Chapter 12

And the wayward wind is a restless wind
A restless wind that yearns to wander...

We never went to bed that night. The only sleep I got was when I wore them down. We slept in the barn on a blanket spread over some hay with another blanket covering us. That was the way we awoke at daylight. I was ready for some more, but Ruby, Jonnie and Jamie were too sore to go again. I showed them more about how I was taught to caress a woman’s body and touch her in places to make her enjoy our lovemaking even more. I took my time with each of them and though they were sore, they told me they already wanted me again as soon as they could.

We took a bath in the water trough and Ruby showed me how to practice swimming by holding onto the end of the wooden trough with both hands while kicking my feet without splashing water everywhere.

When we went to the house, I helped them get Mr. Merle up and into his wheeled-chair. They rolled him out onto the back porch where there was a toilet built next to one end. I watched as Ruby and Jonnie got Mr. Merle onto the seat in the toilet.

When he was done, they cleaned him with a wet cloth and we loaded him back in his wheeled-chair.

Jamie lifted the lid on a wooden barrel about the size of a pickle barrel in a store, then took a long-handled dipper-gourd and dipped two dippers full of powdered limestone, sprinkling it down into the toilet before lowering the lid and closing the door.

I had never even heard of that before, but their toilet didn’t stink. They told me the lime kept the odor down and the flies away.

Ruby wanted us to go to town and order the machinery parts and pulleys we’d need to build a better swing boom at the bathing pool. We needed other supplies and some feed too, so we took the wagon.

Jamie and Jonnie left on their horses to move some cattle from one pasture to another when we left for town. Ruby was wearing a dress today and by the time we were out on the wagon road, she raised her dress and sat on my lap. We rode nearly the whole six miles to Silver Lake with her bouncing up and down on my cock.

On the way back, Ruby told me, “Joss, I’m not sore at all and I want to ride on you again. That was the best yet. I know I got my come at least five times as the wagon bounced me up and down with you inside me.”

Back at the ranch, I drove the wagon straight into the barn and we bailed off onto the blankets where we’d slept the night before. She was on her knees naked, with me behind her, going at it like two dogs when Jamie and Jonnie walked into the barn.

I saw them walk in and by the time they were beside us, both of them were naked.

“Joss, we want you to do us just like Momma. Save both of us some,” Jamie told me.

The next day, I rode over to the far range with both Jonnie and Jamie to take the sheepherder his supplies. We rode our horses and led the two pack mules. It was an overnight trip there and back, leading the slow walking mules. I never waited until dark to be with both girls. I took the saddle off Red and strapped it down on top of a packsaddle. Then I stripped off naked as they took turns sitting naked astraddle my legs facing me. That was some of the best pussy I’ve ever had, and before we made it back to the ranch, each of them had swapped up on me at least twenty times, there and back while sitting on Red.

The third week I was there, Ruby and I went to Silver Lake to pick up the parts and machinery we’d ordered. There and back, she rode sitting astraddle me while I sat on the wagon seat with my pants open.

When we returned to the ranch, we hitched the buggy horse up to the buggy and loaded Mr. Merle. Then we headed to the bathing pool to start working on the new boom pole, and hand cranked swivel that would lift him out of the buggy, then lift him out of the crick when they were through bathing.

It took us another two days to erect the apparatus, but when we were through, I put Ruby in the swing seat and fastened her in with the bar, then Jonnie and Jamie cranked the double-handle crank that lifted her, then cranked the one which swung her out over the water. Using the winch, they lowered her onto the chair I had built in the water just right for Mr. Merle to sit while they bathed him.

“Joss, you’re a good man to have around. There’s nothing here on this ranch that you can’t do,” Mr. Merle told me.

The next day, there was an older man and woman who rode up in a worn out old wagon pulled by one worn out old horse. They were looking for work.

His name was Henry and her name was Lois. I took them into the house, and for three hours, I sat with them and talked with the four members of the Peters family until the five of us agreed to hire them full time. The Parkers didn’t have many belongings, but they seemed happy to have a place to live and a secure job. They moved into the bunkhouse and the Peters gave them enough food, coffee, lard and flour to tide them over until they all went to town for supplies again.

