to be done was simple, if not easy. The settlers of Texas needed protection, from Indians on the north and bandits on the south. As a Ranger, Call had had a job that fit him, and he had gone about the work with a vigor that would have passed for happiness in another man.
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