“What kinda work you do for a living, Mr. McLaren? I raise and train horses. I’m hoping a couple of these will turn out well.” Stolter gestured to the drinking horses.
McLaren leaned over to the left and wiped the dust off his patchwork pants. “I’m sure they will, Mr. Stolter. I’d say that I’m a fair hand using hammers, saws and tools of building barns and houses. I was never much good at learning in school and my folks didn’t believe in a proper education. They taught me to work with my hands. It has served me well.”
Stolter glanced down river to see the horses wading in the water. “Well, the west is growing every year. More houses, more buildings, wider roads. There’s plenty of work out there for a man who is not afraid of a days’ work.”
An image of himself twenty years into the future flashed then through Stolter’s mind. There had been times in the past where a dreadful, depressing loneliness came over him causing melancholy. A snapping twig brought Stolter’s eyes to the children who were feeding apples to the horses without any hurry.
When he looked back across the water, Stolter could see the man was scrawny and thin in the threadbare shirt as he turned to the side. “I don’t want to say that I’ve lived a hard life, but I believe most men have had easier times than me. But, life is what you make it, I suppose.” The thin shoulders shrugged.
As he rode on west, Stolter remembered the man’s word about hard work and scratching out a living. He had tried to earn what he could. He had never expected an easy time in life. He had been working since he was big enough to hold a tool. But with Marianna’s death, times ahead would most a challenge for sure.
Out of the corner of his eye he could see the big mustang moving up alongside the roan. “About another two miles, there is a waterhole. We can stop, if you need to, Mr. Nick, but we’d like to ride on through to Silverhaven. It’s five miles and the horses can run it easy. Three miles the other side of town is the turnoff to Aunt’s house.”
Stolter nodded. “We’ll ride. There’s no need to stop.” He grinned at the young boy who had a broad smile. He watched Eddie swing an imaginary lasso over his head and heard Juan and Chita cheer from the back of the gray mare. Several times the horseman had watched arm and hand signals between the children and still had not figured it out. But he was content to trust that they knew the meaning.
Chapter 21
His watch read 1:30 in the afternoon when the road took them around a point of land. To the left were miles of dry, arid, scrub land dotted with mesquite, cacti and creosote bushes. To the right was a broad, flat road headed north up a slight hill and then curved northwest into trees.
They rode on past the turnoff and straight out onto the hard packed dirt. Stolter saw many horse tracks and a solitary telltale four-wheel track that signaled a heavy load. It looked like a freighter wagon. Stolter scanned ahead but saw only twisted cedars, dirt, and the road.
Another twenty minutes and what sounded to Stolter like a pack of wild banshees rode by him at a hard gallop. The horseman had to laugh as the kids whooped and hollered as Icksy veered onto a dusty track to the left. Up ahead was a broad double gate. Several men ran to throw off the ropes and swung the gates wide as the horses trotted in.
Brown skinned Mexican cowboys with shining spurs lifted Eddie, Juan and Chita from the backs of the horses and kissed and hugged them. Women cried and hugged the children. More than a dozen children of all ages swarmed around the group chattering. Stolter dismounted and after a quick introduction, the men unsaddled the roan and led the horses out to the corral to be rubbed down and fed.
Stolter was made to sit on an alder pole bench near the front of the house. A smiling woman brought him a plate of tender, spicy beef, beans, half ear of corn, a dozen tortillas, and a tall tin cup of beer. He didn’t realize how hungry he had been. Two platefuls later, he admitted defeat as he held out his hand refusing anymore. The women looked disappointed, but they laughed as he rubbed his belly and groaned.
Eddie had washed his face and changed his clothes when he came outside to sit next to Stolter. “Before you lay down to sleep, Aunt wants to meet you. The men want to hear about the trip, too.”
Stolter gestured to his clothes. “I’m a stinking, smelly mess, Eddie. I can’t go near her like this.”
“Come around to the washing stand in the back and you can clean up there. Uncle found a clean shirt you can use.” Stolter nodded and followed Eddie around the broad veranda to the back. The boy showed him the razor, cloth, soap, and a dry towel. Just as he dried off, Chita came out sucking on a piece of candy and with wide eyes she stared.
