Chapter 1: Trial by Fire

I didn't know the guy but I liked his spirit. He was maybe in his early forties, short and stocky, and he made me think of a cocky bantam rooster. He was playing poker at the high-stakes table. Almost everyone knew Julesburg was the 'wickedest city in America' so he should have been paying more attention to the dealer. I guessed the half-empty bottle of the local rotgut sorta dulled his senses.

I'd bought a small herd in to the railroad for Cap Jones, the old man that ran the ranch I'd worked at since I was fourteen. He was selling out to some Eastern investment company and although they had offered to make me the foreman if I would stay on, I wanted no part of it. Cap and his wife were moving east a bit to live with his daughter in Lincoln so I figured after I took him his money from the sale of his cattle I'd just mosey on.

I came to the King of the Hills to say good-bye to Carla. It was one of the better but still not so nice dance halls around. I was half in love with her even though I knew there was no future in it. She didn't come on duty 'til ten so I dropped back to the poker room to kill the time.

As I watched this cowman getting cleaned out by the dealer using his sly fingers to palm cards off the bottom of the deck, I grew to like his feisty attitude. With a sudden move he stood up and drawing his .44, he slammed it down on the table.

"God damn you cheatin' bastard! I seen ya dealin' off the bottom. Give me back my money or I'll blow yer damn head off."

What he couldn't see, but I could since I was standing behind the dealer, was that the gambler was holding a .41 caliber derringer under the table and didn't look like he would hesitate to use it with no warning. I leaned over and grabbed his wrist, forcing it down. The derringer went off shooting the dealer in the lower leg. Reaching down I grabbed his left hand, turned it forcefully over and banged it on the table. The seven of diamonds, which would have filled his inside straight, was nicely stuck in the dealer's palm.

It was over pretty quick. A couple of teamsters grabbed the gambler and unceremoniously threw him out the door into a pool of muddy water in front of the dance hall. The various participants, with big smiles divided what they felt was their just desserts from the gambler's leavin's and the bowlegged rancher took my arm and led me to the bar.

The grin sliding from his face, he admitted, "Wal, I guess he had me purt near to rights. I was damn near dead there for a minute. You don't look like the kind I could give some money to so I'll just say if ya ever need a job come see me." He took my hand and tried his best to crush it. "I'm Pete Dancer, and damn, it, thanks!"

"I'm Slade Ransom." I told him a bit about myself, twelve hard years herdin' cattle and how I'd started at fourteen after my folks died when our house burnt down under questionable circumstances.

He told me about his ranch, the Circle R, and gave me the directions on how to get there. He added, "My ranch is north a few miles up from Walden, Colorado, just a ways down from the Wyoming border. It's not huge as far as ranches in the area go, but I have four hundred acres of hay along the river and I've spent a lot of money upgrading the herds.

"I've been losing too many cattle to rustlers and I don't think my foreman, Bill Klein, is working hard enough to stop them. I'll be honest with you, twenty years ago I could have chased him off but I'm too old for that now. I need a man like you to kick him off the ranch and take care of my rustling problem. The other thing is he's chasing after my daughter and I'm afraid of what might happen. She's a notional gal and hard to handle.

He said as he shook his head, "Her ma has done her best, but she has a temper, and ... oh, hell. I just can't handle her anymore. She's a red headed filly that's near as wild as the few longhorns I got left. She shore 'nuff needs a man to rein her in, so maybe you're the one that can do it. Man, I'd like to see that. Her name is Candace but everyone calls her Candy."

We talked on for a bit as he told me of his drive of a couple of hundred head of three year olds to the railroad in Walcott and of his plans to upgrade his herds with Herford bulls. He'd taken the train on down to Julesburg to see a local rancher about a couple Hereford bulls.

He gave me a hard glance, and finished with, "I'll be honest with you. This job could be a bit dangerous. I'm steadily losin' cattle, particularly calves. It seems like each of my cows only have half a calf!"

He laughed with a bit of bitterness and walked out of the dance hall. I liked him and thought maybe I'd look him up. I wasn't worried about the rustlers, and it sounded like a fair challenge — and maybe a bit of fun — to tame his wild daughter. He said his daughter was "right nice lookin', but I took that with a grain of salt ... not that I was picky or anything.

I found Carla, and after a couple of dances, took her back to her room to say good-bye. As I left the dance hall, I could see her wipe the tears away and start dancin' with a cowboy from Wyoming I'd seen a couple of times. I guessed she'd not pine for me too long.

