Teaching My Sons About Horses by EM

Word Count 7,046

Murdoch drained his coffee cup, sat back and watched as his sons finished their supper.  Even though it had been four and a half months since they came home, he didn’t think he’d ever get tired of seeing them at his table.

Mentally going through his list of everything that needed to be done tomorrow, he cleared his throat

Johnny and Scott looked up at him in expectation.

“Let’s move into the study.” He got up and the boys followed him.  He poured a brandy and gave one each to his boys.  Settling in his favorite chair, he noted how relaxed Johnny and Scott were. Johnny in his favorite chair by the fireplace, Scott on the couch with one foot in the ottoman.

Savoring his drink, he sighed, “That’s good. You boys know we’re still shorthanded. We need to add at least fifty more hands before we start round up in the fall.  Every ranch in the valley is going to be adding hands, however, we can offer jobs earlier since we’re so shorthanded.  We’ll start putting word out in the local towns and see what we come up with.”

“What about putting advertisements in various newspapers?” Scott asked.

”I’ve never thought about doing that,” Murdoch replied. “Let me think about it a little bit.”

“Do you honestly think that vaqueros are going to be reading the newspaper looking for a job?” Johnny asked, disbelief in his tone.

“Well, maybe it wouldn’t hurt and it wouldn’t cost that much,” Scott replied.

“Let’s talk about it tomorrow,” Murdoch said as he put his drink on the end table.

“The other issue is making sure we have a big enough remuda for all the hands by the time round up comes. We try to have five or six horses for each hand, more if we can.  It never fails, some horses are injured, or need to be sent back to the ranch for one reason or another.”

Johnny looked up. “Why didn’t you say so we could go round some up tomorrow.”

“Not so fast son. Let’s pull out the maps and see where it makes the most sense to go out and catch some. In the past, our best bet was to go after the bachelors.  With no stallion, and not having to worry about trying to work around mares and foals, it’s easier to get those colts in.  We’ll end up bringing in some yearlings, but they can be pastured until they’re old enough to break.”

Murdoch could see from the look on Scott face he had a lot of questions and from the look on Johnny’s face, he was disappointed that they couldn’t go right out and get started rounding up horses.

Clearing his throat, Scott drained the last of his drink.  “I assume Pardee made off with a lot of the horses. What did you call it?  The remuda? In the army we called them remounts.”

“Yes, one and the same.  Pardee stole or ran off a lot of them. I’m hoping when we go out to round them up, we’ll find some of them have returned to the wild herds.”

Murdoch continued, “Whenever we go out and round up wild horses, we bring them back to the big corral, brand them, geld the colts.  If they look like they’re three years old or older, we’ll go ahead a couple of weeks later and get them broke. If we don’t need them right away they’ll all get turned out again.”

Murdoch was pleasantly surprised as he saw both his sons looking at him with interest.  “Both of your horses,”  nodding at his sons, “were produced from our palomino breeding program. They were branded and turned out with their mothers until they’re six months old. After they were weaned, we geld the colts, and they’re all turned out together.  Then they’re brought back in at three and broke. After that we turn them out again.”

Scott and Johnny looked like they had so many questions. Before Johnny could ask one, Scott got his question in.  “You don’t keep any colts entire?”

“Only rarely.  Stallions create havoc around the other horses and have their mind on other things instead of work. It takes a lot of training to make them useful and to keep their mind on the job.”  As he said that, Murdoch had to bite his lip to keep from laughing thinking, ‘just like these boys.’

Deciding he better change the subject, he added,  “Your horse Scott, I want to say is six years old so he’s been brought in every year, and we’ve used him as an extra in the remuda.  He’s a good rim rocker since he’s so tall and leggy.”

“What’s a rim rocker?” Scott asked

“It’s a horse that can travel over long distances without getting tired. They don’t always make the best cutting horses, but they’re real good for round ups,” Johnny offered.

Murdoch nodded.  “That’s true, and he seems to be a good match for you.”

“He is at that,” Scott replied.

“What about Barranca?” Johnny asked. 

“I’ll have to look at the stock book, but I’m pretty sure he’s four. He was broke last year, and turned back out.”

“I would have thought he would have been run off with the rest.” Scott observed.

