If the bronc blew the plug and started bucking, Dewey let him go, rode him out, then worked him easy for an hour or so around the corral, reining him, stepping down to smoke a cigaret, stepping up again. Then Dewey put the hackamore back on, with the drag rope, and got the other bronc and went through the same routine.
If the boys came in for dinner and rode out again by one, it gave Dewey four hours of afternoon time with the broncs. But any time a boy rode in, he had to leave off and hurry back to camp.
During those days Squab rode the pasture fence, repairing breaks and checking the posts. When the boys got lucky and brought cattle in by ten o’clock, Squab always spotted their dust and got back in time to have the extra saddle horses waiting for the change. Then it was eat on the run, change horses, and get going. And it appeared that Hank knew every old renegade steer in the country. He always knew where the boys could ride out and rope a few wild ones, tie them to trees, and bring out the burros. And while that tough work was going on endlessly, Squab sometimes helped Dewey work the broncs around in the corral. Plus riding fence and getting horse changes ready, Squab somehow found time to carry firewood, help get water, and even wash up a little bit around camp.
The boys followed the same routine every day, once they had cattle in the pasture. They cut out around twenty-five head of burros, rounded up the cattle, and shoved the burros into the bunch. If a cow broke away she was roped and brought back. Then the boys just rode around the bunch and moved them three or four hundred yards, stopped, worked around again, moved again, stopped again. That was to gaunt the cattle down, gentle them, get them used to the burros. The boys were averaging around twenty head roped and caught each day, and they had a hundred and sixty head at the end of eight days.
“We can’t handle any more on the drive in,” Hank said that night. “We’ll start back in the morning, Dewey. Everybody has to turn out and help.”
“But we ain’t done here?” Dewey asked.
“No,” Hank said. “We’ll come right back, but cover another slice of ground.”
“Does it get tougher?” Dewey said.
“It sure don’t get no easier,” Hank said. “Pass them beans.”
Next morning everybody was on the job because, when they opened the holding pasture gate, that was the most likely place for a run. Hank cut out a good cow horse for Dewey, and Squab had the best horses ready for all the boys. First off, the boys tied twenty of the wildest cattle to twenty burros, and two boys—Spradley and Raymond—pushed them up close to the gate. Squab opened the gate on Hank’s signal and jumped right back on his horse, and inside the holding pasture Spradley and Raymond eased those tied burros and cattle outside where all the boys held them in a kind of barricade.
Then the loose cattle and burros were pushed out and held up against and behind the leaders, and made to sit still an hour. Every boy was ready, loops spread to catch a breakaway. Finally Hank nodded and the boys started moving the entire herd up the canyon. Dewey and Squab helped for a mile, and then Hank said, “All right, Dewey. Better get back and pack up.”
Dewey and Squab high-tailed back to camp, packed the kitchen burros, and followed along. Dewey cut off enough beef for two meals, and spread out the rest for the animals and birds. Ten days was about the limit for fresh beef in this country; after that it began to get sour and smell just a trifle high.
There was no dinner that day, and Dewey was lucky to manage supper. He and Squab had the kitchen burros and the horse remuda on their hands. Squab led out on a trail that took them pretty high, and never closer than a half mile to the moving herd. They worked along five miles and Squab cut out saddle horses and drove them down to the herd.
The boys came out one at a time to rope and change horses, and each time Squab leaped onto the gaunted horse and rode it back into the bunch, and finally drove all the work-out horses up the hill into the remuda where Dewey was holding horses and cussing burros at the same time.
They made Hole-In-The-Ground about five-thirty, threw the horses into the holding pasture, and got ready for the boys who had lagged behind today, easing those wild cattle along at a snail’s pace.
Dewey built a fire and started cooking beefsteak, biscuits, and cream gravy. He threw some dried prunes into a potful of water and hoped they’d get soft in time, and warmed up his last pan of beans. Squab was across the creek cutting out another relay of horses. Dewey straightened up from the fire, his eyes burning from smoke, in time to see Squab head down the trail with the horses. He couldn’t make out where Squab met the herd, but pretty soon the Indian boy rode in with the gaunted horses and turned them into the corral. And while he watched that, Benstega sneaked up and snaked a dishrag off the low branch of a tree.
“Hey!” Dewey yelled. “Get away from there!”
He threw a few stones at Benstega and the others, until they moved off a ways, and then he was busy as a one-armed paper hanger turning beefsteaks, watching his biscuits, and making gravy.
The boys pulled in at sunset, dust roiling up above the herd, turning orange and red in the slanting sunrays. They put the herd into the holding pasture, untied the burros from the wild cows, and came stiff-legged for camp. Then it was time to eat like hungry wolves, unroll the beds, and just plain fall down. Nobody lingered over coffee. They were bone-weary, caked with dust and dried sweat, and even Raymond was too tired to click his teeth and slobber. Hank lay on one elbow, unbuttoning his shirt, and nodded sleepily.
“We’ll stay two days,” Hank said. “Got to rest ’em up.”
“Boys or cattle?” Dewey said.
Hank managed a wry grin. “A little of both, Dewey.”
They camped two days before moving the herd on to the main ranch. Dewey left the pack outfit and burros in the Hole, hung everything high, and helped drive the herd back. It was a one-day trip to turn the cattle into the big main ranch pasture; and one night’s rest was all Hank allowed.
Next morning Dewey packed provisions on a horse and rode straight to Hole-In-The-Ground. Dewey and Squab spent that afternoon working over the supplies, getting set for a morning move. He had no time until after supper and then it got dark before he did much more than putter with the two half-broke broncs. Raymond brought along the shoeing tools and sewing kit, and everybody worked before and after supper.
“It’ll be the same routine,” Hank said. “But we move over and sweep fresh ground.”
“Same time?” Dewey asked.
“Eighty-nine days,” Hank said. “With luck. But I wish we could handle more cattle. We just cain’t drive a bigger bunch than the last. That’s what takes the time.”
“Can we finish up in ninety days?” Dewey said.
“Got to,” Hank said. “Them’s the orders . . . sure, we can do it.”
Dewey said, “I ain’t breaking many broncs, Hank.”
“Never mind,” Hank said. “Cooking comes first. Do what you can, Dewey. A man’s only got two hands.”
Dewey sat beside the fire and watched Hank fall asleep the moment his head hit the folded jacket. The other boys were already sleeping, Raymond snoring through his teeth, George Spradley curled up like a bear, Thornhill flat on his back, making no sound. Indian Tom was off somewhere alone, using that single blanket, apparently never bothered by stones or sticks.
Squab drifted in silently with an armload of wood, stacked it beside the fireplace, and sat down on his blankets. Squab pulled off his moccasins and rubbed his dirty feet, staring downward at the flattened toes, eyes reddish in the fireglow. The kitchen burros moved nearby and the horses stomped restlessly in the thin grass beside the water hole. Dewey poked the fire and then lay back and looked at the sky and the stars. He wondered if they could do the job in ninety days; it seemed like