Then, for a another week, I rode fences with the three Peters women and Henry, repairing broken barbed wire, resetting loose fence posts and wobbly gate posts. It took two whole days, riding hard, to make a complete round of the perimeter on The Windy Ridge. Ten thousand acres is a big ranch.

I stayed on another three days and broke five horses that had never been ridden. I’m turning out to be a pretty damned good bronc buster, the more I ride.

I have yet to be thrown.

The last night I was there, Ruby and I slept in the bed with Jamie and Jonnie. After a whole night of the fiercest fucking I had ever been put through, all three of them told me the next morning that they were definitely with child. They were happy and I was too. Though I was leaving there happy, I hated to leave them.

With tears in their eyes and my eyes too, they told me to hurry and get my drifting done so I could come back home to them.

The next morning, I spent an hour sitting on Mr. Merle’s beside ... just him and me, as we talked. We didn’t talk about him dying or me leaving, we just talked about how happy he was now that the Peters women were happy. Then, we talked about all the places I thought I might travel.

Before I left, he told me that he understood about me needing to keep moving. “Just come back home when your drifting is done and the restless winds are no longer calling you out. You have a family here now Joss, and they’ll need you here with them.”

When I looked at my map, for some reason the town of El Dorado stuck out to me. The name itself made it sound like a good place to visit, since it was sort of on my way. I didn’t learn many Spanish words in school, but I knew that El Dorado meant something close to the golden land.

I figured I could make the hundred and twenty-five miles easy in four days...

Early on the morning of the fourth day, I was breaking camp when I saw three riders coming toward the tree lined crick where I had camped. As soon I saw them, I had a gut feeling that bad trouble was headed my way. I’d only spent a few nights on the trail until now, and so far, I had yet to run upon any really bad men. I did meet and pass by some along the way who looked at me like they hated me – for whatever reason I’ll never know.

I was standing beside Red, with him between them and me when they rode in and pulled their horses up. I stood as if I was tightening the girth on his saddle when they stopped a few feet away. They just sat there on their horses, looking all around, finally looking straight at me. The one in the middle spoke up after a long hard look at me and I knew right then, my hunch was right.

“Where you headed, Boy?” he spoke as if he was already mad that I was here.

“Nowhere, really,” I told him, which was the truth, but it was none of his concern where I was headed.

“Well, you may have arrived and didn’t know it. Step out from behind that horse so we can talk better. I’m sure we can make a satisfactory deal on that big Red Roan and that old Blue packhorse of yours.”

“They’re not for sale and I’d advise you men to ride on before you find yourselves in more trouble than you’re looking for.” I meant what I said, but I figured they thought I was bluffing. The one thing they didn’t know, I had one of my rifles out of the scabbard and under my left arm. The loop was off the hammer on my Colt, ready for whatever they threw at me. I wasn’t about to give up Red and Blue, and there was no way I was going to let them rob me of my money.

“You’re awful damn young to be giving advice to three grown men. Now, do as I say or we’ll get off these horses and come whup hell outta that ass for you.”

“If you think you can whup my ass, then come and get it. I need to warn you though, you’ll all die if any one of you makes a move to get off your horse.” I’d already made up my mind, I was going to kill all three of them if they kept on. Polk had warned me about men like this and he told me more than once, never let them even get close enough to harm me. Kill ‘em before they expect it, was his words.

They nudged their horses to step wider apart, then looked at each other. I saw them nod ... and about that time, the one on the right reached for his pistol when the other two started to get off their horses.

I stepped out with my rifle raised, killing that first man before he could raise his pistol toward me. I turned with my rifle pointed toward the one in the middle.

Then the man on the other side reached for his pistol and I whirled to kill him next. The man in the middle poked his horse and charged right at me.

Ducking under Red’s neck, I pulled his head around as the man rode past.

He turned his horse, pointing his pistol at me as he did. I shot from the hip with my Henry, hitting him under his chin, ripping a hole through his throat with the .44 rifle slug.

When it was all over I looked around and none of them were moving, not even their horses. There wasn’t a sound up and down the crick. The first thing that came to mind was, I had just killed three men. Hell, I tried to tell them I was going to if they didn’t ride on and leave me alone.

I didn’t let it bother me though, I did what I had to do to stay alive.

