“Take it easy,” Fuentes suggested. “You look tired.”
I shrugged. “What the hell? Should I leave it all for you to do?” When we went outside, Fuentes warned me. “Don’t tie onto anything with the steeldust. That’s one of the fastest horses on the place, and a good cutting horse but skittish on a rope.”
We split up and I turned off toward the southeast, riding right where I’d gotten into trouble. Which shows how much I’ve got in the way of brains. Yet the pickings were good. I found a half dozen head in the first few minutes, broke them out and started them back. I cut wider and brought in several more, then moved the lot down on the better grass en route to the ranch. Circling back, I looked for signs. No horse tracks anywhere. Suddenly, I came upon several head of cattle, and had turned them, when I heard a crackling in the brush. The steeldust started nervously and rolled his eyes. Sure enough, it was Ol’ Brindle standing there with his head up, looking at me. I’d no bones to pick with him. In fact, he’d probably saved my bacon there a while back. So I just waved a hand and worked away from him. When I turned to look back, he was still there. He had his head up and he was watching me. The truth of the matter was that I had a warm feeling for the old boy. He was tough and mean, and someday he might kill a cowhand, even me. But he was wild and free and full of fight, and I liked that. And he had ruled the roost there in his own corner of the country for a long time. There never was a fiercer animal than a big longhorn who had run wild in the plains or the brush. They’d tackle anything that walked, even a grizzly. Nonetheless, I think most of the riders in that part of the country wanted to get a rope on him. It was a challenge to see him there. A challenge, because you knew when you dabbed a loop on Ol’ Brindle you had tied onto a cyclone, and you’d have to win or get smashed up or killed. You give a cowhand a rope and, sooner or later, he’ll dab it on anything that’s running loose. He’d rope wolves, coyotes, mountain lions and bears … And I knew of one even roped an eagle.
But as far as I was concerned, Ol’ Brindle could make his own way and he’d get no trouble from me … unless he started it. Which he might. Topping out on a rise, I pulled up short. Down in the hollow before me, a man with his back to me had roped a steer and was kneeling on its side. His horse looked up at us, ears pricked, but the stranger was too busy with what he was doing to know we were there.
Branding? I saw no fire.
Slowly I walked my horse down the hillside, shucking my Winchester as I went. The steer was dead. The man had cut its throat, and now he was cutting a piece of hide from the hip. And I knew that steer. It was one of those we’d pushed out of the brush the first day I was back.
“Is this a one-man party,” I said, “or can anybody get in?”
He turned swiftly, his hand dropping to his gun.
It was Balch.
14
His face flushed even redder, then seemed to pale slightly. “Look,” he said, “this isn’t what you think.”
“Take your hand off your gun and we’ll talk about it,” I said mildly. And very carefully he let go of his gun and lowered his hand. “Seems to me,” I said, “that you’ve killed one of our steers, on our range. I’ve seen men hung for less.”
The stiffness and harshness had gone out of him. He measured me carefully. “Talon, this looks bad, mighty bad. The worst of it is, it is your steer, and he’s wearing my brand.”
“Your brand?” I was startled. To tell the truth, I’d seen that steer around and hadn’t noted the brand, something a cowhand does naturally as he rides about his business. But this one had been pushed in among other cattle, and somehow I hadn’t noticed.
“Our steer? Wearing your brand?” I repeated.
“Talon, this brand’s two or three years old. And you can believe it or not, but I’m no rustler. I want every cow critter I can latch on to, but honestly latch on to. I’d steal from no man.”
He paused. “Rossiter may believe different, an’ you boys, too, but it’s a fact. I never stole a beef from any man except for range eating … which we all do when we’re out from home.”
He continued. “A couple of years back I saw this steer following one of your cows. Now that’ll happen now and again, when a calf loses its ma early and just takes after some cow that happens to be close by. But I paid it no mind until something else showed up a while back. Then I started to get curious, almighty curious.”
Balch held out the patch of hide he had cut from the steer’s hip. When a brand has been reworked, with another brand burned over it, it may look all right from the outside, but a look at the back side of the hide shows plainly what has been done.
“Been altered, all right,” I agreed. “Ours to yours. There’s evidence for a hanging, Balch.”
He nodded. “Talon, I’ll take an oath I didn’t do it, and I’ll speak for my boys, too. I’ll admit, I’ve hired on some rough men lately, but the boys I had two years ago—and most of them are still with me—were honest as the day is long.” Balch paused again. “And why should I check the brand on a steer that reads to be mine? Talon, there’s something goin’ on here. I don’t know what it is, or why, but somebody has been misbranding stock. Somebody had branded your cattle to look like mine, and they’ve done it the other way, too.” Now I didn’t like Balch. He was a rough, hard-shouldered man who’d walk right over you if he could, but right now I believed him. “Looks like somebody might be trying to stir up trouble,” I said. “Maybe somebody wants us to fight.”
“I thought of that.”
“Maybe somebody wants to fall heir to all this range and what cattle are left, somebody who figures he’s got a lot of time.”
“Maybe … But who?”
Oddly, at that moment I thought of Lisa. I did not like mysteries or puzzles, not when they concerned my life or my work. And now we had two. Might they be solved the same way? After all, who was Lisa? Where was her family? Where was her home?
You’d think, in a big, wide-open land like this, that people wouldn’t know each other. But a ranch community is tightly knit and everybody knows everything about each other … or thinks they do. A stranger is spotted at once, and nobody’s quite satisfied until the stranger has been fitted into a place in the scheme of things. Yet nobody knew anything about Lisa. Which meant two things, at least. Lisa was new to the country, and she lived in some remote place. Who else was there?
The major … obviously out of the question. He had all he wanted, lived exactly like he wanted, was the most important man in the area, both in his own mind and that of others.
“Take some thinking,” I said, after a bit. “Balch, let’s keep this under our hats. If you come up with any ideas, let me know.” Suddenly, on an inspiration, I told him how I’d been shot. Of somebody hunting me down. “Why you?” he was puzzled.
“Some of our boys thought it was your outfit. It seems some of the folks around have heard I was good with a gun, and they figure your boys would like to have me out of it.”
“No … I doubt that.” He looked up at me. “Talon, my boys aren’t afraid of you … or anybody else. They’ve offered to brace you, bring matters to a showdown, and I’ve put my thumb down on it. Talon, if somebody shot at you, it was not one of our bunch.”
“All right,” I agreed. “You keep your lot and I’ll try to keep ours. Meanwhile, let’s say nothing and see what develops. When it begins to appear that we aren’t going to fight, whoever it is may try something more drastic.” Balch held up his hand. “All right, Talon. I’ll ride with that.” He rode out of the hollow and, not being a wasteful man, I stepped down and cut myself a few steaks before turning back to the cabin. Now I had to talk to Joe Hinge. Fortunately, none of the Stirrup-Iron outfit were trouble hunters. There must be no trouble with Balch and Saddler. All the way back to the new corral that had been put together in the brush while I was laid up, I thought about the situation. But I came no closer to seeing an answer.