Water and Stone (6 page)

By the time the boy turned sixteen he'd purchased his first piece of real property: the old Barnes place, twenty acres of arid land with a rundown shotgun shack on the edge of it and a little more than a dozen dying cattle sick from the drought and lack of food. He bought the parcel and livestock for a hundred dollars, an old beat up Ford pickup truck, and a handshake.

"What on earth are you going to do with that old place, Rancher?"

"I'm going to try my hand at ranching. With a name like mine, how can I go wrong?"

Hank chortled a perfunctory laugh while continuing to shake his head as if he believed his lone employee had come down with a severe case of heat stroke from spending too much time under the hot Texas sun.

"That isn’t a ranch, Rancher."

"Maybe not now... but I have plans. You'll see, Hank. Want to partner up with me?"

"I think I'll pass on that offer. I'm telling you... that dump surely isn't worth the dust that covers it."

"I paid five bucks an acre for it, Hank."

"Plus you threw in your pickup truck, Rancher. How are you planning on getting around now?'

"I got feet."

"You know old Ned Barnes would've never parted with that land of his if hadn’t there come the drought."

"Yeah, I know."

"I believe that old buzzard still has the first nickel he ever earned. If he ran away from that ranch, believe you me, that place is long past saving."

"Maybe you're right, Hank. I'm planning on finding out though... sure do wish you'd change your mind and come in with me on my ranch."

"I have enough problems as it is, Rancher... but thanks anyway, and good luck to you. I mean that."

Hank the baker was an astute business man but so far as Rancher Ford could see he had no imagination to speak of. By hauling fifty five gallon drums filled with water he pumped for free at the city park out to his homestead in a horse drawn wagon he found on the farm behind an old nag he got for nothing Rancher watered the parched cows as well as a patch of grass that in its gratitude sprouted up seemingly overnight allowing the hungry animals their first real meal in months.

He counted twelve cows, two bulls, three goats, half a dozen barn cats, and one scrawny chicken. Hunkered in corner of one of the dusty corrals and resting inside a dry and badly beaten bucket he discovered an ancient iron with a trio of sixes on the branding end promptly deciding to name his newly acquired ranch—what there was of it, anyway—the Triple Six.

He did it in part to purposely thumb his nose at the church. Knowing that the triple six sign was regarded with dismay—the mark of the beast—and having no love for the machinations of Catholicism, his father's religion of choice, Rancher never bypassed an opportunity to rub the memory of the old man's face in the dry Texas dirt.

The other reason he called his new ranch the Triple Six was more circumspect... he'd always believed that his destiny wasn't in following the morality of the world so much as it lay in opposition to it. Though he knew it was grandiose to think so, he sometimes saw himself as the antithesis of all that was admirable... little more than a beggar made wealthy despite his own transgressions.

Rummaging in one of the old barns on his newly acquired estate the boy discovered an old grimy tractor that wouldn't run. He spent the next two weeks of his free time tearing down the engine and restoring it to like-new condition. Once he got the machine running he promptly traded the tractor away for the adjoining twenty acre parcel of land that just happened to have a well on it though the old homestead had burned some years prior.

In short order Rancher Ford hauled the dilapidated pump out of the well, repaired it, reinstalled it, and began pumping water to his now revitalized and growing herd of cattle. By the time he was twenty years old the boy owned a thousand acres of ranch land and twice as many cattle and rivaled Hank as one of the wealthiest men in Guthrie.

He still worked for the baker but only on a part time basis since his other business interests tended to take up a good deal of his time. They'd become fast friends and one day Hank stopped over for a visit. It was plain to see that he didn't like what he saw.

"I don' know why you keep on living in this shit hole of a shack, Rancher. You must be worth a million dollars by now. Why don't you build yourself a regular house?"

"I hate to be beholden to any bank and I tend to spend all my money on land, Hank. I suppose one of these days I'll look into upgrading the old homestead but the time isn't right."

Lorraine Townsend came along less than a year later and changed everything for Rancher Ford. Though the woman wasn't what anyone would call pretty—she seemed more a man than a lady and looked as if she'd run to fat as she grew older—they seemed to hit it off in ways he'd rarely done with any of the local girls.

And she came from money.

Despite the fact she was some years his senior, he proposed to Lorraine while necking behind the grand stands that had been erected for the county folk to all come and listen to her father give his Presidential campaign speech. They listened together under those bleachers and when he asked for her hand in marriage, she accepted.

He didn’t like to imagine making love to Lorraine with the lights on. And though they were married in front of a thousand wedding guests he found discomfort in taking his new wife out in public. Still, when her father saw the shack where they were going to make their matrimonial home he promptly made a gift to them of a half million dollars earmarked to build a new mansion... a regular hacienda.

By the time their one and only son came along—Billy Ford—Rancher Ford had managed to buy up close to a hundred thousand acres of land along with most of the businesses in Guthrie including the bakery where he once worked after Hank sold out and moved east during a particularly dry and hard drought.

Some called him lucky and others called him ruthless but to Rancher Ford he merely took advantage of opportunities offered to everyone. He still remembered the old hobo's advice to him. He knew what he wanted and he went out and got it.

His one regret was not spending time with Church Gutiérrez, his other son. He'd given the mother free use of an old shack out on the frontier edge of his property hoping his wife wouldn't catch wind of his dalliance and if she did she never said so, in words, anyhow.

When he'd hired the boy's mother, Yani, as part of a pack of migrant workers from Mexico to help around the Triple Six hacienda it was an innocent thing. She was just another worker in a long line of them.

Early one morning, however, Rancher Ford happened to ride down by the creek searching for a lost cow. Hearing something splashing in the water he dismounted and crept forward in order not to spook what he thought was his wayward animal.