By the time I had them across their saddles and tied where they’d stay, it was close to 8:00. I searched their saddlebags and found very little money in the first two. When I looked in the third man’s saddlebags, I found nearly a thousand dollars in small bills, nothing over a ten. I figured they’d robbed a store, or a bank maybe, to get all this money. They just didn’t look like the working kind to me.

I kept the money, except for a few wrinkled up old one dollar bills, figuring to give the money back if I ever run upon whoever could prove it was theirs. I put their pistols and pistol belts in my saddlebags with all the bullets they had between them.

I looked at my compass as I held it beside my map, then set out on a trail for El Dorado.

I had just glanced at my watch a few minutes before, when I looked ahead to see the small town in the distance. We rode into El Dorado, Kansas just after 2:00 in the evening and in no time, we had a following of twenty folks. They were talking and pointing at me, as I led the three horses with a dead man tied across each one. I hoped I was doing the right thing by bringing them with me and not burying them back on the trail.

I rode up to the town marshal’s office and an older man stepped out onto the boardwalk to stand looking over the hitching rail at me. His right arm was in a sling and his head was bandaged.

“What you got there, Boy?” he asked.

“These three men tried to jump me back on the trail early this morning as I was breaking camp. I told them to ride on and leave me alone, but they didn’t listen. I had to kill them to keep them from killing me.”

One of the men standing nearby walked over and raised the head of the man I’d killed last. I watched as he looked at me wide-eyed, then at the marshal.

“Marshal, this is Cort Littleton, and it looks like his brothers over here ... Hell yes it is,” he stated when he looked at the other two dead men’s faces.

“What’s your name, Boy? Where you out of? Where you headed?” the town marshal asked.

“The name’s Joss Wayward and I’m out of Sedalia, Missouri to begin with. But I’ve been in Kansas for a month or so, working on different ranches and breaking horses. I was headed down toward Texas to see if I can find some work, before this happened.”

“You’re not a bounty hunter?”

“No Sir. I’ve never even shot at another man until today. I tried my best to tell them to leave me alone ... as you can see, they didn’t.”

“Step down from that big red horse and come on inside. There’s a sizable reward for those three Littleton Brothers. I’ll get the paper work done up and we’ll head over to the bank to collect your money.”

There was a two hundred dollar reward for Cort Littleton and another hundred apiece for his brothers, Curt and Colon.

I put Red and Blue up at the livery and headed to the hotel. I was ready for a hot meal and a hot bath, with a night’s sleep on a soft bed. I’d made more money in one day than I’d ever dreamed I’d make in five years. I decided to spend a few dollars of it on myself.

Up in my room, the bath water was already in the tub and I looked at it real close to make sure no one else had bathed in it. I didn’t mind taking a bath in clear crick water, now that I’ve learned to swim good enough to save my self from drowning. But, I’ve seen some awful scroungy looking men in the few days I’ve been on the trail and I’ll be damned if I’m going to bathe in a tub of water after any of them have been in it.

With my dirty suit of clothes rolled up and stuck under my arm, I went downstairs to eat. The hotel had a laundry service for twenty-five cents and I left my dirty clothes at the desk after telling the man I’d be leaving as soon as I ate breakfast in the morning.

I had just sat down and told the man what I wanted for supper when I saw the marshal walk into the dining hall. He was looking around the room, then he grinned as he spotted me. He walked my way, followed by an older man. With them was a woman about Ruby Peters’ age and two girls a year or two older than me. They walked right up to the table where I was sitting. The marshal was still smiling as he looked down at me...

I knew that smile on a man – he wants something.

“Joss, I want you to meet my older brother, Clifford Tate, his daughter Eloise Sutter, and his two granddaughters, Melanie and Melody ... Clifford’s got something he needs to discuss with you, that is if you’ll let us sit with you.”

I looked at the three women and made my mind up real quick, when they smiled at me... “Sure, y’all sit down and I’ll listen to what you have to say.”

For some odd reason in my mind, I just about knew this man was going to ask if he, his daughter and two granddaughters could travel south through Indian Territory with me.

I was close to being almost halfway right...

“ ... As I was saying, Joss ... Eloise is trying to get away from Melody and Melanie’s daddy. He’s an older man and has become very abusive. He’s already put bruise marks on all three of them. He’s got men who watch the train station and men who watch the stage lines. The only way we could think of to sneak them out of town was find a good man we could trust and send them off into the night, toward Indian Territory.”