“Who are you?” She giggled and ran back in the house. Stolter heard the women laughing at the small girl. Stolter chuckled.
Eddie’s aunt was maybe fifty with beautiful, smooth skin and long black hair wound about her head in an ornate braid. Ofelia Romero Pelayo was the youngest sister of Salvaterra Romero and had married Rico Augustus Pelayo. While the boy translated her remarks, Stolter detected that she understood a great deal of English as she listened to the events of the trip. Several of the gray haired older men asked questions and Eddie translated Stolter’s answers.
After she had retired to her room, Juan said the men were waiting out at the barn. “They want to see your wound. You might need stitches or they can burn it with the iron to make the bleeding stop.” Juan nodded. Stolter looked alarmed.
“Juan, what I’d really like to do is find a way to get a message to my family in California. I want to tell them that I’m coming home.” Stolter rubbed his face with both hands as they walked to the barn.
Juan smiled and nodded. “Oh, we can go catch the stage in the morning and give them a letter to your family. We have plenty of time.”
It was thick adobe walled two story barn with a raised wood floor ninety feet deep. The south side had a forge and an anvil for working on the horses and repairing things. The north side was a series of five individual bunk rooms for the cowboys with doors into the barn and an outside door. The men were gathered around four rough wood tables on the west side.
Eddie introduced the nine men and Stolter couldn’t remember all their names and he laughed. Glasses were produced and several bottles of whiskey and tequila. They drank to the horses, the road, the sky, the kids and thanked God several times for getting home safe. It was plain to Stolter that he had escorted and helped to deliver a precious cargo.
The next morning when he woke, he found ten new stitches in his left arm closing the ugly gash. He hadn’t felt a thing and had slept like a baby.
The smell of coffee drew him to the house and one of the women pointed at the table and he sat down. He had eaten half of his eggs and beans when Juan came in with paper and a pencil.
“I can write the letter while you tell me what to write. Or I can eat your eggs while you write the letter.” Juan grinned. Stolter laughed. The horseman took the pencil and paper and wrote out almost a full page. He folded it over and wrote out the address of the Windy Ridge Ranch in Yucca Valley, California.
“Uncle Zeke is going to rid over to Silverhaven in a few minutes. He’ll make sure the letter gets onto the stage for you. Tomorrow, the uncles will take you into town to get supplies for the ride home.” Juan waved and trotted out the door as two of the men who sat down at the table with Eddie.
“We want to check over the horses and make sure their feet are good and strong for the rest of the trip to California. Is that okay with you, Mr. Nick?” Eddie looked at Stolter.
“I’d appreciate that. I had planned on doing that the day before I left, but if you have help for it, that would be very good.” Stolter wiped his mouth on the napkin.
“Emilio, Pepi and Fredo are going to help me with them. Pepi wants to look at that cut on the leg of that one black yearling colt and make sure it hasn’t gone bad. All of those horses know us now and trust us so it shouldn’t take too long.” Stolter nodded to the men and thanked them. Eddie and the men got up and headed out. At the door, the boy stopped
and turned back.
“Oh, and my cousin Emmie came over this morning. She is the one that raised and trained Icksy. She wants to meet you and hear about training the cutting horses.” He waved and trotted out.
Stolter swallowed. “I’ll be out directly when I done.” Just then the cook slid a plate sized pancake onto his platter and Stolter groaned. The woman walked away chuckling.
###
Later, Stolter walked out into the yard and watched the kids playing game of tag. A tall, slender teenage girl sat on the top rail at the corral barking instructions in Spanish to one of the younger boys as they rode a young mustang colt. She jumped down when she saw Stolter walking in her direction.
“Mr. Stolter, it’s good to meet you. I am Emmie. Thank you for bringing the kids through from Tucson. We are in your debt.” Her hand was cool and dry in his with a firm grip.
