insistent on plastering itself on her face.
Even Papa seemed to enjoy his cowboy lesson. He sat astride his horse, a chestnut belonging to the recently deceased Willie, with an erect posture and a wide grin of his own.
“You’re doing great, Jonas.” Mounted on Bo, Luke urged his horse to the front of his small cluster of students. “Okay, now I want you to let the reins lay loose in your hands while you grip the horse tightly with your knees. That’s how you will communicate, through the pressure of your legs.”
Papa’s horse surged ahead of Emma’s to follow Luke. Emma admired the way he sat tall in the saddle, his posture straight and at the same time relaxed. While she clutched the reins with a death grip, Papa let the leather straps slide freely in his grip.
Even Luke noticed the ease with which Papa rode. “You’re not a bad rider, Jonas.”
The grin on Papa’s face tickled an answering grin from Emma.
“I may be Plain,” Papa replied with dignity, “but I’m tough.”
Emma laughed and then tightened her legs around Sugarfoot’s chest. Her heart thrilled when the mare surged forward in response.
She urged the horse to Luke’s side. “When will we learn to lasso a cow?”
Luke threw his head back and laughed, his expression the lightest she had seen it since they had caught up with him.
“I’ll be happy if you can manage to keep yourself in the saddle,” he replied. “Leave the roping to us.”
“Hmm.” Emma gave him a tight-lipped reply, and then she urged Sugarfoot forward with a tightening of her knees. Yes, the situation was serious, but before this herd was delivered in Hays, she intended to prove to Luke she could do more than keep her seat on a horse.
SIXTEEN
Six graves took a while to dig with only two shovels. While Luke taught the Switzers how to ride and move the herd, he assigned McCann and Charlie to dig and sent Griff and Morris riding off toward the southeast where Luke had seen a large number of cattle run during the earlier skirmish. The pair had instructions to ride hard for thirty minutes, gathering strays along the way, and then head back. Vic returned to camp shortly, having caught up with the scattered remuda a short distance away. He corralled his charges, and then he relieved McCann from digging duty so he could get a start on supper.
The sun had started to sink in the western sky by the time Griff and Morris returned, driving a hundred and fifty head before them. The strays approached camp almost gratefully and quickly lost themselves in the anonymity of their herd.
Griff’s horse galloped to the campfire, and the man dismounted near Luke. “We caught up with them not more than five miles from here, standing around like they were waiting for us to come and get them.”
“They’re tired.” Luke examined the cattle closest to him, noting the way their heads drooped on their necks and the halfhearted way they grazed. “It’s been a long trail since El Paso, and I think that stampede the other night exhausted them. They don’t have another one in them.”
“Which is why those rustlers chose this place.” Griff’s eyes hardened. “Right at the end of the Chisholm Trail within a few days of the railhead. That sure wasn’t an accident.”
Luke felt certain the man was right. “Did you see any sign of them?”
Griff shook his head. “Not a one.” His gaze shifted to the four fresh graves set off a distance from the other two, their occupants already in place and dirt mounded overtop. “They’re shorthanded now. Probably take a while for them to regroup.”
“Yeah.” Luke heaved a bitter laugh. “But they have four men to run three hundred head of my cattle, which means they’re not nearly as shorthanded as we are.”
The grizzled cowboy looked over Luke’s shoulder. “How are the replacements coming along?”
Luke turned to where the Switzers sat near their wagon. Mrs. Switzer had requested that her rocking chair be set near the cook’s campfire, where she watched over a sleeping Jesse stretched out on a pallet in front of her. He’d pitched a fit when she insisted on using perfectly good whiskey to clean his wound, and when she ignored him, howled like a wounded coyote when she poured it over the gash in his leg. Under her instructions, McCann and Charlie set the bone, and Jesse had screamed until he passed out. She seemed unconcerned. At the moment she rocked in