“Fine, you boys will ride with me tonight. We’re going to steal some cows. I’m going to teach you boys how to rustle cattle.”
“Oh, no, we do not steal,” Ricardo said. “We are honest men.”
“They’ll do,” Flagg said to Dag. To the two Mexicans, he said, “Don’t worry. We’re going to rustle cattle the legal way.”
“Okay, Ricardo, Paco, you saddle two horses to ride,” Dag said. “Bring some rope. We’ll light out right after the sun goes down.”
“Yes, sir,” both boys chorused. They ran off to catch their horses.
“You could have picked me a better pair than those two, Dag.”
“You wanted two of the dumbest. They’ve had schooling and they do speak English. But they can’t count and sometimes you have to tell them twice to do something that’s a mite complicated.”
“That’s real good, Dag. I’d rather work with boys who want to learn than with men who think they know it all.”
“I still don’t know what you have in mind, Jubal, but I like the legal part. Just keep in mind that I can’t afford to buy the cattle I need for this drive.”
“That’s exactly what I’m keeping in mind, Dag. Don’t you worry about a thing, hear?”
Flagg left to look over the herd. Dag walked over to Jimmy, who had just finished hobbling the last horse.
“You’re going to have to take those hobbles off right after sunset, Jimmy.”
“Huh?”
“Flagg wants us to move the herd ten miles north tonight.”
“Tonight?”
“Yeah. What do you think?”
“Well, we’ve got us a full moon, or near-bouts. We can do it, I reckon. Matlee will wonder where in hell we went.”
“By the time he gets here tomorrow, he’ll know.”
“Who’s taking the lead?” Jimmy asked.
“I am. Flagg’s going off to round up more cattle.”
Jimmy snorted.
“You don’t like Jubal much, do you, Jimmy?”
“I don’t know many who do.”
“Why?”
Jimmy looked down at his feet, kicked a clod of dirt. “I don’t know a man like Jubal Flagg,” Gough said. “He’s hard. Not just outside, but inside. He don’t give no leeway. You know he hanged one man.”
“I heard that,” Dagstaff said. “A rustler, wasn’t it?”
“Horse thief, yeah. When he was working at the Z Bar.”
“So?”
“He horsewhipped a man for mistreating a cow when he worked at the Circle S. Near killed him.”
“I don’t hold with mistreating animals either, Jimmy.”
“They say he shot a man over to Corpus one time. Over a woman.”
“Rumors, Jimmy.”
“Well, he sets hisself up as judge, jury, and executioner a mite too much to suit me, Dag.”
“I asked him about that, you know.”
“No, I didn’t know. What did he say?”
“He said he did what he did because, at the time, he was the only law around. He said we can’t have any kind of society without laws. And if there’s no law around and you see a man commit a crime, you’re both the law and society.”
“That sounds like prime bullshit to me, Dag.”
“Maybe so. But he’s the best there is at driving cattle, handling men.”
“He handles men because they’re scared of him.”
“Are you scared of him, Jimmy?”
“Hah. He don’t scare me none.”
“Good. Because Flagg’s the boss of this outfit and I don’t want any trouble about his authority.”
“If Flagg speaks for you, I foller him. But if he tells me to do something that’s wrong for the horses, I’ll buck him.”
“You’re the head wrangler, Jimmy. That won’t change.”
“That’s good enough for me.”
After supper, Dag got the herd moving. The longhorns bellowed and groaned as they set out in the darkness, with the moon just clearing the horizon. He had a good lead cow, and once the entire herd was moving, they formed a river under the rising moon, a steady flow over the pewtered land, with the outriders flanking them like ghost men on dark horses.
Flagg, along with the men he had picked for the night’s work, rode off to the west and disappeared in the darkness. The chuck wagon rumbled along well behind the herd, its pots and pans clanging softly like a chorus of distant cowbells. The wagon was invented by Charlie Goodnight, the most famous trail-breaker of them all. And the horses pulling the wagon were stepping out like circus performers on parade, their hides limned by the moonlight so that they seemed bathed in a soft silver fire.
Chapter 8
Flagg led his men deep into desolate country, following a path only he knew. A couple of the horses were skittish, balking at every dark shape, sidestepping clumps of brush and rock outcroppings as if the objects were alive and had teeth and fangs. Some miles from the herd of cattle they had left behind, Flagg reined up and held a hand up to stop the others. When they rode alongside, he finally spoke, in a solemn whisper.
“Right over yonder, beyond that next rise,” he said, “is a watering hole. That’s where we ought to find some outlaws.”
“Outlaws?” Paco said.
“Wild cattle with no brands.”
Paco nodded in understanding.
“Now this is dangerous work, boys. And you’re going to have to shake out them ropes. I want to go down there and rope at least four head, if we can. Then we’ll check for brands. Chase ’em if you have to.”
“How many head do you figure are at that watering hole?” Don Horton asked.
“There’s always a dozen or so,” Flagg said.
“Be hard to rope in the dark like this,” Paco Noriega said. He noticed that Flagg, Horton, and Chavez had three or four separate ropes tied to their saddles. He and Mendoza only had one rope apiece.
Flagg looked up, pointed to the nearly full moon. There were a few clouds in the sky, but there were scattered balls of white fluff, and none were near the moon at the moment.
“After we rope some and check for brands, we’ll lead those we catch back to the herd, then go to another place for more. We’ll be at this all night, boys. Any questions?”
“What’s dangerous about it?” Paco asked.
“Some of these steers have been wild for a long time. They’ll fight if they’re cornered. Those long horns aren’t just on their heads for decoration. They can gore you clean through the gut without you ever seeing it coming. Just be careful, all right?”
The others nodded.
“Now,” Flagg said, “we’ll split up and fan out, circle the watering hole. I’ll go in and rope the first one. The others may hold just out of plain curiosity. You all come in fast with your loops built and start snaring cattle like they was catfish in a barrel.”
Flagg turned his horse and circled the rise to the left. He motioned for Don and Manny to go to the right. The two young Mexicans followed Flagg, spreading out, watching him closely.
The small pond—what many in that part of the country called a stock tank, or a tank—looked like a rippled mirror in the moonlight. At its edges, dark shapes loomed as indiscernible objects, casting shadows along the edge of the water. There were soft sucking sounds and small splashing noises that drowned out the sawing, high-pitched drone of crickets and the throaty moans of bullfrogs.
Flagg reined his horse to turn it, then prodded its flank with his left spur. The horse, trained to do this, sidled down the slope toward the tank, its hooves falling soft on the ground. Flagg halted the horse when he was about fifteen feet from the edge of the water.
He waited. One cow lifted its head, its curved horns gleaming a velvety black in the moonlight. Flagg swung the rope, letting the loop out, then sailed it toward the set of horns jutting up above the hulks of the other cows. The rope made a low whirring sound and then dropped perfectly over the horns. Flagg jerked out the slack, wound part of rope around his saddle horn, pulled in hard on the reins, and dug in his spurs to both flanks of his horse. The horse backed up, pulling the cow’s head sideways until the animal turned and followed the path of least resistance. The other cattle, a dozen or so, looked up, and there was a phalanx of horns silhouetted against the reflective water of the pond. Riders rode in from two directions, swinging their loops overhead. Swish, swish, swish. The ropes sailed through the air. One of the lassoed cattle fell down and let out a long mournful groan from deep in its chest. The other cattle scattered, their heads swinging from side to side, heads lowered, horns thrusting.