“Hello, Emmie. The pleasure is mine. If it weren’t for them, I’d probably be laying in the brush somewhere along the road.” Stolter tried to smile but he eyes fell on the ground as he realized how true his words were.
She could not have been more than fifteen years old. He guess that she might be about the same age as Kelly. Her long black hair was pulled back in a ponytail and she wore snug black jeans and boots. Her dark lashed eyes were quick and she had a quick white smile.
Stolter shifted his weight to the other foot. “Your English is very good. You sound like you’ve lived here all your life.”
Emmie smiled. “Yes, we all have put in our hours in the American school over in Phoenix. I’m done with school now and I train our horses full time.”
Stolter nodded. “Juan and Eddie both told me about your working with the animals. They are very proud of what you do.”
Emmie dug the toe of her boot into the dirt. “Next week I leave to go down to Baja to Uncle Victor’s house. He has a couple of promising young colts that might turn into something special with some training. He says they are smart and quick so we’ll see.” Emmie watched the colt in the corral changing left and right lead foot.
Stolter watched the colt work and said, “Is this one of yours?” The young girl nodded and her tiny silver hoop earrings gleamed. She turned to look at Stolter.
“I understand you met Rio when you got the horses. The young boy on that colt is Rio’s younger brother, Miguel. We start riding and training with our colts when we are very young, Mr. Stolter. That colt is Tormenta. Storm in English. For the next year nobody will ride Storm, but Miguel. The boy has to learn the horse like the horse learns the rider.” Emmie nodded.
Stolter was silent for a few moments, then he said, “I wanted to ask you about something. On the way here, Chita rode on Icksy in the front holding onto his mane. Juan was behind her. She also rode one of my horses, the white stockings gray mare, again with Juan behind her. I was afraid Chita was not strong enough to ride alone because she was so young.” Stolter looked inquiring at the young woman.
“Eddie and Juan are protective of their sister. Chita may have wanted to ride alone but the brothers kept her safe. Here in the corral she can ride alone even though she is only four years old.”
One of the men came around the corner of the barn and waved his hand as he yelled for Stolter.
“Thank you for speaking with me. I hope you get home safely, Mr. Stolter.” She smiled.
The horseman tipped his hat to her. “If you ever get over my way, stop in and say howdy, Emmie.” She waved her hand to him.
Stolter felt familiarity, a kinship with the young woman trainer. This is the young woman that Kelly would grow into someday. Somewhere in his mind he remembered meeting a young woman at a rodeo many years back. With that vivid memory, he walked toward the man.
Behind the barn, the three black yearlings were milling around in the corral. Juan was talking with broad arm and hand gestures in Spanish to the man with the heavy leather gloves.
“Your roan was missing a couple of nails out of one shoe so we fixed that. Somewhere the gray mare with the white stockings lost both back shoes. We put new ones on her.” Juan gestured to the corral.
“Your yearlings want to bite. We can’t work on them. I was hoping you could hold them while we work on their hooves. They know you better than us so maybe they will be good horses for you while we look at their feet?” Stolter frowned. He stepped over to the corral and looked at the black horses who stood looking at him.
“Do you have any apples or carrots? They like those. Maybe I can get their attention for a while,” said Stolter. Juan snapped his fingers and nodded as he walked into the barn. A minute later he came back out with three green apples.
As he cut the apples, Stolter saw the horses start to come closer to the corral fence. Stolter grinned and bit one of the fresh slices and one of the yearlings nickered. The men sitting on the benches laughed. It took over an hour and ten more apples to get shoes on the young black horses. While the men worked, Stolter told them the story of finding Icksy and the yearlings captured inside the brush corral.
There was a spirited discussion in Spanish with much arm waving. Stolter was lost in the words but got the impression that someone had made a mistake and that was why Icksy had been in the corral.
After all the horses were checked over, the men sat around the benches and told horse stories. Stolter had told them about sliding down the gravel and clay slide in the rain. Juan and several of the men agreed that Icksy was a smart horse for finding the other trail up out of the gully. Stolter caught himself scratching at the new stitches when one of the darker men said something in Spanish. Juan looked at him and then at the ground. He nodded and then looked as if he were choosing his words with care at Stolter.