I went back to Cap's place to say good-bye to him and to gather my possibles pouch. Cap was real nice about it and gave me a good bonus. He almost felt like my dad and I'm sure he looked at me like a son. We said our so longs and I moseyed on down to Ogallala to figure out what I wanted to do. I got down there late in the afternoon — Cap's place was on Blue Creek north of the small settlement of Lewellen a few miles — and had a couple of drinks and ate a steak I figured must have taken the better part of a steer. It was too late to get to the bank and put my money from Cap in a safe place so I put up at the hotel.

I'd saved up quite a bit and with Cap's bonus I had more money than I'd ever dreamed of, and didn't want to carry it with me. When I said good-bye to Pete, he told me with a pleading voice, "Just get here as damn fast as you can." I figgered I'd work for him for a couple of years and start buying a bull and a few cows and maybe I could build my own ranch to park that red-haired Candy Dancer.

I didn't sleep well listening to some woman complainin' to her man somethin' about promises not kept. I was 'bout ready to go next door and rap this fools head against the wall when they gave up with their damn folderol and went to sleep. I woke early the next mornin' and after stuffin' myself with flapjacks and a gallon of damn fine coffee, I was waitin' in front of the bank for them to open.

I'd tied Dirty Red to the rail with a loose loop of the reins. The red part of his name was from his color and the dirty from his disposition: he felt honor bound to make sure I really knew how to ride each time I threw a leg over the saddle. He wasn't shy about trying to bite me. I was sittin' on the bank's steps, finishin' a smoke, knowin' they'd open in a minute. Three worn-out lookin' men pulled up on better horseflesh than I'd seen in a while, stepped by me to the door and started bangin' on it.

A nervous lookin' clerk opened the door and the men went in. Of a sudden, there was a crash of guns and two of the men came runnin' out only to be cut down at once by both barrels of what sounded like a twelve gauge. The man with a gun had a star on his shirt and saw me as I jumped up trying to figure out what the hell was going on. He saw my movement and, in his excitement, forgetting he'd just fired, swung the barrel over to me and pulled both triggers again. With an oath he threw the empty gun down and swept his hand down for his sidearm.

I hadn't done anything wrong but be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Standing' around jawin' about things didn't seem like a healthy option as long as bullets were flyin'. I grabbed the reins that were lying loose over the rail and jumped aboard Red. He took off with a savage leap, wasting no time crow hopping like he was wont to. We made it about ten yards 'til we were on the verge of swinging around to the alley between the bank and the mercantile.

I heard a shot from the deputy and felt a hammer blow to my back. The shock of it almost knocked me off my straining horse but I fell flat as another bullet whizzed by so close I swore I could feel it tug at the too long hair at the side of my head. I jerked Red around the corner then took a left at the trash filled back alley and took off for the stockyards down by the river.

The pain was intense but I knew I had to hold it together. It looked like the law had gotten a tip about a bank robbery and had set up an ambush. I'd just been in the wrong place at the wrong time but I didn't feel like arguin' with some deputy about how I was an innocent bystander. As I swung through the muddy tracks around the pens, I made for the willow breaks alongside the South Platte. The river was low for February since we had had a very dry winter, and I slid down the low sandy bank into the water making my way upstream. I didn't have a plan; I just knew if I didn't get lost in a hurry my cowboy days were over.

Even with the heavy growth of tress alongside the river I could hear the yelling and pounding hooves of a posse forming, but looking back at the stockyards I couldn't see anyone. If I could lose myself along the river I might get away from them unseen. My more immediate problem was the intense burning in my side that cried for relief.

The bullet had torn through my left side a couple inches over my belt and in about two or three inches. It had gone straight through and I was bleedin' like a stuck pig. The worst of it was from the ragged exit wound in the front but I was able to untie my dusty neckerchief and wad it into the wound.

The thick stand of young willows and a number of large, overgrown cottonwoods screened the river from the town. There were no leaves at this time of year but the willows were so dense I wasn't worried about being seen. There hadn't been anyone around when I went past the stockyards but someone might have seen me. I knew a place about two miles west of town where the north bank was sandy for about a half mile.

I climbed up at that point, making my way the short distance to the railroad tracks. I was fadin' fast but I got Red headed west down the tracks. There was gravel filling the spaces between the ties so he didn't have too hard a time of it. I collapsed on Red and was out of it for a while but he kept plodding on. He stopped and then I woke up puzzled as to why. I saw there was a trestle in front of us bridging a quarter mile wide swale. I recognized it as the drainage for the Ogallala Gulch and eased Red on down the embankment into the dry wash. Looking back I couldn't see or hear anything of a posse.

The Gulch led through the range of hills that were a few miles north of the South Platte. Past the hills another four or five miles was the North Platte. I figured if I could make the far side of the North Platte I could hole up for a day or so. From there it was maybe thirty miles to Cap's Double Cross ranch which was a few miles north of Lewellen in the valley east of Twin Buttes.