He followed her all day. He never saw her. Once he rode her up out of a bed in a windbreak thicket on the south slope where she’d slept in the sun. Or thought he rode her up. He knelt and placed his hand in the pressed grass to see if it was warm and he sat watching to see if any blade or stem of grass would right itself but none did and whether the bed was warm from her or from the sun he was in no way sure. He mounted up and rode on. Twice he lost her track in the Cloverdale Creek pasture where the snow had melted and both times picked it up again in the circle he cut for sign. On the far side of the Cloverdale road he saw smoke and rode down and came upon three vaqueros from Pendleton’s taking their dinner. They did not know that there was a wolf about. They seemed doubtful. They looked at one another.
They asked him to get down and he did and they gave him a cup of coffee and he took his lunch from his shirt and offered what he had. They were eating beans and tortillas and sucking at some sparelooking goatbones and as there was no fourth plate nor any way to divide what any had with any other they passed through a pantomime of offer and refusal and continued to eat as before. They talked of cattle and of the weather and as they were all workscouts for kin in Mexico they asked if his father needed any hands. They said that the tracks he’d followed were probably of a large dog and even though the tracks could be seen less than a quarter mile from where they were eating they showed no inclination to go and examine them. He didnt tell them about the dead heifer.
When they’d done eating they scraped their plates off into the ashes of the fire and wiped them clean with pieces of tortilla and ate the tortillas and packed the plates away in their mochilas. Then they tightened the latigos on their horses and mounted up. He shook out the grounds from the cup and wiped it out with his shirt and handed it up to the rider who’d given it to him.
Adiós compadrito, they said.
Hasta la vista.
They touched their hats and turned their horses and rode out and when they were gone he got his horse and mounted up and took the trail back west the way the wolf had gone.
By evening she was back in the mountains. He followed afoot leading the horse. He studied places where she had dug but he could not tell what it was she was digging for. He measured the remaining day with his hand at arm’s length under the sun and finally he stood up into the saddle and turned the horse up through the wet snow toward the pass and home.
Because it was already dark he rode the horse past the kitchen window and leaned and tapped at the glass without stopping and then went on to the barn. At the dinner table he told them what he had seen. He told them about the heifer dead on the mountain.
Where she crossed back goin towards Hog Canyon, said his father. Was that a cattletrail?
No sir. It was not much of a trail of no kind.
Could you make a set in it?
Yessir. I would of had it not been gettin on late like it was. Did you pick up any of the sets?
No sir.
You want to go back up there tomorrow?
Yessir. I’d like to.
All right. Take up a couple of traps and make blind sets with em and I’ll run the line with you on Sunday.
I dont know how you think the Lord is goin to bless your efforts and you dont keep the Sabbath, their mother said.
Well Mama we aint got a ox in the ditch but we sure got some heifers in one.
I think it’s a poor example for the boys.
His father sat looking at his cup. He looked at the boy. We’ll run it on Monday, he said.
Lying in the cold dark of their bedroom they listened to the squalls of coyotes out in the pasture to the west of the house.
You think you can catch her? said Boyd.
I dont know.
What are you goin to do with her if you do?
What do you mean?
I mean what will you do with her.
Collect the bounty, I reckon.
They lay in the dark. The coyotes yammered. After a while Boyd said: I meant how will you kill her.
I guess you shoot em. I dont know no other way.
I’d like to see her alive.
Maybe Pap will bring you with him.
What am I goin to ride?
You could ride bareback.
Yeah, Boyd said. I could ride bareback.
They lay in the dark.
He’s goin to give you my saddle, Billy said.
What are you goin to ride?
He’s gettin me one from Martel’s.
A new one?
No. Hell, not a new one.
Outside the dog had been barking and their father went out to the kitchen door and called the dog’s name and it hushed instantly. The coyotes went on yapping.
Billy?
What.
Did Pap write Mr Echols?
Yeah.
He never heard nothin though. Did he?
Not yet he aint.
Billy?
What.
I had this dream.
What dream.
I had it twice.
Well what was it.
There was this big fire out on the dry lake. There aint nothin to burn on a dry lake.