“He would have, but he was one we brought in just before the raids.  I don’t remember why anymore.  Paul was in charge of that.”

Johnny broke the uncomfortable silence.  “He seems like a pretty good horse, and since he’s a palomino, I’m surprised he was gelded.”

“At the time we had his sire, and most of our mares were related to him so we didn’t need another colt.  Since the stallion was stolen by Pardee, and then we lost him, it will take years to recover. Your horse, Scott, and Barranca were sired by that stallion.”

The boys looked surprised to know that the two horses were half brothers. Murdoch, saw that little smirk on Johnny’s face he could tell exactly what the boy was thinking.

“I don’t understand, sir. I thought the stolen stallion was a palomino.”

 “He was.” Murdoch waited for Scott’s next question.

It wasn’t long in coming. “My horse is a dark chestnut. How could he be sired by a palomino?”

Johnny was leaning forward and remarked, “I was wondering about that too.”

“I talked with a few other breeders of palominos, and we’ve all noticed the same thing. If we breed a palomino to a chestnut, there’s about a 50-50 chance we’ll get a palomino so about half of them are chestnut. Paul was in charge of our breeding program and he preferred breeding chestnut mares to the stallion.”

He continued, “To be able to breed palominos, you not only need to have a good quality palomino stallion, you need to have good quality, chestnut mares with a palomino background to breed to him. Then when you get some good quality fillies that are palomino, you have to find a good quality chestnut stallion to breed them to.”

“I didn’t realize it was so complicated,” Scott said.

“Me neither. I thought it was as simple as breeding a palomino to a palomino,” Johnny remarked.

Murdoch was enjoying teaching his sons about a subject he knew well, “There’s a lot more that goes into it.  If you are lucky, breeding two palominos gives you a palomino half the time.  I’ve found that sometimes it dilutes the color too much.  We get the best golden colors crossing palominos and chestnuts.”

Murdoch could see his boys thinking about this.  This whole conversation was so different that the ones they usually had in the evening.  He found himself enjoying sharing his knowledge with his sons instead of dictating his plans.

“What about breeding a bay or a black to a palomino?” Johnny asked.

“For a bay, the foal could be buckskin, kind of a smoky black, and occasionally it’ll come out a palomino, but it won’t be that rich, gold color such as you see with your horse.  Often if the foal is a palomino, it is what we call a smutty palomino.  Not something we want to put the Lancer brand on.”

“What about breeding a palomino to a black?” Scott asked

”We never bred a black, but I remember Paul telling me, other breeders told him they tried it and got buckskins and sort of a grayish blue color.”

“That sounds interesting,” Scott mused with a thoughtful look on his face.

“How many other ranches are breeding palominos?” Johnny asked.

“There’s just a few left. I’ll ask Teresa where Paul’s stock books are.  He was most interested and we went in 50/50 on the horses.”

Murdoch got up and walked to the drinks tray.  Scott held up his glass, but Johnny shook his head no.  Settling in his chair again, Murdoch took a sip, “The old Spaniard’s who started breeding palominos in California, said that the coat color should match a gold coin.  Now in winter, your horse, Johnny will get lighter as he gets his winter coat but when he sheds off, it’ll be that rich golden color that is sought after.”

“Too bad he’s gelded,” Johnny mused.  

“True, but if he wasn’t gelded, he wouldn’t make much of a working cow horse around here.  He’d have girls on his mind all the time. He wouldn’t be a reliable horse, and frankly, if we kept him for our breeding program he wouldn’t have been offered to you as a ranch horse.”

Johnny crossed his arms, looking quite disgruntled. Murdoch knew without him saying a word that he was thinking that if was the case and he wanted the horse, he would’ve taken him.  Relieved that he didn’t have to have that discussion with his sometimes unpredictable son. He wondered if either of his boys had any more questions about the horse breeding.

He didn’t have to wonder and he didn’t have to wait very long before Johnny asked a question

“Since I’ve been here, I haven’t seen any other palominos, so what happened to them?”

“Pardee scattered off a good amount of our horses as well as cattle. Whenever we could spare the time we went back and rounded them up.  While he was off in Modesto, creating havoc, Cipriano took some hands out and they were able to bring in about a dozen palomino mares, but we think the rest of the horses have joined a wild herd or two.”

