Pearlie rose up from his grassy hiding place. “Johnny took a bullet in the leg, but it’s hardly more’n a scratch. I tied his bandanna ’round it till we could fix a proper bandage. He’s lyin’ over yonder next to the horses.” He pointed north. “All of ’em cleared out, leastways the ones we could see. Wasn’t near as many of ’em as I figured there’d be.”
Smoke didn’t bother to explain how he’d reduced the odds considerably. “Let’s get the horses saddled and round up as many of our cows as we can.” He examined the bunched Herefords not far away. “One of our young bulls caught a stray bullet in the neck, and we’ll probably have to put him down.”
“I seen it up close,” Bob called from a spot near the bulls, “an’ it’s in his brisket. Bullet passed clean through. It don’t hardly bleed any now, an’ I’m bettin’ he’ll make it.”
“That’s good news,” Smoke replied tiredly, sinking to the ground to put on his riding boots and place the bloody tomahawk in his saddlebags.
One by one, the cowboys stood up, when it was clear Evans and his men were gone. “We damn sure held ’em off,” Cletus said, as Johnny limped over to their blackened firepit with pain written across his face. “ ’Cept fer Johnny, I’d say we was lucky.”
Johnny agreed. “I was also lucky. That slug could have hit me in worse places. I’ll mend.”
Longhorn heifers were scattered from one end of the plain to the other, while many had run into the trees to escape the loud banging noises.
“We’ll be all day gittin’ ’em rounded up,” Pearlie said, as he carried his saddle to the picket ropes.
Duke was the last to come in from his hiding place in the grass. “I figured they was gonna run over us like a locomotive for a spell. Somethin’ must have changed their minds.”
Pearlie gave Smoke a knowing look. “I imagine Mr. Jensen can tell us what it was, ifn he’s of a mind to talk about it.”
“I got a few,” Smoke replied, pulling on his boots before he stood up with his saddle and bridle. “Everybody ride careful out there, just in case there’s some who ain’t dead, or still have some fight left.”
Cal ’s face was ghostly white when he spoke up. “What do we do if we find a wounded man, boss?”
“Leave the son of a bitch right where he is. We haven’t got time to be doctorin’ men who just tried to kill us. Let ’em rot for all I care.”
“I shot one,” Cal added quietly, “a big feller in a sombrero with belts on his chest. Makes two so far on this trip. I sure do hope there ain’t no more to my credit later on.”
“You were doing what you had to do to help protect your friends and the cattle herd, son,” Smoke told him. “Don’t let it eat on you so hard.”
“I’m tryin’ not to think about it.” Cal lifted his saddie to go to the picket line. “But I seen his face when I shot him. His eyes got big as fried turkey eggs, an’ then there was blood all over his face. He dropped the rifle he was carryin’ an’ put his hands over his eyes just before he fell off his horse. It damn near made me sick all over again.”
“I’m bettin’ a month’s pay you ain’t sick enough to keep from cleanin’ your plate tonight, young ’un. Don’t nothin’ make you that belly-sick.”
In spite of Johnny’s obvious pain, he chuckled. “That’s damn sure one thing about Cal, all right. He can eat no matter what.”
Cal pretended not to be listening, saddling his horse as quickly as he could.
Smoke was in for a pleasant surprise as the morning wore on, for it seemed the longhorns were willing to gather on the prairie without much urging. Most of them settled quickly and began to graze alongside the Hereford bulls.
As the cow work continued, Smoke thought about the direction the Evans gang had ridden… north, making it logical they would try again farther up the trail. He wondered how much convincing Jessie Evans needed.
Pearlie and Duke came trotting over to a grove of oaks where Smoke had just driven out three longhorns, helping him push them toward the main bunch.
“That makes over a hundred an’ thirty head so far,” Duke said. “This is easier than it looked like it was gonna be when we first got started.”
Smoke nodded his agreement as he saw Cletus and Cal bringing five more cows from the east. Two more strays came out of the woods farther north on their own. “Some of ’em are volunteering to come back themselves.”
Pearlie shrugged. “Longhorns is the most unpredictable critters on earth. Sometimes they run off fer no reason at all. Other times they won’t run if you ask ’em to, an’ a few times they stampede an’ then come back without bein’ asked. The first man who figures out how a longhorn’s brain works is gonna make hisself a fortune.”
Smoke was keeping an eye on the horizon, and Pearlie was the first to notice.
“You know they’ll be back, don’t you?” he asked, as the cows took off in a trot to rejoin the others.
“It’s likely,” was all he said.
“They’ll do it different next time,” Pearlie assured him a moment later. “They won’t come at us straight on.”
“Hard to say, Pearlie. About all we can do is stay watchful until it happens.”
“It’ll happen. You know it as well as me. The way I see it, after they’ve tried so many damn times, we’ll have to kill might’ near all of ’em afore it’s over an’ done with.”
Smoke knew there was a great deal of wisdom behind Pearlie’s words.
That evening, as Pearlie signaled a pot of beans was ready to eat, only seven heifers remained unaccounted for. Time was more important now than seven cows, Smoke decided, his eyelids heavy from lack of sleep.
