Read Online Hard Country by Michael McGarrity - Free Book Online Page B

southerly nameless mesa grasslands and the faint outline of the mountains near the El Paso border town.
    The basin and the mountains that confined it were a land impossible to ignore. Kerney had seen beautiful places before; the endless Texas prairie that stretched a man’s vision to the distant horizon, the rich farmlands along the wide Missouri that seemed to be cast in every imaginable shade of green, the deep forests of the Kentucky blue mountains. But on the Tularosa—where sentinel mountain ranges hid fresh running streams coursing down narrow ravines, where bunchgrass grew as high as a horse’s belly, where massive creamy clouds gathered thousands of feet above vertical spires—here his spirits soared, and the sadness that had dogged him the last few years lessened.
    The basin was vast, inspiring, daunting, filled with plants and animals that stung and bit, harsh and windswept, ravaged by floods and parched by drought, and mostly empty of people. It suited John Kerney just fine.
    Trailing five horses he’d picked up for his employer from a rancher trading livestock at the army fort two days ago, he’d camped overnight on the Apache lands in the high country without incident and had just passed Dead Man’s Mountain when he spotted a convoy of four supply wagons winding up the rocky wagon road from the village far below. He continued on until he reached the slow-moving wagons and then halted his small remuda. The Mexicans from Tularosa likewise reined their horse teams to a stop. Kerney greeted them with his slowly expanding Spanish vocabulary.
    “Señor Kerney, your Spanish is improving little bit,” Ignacio Chávez said with a smile. “Why we don’t see you in the village anymore?”
    “I parted ways with Pat Coghlan,” Kerney replied as he opened his saddlebag and pulled out a small parcel. “I’ve been working for John Good over at La Luz. Haven’t been back this way since he took me on.”
    He leaned out from his saddle and handed the parcel to Ignacio. “This is for you.”
    “What is it?” Ignacio asked, surprised.
    “I know you like to read. It’s a book of stories by a writer named Hawthorne. It’s pretty beat-up, but most of the pages are there, and some of the yarns aren’t half bad if you can stand all the fancy words he uses to get the job done.”
    With Ignacio in mind, Kerney had bought the tattered book for a five-cent piece from a soldier’s wife at the fort.
    “Is it written in americano ?” Ignacio asked, almost unbelieving.
    “Yep, so your English can get better, poco a poco. ”
    Ignacio laughed and grinned with pleasure as he unwrapped the parcel and slowly sounded out the words of the title. “ Twice-Told Tales. What means that?”
    Kerney shrugged. “I don’t know.”
    Ignacio carefully tucked the book inside his shirt. “ Muchas gracias, Señor Kerney.”
    “ Por nada, ” Kerney replied. He touched the brim of his hat, waved good-bye to the men in the wagons ahead of Ignacio, and started down the road trailing his small remuda.
    A good mile farther on, Ignacio suddenly remembered that the gringo Charlie had asked him several times if he knew of Señor Kerney’s whereabouts. And although he had no knowledge that Charlie wished Kerney harm, Ignacio had an urge to stop the horses, turn the wagon around, and warn the señor about the pistolero.
    Over his shoulder he could see only dust on the trail kicked up by Kerney’s remuda. Ignacio hoped there would be no trouble waiting for him in Tularosa.
    * * *
     
    A s John Kerney drew near Tularosa, the village spread out before him. The low, flat-roof adobe houses with chickens running loose in yards behind low walls, the orderly irrigation ditches filled with clear running water that fed the carefully tended fields, and the cottonwoods along the riverbank spreading welcoming shade made for a pleasant view. Beyond the village, the hot sun on the still basin and the shimmering mountains to the west etched by a cloudless