“We should go round them up,” Johnny said. 

“I was thinking the same thing,” Murdoch smiled, and he waved off Maria with the coffee pot standing up, he said let’s get a good night’s sleep and we’ll talk about the best way to find and bring those mares in tomorrow.”

They started toward the stairs, when Johnny stopped and asked, “What happened to the palominos that you rounded up.”

“I sold them.”

“Why?” Both Johnny and Scott said at the same time.

“The ranch was having a hard time and I needed money.” Murdoch started to walk past after turning down the lamps.

“Wait a minute!”

“Johnny just take it from me the ranch needed money, and since we didn’t have a stallion to breed those mares to, I took a good offer for them.”

Before either son could ask another question Murdoch strode past them and headed up the stairs.  He didn’t want to tell either of them that he needed the money to pay them for the hour of their time and their expenses. Johnny in particular cost quite a lot to get him free from the ruales, not to mention the fees to the Pinkerton’s.

---

The next morning was full of little disasters common on a ranch the size of  Lancer.  A fence went down and fifty cows were gorging themselves on alfalfa.  A windmill stopped working and one of the horses coliced. The subject of horses didn’t come up.

That evening found three tired Lancer men waiting with anticipation for their supper.  The smell coming from the kitchen was mouth watering.

Teresa brought a platter of pork tamales to the table and Johnny pounced on them, quickly serving himself two.  He took a big bite and said, “ mmm Maria’s  males.”

Before Murdoch could suggest Johnny not talk with his mouth full, Scott commented, “You okay there brother?  You look like you’ve seen the Holy Grail.”

Johnny swallowed and started to wipe his mouth on his sleeve when he remembered his napkin.  “Maria’s tamales remind me of my mama’s tamales.”

“I’m not surprised, your Mother made tamales with Maria and some of the other ladies.”

Murdoch was rewarded with a smile from his son as he watched him take a large drink of milk, before wiping the milk mustache with his napkin.

Maria came in with the next course, and Murdoch praised her.

“Gracias Maria, Tus tamales son excelentes.”

“De nada Patron.”

After dinner, the family sat in the great room and the three Lancer men sitting around Murdoch’s desk, looking at the stock book that Teresa had found on her father’s desk

Scott was leafing through it and he said in wonder, “This goes back twenty years.”

Johnny leaned over and noted the meticulous entries and three different handwriting. He reached across and took the book and turned the pages back to the beginning.

Murdochs heart started beating faster as he realized his son was looking at the entries that his mother had added to the book.  Deciding to take the bull by the horns so to speak, he offered,  “Your mother, used to keep the entries whenever a foal was born. Even though she was here a short time, she loved the horses.”

Clearing his throat, which was suddenly much dryer than he realized, he added, “your mother’s uncle loaned us a palomino stallion.”

Johnny looked up and surprise. “I didn’t know anything about that,” He said quietly.

“That stallion was your horse’s grandsire. He started our herd.”

“What happened to him?” Johnny asked.

“He was 10 or 11 when we brought him to California.  I sent him back two years later.     His son was the stallion that Pardee stole. Other than those palominos that were sold, unless they’ve died, we should have about a dozen broodmares. Most of them were in foal, so there could be some yearlings that we need to round up as well.” Murdoch sat back in satisfaction at seeing his son’s interest.

“If the mares joined a wild herd, they likely could be in foal now as well,” Scott stated

Murdoch nodded and said, “Yes, I would imagine so.”

It wasn’t long before Murdoch felt Scott nudge his foot correcting his attention to Johnny who looked like he was asleep draped over the Ottoman in front of the fireplace.

The grandfather clock chimed eight times and in between that and Murdoch calling his name, Johnny roused looking around and rubbing his eyes. Murdoch couldn’t help but remember the two year-old that used to get tired and rub his eyes and practically drop from exhaustion.

“You’ve had a busy day, why don’t you go to bed?” He suggested.

Johnny squinted toward the darkness through the windows.  “But it’s too early.”

“By the time you get up there and get ready for bed and actually get to sleep it’ll probably be about nine. 5:30 in the morning comes early.”

Without another word, Johnny got up, rubbed his eyes one more time and wished his father and brother good night and headed up the stairs. He stopped on the second stair,  “when do you want to go after those horses?”