“Mr. Nick, you should know. They want me to tell you about your trip. Jesus, Pedro and Joaquin say that you are headed into trouble. There are many bad men who will try to hurt you and take the horses on the road. And you’ll be alone.” Juan rubbed his hands together and glanced away.
Stolter let out his breath and nodded in agreement. “I kinda figured that it wasn’t going to be an easy ride.”
Again, two of the men talked amongst themselves and then gestured for Juan to speak. “You’ll ride out with the horses around seven in the morning. It’s almost forty miles to the cutoff to Mexicali. Uncle Pedro, Emmie and Miguel are leaving day after tomorrow for Baja. You should be long past the Mexicali cutoff by then. But if you have trouble, ride down the cutoff for a couple of miles and stay there. They’ll find you and help you, if they can.”
Stolter rubbed his face with his hand and looked at the serious men. He had come to trust Juan and felt that there was more but there were no words to explain. That sense came over him. It was the riding of his courage in the face of coming difficulty. Going home was worth fighting for.
“Muchas gracias, senors. Thank you, Juan. I appreciate the good thoughts. I have to try to get myself home now.” Stolter cleared his throat. Juan nodded.
“After dinner, they’ll take you into Silverhaven so you can get what you need for the trip. If you don’t mind, what kind of things do you want to get?”
For the next half hour the men all threw out suggestions about what might be needed. Juan laughed and said they has enough stuff for a wagon train. They were laughing as the chimes rang calling the family to dinner.
In Silverhaven, there was a family friend with a small general store where they took Stolter into for his necessities. Coffee, beans, two flints, an old cooking pot and cup. He made up a first aid kit with bandages, pins, ointments and two soft cloths.
It was a similar scene at the counter when the men crowded around a large piece of brown paper and debated the merits of each route. Side trails were marked. Waterholes were put in and then scratched out. Trees, bridges, caves, and shelters were all favorite places to stop and the small marks went nearly all the way to San Diego. Stolter bent over laughing until he had tears in his eyes.
“If I follow this map correctly, I should be able to ride almost a full m
ile before stopping between markings!” Juan translated and they all laughed with gusto.
“I’ll be home in time for Christmas!” Again they roared with laughter. More stories were told on the ride back to the ranch.
The sun had gone down. The evening meal was over. Someone sat on the bench in the front strumming a guitar while a woman sang. Stolter had just finished writing out several letters when Eddie came around the corner to the table.
Stolter took Eddie’s arm. “I need you to do something for me, if you would.”
“Sure, Mr. Nick. What do you want me to do?” The boy grinned and brushed the hair back out of his eyes.
“In case I don’t make it home, I’ve written letters to my children in California. I want you to put these letters on the stage three days after I’m gone. I should be home to get them if everything goes well. If not, I want my kids to know that I was thinking about them and that I love them. Can you do that for me, please?” He handed the envelopes to the boy.
“Yes, sir. I can do that. You’re gonna make it home, Mr. Nick. It won’t be easy, but you will make it home. I know you will.” Eddie gripped Stolter’s right shoulder and shook him.
“Now come out front. The men want to have a couple of drinks with you before they go to bed. And Emmie is going to sing!” Stolter grinned and nodded as he stood up to follow the boy out into the cool evening air.
Family. He stood near the big fire and saw how the children were loved and cherished. He didn’t know many of the words in the songs but did know the deep ties of family in the people who sang them. As Emmie sang a ballad, Stolter averted his eyes down to his boots. Somewhere in the Spanish words were the love of a man for a woman and the deep ache in his heart flared up. When he looked back up, he saw more than one face nodded and smiled to him.
Chapter 22
The next morning, two hours had gone by with Stolter in the saddle and his horses trotting behind him. It was a two foot square piece of flattened iron painted white nailed to three posts alongside the dusty road. Big, crude black letters had been painted on signifying the California border. If Stolter remembered the map, there would be water on the left up ahead less than a mile.