Yani was bathing while standing up to her knees in the cool water wearing only her panties with her long black tresses wet and cascading over a body far more voluptuous than it appeared beneath the baggy clothes she wore.

Bending backward to wring the water out of her hair she struck the pose of a goddess, a Venus, perhaps, a girl unspoiled by time or by man, untouchable by all save the divine. Though he wasn’t close enough to see as clearly as he wished, there were some type of strange markings covering her skin which he put off to the reflection of the sun upon water and stone. He'd never know how close he was to being right.

Standing on the shore in the high brush not wishing to reveal his presence Rancher Ford was immediately and irrevocably frozen by her beauty. He often wondered later why he didn’t notice it right off, but he hadn’t. When the other workers packed up to move on, he found himself asking Yani to stay.

And she agreed.

He'd stopped by the shack on an early spring evening for a drink of water. Point of fact was that his canteen was full but while he was riding down the road on his way from checking if the workers had repaired the border fences as they said Rancher Ford happened to notice Yani putting out laundry. Before she was able to hang more than a couple items the rotten clothesline snapped.

Like a knight riding to the rescue of a damsel in distress he clucked his horse up the lane toward the tiny shack, dismounted, and taking a coil of rope hanging from his saddle he fashioned a new line upon which Yani could hang out her laundry.

By the time he finished and with the evening still hot he was dripping sweat. Grateful for the water Yani brought him to drink, Rancher Ford sat down under the overhang that served as a front porch to rest a few minutes and mop his brow with a bandana before continuing his journey home. She sat beside him seemingly happy to have a visitor.

"Are you from Texas, Mr. Ford?"

"No... I hail from out east... I was born in Indiana."

"That's surprising... you seem made for this land."

"Where are you from, Yani?"

"What does that matter?"

Her dark eyes flashed hot and angry as she glared at him.

"I'm sorry, Yani... I didn’t mean to pry. I best be on my way."

He got up, handed the empty glass to her, and began walking back to his horse grazing in the tall grass. Yani followed him and taking him by the hand she bade him to stop.

"Wait... I'm so sorry to speak to you like that, Mr. Ford. There are people who're looking for me. Should they find me they'll do terrible things to me. I'm never sure who to trust."

"I'm your friend, Yani... tell me about these people who are after you and I'll see to it they're caught and prosecuted."

"More would only take their place, Mr. Ford. But thank you."

She stood tip toe to kiss him on the cheek.

"Please stay for dinner, Mr. Ford. I was just about to make something and I grow tired of eating alone."

"Well, I am a might hungry, come to think of it... and please call me Rancher, Yani. Any time someone calls me Mr. Ford I feel like they're talking to my father."

"Okay then... come inside, Rancher. I'll make you some fresh eggs."

The shack was every bit as poor as he remembered it being when he lived there though it was neat and clean. Sitting down in one of the old wooden straight back chairs clustered around the table he watched as the girl lighted a lantern and then set a fry pan on the wood stove, kindled a small fire inside of it, cracked several eggs, diced some green onions and garlic before adding them to the pan, and stirred the concoction as she looked at him and began to speak in a sort of singsong cadence that nearly put him to sleep..

"Before coming here I lived in a town called Angangueo in central Mexico but I'm originally from Cuba. There are still many people on that island who'd pay well to know I'm here. I trust you, Rancher. I know I'm safe with you... I know you'll never betray me."

"What did you do that those people are after you, Yani? You don’t have to answer me... I'm just curious why such a pretty girl would have enemies like that."

"I did nothing, Rancher. It's more a family matter than anything I'm guilty of... but sometimes I feel like a thief."

"People can be cruel, Yani. I learned that long ago. Stay here as long as you wish. I'll make sure no one bothers you. I promise."

"I've been alone for so long I decided I'd always be that way. I tell myself it doesn’t matter. Sometimes, though, when I'm working at your hacienda and I see how happy you are with your family my heart aches to know the same feelings."

"Looks can be deceiving, Yani. I love my son and I adore my wife but sometimes I wish... well, I shouldn’t bore you with my lament. I made my bed."

"Thank you for your many kindnesses to me, Rancher. You're a good man. I'm lucky to know you. I only wish... no, I cannot give voice to such thoughts. It isn't proper to do so... you've promised yourself to another woman. You must believe I'm little more than a puta, a whore... please forgive me."

"I'd never think that, Yani."

When tears began falling from her eyes Rancher Ford was momentarily disconcerted. Going to her he assured her she was right to trust him. Before he realized what had happened the night was full and Yani was soft and asleep in his arms.

He returned the next evening and the night after and each time was better than the one before. Rancher Ford never dreamed what being with a real woman could be like. He soon realized how hooked on the tiny Cuban girl he'd become and forced himself to stop seeing her though it took him a month to finally break free of her spell.

Being with Yani filled him with a confidence he never realized was there and before he knew it, women flocked to the bed he kept above his newly acquired hotel in Guthrie, all of them exceptional beauties. He soon forgot about the pretty migrant girl who appeared for her work each day at the hacienda with an ever growing belly and eyes of reproach for Rancher Ford.

He heard of the boy's birth on Christmas Eve. Yani was back at work the next day serving up dinner and washing dishes afterward. She looked at him as if she wanted to say something but he turned away. Lorraine was there and he felt her eyes on him, as if she knew what had happened and if he went any farther with it she might just leave him.

They no longer made love, he and his wife. In fact, they had only consummated their marriage one time years after the sacred ceremony took place and that single union led to the birth of Billy. Lorraine didn’t seem to enjoy the act any more than he did. Still, they'd grown close over the years and the lack of sexual relations didn't weaken the bonds of love he felt for his wife.