“How about the day after tomorrow,” Murdoch suggested

“That sounds good to me, sir.”

“Me too,” Johnny agreed yawning.  “See you in the morning.”

“He used to do that as a child,” Murdoch said quiet

“Do what?”

“He was a whirlwind all day long and then he’d rub his eyes when it was getting time for him to go to bed, but he always protested that he wasn’t tired. He was usually asleep before I even finished two pages of a story.”

“Nice to have those memories of him,” Scott commented.

“I wish I had those memories of you too, son”

“Me too.”  Before it got anymore awkward,  Scott rose, and wished his father good night

“Good night son see you in the morning.”

---

The day finally arrived, and Murdoch could see that his sons were feeling the excitement and anticipation.  He shared a grin with Cipriano.  In all honesty, he felt the same. He knew his back was going to be bothering him by the end of the day, but it would be worth it spending this time with his sons.

Even though the ranch couldn’t spare six men away from all the other jobs that needed to be done, they needed enough men to get this job done.  It was decided that they would each bring an extra mount and use a box canyon that they’d used before to hold the horses as they found them.

Once they had a small group together, two of the men would drive them back to the ranch and then come back with fresh saddle horses. 

They spent a couple hours the night before pouring over the map of the ranch and decided that the logical place to start would be Black Mesa. There were springs and watering holes up there that the wild horses used, and the herds could travel long distances, and still find water.  With a little luck, they hoped to find the majority of the lost mares along with a large number of bachelors.

After riding most of the day, it was nearing lunchtime when Murdoch turned his horse to the left down a small trail, saying over his shoulder, “We’ll make camp by the stream.”

“Pretty early to make camp,” Johnny wondered aloud.

“This will be our base camp. We can have a fire here without alerting the horses, and there’s plenty of graze and water as well as  shelter if it starts to rain.”

“Once we have camp set up, let’s change horses and go out to see what we can find.”

Cipriano and the vaqueros  along with Scott and Johnny quickly made camp. Murdoch unsaddled his horse and shook out his saddle blanket before smoothing the blanket on his spare horse.

He was the first one in the saddle and watched the rest of the men get their second horse ready.

Cipriano led them at this point as he knew this area very well and had a pretty good idea where to find horses

“The wild ones will come for water later this afternoon, so we’ll go up above on the bluff and see if we can see them coming in.”

Following the Segundo, they rode another hour and followed his example when he dismounted and tied his horse off to some scrub brush

“Now we walk.”

Murdoch dismounted, stifled a groan and stretched out his back noticing that Johnny did the same. A flash of concern came across his mind wondering if maybe his son wasn’t ready for such a long ride, but the vigor of youth shook it off and he looked ready to go.

Turning to his saddle bags, Murdoch took out a looking glass, and they all started climbing

The rocks were slipping out under their feet and they were having to hold onto brush to make it to the top. At one point, Murdoch slipped back and Scott caught him, but not before he bumped into Johnny which caused a chain reaction down the hill to the rest of the men. No one fell, but it was a close one.

Cipriano motioned, all of them to lay down on their stomachs and take off their hats. Being as quiet as possible, they all looked over the rim down into the valley. The view was vast with all colors of sage, green and purple. Some of the rock outcroppings were red and black, and some were sparkling silver in the sun.

“What kind of rocks are those?” Scott asked.

“Granite,” Murdoch replied as he put the looking glass up to his eye.

Scott shaded his eyes with his hand and saw sparkling off in the distance, one of the small lakes Cipriano had told them about.

Murdoch handed Scott, the looking glass and settled in while his son scanned the valley below

“See anything?”Johnny asked reaching for the glass.

“Give me a minute please, I haven’t even finished looking in one section yet,” Scott replied as he shifted away from his brother.

Murdoch had to hold back a smile at his youngest’s impatience for action. He hoped his son could hold out because it could be hours before they saw any horses.

“I see something moving,” Johnny said as he pointed.

Scott immediately followed his finger and looked for whatever it was. Johnny thought he saw.

“Deer,” he said,

Within minutes they could all see the deer clearly as they watched the small herd of deer as they headed for the water.

As the first hour passed, the looking glass was passed between all the men, and they all got a chance to look.

