“Come on, James, I’ve packed wagons before. See for yourself.”
James looked into the wagon, then back at the items on the ground. “It looks like a good tight pack,” he admitted. He shook his head. “I can’t figure out why everything’s not going in.”
Duke looked into the wagon as well. He moved back to study the wagon from outside, then he stepped back to look down inside again.
“I’ll be damned,” he said.
“What is it?” James asked.
“Bob, reach underneath the wagon there,” Duke said. “Put your hand on the bottom.”
Bob started to do as Duke asked, but Duke redirected him. “No, do it up here,” he said.
With a puzzled shake of his head, Bob walked up to the front of the wagon where Duke was standing, then he dropped to one knee and reached up from beneath the wagon to put his hand on the bottom. Duke stuck his hand down over the side of the wagon and touched the bottom from that side just above where Bob was touching. Then he looked over at Revelation.
“What are you carrying in this wagon?” Duke asked.
“I don’t know what you are talking about,” Revelation replied.
“The hell you don’t. What are you carrying in this wagon besides vittles?”
“What is it, Duke?” James asked.
“Look how much space there is between the floor of the wagon and the bottom of the wagon. It has a false bottom.”
“Glory be,” James said, looking at the disparity Duke had pointed out. “You’re right.” He looked at Revelation. “All right, so what’s going on here?” he asked. “What’s under the false bottom?”
“Look, this is as much a surprise to me as it is to you. I don’t know what you are talking about,” Revelation insisted.
“Let’s get the wagon unloaded and check it out,” James said.
When Matthew and Mark Scattergood arrived on the scene a few minutes later, they saw all the supplies spread out on the ground. Duke and Bob were up in the now-empty wagon, working on the floor with a crowbar. As he pulled a nail loose, it made a terrible screeching sound.
“Here, what are you adoin’ tearin’ up our wagon like that?” Matthew asked, challengingly.
“We’re repairing it,” James explained.
“Repairing it? What do you mean, repairing it? It’s purt’ near new. There ain’t nothin’ wrong with it.”
“The floor is too high,” James said, innocently. “We figured if we could lower it a bit, we might be able to get all our stuff loaded.”
Matthew and Mark looked at each other, their faces reflecting some concern.
“There’s no need to do that. The floor’s fine just the way it is,” Mark said.
There was another screeching sound as a nail was removed, then the sound of a board being pulled up, followed by a shout of triumph.
“Well, now, what do we have here?” Duke asked from inside the wagon. He held up a jug.
“What is that?” James asked.
“It looks like it might be a little moonshine whiskey,” Duke replied. He pulled the cork. “Smells like it, too.” He turned it up and took a drink “Well now, fancy that, it
“What do you mean it ain’t all that good?” Mark asked in an angry spurt. “I’ll have you know that’s the best whiskey in the county.”
“Whether it’s good whiskey or bad, it has no business here,” James said, pointing to the wagon.
“We thought maybe we would take some along to use for snakebite,” Matthew suggested.
“Snakebite my ass,” Bob said. “You were plannin’ on sellin’ it.”
“So what if we are?” Mark responded. “There’s no law against an honest man making a living, is there?”
Bob laughed. “Honest? That’s not a word you often hear in the same sentence as the name Scattergood.”
Mark glared at Bob.
“How many jugs of whiskey do you have in there?” James asked.
“They’re gallon jugs, we have forty-eight.”
“Get it off, now.”
“What will we do with it?”
“James, we don’t have to get rid of all of it,” Duke said. “There will be room for some. Say, eight gallons or so.”
“All right,” James said. “You can take eight gallons. The rest of it stays.”
“You didn’t answer my question,” Matthew said. “What do we do with the whiskey that stays?”
“Drink it, burn it, pour it out on the ground,” James said impatiently. “I don’t care what you do with it. Just get it off that wagon.”
There was a hollow sound as Duke pulled the cork on another jug, then a gurgling sound as he began to pour the whiskey out.
“Wait, no sense in pourin’ it all out,” Matthew said, climbing up onto the wagon. He picked up another jug and pulled the cork. “We may as well drink what we can.”
Chapter Ten
When dawn broke the next morning, Matthew and Mark Scattergood were passed out drunk. Angrily, James ordered Luke and John to get their brothers on their horses, even if they had to be tied bellydown across their saddles. They weren’t tied down, but they were tied to their saddles, their hands crossed in front of them and secured to the saddle horn.
Everyone but Revelation had drunk a little the night before, but no one drank as much as Matthew and Mark. In fact, James didn’t think he had ever seen anyone drink as much as they did.
“Herd’s on the move,” Bob said, coming up to him then. “Luke is riding drag, Billy and Duke are flank and swing on the other side, I’ve got John riding swing on this side and I’ll ride up front as flank.”
“Thanks,” James said. “I’ll take point.”
“Say, James, have you thought of a name for our outfit yet?”
“A name?”
“Yes. We have to call it something. What shall we call it?”
“How about the Ferguson, Faglier, Swan, Scattergood, Cason Cattle Company?” James suggested.
“No, that’s no good. Too long. How about the Cason Cattle Company?”
James shook his head. “No, that wouldn’t be fair to everyone else. We all have a stake in the drive.”
“Well, we have to call it something.”
At that moment, James Cason saw a calf, hurrying quickly to catch up with its mother. The early morning sun cast a golden halo around the calf. He laughed, and pointed. “There’s our name,” he said.
“What?”
“Golden Calf. The Golden Calf Cattle Company.”
“Yes!” Bob replied. “Yes, that’s a great name.”
“Think we ought to check with the others?”
“Why? I’m the one who decided we should have a name, and you are the one who came up with it. Far as I’m concerned, that’s good enough.”
“Then the Golden Calf Cattle Company it is,” James said. He twisted around in his saddle. “By the way, have
