“And Doug,” Ruby added, “sorry about calling so late.”
Roper replaced the phone, gulped down the soda water, then crawled back in bed.
She is right, he thought as he rolled over. No one had elected him spokesman for the ranchers. Brisco had appointed him, probably because someone had recommended him as a person she could work with. But on the other hand, he sure hoped Brisco didn’t think he would be a “yes” man. Whether the other ranchers realized this or not, he was there for only one purpose, to see that they got a fair shake as this monument progressed. If not handled right, this whole thing could blow up in their faces like a match in a grain silo.
Rolling over in the other direction, he pounded his pillow, like tenderizing sirloin steak. Though he could still taste that damn sausage, he was happy about one thing, Ruby had asked him to help her. It wasn’t like he didn’t have enough to do tomorrow, but the thought of spending the day with Ruby made him smile.
Roper rewound their conversation. She did seem upset about something tonight. He was flattered she had turned to him for moral support but in retrospect, she hadn’t told him much. He was the first to admit he didn’t know much about women, but in his meager experience when a woman became that upset it was usually over a man. Other than rumors about Angus Macdonald and possibly Skinner Jacobson, Roper really didn’t know of any men in Ruby’s life. But then again, he really didn’t know much about her, other than he could easily tell she was a competent rancher, an expert horseman, and quite pleasant to look at.
Holding onto that very agreeable picture, he finally dosed off.
4
THE VERMILLION CLIFFS
The second step of the Grand Staircase, the Vermillion Cliffs, often over a thousand feet thick, is composed of three separate and distinct layers of primal Triassic rock.
Forming the bottom layer of this multi-tiered butte is the Chinle formation. Composed of Chinle shale and Shinarump conglomerate, it is 225 million years old and makes up the lighter strata near the base of the cliff.
The bulky red middle layer is composed of Wingate sandstone. Created approximately 200 million years ago, it was formed from huge prehistoric sand dunes that in time were buried by another layer and eventually ossified.
The top and capping layer is the darker Kayenta formation. Estimated to be 190 million years old, it is composed of siltstone spawned from an ancient lake during a more moderate climate and is characterized by its distinctive horizontal stratification.
In the whole scope of the Grand Staircase, the Vermillion Cliffs are the most prominent, the most easily viewed and make a spectacular backdrop for the city of Kanab.
Roper Rehnquist took a deep breath of fresh air as he looked around at the magnificent view. God, how he loved this way of life!
The pungent odor of burning calf hair, the popping sounds of a hot juniper fire heating a long-handled branding iron, the physical strain of wrestling a hundred and fifty-pound calf, the frantic bellowing of the animal being branded, the unique stench of the black tar unguent being slathered on the raw horn bed, the incomparable sight of lacy white clouds racing on a glacier blue sky, the musty fragrance of riding a horse through hip-high wet sagebrush, or just the very common sight of the rugged Utah hillsides flecked with moss green junipers now dressed with bluish round berries and the coup de grâce, the locker room aroma of dust and sweat, confirming an honest day’s work. These were the things Roper had missed during his years of academia.
Absentmindedly, he gazed south in the direction of his BLM allotment. There was nowhere on earth quite like it. Fifty Mile Mountain was essentially a flattop mesa stretching for fifty miles. The entire southern tip, twenty miles or so, was his Lake allotment and comprised his summer range. In the late fall, he drove his cows off the mountain onto Fifty Mile Bench then after a month or so grazing there, he trailed them down onto desert floor. Here they would spend the winter. This area, his Soda Springs allotment, was more arid, but much warmer. Between the two allotments, he had about one hundred and fifty square miles, about half of that on Fifty Mile Mountain.
Geographically and geophysically, it was a big and difficult operation. Historically, the BLM had not allowed any road construction upon Fifty Mile Mountain and only minimal building construction. After years of haggling, they had permitted one corral on each allotment. Taking advantage of that window of opportunity, he and his father had built corrals, but also a small cabin on each allotment. With no roads up onto Fifty Mile Mountain, constructing that cabin had proved to be something of an ordeal. Everything, all building materials including nails, 2x4s, cement, windows, caulking, stove, sink, pipes and all furnishings had to be packed up by horse over a steep narrow trail that snaked directly up and over the face of the Straight Cliffs.
The Soda Springs cabin had not been a problem. With a spur road leading right to it from the Hole-in-the-Rock Road, those same building materials had simply been trucked in. Subsequently, the Soda Springs cabin was a little bigger and a much more comfortable compared to the mountain cabin. Over the years, the system had worked well. Depending on the season and where the cows were grazing, they always had shelter and a dry place to sleep.
Spring and fall, cattle moving time, were always a challenge. Considering the narrowness and pitch of Cliff Trail, all Roper could drive off the mountain at any one time was a small herd of about thirty to forty head. In the fall, he would gather cows in the corral at Lake Pasture until he had approximately forty head, then he would push them off the Straight Cliff Trail to the Bench then after a month of grazing there on to Soda Springs. He repeated this cycle until he had all three-hundred and fifty cows off the mountain. In the spring, he simply reversed the direction and drove the cows back onto the Fifty. All in all, he averaged about eighty or ninety nights a year in those two cabins.
Of course the wild ones never came off. For over a hundred years, ever since his granddaddy had started grazing the Fifty, there had been feral or wild cows. Originally, the wild ones had probably separated from his grandfather’s herd, missed in the fall roundup due to the incredible ruggedness of the land. Now, however, they were basically a separate species. Any cowboy worth his salt could tell a wild cow at a glance. They were tall, rangy and weighed upwards of sixteen hundred pounds, sporting a full set of wicked horns like fine-honed curved sabers. Their eyes were wild and suspicious, and their attitude and posture were consistently confrontational. Without the assistance of man, they were born, reproduced and died. Darwin’s system of natural selection had made them a fierce and violent breed that had somehow had managed to survive severe freezing winters, crippling droughts, deadly predators such as mountain lions and man, and they did this all on an impossibly rugged rangeland where they had to have the dexterity of a mountain goat just to get around.
Mostly, they kept to themselves over on the remote western lip of the mesa, adjacent to the wild horse allotment. In the winter, they would duck off the mesa top, just under the rim where it was more protected from the freezing wind and blowing snow. In summer, they would invariably return to the top of the mesa. They kept their gene pool fresh by occasionally enticing one of Roper’s young heifers to join them. Also, those cows missed in the fall roundup would often end up joining the wild ones as a matter of survival. On her allotment, Ruby had managed to rope and brand a few wild ones, but she almost never got them off the Fifty to market. At first opportunity, they would break way and vanish back to the west side, often coaxing a young cow with them. There was no economic advantage to them at all, so they were tolerated because—well—because there was nothing else one could do.
Located just to the north and bordering his Lake allotment was Ruby’s Mudhole allotment. Her winter range ran off the western side of the Fifty Mile Mountain into the Woolsey Arch area, on the opposite side of the mesa from Roper’s. Even though Ruby had only one allotment, her total area was probably larger than Roper’s two allotments. But her lease did not have