Ramon tapped the Segundo and whispered, “Senor, they are coming.”

Those simple words alerted all eight men, and they all watched with anticipation. Within a few minutes, they could see a herd with their naked eye

“It’s a big one,” Johnny whispered

“Yes, that must be an older stallion and he’s got himself quite a harem,” Murdoch answered just as silently.

As they became easier to spot, Scott asked,  “Do you see any of our mares?”

Both Cipriano and Murdoch were taking turns looking through the glass to get a close-up view of the horses. Ignoring the roans and the bays, they focused on any that were chestnut.

“I count six, that could be ours,” Murdoch said

Cipriano said he agreed and it was worth trying to get a closer look.

“Let’s go get them,” Johnny said enthusiastically.

“Not today son, we’ll go after them tomorrow morning. Right now let’s see what other herds come to the water hole. We’ll send Ramon and Mani to keep an eye on the herds when they leave so we have an idea of where they’re going.”

With more patience than he thought his son actually had, he saw Johnny settle back down for the long wait.

Thankfully, there wasn’t a long wait as another herd came down to water.  The stallion was a black and the men could not help murmuring when they saw this fine horse.

 “He’s a real beauty.”Johnny said under his breath everybody agreed with his  assessment.

“He’s looks like a young one to have acquired a herd of mares,” Cipriano observed.

As the five mares and the young stallion tentatively made their way down to the watering hole, the older stallion postured making the younger stallion nervous. The two herds kept their distance and the watering hole was plenty big enough to accommodate all of them.

“I don’t see any of ours,”  Murdoch whispered, and Cipriano agreed that there weren’t any of their mares in the small herd.

The larger herd moved off, which allowed the black stallion to work his way down to the watering hole and drink his fill. He constantly raised his head looking around. His ears were twitching and his nostrils were taking in every scent.

One of the men must’ve moved or else it was just the wind blowing the leaves.  The young horse stood like a statue, staring straight at the ridge.

All the men collectively held their breath and let it out softly as the stallion gathered up his mares, and they trotted off.  The lead mare, took the lead and the stallion, brought up the rear, stopping and looking in their direction

“He’s a cagey one,” Murdoch concluded.

As the sun was going down, and no other herds had come to water, they decided to let Ramon and Mani follow the big herd to see where they bedded down and then they could come back to camp

About 10 o’clock the men came back and reported where the herd was.

 “They probably will be there for the next few days.  We should get up at dawn and go watch that watering hole again to see what other horses arrive.” Cipriano added.

“Won’t that big herd move on and get away?” Scott asked.

Cipriano smoothed down his mustache and considered. “I don’t think so señor Scott, most of the time these horses only go into a new area after grazing the area down, returning to the water every day. I think we’ll be able to find them tomorrow, but we need to first take advantage of letting any other herds in the area come to water.”

“If we go down there and start rounding up the big herd it’ll scare off all the others,” Murdoch added.

Murdoch felt content when both sons nodded their agreement and followed him down the hill back to their horses. They were all grateful to be heading back to camp for supper and hopefully a good nights sleep.

---

After dinner of beef cooked over the fire on skewers, potatoes, and beans, they all relaxed around the fire drinking coffee.

“Gracias Pedro, that was a good supper.”

“De nada, senior.”

Johnny and Ramon gathered up the plates and silverware and took them down to the stream to wash them up

Murdoch couldn’t hide his smile when they came back and Scott remarked, “You’re going to make someone a fine wife someday, brother.”

Johnny laughed and said, “You get to do the breakfast dishes. Something tells me you need to practice.”

The next morning, everyone got their horses ready and there was an air of excitement as today was the day they were going to try to round up that big herd and drive them into the box canyon.  They’d gone over their plans carefully the evening before.

Murdoch felt confident that he made the right choices pairing Johnny up with Cipriano and Scott up with him. The other vaqueros were paired up with everyone carefully hidden along the route to the box Canyon.  Ramon and José made a wide circle around the wild herd and slowly walked their horses toward the wary animals.

Before long, the stallion was snaking his head down to the ground and herding his mares and foals.  Mani and Jaime were on each side flanking them. The stallion was nervous and his only choice was to drive the mares forward, one mare panicked and took off.  The stallion thundered after his mare, and with a flurry of kicking and squealing, the stallion pushed her back to the herd.

