The Diamond Hitch. Frank O'Rourke
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Young, Arizona, and had a wife and two kids. He was five-eight and weighed around one-fifty and sported a big handle-bar moustache. His riding partner was Driver Gobet, old Buford explained, and Driver was a good man, taller than Spradley, slender and well built, with a hatchet face spilling down sharply behind a long nose. There was Jim Thornhill, called Thistlepatch, who was an easy six-two and weighed over two hundred pounds. He had sandy hair and red whiskers, he talked in a slow drawl and didn’t say too much. Old Buford explained that Thistlepatch was now twenty-five, a Montana boy who’d left home at thirteen and worked down into Arizona and been riding ever since on different cow outfits, the Cherrycows, the R4, at times for the government on the reservation keeping outfits off the Indian grass, and finally for the Flying A.
Buford began talking about Raymond Holly, but Dewey cut him off because he knew Raymond from way back. That brought them to Hank Marlowe and old Buford spared no praise regarding the cowboss. Buford maintained that Hank was the best roper Buford knew, one of those men who could walk out in the morning and say, “What do you want?” and take another man’s rope and ketch, either hand, in nothing flat. Hank had grown up around Winslow and spent his childhood roping wild burros, and now he was rated the best cowboss in the country.
“Bob,” Dewey Jones finally said. “What kind of a bird is this Cochrane? How is he on feeding the boys?”
“Damned penny pincher,” Buford said. “Saves pennies on the groceries.”
“How long you been here?” Dewey asked.
“About eighteen years,” Buford said. “Cochrane’s the first bastard I’ve worked for, but his wife’s a fine woman and they got a good kid.”
Dewey Jones said meaningly, “I’m getting groceries tomorrow—”
“Buy what you want,” Buford said flatly. “Hank’s the cowboss, he feeds his men. Cochrane won’t know what you buy because the bill goes to the Los Angeles office.”
Old Buford didn’t tell Dewey Jones what to buy, but he did guess that Dewey might be a greenhorn on pack outfits, and so began giving the low-down on that subject. “Pard,” old Buford said passionately, “you sure got to watch them goddamned ornery burros. Them sonsabitches’ll rifle camp every time you get ten feet away from ’em.”
Dewey said, “Which ones are bad?”
“Them kitchen burros,” old Buford said. “Tom, Jerry, Jim Toddy, and Benstega. Them four with their black hearts!”
“You must know ’em,” Dewey Jones said.
“Know ’em! Lemme tell you!”
Old Buford began working up a big head of steam, but Dewey Jones waved and escaped into the bunk room, found an empty bunk and unrolled his bed. He lay back and smoked and listened to the boys talk, because you could learn more just listening, getting the real feel of an outfit. He felt their respect for the cowboss, but any time Cochrane’s name was mentioned it came offhand and gave him the feeling none of the boys thought too much of the G.M.
He smoked a final cigaret and closed his eyes when Thornhill snuffed out the lamp. Nobody had asked him any questions. They were all reserving judgment until he proved up. Raymond turned in the next bunk and said, “‘Night, Dewey,” and Dewey Jones mumbled, “‘Night, Raymond,” and let sleep take him down the long, soft trail with the sore-muscled dreams of gone shows and bad rides and carnivals, of women he’d known and drunks he’d been on, of twenty-eight years spent and gone. He didn’t move until five o’clock when Raymond shook him awake and old Buford yelled stridently.
“Come and get it!”
Cochrane showed up to give the day’s order at breakfast. Cochrane told Dewey Jones to get the chuck-wagon team, drive to town, and get a bill of groceries to last ninety days. Raymond went out and had the four chuck-wagon mules ready when Dewey came down from the house. Raymond showed him the harness in the tackroom, wished him luck, and hurried off to saddle up and join the crew. Hank Marlowe said, “See you tonight, Dewey,” and led them off about the day’s business. Dewey Jones harnessed the mules and headed for town, making notes all the way, studying out his order for Babbitt Brothers Mercantile Company in Holbrook, letting the mules follow the road, paying no attention to the country as he licked his pencil stub and made out his order. When he hit town and entered the store, he had the bill nearly ready for the clerk.
And right off the bat his first item made the clerk laugh. The clerk said, “What in hell are you doing with fifty pounds of corn meal on a cow outfit?”
“Listen,” Dewey Jones said stiffly. “Onions and corn meal and sage make a good dressing for roast beef where I come from. You got any objections?”
“No,” the clerk said.
“All right,” Dewey Jones said. “Let’s get to popping.”
The clerk grinned and began filling the boxes. Twenty-five pounds each of onions and pinto beans, hundred and fifty pounds of Hill Brothers Blue Box Coffee, the one-pound square boxes only because Dewey Jones used a pound and a half for breakfast, and the other pound and a half for supper; then twenty-five pound boxes of dried apricots, prunes, and peaches; four hundred pounds of flour, ten pounds of Arm & Hammer soda, ten pounds of salt, four pounds of pepper, sage for the dressing, two hundred pounds of sugar. With these staples, Dewey Jones ordered five dozen eggs and forty pounds of bacon and fifty pounds of potatoes. He pulled down fifteen pounds of P&G yellow soap for the hard water country they were going into; twenty-five pounds of lard in a big pail, and six cases of Pet milk in twenty-four can boxes.
He grinned a little then, thinking how he had a dollar-ten in his pocket and yesterday he was just hoping for luck; and here he stood buying groceries and spending money like a drunk Swede in a parlor house. He added three cases each of tomatoes and corn, six gallons of molasses, and baking powder. Then he gave the clerk his own personal order and asked for a separate bill. The clerk got him two pairs of Levis, two shirts, one Levi jumper, half a dozen pairs of socks, two suits of light underwear, three cartons of Bull Durham, and an extra carton of papers.
“That does it in here,” Dewey Jones said. “I’ll swing around back.”
He drove the chuck wagon behind to the loading dock and helped the clerk carry out the order. They topped off the load with sacks of clean oats and cotton-seed cake, Dewey signed the bills, and crossed over to the Chink’s for his meal. He ate with a fine appetite and rolled a cigaret on the sidewalk, staring sideways at the saloon doors ten steps on his right. He was heading out for three months, a long, rocky road before he’d get another drink. He ought to have a couple just for the road and then head for the ranch.
Dewey Jones started toward the saloon, sniffing the malt odor that drifted through the swinging doors; and then he stopped and walked across the street and down the alley toward the loading dock. If he couldn’t trust himself yet, he had no business trying two drinks and maybe signing away his unearned pay and ending with twenty. He climbed aboard, shook out the lines, and spoke gently to the mules.
“Good luck,” the clerk called.
“Thanks,” Dewey Jones said. “See you in July.
CHAPTER TWO
DEWEY JONES DROVE into headquarters just ahead of supper call. He located the big canvas tarp in the tackroom and snugged it over the chuck wagon, fed the mules, and went to supper. Later on he smoked in his bunk and listened to the talk. Jim Thornhill said softly, “Sure don’t look forward to that Black Brush,” and the others began talking about the Salt River country, building up a vague word-picture in Dewey’s mind. Finally the lamp was snuffed and five o’clock came all too soon, with old Buford’s stentorian yell jerking them upright.
After breakfast Dewey Jones harnessed his mules while the boys saddled their number one horses and rounded up fifteen extra. Bedrolls were lashed atop the chuck wagon and Cochrane gave them some parting words which consisted of wishing them good luck and reminding Hank Marlowe that the front office expected a damned good gather. Hank said, “Do our best,” and Dewey knew the boys didn’t particularly