Rampage of the Mountain Man

“I swear, Miz Sally, if this ain’t about the best breakfast I done ever et anywhere,” Pearlie said.

“Ha!” Cal said. “It’s come to my mind, Pearlie, that anything you eat is the best thing you ever ate.”

“Well, yeah, I do like to eat, there ain’t no denyin’ that. But this here breakfast is particular good.”

Cal nodded. “I’ll have to agree with you on that. Why the big feed, Miz Sally?”

“No particular reason,” Sally answered.

Smoke stared at his wife over the rim of his coffee cup. Seeing his intense stare, Sally looked away.

“Another bear claw, darling?” she asked.

“What is it, Sally?” Smoke asked. “What is going on?”

“What makes you think something is going on?”

“Because I know you, Sally. We’re married, remember?”

“All right, I’ll tell you,” Sally replied.

Sally poured herself a cup of coffee, then sat back down before she went on.

“Do you remember the big winter freeze we had a couple of years ago? We lost over eighty percent of our herd. Do you remember that?”

“Of course I remember that,” Smoke said. “We not only lost our herd, we almost lost Sugarloaf.”

Sally reached back to the sideboard and got a small book, which she slid across the table to Smoke.

“What is that?” Smoke asked.

“It’s the Farmer’s Almanac,” Sally said. “According to the Almanac, this winter is going to be as bad as that one was.”

“Oh, that’s bad,” Pearlie said. “That’s really bad.”

“And that’s why the big breakfast?” Smoke asked. “We are celebrating the fact that we are going to have another bad winter?”

Sally shook her head. “No, we are celebrating the fact that a bad winter isn’t going to be as big a problem for us this year.”

Smoke drummed his fingers on the table. “What makes you think it won’t be a problem?”

“After that last big freeze, you built shelter areas, remember?”

“Of course I remember. But we can only shelter about half of our herd.”

“That’s all we’ll need to shelter,” Sally said.

“Sally, it won’t put Sugarloaf in danger like the last freeze-up, but do you have any idea how much money it would cost us to lose three thousand head.”

“Just over one hundred thousand dollars,” Sally said easily.

“What?”

“It would cost us just over one hundred thousand dollars to lose three thousand head. But we won’t lose them if we sell them,” Sally said.

Smoke shook his head. “You might be right, but if everyone is in the same situation, we won’t be able to sell them.”

“I know where we can sell them,” Sally said.

“Where?”

“We can sell them to Mr. Colin Abernathy.”

Smoke shook his head in confusion. “I don’t know anyone named Colin Abernathy. He’s not a local rancher. Is he an absentee owner?”

“Mr. Abernathy is the Indian agent for all the Cheyenne in Wyoming Territory. He needs the beef to get the Indians through the winter.”

“Wait a minute. Did you say all the Cheyenne in Wyoming?”

“Yes, and to be honest, that is the fly in the ointment,” Sally said. “Mr. Abernathy will only pay for them when they are delivered to the procurement center. That means we’ll have to drive three thousand head to Sorento, where we will deliver them to Cephus Malone.”

“I thought you said Colin Abernathy. Who is Cephus Malone?”

“Malone works for Abernathy.”

“I see. And where is Sorento?”

“It’s in Wyoming Territory, near the town of Laramie.”

“Whoa, that’s almost five hundred miles. You are proposing that we drive three thousand head five hundred miles? Sally, darlin’, I know you mean well, but think about it. It would take us a month to get there, and you say that it is just a fly in the ointment. That’s a pretty big fly, don’t you think?”

“It is, I suppose,” Sally said. “But when you think about it, we will have a pretty big fly swat.” Sally smiled sweetly at her husband.