One Step Over the Border (10 page)

Hap stretched out his arms and yawned. He longed for a hot shower and a soft bed. Even a meager bedroll on hard ground sounded
better by the minute.

After an hour of steady plodding, Greene signaled them to join him at the back of the herd. “Thanks, boys. Can you just waltz
these bovines up to that rise and hold them? With all the fencing going on along here, that’s the only place along the border
that I can get them across. It’s hard to spot at night. I’ll signal you from the river with my flashlight. You start them
toward the beam. When we get them to the river, we’ll use the flashlight to sort brands, and I’ll push them over myself if
you want to quit then.”

“We don’t quit,” Laramie insisted. “But we don’t steal, either.”

It only took a moment for E. A. Greene to ride out of sight. Laramie and Hap moseyed sixty-one head of shorthorns toward the
distant Rio Grande. The sluggish cattle bunched together, so the boys rode side by side to push them along.

“Laramie, I’ve been deliberatin’. I think you’re right. No matter what brand is on their hide, this feels like rustlin’ cattle
to me.”

“Did you ever rustle cattle before?”

“Not that I know of. I’ve pushed a lot of bovines that belonged to other people, but I reckon they all knew what I was doin’.
But one of the first lessons my daddy taught me: Don’t quit until the work’s all done. What lesson did you learn from your
daddy?”

“Don’t become a drunk,” Laramie mumbled.

They peered through the shadows and plodded the cows along. The breeze cooled them enough to stop sweating, but was not so
nippy as to rub their arms. Besides the shuffling of bovine hooves on desert sand, the song of myriad crickets rolled up from
the Rio Grande. Even those noises died down as they reached the last rolling rise, before a gradual descent to the river.

Laramie shoved a canteen at his partner.

Hap unscrewed the cap. “One thing about it, these Rio Grande nights are pleasant. Kind of a light gulf draft driftin’ up the
river. Makes a cowboy want to sleep on top of the bedroll thankin’ the good Lord for that meadow up above full of twinklin’
stars.”

“Do you see Greene’s signal light?”

“Nope. This is peaceful, so far.” Hap sighed. “Let’s just swim back over and build us a fire to dry out our jeans. One thing
I like about this cow business are the quiet, remote places. Gives a man the opportunity to sort out his life and review the
choices… good and bad. I like to remember old pals from bygone days. And I try to recall the lessons my mamma taught me with
her sweet smile and the Good Book in her lap.”

“You’ve been thinking about all that?”

“Shoot, yeah, Laramie. That’s what soft summer nights do to me. They flood me with melancholy, in a good sort of way. I reckon
that’s the way it is with all cowpunchers. What are you thinkin’ about this evenin’?”

“Ants.”

“What? You wastin’ a fine evenin’ like this meditatin’ on ants?”

“I want to know… do those little suckers work hard because they’re smart, or because they’re dumb?”

“I don’t exactly get your drift, Laramie.”

“Ants do what they’re programmed to do and they do it well. But they don’t stop and scratch their little heads and say, ‘This
just isn’t right.’ No ant contemplates his own destiny or how he fits into the grand scheme of history and the universe. They
follow their genetic code even to their own demise.”

“Is this biological discussion leadin’ somewhere?”

Laramie circled his arm to the north. “It’s leading to the Rio Grande.”

Hap rubbed a cramp out of his shoulder. “You figure we’re just following our genetic cowboy code? You think we’re headed to
our own demise?” Hap patted his scabbard. “You reckon we ought to pull the carbines out?”

“That makes it seem like we know what we’re doing. I think we’d better stick to the dumb, innocent routine.” Laramie nodded
toward the river. “That must be Greene’s flashlight.”

“It was either that or a cigarette lighter, but we haven’t see a livin’ soul since we left that cantina. It must have been
Greene.”

Grass-filled during the day, the cows moved slowly, as if looking for bedding ground. Laramie and Hap picked up the pace.
The smooth saddle leather fit them like their old Wranglers. Even the jingle of their spurs fell silent in respect for the
night’s quiet.

