"Tell me about the longhorns, Melanie," Shane said, ignoring her comments about the cowhands. He had known there would be obstacles in this new way of life. But that did not make the hurt sting his heart and insides any less when he came face to face with it.
But he would overcome it all.
To survive, he must.
His father had shown confidence in him by leaving him in charge of so much. He could not let him down! Shane believed that when a loved one died, they were not truly gone. Their spirits lingered somewhere overhead, observing. Just as the old chief watched Shane from somewhere, his true father was watching him now, also. Perhaps his
father was holding his precious wife's hand in the hereafter, both observing the son they had loved with all of their hearts.
Melanie would not be put off all that easily. She wheeled her horse around and blocked Shane's further progress. "Damn it, Shane," she said, squaring her shoulders angrily. "Those men are under your employ. Don't let them get away with this. Let them know that you are the boss or give them their walking papers!"
Shane grabbed Melanie's reins from her and glared at her. "Woman, I know that you mean well," he said flatly. "But let it be. I will fight my own battles in my own way. Do you understand?"
Melanie flinched as though she had been slapped. Color rushed to her cheeks and tears burned at the corners of her eyes. She grabbed her reins back from Shane, gave him a hurt stare, then rode away from him, her horse's hooves a sullen thunder against the ground.
"Melanie!" Shane shouted, riding after her. When he caught up with her, his eyes were apologetic. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have scolded you. I do know that you mean only what is best for me, but darling, there are some things you cannot teach a man. Self-respect is one of them!"
A strange sort of pain centered around Melanie's heart when she heard Shane's pleas. She had been wrong to become angry with him. That was the last thing he needed at this time. Her fingers tightened on the reins and her horse slowed to an easy canter again.
"Shane, I'm the one who needs to apologize," she said, brushing a tear from her eye. "I was insensitive to your feelings. Darling, I'm so sorry."
"Let us not talk any more of feelings today," Shane said, reaching over and cupping her chin within the palm of his hand. "You say you want to teach me about the longhorns. I am eager to learn."
"And I am perhaps too eager to teach you?" Melanie said, smiling weakly up at him.
"Only because your love for me is strong," Shane said, leaning to brush a kiss against her brow. He drew away from her and looked across the vastness of the land dotted with grazing longhorns.
"The longhorns came from a place called Texas?" he asked, admiring anew the animals with the glistening, curved horns.
Feeling as though everything was back in proper perspective again, Melanie relaxed her shoulders. She circled a hand on the pommel of her saddle and rested it there. "Yes, they are from Texas," she said, smiling. "They are trailed to New Orleans, and on up to Minnesota Territory by boat." She paused as she turned her attention to the cattle. "Longhorns are a profitable business. The meat sells at three cents a pound."
They watched together as cows and calves were cut from the main herd for branding.
"It takes a special pony to separate the cows and calves," Melanie explained. "The best cutting ponies are so alert and intelligent, their riders have little need of reins. As soon as the cowhand shows
the pony which calf or steer he wants to cut, the horse's ears begin to twitch and its eyes stay glued on the animal being chased toward the branding iron. It knows what it's doing."
Shane watched as the branding irons were heated to a red-hot glow. Two men on horseback roped a calf by the hind legs and dragged it toward the fire. Working in teams, others wrestled the calves to the ground. Each calf was branded on the ribs and dehorned; the males were castrated.
This continued, the cowhands taking turns roping, branding, cutting, and earmarking.
Melanie and Shane rode among the longhorns, looking them over carefully. "On our farm, we castrate the calves only every other year," Melanie further explained. "In alternate years, all the males are left to breed."
She nodded and gestured with a hand. "As you can see, a quantity of Hereford bull yearlings have been placed among the longhorns," she said.
"Do you ever worry about stampedes?" Shane asked, seeing the fierceness in the eyes of some of the larger animals.
"That is the only true disadvantage of raising longhorns," Melanie said, frowning. "They have an extraordinary wildness about them that makes them nervous, easy to stampede."
She drew her reins taut, stopping her horse. "Do you see that longhorn over there?" she said, pointing one out. "His thick horns, set forward as they are, can be as sharp as any knife."
Shane studied the animal, his jaw set. Of all the longhorns he had seen, this one seemed the most
untrustworthy. Mighty-antlered and wild-eyed, the bull even now seemed to be challenging Shane and Melanie for the right to the land that it grazed on. Its coarse-haired coat was a glossy dunnish-brown merging into black with white speckles and splotches on its rump, and a washed-out copper line down its back. It was tall, bony, flat-sided and thin-flanked, and grote
squely narrow-hipped. Its length was so extended its back swayed, its big ears were carved into an outlandish design. Its horns were most threatening in their size.
"Several bulls have taken up with our cattle and have become quite domesticated," Melanie said, watching this particular bull with care. "But this is not one of them. This is the one that Terrance has named Wild Thunder. I would suggest we ride on. I don't like the gleam in his eye."