“I have to pay the bank by the fourth of July.”
“That’s not for two more weeks,” Matt said. “Sure, we can spend some time in Chicago.”
Jake and Crack drove the wagon up to the five-acre field, then stopped.
“Where are the damn horses?” Jake asked. “Hell, last night they filled the field. Now I don’t see a damn one.”
“They’re prob’ly all gathered around the creek. We just can’t see them because they’re below the rise,” Crack said.
Jake stood up in the wagon, put his fingers to his mouth, and let out a loud, piercing whistle.
He got no response.
“Even if they were below the rise, I should be able to see ’em by standin’ up here on the wagon seat like this.”
“Drive on up there, Crack,” Jake said.
Crack slapped the reins against the back of the team and the wagon lurched forward. When they reached the crest of the rise, they not only saw that all the horses were, indeed, gone, they saw why they were gone.
“The damn fence fell down,” Crack said.
“Fell down hell. Look at it. It was took down,” Jake said.
Matt and Kitty were still at their breakfast and making plans for the trip to Chicago when Tyrone Canfield stepped into the dining room.
“Good morning, Tyrone,” Kitty greeted, smiling at her foreman. “Have the men recovered from the party last night? I hope they had as good a time as I did.”
Kitty’s smile left when she saw the expression on Tyrone’s face.
“Tyrone, what is it?” she asked. “What is wrong?”
“They’re gone, Mrs. Wellington,” Tyrone said.
“Who’s gone?” she asked. “Good heavens, are you talking about the men? Where have they gone?”
“No not the men,” Tyrone said. “The horses we put together to ship to Chicago. They are what is gone. Ever’ last damn one of them.”
“But that can’t possibly be,” Kitty said. “Five hundred horses? Not even the rustlers ever took that many.”
“Five hundred and twenty-three to be exact. When Jake and Crack went out to take some hay to ’em this mornin’, there weren’t none of them there. At first, I thought maybe they might have found a break in the fence, and just wandered back out into the field. But I went down to have a closer look at the field. The fence at the south end of the field? The one we put up yesterday? It hadn’t just been broke through by the horses. The fence had been taken down.”
“Tyrone, I noticed Asa riding out this morning,” Matt said. “Is he the one who discovered it?”
“No,” Tyrone answered. “Well, the thing is, I don’t know if Asa saw that the horses was gone or not. Even if he had, he prob’ly wouldn’t of told us. I fired Asa this morning.”
“You fired him?” Kitty said.
“Yes, ma’am. You remember, Mrs. Wellington, you give me the authority to hire and fire. Asa needed firin’.” Tyrone gave no explanation as to why he fired him.
“You are right,” Kitty said. “I did give you the authority, so I won’t question it now. If you fired him, I’m sure you had a good reason.”
“Yes, ma’am, I did.”
“Tyrone, is it possible that Asa might have taken the fence down, then run the horses back out onto the range in anger over being fired?” Matt asked.
“I wish that was it, Matt, then all we would have to do is round ’em up again,” Tyrone replied. “But the truth is, he rode off no more than a couple of minutes before Jake and Crack did. He wouldn’t have had time to take the fence down and run off all the horses before Jake and Crack got there. No, sir, these horses was stole.”
“Rustlers?” Kitty said in a distressed voice. “I thought with Poke Terrell gone, that we were through with rustlers.” She sighed, then sunk back in her chair. “Oh, Matt, what am I going to do?” she asked. “That was more than half of my saddle horses. I don’t have enough left to meet the terms of the army contract.”
“I’m sorry Mrs. Wellington,” Tyrone said, contritely. “I should have put some night riders out. But there hadn’t been nothin’ happen for more than a month now, and what with Poke Terrell dead, well, like you, I just sort of figured that we wouldn’t be havin’ no more trouble.”
“No, no, Tyrone, you mustn’t blame yourself. It isn’t your fault. If I had thought we needed night riders, I would have asked you to put them out.”
“But you shouldn’t have had to ask me, Mrs. Wellington, that’s the point,” Tyrone said. “I’m the foreman, it’s my job to look after things like that.”
“Don’t worry about it, either one of you,” Matt said. “I’ll find the horses and we’ll get them back.”
“How are you going to find them?” Kitty asked with a sense of defeat. “This isn’t the first time we’ve had horses stolen and we’ve never been able to get them back before.”
“They’ve never stolen this many before,” Matt said. “This time they took over five hundred horses. That’s going to be a lot harder for them handle.”
“But there is no telling where the horses are now,” Kitty said.
