The Diamond Hitch. Frank O'Rourke
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made twenty-three miles that day and camped just outside Snowflake on the irrigation ditch under big, old cottonwood trees. Throwing horses and mules into the pasture, Raymond explained that the Mormons kept the little twenty-five acre pasture for the convenience of travelers.
“Good folks,” Dewey said.
“Sure,” Raymond said. “I was born here. You and me’ll go to the dance tonight.”
Snowflake had about three hundred people and you couldn’t buy coffee, smoking tobacco, or cigars because of the Mormon religion. Raymond knew everybody in town and was treated kindly, but he’d backslid and was called a jack Mormon. The other boys turned down Raymond’s invitation and hit the sack early, and Raymond took Dewey into town for the dance.
“Just mind your p’s and q’s,” Raymond said. “Don’t start no trouble.”
The dance was opened with prayer and a song; then Raymond introduced Dewey to a cousin and she took him around the hall and made him acquainted with everyone. He danced with the girls and liked one pretty little thing who was all blue eyes and yellow hair and kept smiling at him as they whirled around in waltzes and two-steps. Dewey worked up a sharp appetite for the midnight supper, just peeking over at the long table loaded down with fried chicken and ham and cake and pie. He got to bed at one and was up at five, feeling fresh despite the short rest. They ate breakfast at the local cafe and Hank signed the tab which went to Cochrane, and thanked the lady for rising so early to cook just for them; and then they wasted no time lining out south on the Show Low road.
They got into piñons and junipers and cedars that day, and the first high stands of ponderosa pine, with mountains looming up jagged dark to the south and west. Making a twenty-eight mile drive, they hit Show Low at sundown, coming through a shallow valley into the town that sprawled on a slope with trees standing up black and thick to the west. Show Low had gotten its name from a game of Seven Up played on this spot in the early days. There was a big hand with a seven-thousand-acre ranch at stake and the first bidder begged on five and the other fellow gave him one and then said, “Show low, and take it,” and the man showed it and won the ranch, and the name stuck until it became official.
They camped out that night and Dewey cooked a good breakfast of bacon and eggs and fried potatoes. They drove to Cibecue, camped out, and the following morning went seven miles to the rock storehouse where groceries and supplies were kept for outlying ranch work. The storehouse had no windows and just one door lined with flat iron slabs. The next morning Hank, who had gone on ahead during the night, returned with an Apache Indian boy and the string of pack burros.
Dewey studied those burros while he cooked breakfast. He didn’t know much about burros and his first thought was, if that was his kitchen transportation, and he had to pack and unpack those little demons, he wondered who was going to keep them close at hand and how many days it would be before the boys quit because the meals weren’t put out on time.
Hank opened the storehouse and everybody got busy, splitting up all supplies for storage or packing. The storehouse sat in the northeast corner of a big pasture about three sections square, with a little stream running through the middle. The pasture was barbwire fenced, five strands high on cedar posts, and used mainly as a holding pasture. It was one day’s ride from the main ranch and the boys usually rested cattle here before driving on to the railroad. “In a couple of weeks,” Hank Marlowe said, “Cochrane and old Bob’ll come down, pick up the chuck wagon and mules, and take ’em back to headquarters. Now we got to pack and get started. Squab, cut out the kitchen canaries!”
The Apache boy drove the four kitchen burros over and gave Dewey his first close look. He could tell the leader right off, that was Benstega, who weighed around four hundred and seventy-five pounds. Benstega was brown with a white face that boasted a brown streak down the middle.
“Jim Toddy,” Squab said, pointing to the other brown burro.
Jim Toddy was smaller than Benstega. Tom was mouse-colored and a little bigger than Jim Toddy. “This one,” Squab said, slapping the last burro, “Jerry.”
Jerry weighed around four hundred and was sort of grayish-white, more from age than anything else. Dewey looked them over while they eyed him in burro fashion, and Hank Marlowe swallowed a grin. Dewey Jones might not understand burros now, but a month from today he’d know too damned much and wish he never learned.
Hank laid out blankets and hair pads for each burro, put good blankets over the hair pads, with pack covers all ready. Dewey sorted out his kitchen equipment while Squab led the other ten pack burros up and saddled them. Dewey got everything in neat stacks, dried fruit, flour, sugar, Dutch ovens and pots and pans, cutlery and tin cups and plates. He’d never packed burros before but he could load a mule, and this couldn’t be too different. Hank had brought a quarter of fresh beef from the home ranch, and this was on a piece of canvas, waiting to be packed.
Hank said then, “You ever pack burros?”
“No,” Dewey said honestly, “but I can learn.”
Hank slapped the kyack boxes and pointed to a canvas bag hanging on Tom’s saddle. “Each one can handle a hundred and fifty pounds, so we split up the loads equal as possible. Put your odds and ends in that bag, stuff like baking powder and bacon and tin cups. We’ll load today, you watch how it’s done.”
Benstega got the flour and one box of fruit. Jim Toddy got three boxes of fruit and three cases of Pet milk. Tom got his kyack boxes filled with pots and pans, and the odds and ends in the canvas bag, Dutch ovens and the quarter of beef on top. Jerry got the sugar, a sack on each side and one on top. “Now,” Hank said, “the rest goes on the other burros.”
They packed the cotton-seed cake, the other three cases of Pet milk, the oats, the tomatoes and corn and bedrolls on the ten pack burros. Dewey was rusty at the job and the burros were different from mules, but he gradually got the hang of things. He had trouble with his diamond hitches; his fingers were all thumbs, he felt like a rank amateur because Squab and Hank tied down so fast. But finally the burros were packed, the few extra supplies locked in the storehouse. The other boys had left, driving the spare saddle horses, leaving Dewey with Hank and Squab. The Indian boy lined the burros up and took his place at the lead, the burros fiddling around a little while before following him up the trail nose-to-tail.
“We got twelve miles to go,” Hank said. “Can’t hurry burros, so enjoy yourself.”
They rode in the rising sunlight that filtered down through the trees, on a winding trail that bore steadily south and east into wild country. The Indian boy slouched lazily in his saddle, paying no mind to the trail, letting horse and burros follow a path they knew from long experience. Hank rolled a smoke and then said casually, “You ever worked in rough country before, Dewey?”
“Not this kind,” Dewey said, “but I worked for the Adams Cattle Company back in New Mexico, that’s the old A6. I sure can see the difference in the way you do things.”
“Rougher country,” Hank said. “I reckon you used wagons back there.”
“Yes,” Dewey said. “We had line camps at the Adams and you could get over near all of it in a wagon so we never knowed what a pack horse was except for carrying beds. There was line camps with good ranges, and the wagons carried bedrolls and groceries from one camp to another. We’d start roundup at Red River Camp.”
Hank pushed his old black Stetson back and nodded in understanding. Like all cowmen, Hank was interested in other parts of a common land and trade, in a big country where methods might differ but down-to-earth working and living were always the same. Then too, Hank had stayed back today to ride with Dewey Jones and find out some more about the new cook.
“I been through that country,” Hank said. “Just where is that camp?”
“On the east end,” Dewey said, “near the old town of Catskill. The Adams was fenced in pastures and we’d round up a pasture and throw it into the corrals at Red River Camp. Next day them cattle was transferred on up to the Carrizo Camp, and from there to Castle Rock Camp close to Vermejo Park, and then to Penaflor Camp where they