Within a few minutes they reached the dirt roadway that paralleled the river and boundaried the banks of the Rio Grande.

“Do you see Greene anywhere?” Laramie asked.

“No, but I felt a twinge in my genetic code.”

At the first gunshot, they dove at their scabbards. But when the headlights of three pickups triangulated their position,
they threw up their hands instead.

“Hold it, compadres, we ain’t lookin’ for a fight,” Hap called out.

Four carbine-toting Mexican men hiked into the headlights from the east, three more from the west.

A hatless man in a three-piece suit without a tie laid his gun over his shoulder. “Stealing cattle is against the law, no
matter what side of the border you’re on.” The spokesman’s English was good, with a hint of accent.

“Yes sir, we’ll agree with that.” Hap tried to make out the man’s face. “We had a few shorthorns stray across the river. We
wanted to take them home so they wouldn’t eat your pasture.”

“These are Mexican cows,” the stocky man insisted.

“We can see that now that you have the car lights on,” Laramie said.

“Señors, we shoot cattle rustlers over here,” a thin, carbine-toting man with a New York Yankees baseball cap announced.

“We’re new to south Texas,” Laramie explained. “We were told that any cattle that strayed across the border should be gathered
up and brought home. Don’t you ride over to Texas and bring your cows back? We thought it worked both ways.”

“I don’t steal another man’s cattle,” the man in the suit replied.

A long discussion in Spanish ensued. Hap surveyed the river for a sign of Greene. He lowered his hands slowly, then walked
his fingers closer to the scabbard of his Winchester.

The man in the suit waved his gun like a professor making a point to the freshman class. “We have two options. Either we shoot
you as rustlers or we take you to town and throw you in jail.”

Laramie rubbed his beard. “Hap, does it surprise you that the boss is nowhere to be seen?”

“Hope he’s got a good Mexican attorney.”

“You working for someone else?” the hatless man asked.

“Yes, sir. We were tryin’ to track his cattle across the river and thought these belonged to him,” Hap insisted. “Laramie,
show him the list of brands we were sent to fetch.”

Laramie reached in his damp shirt pocket, but the wet note tore as he yanked it out.

The man in the suit pointed to the cattle that had already begun to bed down. “Señors, that is my family brand.”

Laramie tossed the remnants of the note to the dirt. “We were a little confused in the dark.”

“Get off the horses,” the man in the suit commanded.

Laramie dug his boots deeper into the stirrups. “I don’t believe that would be a smart move.”

“We can shoot you off,” the man barked.

“Yes, sir. But, as we see it, we ain’t committed a crime,” Hap said.

“You were stealing my cattle.”

“Is this property still your ranch?” Laramie asked.

“Yes, of course.”

“Then we haven’t stole anything. The cattle are still on your property.”

“We were just cuttin’ across your place to get back to Texas,” Hap explained. “And this bunch of cows jumped up and trotted
in front of us. I’m sure they would have turned back at the river and we would be on our way home. We didn’t see any
No Trespassing
signs.”

“That’s absurd. No one would believe that,” the man said.

“You better hope no one believes it,” Laramie said. “You’ve got six men here to watch you kill us. You’ll have to keep them
happy and quiet the rest of their lives. We don’t show up at our regular place tomorrow, a search will begin. Folks know we’re
over here to gather strays. So the police, maybe the FBI, will start poking around. The twenty-four-hour news station will
set up camp and make a circus out of it. One day, one of your vaqueros might get peeved with the meager pay you give him.
At that point they will extort you or you’ll have to shoot them all.”

“They wouldn’t do that.”

“Did you ever see the kind of cash those cable channels offer for an exclusive story?” Hap said.

“In that case, we’ll turn you over to the policia.”

“Say, do any of you know Mr. E. A. Greene?” Laramie said. “He can explain this better than we can.”

“
¿Trabajan para el
Señor Greene?” a stocky, hatless man in the shadows grumbled.

“Yep,” Hap replied. “He hired us to gather up his strays.”

