all that era had been abundantly preserved in celluloid for the western movie channel and that was enough. Roper sighed and leaned on the saddle horn.
“Doug!” Ruby yelled. “I could use a little help.”
Roper waved in acknowledgment then spurred General Stepper toward Ruby. She was kneeling on a bawling white-faced calf, but couldn’t quite reach the branding iron. Reining in General Stepper, Roper jumped down and snatched the hot iron.
“From the amount of work you’ve done, I can tell you right now, you haven’t earned much of that picnic lunch.” Ruby grinned as she watched Roper apply the fiery iron. Instantly, the scintillating heat waves rose accompanied by the pungent odor of burning hair and the frantic bellowing of the young bull. He lunged against the ropes but with a knee on his chest, Ruby held him fast.
“What can I say,” Roper shrugged with a grin, jumping back as Ruby released the calf. “Good help is hard to find.”
“I saw another one head into that clump of cedars,” Ruby said, pointing to her right.
“Me and Moses’ll go flush him out,” Roper said, his blue eyes following her gesture.
Effortlessly, he remounted General Stepper then clicked his tongue for his dog to join them. Moses, a spotted brown Catahoula Leopard hound from Louisiana, immediately took the lead, nose close to the ground, hunting for the smell of the calf.
For some years now, Roper had been using Catahoula Leopard hounds to help with the round up. They literally took the place of another wrangler and in some ways were better. They could sniff out cows in thickets so dense that normally Roper would ride right on by. Also, if asked, they would hold a cow or even a small herd at bay, confining them for hours while Roper went on to hunt for more cows. In a very real way, during roundup the dogs also provided the extra corral that he so desperately needed and had been denied.
Within minutes, Moses had located the calf, pushing it out of the dense undergrowth where Roper could throw a rope on him. It snapped taut and Stepper back-stepped, dragging the bellowing calf to Ruby. She quickly branded, castrated and dehorned him, all in less than ten minutes.
“Well, that about does it, thank God.” Ruby crossed herself in the traditional Catholic way, then slapped the dust from her Levis. “Let’s head up to the rim where we’ve got a view and some shade, then I guess I’ll have me some lunch.”
“Fine by me,” Roper agreed. “I’m starved.”
“Didn’t hear me invite you.” Ruby grinned.
“I’ll tag along just in case you change your mind,” Roper chuckled.
“Suit yourself,” Ruby smiled, dark eyes flashing, “but I don’t feed slackers.”
“It’s almost four,” Roper said, consulting his watch. “Always thought lunches were supposed to be at noon. What kind of chicken outfit is this?”
“Quit your whining,” Ruby said. “Lunch or dinner, what does it matter? From the amount of help you’ve been, you’ll be lucky to get any.”
Mounting, they worked their way over to the rim of Fifty Mile Mountain. Pausing briefly at an overlook, they soaked in the view. Immediately beneath them was the sheer gray face of the Straight Cliffs. Further below, the desert valley spread out like flood waters, flowing to the north and south, though not so much toward the east. That direction was blocked by a maze of red domes and ribboned walls that constituted the lower Escalante canyons and were actually part of the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. To the far north was the town of Escalante and to the far south was the tumbled landscape of red Navajo sandstone that made up the basin of Lake Powell. Through this narrow arid valley snaked a serpentine gravel road, connecting Escalante with the Hole-in-the-Rock and subsequently to Lake Powell.
Ruby pulled a small ground tarp from her saddlebags, spreading it over the thick layer of pinion and juniper needles. While she retrieved the steak sandwiches and cold drinks, Roper stretched his wiry frame out on the tarp, resting his back against a downed pinion log. He couldn’t imagine anything better, a picnic with Ruby Nez. Life was good.
“You want a beer or Coke?” Ruby asked, holding up both.
“Coke,” Roper said, taking the can and popping the tab. He took a long swallow, then settled back on the canvas. “Ah, that hits the spot.”
“You don’t drink beer?”
“Nah, it’s against the Word of Wisdom.”
“And caffeine’s not?” Ruby asked, gesturing toward the Coke.
“Well,” Roper stammered. “I guess it’s a matter of degree.”
“So alcohol is a bigger sin than caffeine,” Ruby said, as she finished unpacking the lunch and arranging it on the tarp.
“Something like that.”
“Makes no sense to me,” Ruby said bluntly, offering Roper a roast beef sandwich. “But then again, your religion never has.”
“And Catholicism does?”
“Well, as least there’s a direct line to St. Peter,” Ruby replied.
“Doesn’t matter that the line ran through miles of corruption, debauchery, plunder, murder and child molestation?”
“And Mormonism doesn’t have any skeletons? Tell me about Mountain Meadows.”
“That is a subject for a different time,” Roper said. “How do you suppose the pioneers ever got their wagons through Hole-in-the-Rock?” Roper asked, changing the subject and gazing south at the barely visible bulwark of Navajo sandstone where the early Mormon pioneers had literally carved a wagon trail through solid rock.
“Hell, Doug, I don’t know, that’s why they call it Hole-in-the-Rock,” Ruby answered sharply as she opened a beer. “I suppose, they just took a concrete saw and ripped a hole in the canyon wall, then parted the Colorado like the prophet Moses and walked across.”
“Your sarcasm is duly noted, “ Roper said, “but it still amazes me. They did all that back in eighteen seventy-nine.”
“They wouldn’t have had to do it at all if they would have just followed Father Escalante’s route,” Ruby said, then she broke out into a grin, “I’m just giving you a bad time. It was an amazing feat.”
“I guess it’s the history in me,” Roper said then fell silent, munching on the sandwich, “but that sort of thing has always fascinated me.”
“Why’d you really come back, Doug?” Ruby asked after a moment of silence. “You know what they’re a sayin’, don’t you?”
“Yes, I know,” Roper replied and took another bite. “I didn’t get caught cheating on my doctorate and I didn’t wash out. I got good grades and I was a fair teacher. Believe it or not, I just didn’t like it—not like I do this,” he said gesturing at the panorama before them.
“They say you were almost done.”
“Depends on what you mean by done. Finished my masters and
