was on a piece of canvas, waiting to be packed.
Hank said then, “You ever pack burros?”
“No,” Dewey said honestly, “but I can learn.”
Hank slapped the kyack boxes and pointed to a canvas bag hanging on Tom’s saddle. “Each one can handle a hundred and fifty pounds, so we split up the loads equal as possible. Put your odds and ends in that bag, stuff like baking powder and bacon and tin cups. We’ll load today, you watch how it’s done.”
Benstega got the flour and one box of fruit. Jim Toddy got three boxes of fruit and three cases of Pet milk. Tom got his kyack boxes filled with pots and pans, and the odds and ends in the canvas bag, Dutch ovens and the quarter of beef on top. Jerry got the sugar, a sack on each side and one on top. “Now,” Hank said, “the rest goes on the other burros.”
They packed the cotton-seed cake, the other three cases of Pet milk, the oats, the tomatoes and corn and bedrolls on the ten pack burros. Dewey was rusty at the job and the burros were different from mules, but he gradually got the hang of things. He had trouble with his diamond hitches; his fingers were all thumbs, he felt like a rank amateur because Squab and Hank tied down so fast. But finally the burros were packed, the few extra supplies locked in the storehouse. The other boys had left, driving the spare saddle horses, leaving Dewey with Hank and Squab. The Indian boy lined the burros up and took his place at the lead, the burros fiddling around a little while before following him up the trail nose-to-tail.
“We got twelve miles to go,” Hank said. “Can’t hurry burros, so enjoy yourself.”
They rode in the rising sunlight that filtered down through the trees, on a winding trail that bore steadily south and east into wild country. The Indian boy slouched lazily in his saddle, paying no mind to the trail, letting horse and burros follow a path they knew from long experience. Hank rolled a smoke and then said casually, “You ever worked in rough country before, Dewey?”
“Not this kind,” Dewey said, “but I worked for the Adams Cattle Company back in New Mexico, that’s the old A6. I sure can see the difference in the way you do things.”
“Rougher country,” Hank said. “I reckon you used wagons back there.”
“Yes,” Dewey said. “We had line camps at the Adams and you could get over near all of it in a wagon so we never knowed what a pack horse was except for carrying beds. There was line camps with good ranges, and the wagons carried bedrolls and groceries from one camp to another. We’d start roundup at Red River Camp.”
Hank pushed his old black Stetson back and nodded in understanding. Like all cowmen, Hank was interested in other parts of a common land and trade, in a big country where methods might differ but down-to-earth working and living were always the same. Then too, Hank had stayed back today to ride with Dewey Jones and find out some more about the new cook.
“I been through that country,” Hank said. “Just where is that camp?”
“On the east end,” Dewey said, “near the old town of Catskill. The Adams was fenced in pastures and we’d round up a pasture and throw it into the corrals at Red River Camp. Next day them cattle was transferred on up to the Carrizo Camp, and from there to Castle Rock Camp close to Vermejo Park, and then to Penaflor Camp where they done all the earmarking and branding. Then the cattle was turned loose and went on up into the Costilla country on summer range. Them old cows, when they was turned loose, would mother right up to their calves and hit a shuck for that summer range. The Penaflor Camp was on the old U. S. trail going up into the Costilla.”
“Sounds like a pretty good outfit,” Hank said.
“It was,” Dewey said. “The ranch was twenty-eight by seventy-one miles. There was streams in every valley, and springs come out of most hills. Plenty of grass when it showed from under the snow. But hell, Hank, it gets cold in that country. Nothin’ uncommon to get ten, fifteen below zero.”
Hank looked around them at the rocky slopes and the cloudless sky that forewarned of blistering summer days. Hank said wistfully, “We could stand some of that cold, running water here.”
“Say,” Dewey said, “about this horse-breaking. How many you got to break, are they all raw broncs, how does the horse-breaking fit in with cooking on this outfit?”
“You ever done both before?”
“In New Mexico,” Dewey said. “You know, when I’m in camp and cooking don’t take full time, I like to use that spare time breaking a few broncs. But very seldom out of the breaking pen back in New Mexico because if a man has stuff acookin’ and turns his bronc out, he’s apt to stampede and you might not get back till everything is burnt up. What do you think about me asking how much extra some bronc breaking would be worth?”
Hank said, “What’s Cochrane payin’ you for cooking?”
“Eighty-five a month.”
“What do you think about forty a month for whatever bronc breaking you can do?” Hank said. “But understand, I don’t want you to neglect the cooking job. Cooking and keeping these cowboys fed is worth a lot more than the bronc breaking.”
“Fair enough,” Dewey said. “My breaking’ll be in the corrals, hackamore breaking them because I understand these broncs has got to be turned out every night to feed.”
“That’s right.”
“Well,” Dewey said, “I cain’t have drag ropes on over two or three at a time, so when that Indian boy wrangles the horses he can pick up the drag ropes on a couple of broncs and tie them to a post and then, as I get time, I can tie up a foot on those broncs and saddle and unsaddle ’em and as they go along I can ride them quite a bit in the corrals and have them pretty well on the way to be broken by the time roundup is over.”
“That’s fine,” Hank said. “So the price is agreed on?”
“Suits me fine,” Dewey said. “I sure don’t like laying around camp. Once I get things lined up, I can turn out the meals pronto. I got fifty pounds of corn-meal and onions and sage, and I think a good roast beef will produce just as good corn-meal dressing as turkey or chicken, and it sure breaks the monotony of these sourdough catheads.”
“Sounds good to me,” Hank said, “but I never heard of that corn-meal dressing before.”
“Hell,” Dewey said, “you never get too old to learn, Hank.”
Hank Marlowe laughed softly. “You New Mexico punchers might not be worth a damn in Arizona, but your cooking routine sounds fine to me. . . . Squab, keep them burros moving!”
Hank was evidently satisfied with their talk because he rode out on the flanks through the remainder of the day, scouting the country as they moved along. They hit the main ranch at five o’clock, unpacked the burros, and carried the groceries into the kitchen and the big storeroom at the other end of the ranch house. The boys had arrived earlier but nobody had started a fire in the kitchen, so Dewey built a blaze in the double-oven Majestic Range and began throwing a fast meal together. Squab carried in plenty of dry piñon wood and hung around close, watching Dewey with sharp black eyes in a dark face that never moved with outward emotion. Dewey cooked a feed of baking powder biscuits, cream gravy, beef, and stewed apples for dessert. After supper Squab helped him clean up the kitchen and once everybody had spread their bedrolls on the grass outside, Dewey got right to work on his sourdough.
He
