Lone Calder Star (Calder Saga 9)

“Exactly the same.” Quint wasn’t surprised by that, but he wasn’t pleased either as he returned the tally book and pencil to his pocket.

“I didn’t figure we’d missed any, but there was always a chance we might have.” Empty rested both hands on the saddle horn, one on top of the other, and slanted a knowing look at Quint. “I told you to expect it.”

“To be honest, Empty,” Quint said, allowing a slight smile to curve his mouth, careful not to let it be too wide and open the cut inside the corner of his mouth, “I would have been shocked if you were wrong.”

Empty grunted an acknowledgment and declared, “Rutledge don’t miss a trick and that’s a fact.” He ran a sidelong glance over the multicolored bruise high on Quint’s cheek. “Though, I’ve got to admit I never figured he’d sic his boys on you so quick.”

“It was my mistake for stopping in there for a beer.” But it was Dallas that Quint was thinking about, just as he had countless times in the last two days.

By now she would have heard from Rutledge, either directly or indirectly. Quint could only hope that a warning was all she received. As much as he wanted to make certain she was all right, he knew he had to keep his distance from her.

“Best do your drinking here at the Cee Bar from now on—and damned little of it,” Empty advised.

“I’ve never been much of a drinking man.” Quint collected the reins and swung his horse toward the ranch yard.

Empty followed suit, riding parallel with him while automatically running a rancher’s assessing eye over the pasture condition. “Good thing you got hay coming. The graze is getting pretty thin.”

“I noticed.”

“It could be worse, though,” Empty continued. “Old Ellis Baxter used to own this section. He was one of those progressive kind, always hot to do what some government expert claimed was right.” Empty punctuated the statement with a derisive snort. “It wouldn’t have surprised me if Baxter had seeded his whole place with that damned government Love Grass. It’s the most worthless stuff ever put on earth. Cattle won’t eat it. But that damned Love Grass chokes out all the native grasses. As far as I’m concerned, it’s nothing but a fire hazard.”

As always, Quint listened when the retired rancher opined on a subject. The old man reminded him of the veteran hands at the Triple C, whose storehouse of knowledge and experience they had always been ready to share with him, from the time he was knee-high. They had taught him a healthy respect for the old ways, which often turned out to be the best ways.

“Thought I’d tackle that mesquite in the south pasture tomorrow,” Empty remarked. “You turn your back on that stuff and before you know it, it’s taken over the whole pasture. Then you gotta play brush-popper to get the cattle out of it, and I’m too old to be tearing pell-mell through a bunch of scrub. You only need to drive to the coastal plains or over in west Texas to see what a plague mesquite’s become. An old-timer once told me that whole area used to be a sea of grass. Now it’s damned near a forest of mesquite.”

“I heard.” In his mind, Quint summoned up an image of the grass ocean that covered the Triple C Ranch in Montana. The image quickly dissipated, scattered by the muted jingle of the cell phone in his jacket pocket. Retrieving it, he flipped it open. “Cee Bar.”

His aunt’s familiar voice responded with sharp clarity, “Hello, Quint. It’s Jessy.”

“Back home, are you?” he guessed. “How was the wedding?”

“Huge and beautiful—everything Laura wanted it to be. I’m just glad it’s over and I’m back home where I belong,” she stated with conviction. “How are things down there? Laredo mentioned that you’d run across some problems.”

Quint brought her up to date on the current status. “I talked to the mechanic this morning. It was sugar in the gas tank. But all the repairs on the pickup should be finished next week sometime. As for finding another feed store to supply us with grain, there’s no need to do that until I start running low. We just finished the tally on the cattle and came up twenty-seven head short.”

“Stolen, no doubt.”

“That’s my guess. Since I don’t know how many were in any given pasture, I can’t even pinpoint where the loss occurred.”

“Or when,” Jessy added.

Quint hesitated only briefly. “You might as well know that I was jumped by three men Saturday night,” he said and gave her a thumbnail sketch of the events, omitting any mention of Dallas. “I came out of it with nothing more than a little cut and some bruises, but I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t mention anything about it to my mother.”

“I won’t say anything for now,” she agreed. “But I don’t like the sound of this, Quint.”

“Don’t blow it out of proportion like my mom would. We’re talking about three cowboys trying to pound home a message. If professionals had delivered it, I’d probably be talking to you from a hospital bed.”

“Just the same,” Jessy began with an obvious note of concern for his well-being.

“Nothing’s changed, Jessy,” Quint stated calmly. “There’s no one at the Triple C better qualified for this than I am.”

“That’s true,” she said. There was a smile in her voice when she recalled, “When you were a boy, you always finished any job you started. You haven’t changed in that. I would feel easier, though, if you had someone there with you. Laredo mentioned that you’d found a hired man to work at the Cee Bar? Is he someone you can trust?”

“Without question.”

“That’s good then. What about the hay you ordered? Has it arrived?”

“It’s supposed to be here Wednesday morning,” he told her.