Read Online Some More Horse Tradin' by Ben K. Green - Free Book Online Page A

sweat. I rubbed up and down his legs a little with my hands, just to see if he was all right—and to reassure him that he was being looked after. After all, who knows but what a cow horse appreciates a little extra attention. When you live with a horse, you care more for him and you see more about him than you do if you ride him only on Sunday.
    I glanced out across the street and saw the fat man coming up the hill, the one who owned the café. I thought to myself that we would get breakfast, even if it was Sunday. I gave him time to get to his place of business while I curried and brushed my horse. Then I walked back to the back of the corral where we had slept and where my friend was—I still didn’t know his name—and I said, “I saw the café man pass, and he’s had time to open up. Would you join me in some breakfast?”
    He turned and looked at me rather pleased but neither with surprise nor alarm nor any of those rank, wild things you use to describe a man’s expression. He said, “That would be most enjoyable.”
    We walked out of the corrals together and up the street a piece to where this little café was. Sure enough, the door was open and you could smell coffee was beginning to boil. The café man was getting ready for his day’s business. First thing I wanted was a big drink of water; so he set out some of those big goblets and filled them with water out of a crock pitcher. We drank our water, and then he served the coffee. Of course in a little country café, there are just three or four things they fix for breakfast and everybody knows what they are. In that day nobody every printed a menu or knew how to spell the words. I ordered some ham and eggs, and my friend ordered some eggs and some hash-browned potatoes. I said, “Don’t you want some meat, too?”
    He answered, “I don’t care for porcine flesh.” In other words, he didn’t eat hog meat—but that was a very elite way of putting it, I thought, between two cowboys in a countrycafé on the Rio Grande banks. Maybe he didn’t know how else to say it.
    We finished breakfast, and for want of anything else to do, we started walking back toward the corrals. I said, “Well, it’s Sunday and it’s going to be a long day.”
    â€œAre you riding far?” This was the first question he had asked me.
    â€œNo, sir. I’ve got to wait until Monday and receive some horses.”
    He said, “I think I shall not ride out today, either.”
    So for want of something else to do, we walked up and down the dry bed of the Rio Grande. He commented on the shapes of rocks, the lay of the terrain, and how the mountains rose up out of the desert. You could tell that he had a vast store of knowledge; his conversation was interesting, but it was highly impersonal and spoken very correctly. This was a new breed of man to me. I tried to talk cattle with him, but he wound up the subject with a well-selected phrase. It was hard for me, a cowboy, to start much of a conversation with him; so about noon we drifted back up to the one little street of the town and on toward the eating place.
    There were very few people stirring. We heard the bell ring and saw a few people on their way to church, the ladies with white lace shawls and the men in white shirts. I said nothing of religion and neither did he. When we walked into the café there were a few other men there but no ladies at all. I paid for dinner, and as we walked out on the street, he said, “I have imposed considerably upon your hospitality in partaking of food for which you have paid.”
    I said, “It is my pleasure to be with a man who is so well informed and who is such pleasant, clean company. I am more than repaid. Think nothing of it.” This was the first outburst of politeness that he had heard from me, and it seemed to impress him very much. He looked at me in a more appraising manner than he