“Oh, don’t be silly,” Sally replied. “I’ve heard much worse. You know about Prince Henry, do you?”
“Yes, ma’am, I looked him up and read all about him. He’s a direct descendant of one of the Seventeen.”
“One of the Seventeen?”
“Henry Clay was the first to bring Herefords to America,” Cal explained. “He brung seventeen of them over. Prince Henry is a direct descendant from one of them—uh—those bulls. He would be a great bull for us. Oh, I don’t mean anything by saying ‘us.’ I mean he would be a great bull for Sugarloaf.”
“Of course you mean us, Cal. You are part of Sugarloaf and you know it,” Sally said.
“Yes, ma’am, you and Smoke have sure made Pearlie and me feel like that. Are you going to buy Prince Henry?” Cal asked.
“I’ll buy him if he isn’t too expensive,” Smoke said. “The problem is, some people get so caught up in the idea of a bull being a champion that they think he is worth more than he really is. I mean, when you get right down to it, all we really need is a bull who has an eye for the ladies, right?”
“An eye for the ladies,” Cal said. He slapped his knee and laughed out loud. “Yes, sir, he sure needs to have an eye for the ladies all right.”
Sally laughed as well.
“Where do you find this—handsome fellow—Prince Henry?” Sally asked.
“He is in Colorado Springs,” Smoke said. “The auction is two days from now. I thought I would take the evening train—that would put me into Colorado Springs first thing in the morning and leave me a couple of days to look him over. I would also get to see who else might be bidding on him.”
“Good idea,” Sally said. “That way you might also get an idea as to how much you are going to have to spend.”
“And, if there are several others interested in him, then it will tell me for sure that a new era in cattle breeding is coming,” Smoke said. “That would be good to know, because I sure don’t want to get caught a day late and a dollar short.”
“You’re leaving this evening?” Sally asked.
“Yes. Cal, you can ride into town with me, then bring my horse back?”
“All right.”
“No need,” Sally said. “I’ll take you into town in the buckboard.”
“I’d still like to go into town with you, that is, if you don’t mind, Miss Sally,” Cal said.
“I don’t mind,” Sally said.
“I don’t have to go to Colorado Springs alone, you know,” Smoke said. “Colorado Springs is a nice place to visit. You might enjoy coming along with me.”
“I’ll just pack a few things,” Sally said, getting up from the table.
Smoke laughed.
“What is it?”
“It didn’t take much to convince you to go with me, did it?”
“Ha! You were just being nice, weren’t you? You didn’t really expect me to go.”
“To be honest, no, I didn’t think you would want to go. But I wasn’t just being nice. I’m glad you decided you would.”
During the drive into town that afternoon, they talked about what would be required in order to convert the herd to all Herefords. One of the first things to do would be to sell off all the remaining longhorns.
“If everyone else is selling off their longhorns at the same time, that’s going to have the effect of even further depressing the market for them,” Sally said.
“I know.”
“I mean, we just barely broke even with what we did sell. We’ll take a loss by selling all the rest of them.”
“It could be worse,” Smoke said. “You do remember the big freeze out, don’t you? We lost thousands of cattle that year, with no compensation at all.”
“Yes, I remember that,” Sally said. She shivered involuntarily as she recalled the brutal winter.*
“You want to have dinner at Louie’s?” Smoke suggested.
“Sure. Only, let’s stop by the post office first.”
Chapter Five
Louis Longmont ran a saloon, but as he insisted, “Longmont’s is not your run-of-the-mill warm-beer-and-bad-whiskey saloon. It is as proper a place for ladies as the finest restaurant.”
The Frenchman was true to his word and, when they were in Big Rock, it was Smoke and Sally’s favorite place to relax. After picking up their mail at the post office, they stepped into Longmont’s.
“Smoke, mon cher ami!” Longmont called as he saw the three sitting at the table. “How wonderful of you to grace my establishment with your beautiful young lady.”
“Louis, you make me blush,” Sally said.
“Blushing becomes you, my dear. Oh, whatever you have for dinner, you must save room for my tarte français de soie.”
“Oh, it sounds lovely,” Sally said. “I shall look forward to it.”
“What is, uh, whaever that is you said?” Cal asked.
“It’s French silk pie,” Sally explained. “Don’t worry, knowing you, you will like it.”
“I like any kind of pie,” Cal said with a broad smile.
“Mon jeune ami, this isn’t just any kind of pie,” Longmont said resolutely.
A few minutes later, Louis served them personally.
“Rôti de boeuf avec les pommes de terre. Bon appétit,” he said as he set the steaming plates on the table before them.
“That just looks like roast beef to me,” Cal said. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, it looks like good roast beef, but it don’t look like whatever that is you said it was.”
Louis chuckled. “This is Hereford. I think you’ll find it a bit more tender than what you are used to.”
“See what I’m talking about, Sally?” Smoke said with a resigned sigh. “Even Louis is switching over to Hereford.”
After their meal, Smoke began looking through the mail they had picked up at the post office. He smiled as he held one of the letters up.
“It is from Pearlie,” he said.
“Read it aloud,” Sally said.
Smoke opened the envelope, removed the letter, and began to read.
Dear Smoke, Sally, and Cal,
I take pen in hand to pass on to all of you my regards and to tell you that my thoughts are often of Sugarloaf and the many fine times we have had together.
I am still in the New Mexico Territory where I have taken a job as shotgun guard for the Sunset Stage Coach Company. Five days a week we go from Los Brazos to Chama. The trip to Chama takes about three and a half hours. We stay there for one hour, then we come back to Los Brazos.
There is much desert land here in New Mexico, and also mountains. The cactus flowers are very pretty, but I do not think New Mexico is as pretty as Colorado.
I have thought much about Lucy, and I have wondered how it would be if she had not been killed. But it is not good to think much about such things. I am glad that you are a justice of the peace and that you were able to marry us. I know that our getting married made Lucy very happy, and when I think about it now, I am happy about it too.
Tell Cal I am taking very good care of his silver hatband, and I promise that, one day soon, I will bring it back to him.
Your friend,
Pearlie
“Did you hear that?” Cal asked happily. “He said one day soon, he would come back.”
“He certainly did,” Sally agreed.
“I wonder how soon is soon?”
Half an hour later, after having eaten Louis Longmont’s French silk pie—Cal had two pieces—the three drove in the buckboard down to the depot that served the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad. They reached the depot just as the train was pulling into the station.
“Now I call that good timing,” Smoke said, hauling back on the reins as the train squealed, squeaked, rumbled, and rattled to a halt.