The suited man raised his gun, “Shoot them both. Emmett Greene is a crook.”

Hap kept his hands raised. “He owns Hidalgo County Land and Cattle.”

“He doesn’t own an inch of ground on either side of the Rio Grande.”

“But we were followin’ his big herd, pickin’ up the stragglers,” Hap said.

“Those belong to the Hidalgo County Land and Cattle. But that’s owned by Miller and Robles. They have spreads on both sides
of the river. Greene steals strays before they have a chance to comb the brush. He loads them up and hauls them straight to
a back-street slaughterhouse on Sixteenth Street in San Antonio.”

“Seems like you know a lot of details about him,” Laramie remarked.

“Two of my men worked for Greene. They got arrested and spent time in jail, but Greene escaped prosecution. He always has
an alibi. He hires cowboys to do his stealing, but heads for some public location during the actual crime. If you get caught,
he doesn’t have to pay you. Now, get down,” the suited man commanded again, “We’re taking you to jail.”

Laramie kicked at the man’s hand when he reached for his boot. “No, sir, I told you, we’re not getting off our horses.”

“May the saints have mercy on your mortal souls,” the man shouted. “If you don’t get down right now, I will shoot you for
resisting arrest.”

Laramie locked his knees against his horse’s flank.

Hap backed his horse toward Laramie. “So much for the ‘band of brothers’ during the war. I wish I had listened to you, partner.”

“
Un momento
…” the stocky, hatless man called out. “
Mira eso
.” He pointed at the left, rear hoof of Hap’s horse.
“Tiene una bota de caucho. Son las mismas huellas que habian en la barranca, cerca del relicario de mi sobrina.”

“What did he say?” Hap asked.

“He said you have one rubber boot like the tracks near his niece’s shrine in the barranca.”

“Little Miranda Estrada?” Hap said.

The stocky man with long-sleeved white shirt buttoned at the collar stepped up to Hap’s stirrup. “She was my sister’s daughter.”

Hap yanked off his hat. “I’m truly sorry about the girl. She was a very purdy young lady and I’m sure her family grieves for
her.”

“Where is your
cinta
?” the man asked. “Your hatband.”

“We were roundin’ up strays a few days ago down in that barranca. I stumbled across the memorial your family made for her.
I dusted off the picture, but didn’t have any flowers to leave, so I pulled off my hatband. It’s black and turquoise horsehair.
I braided it myself. Took the hair right out of ol’ Lukey’s mane. I thought it looked nice.”

The man’s voice cracked. “You are the one who did that? My sister thought an angel had stopped to visit the site.”

“How did she die?” Hap asked.

The man wiped the corner of his eyes on his shirtsleeve. “Miranda liked to ride a black stallion. For some reason, the horse
panicked and stampeded toward the arroyo. She stayed in the saddle and tried to turn him. But the stallion didn’t stop until
he crashed into the barranca. By the time my brother-in-law got there, both my niece and the horse were dead.”

“I’m truly sorry.” Hap shoved his hat back on.

The ranch owner lowered his carbine.

“That was a kind thing to do. I won’t shoot you, but I am taking you to jail. This rustling has to stop right now.”

“Mister,” Hap said, “if you eliminate me and Laramie, will you abolish your rustling problem?”

“Not with Greene on the prowl.”

“That’s what I’m thinkin’. I reckon you’re smart enough to figure out once we cross that border, we aren’t comin’ back. But
what if we send him over to you? What have you got to lose? We aren’t much of a threat anymore, and there’s a chance we can
deliver E. A. Greene to you.”

The stocky man cleared his throat, then stared down at his battered boots. “I would like to tell my sister that a cowboy…
not a cow thief… visited the shrine.”

The boss stared hard at them for a long moment. “Get out of here…” he growled at last. “If you show up on this side of the
river, we will shoot you. And if you don’t deliver Greene in the next twenty-four hours, we might come over and shoot you
anyway.”

The mesquite tree next to the brush corral offered slight shade as Laramie and Hap lounged against its trunk.