Just as they started to veer off Johnny and Cipriano made their presence known and the horses began galloping heading right to the box canyon.

Just as they started to veer off at the canyon, Murdoch and Scott started yelling, waving their ropes and pushing them into the canyon. All the rest of the vaquero’s galloped up.  Johnny, Scott and the rest of them jumped off their horses to bring the lodge poles across the mouth of the canyon.  They were heavy and it took three people per pole to get them into place.  Breathing hard, but feeling good about getting this herd captured. They all caught their breath for a second.  Before they could share a moment of triumph,  the stallion turned and ran at a full gallop toward the barrier across the canyon.

Johnny ran into the mouth of the canyon, waving his arms. “Get out of his way let him go,” Murdoch yelled as the stallion launched himself over the top of the lodge poles. The rest of the herd followed, but weren’t brave enough to jump so they slid to a stop and ran the other way back into the canyon.

Murdoch veered his horse in front of the stallion, fearing he would knock Johnny flat. The stallion instead launched himself at Murdoch and his horse, causing Murdoch’s horse to fall with him.

“Murdoch!”  Johnny yelled as he scrambled to where Murdoch’s horse was trying to get up

Scott, Cipriano and the men gathered around the still form of their Patron.

Cipriano gave the men the order to go make sure the rest of the horses didn’t get out while he Scott and Johnny checked out Murdoch who was knocked unconscious

Cipriano looked at Johnny and noted his white face. He had his storm strap between his teeth and was chewing on it anxiously. Johnny watched Scott carefully check for injuries.

“Why won’t he wake up? Is he gonna be OK?” Johnny asked worriedly.

“Let’s make him as comfortable as we can right here and give him a chance to catch up. I think the wind got knocked out of him plus his head hit pretty hard, but there weren’t any rocks under it. I don’t feel a lump,” Scott replied.

Putting a bed roll under Murdoch’s head and covering him with another bedroll was all they could do right now.

Cipriano walked over to Johnny, who was obviously upset. He had his hands behind his head and was pacing while kicking rocks out of the way.

Laying a gentle hand on his shoulder, Cipriano tried to reassure the young man that his father was going to be all right. “We just need to give him some time and he’ll be fine.”

“You don’t know that,” Johnny challenged.

“Let’s not buy trouble until we have to. Let’s give them a little time.”

“He wouldn’t be hurt if he hadn’t tried to turn the stallion. I caused this.”

“It was his decision, Juanito,” Cipriano said softly. “The stallion was doing only what wild horses do.”

Before they could say anything else, Murdoch groaned.

Scott laid a gentle hand on his shoulder and said, “Take it easy, go slow.”

“What happened?” Murdoch asked.

“You got in the way of a wild stallion from what I could see,” Scott said drily, “He mowed you down like a charge of cavalry.”

By then, Johnny was kneeling next to them. “Anything broke?  Are you OK?”

Murdoch carefully moved his arms and legs and neck. “Everything seems to be working.”

“I’m real sorry, Murdoch. It was my fault.”

“No it wasn’t Johnny. You can’t take responsibility for that. It was my choice and frankly son if I had to choose between your safety and mine, I will pick yours every time.”

With a grimace as Murdoch shifted, he instructed, “Help me up.”

“Are you sure, sir?”

“I’m ready.” With his two sons help, as well as Cipriano’s he got on his feet and had to take a few deep breaths to keep his breakfast where it was supposed to be.

Seeing the worried looks, he changed the subject. “What about the rest of the horses did we keep them?”

“Yes, they’re in the canyon,”  Cipriano advised.

Ramon came up to check on the Patron and was relieved to see him on his feet. “We got 14 Patron. It looks like 10 are at least three years old.  There’s a couple yearlings and maybe a couple two-year-olds in the group, as well as a few foals.”

“Go ahead and turn the mares with foals back out.  Any mares that look in foal, or old, turn those out as well.”

When Murdoch saw the questions forming from his sons he raised his hand. “We don’t need them.” Quickly changing the subject he asked, “How’s my horse?”

“He was winded, but he looks OK,” Scott answered.

“Have the boys take him back with the rest of the horses and bring me back another mount,” Murdoch instructed, regaining his confidence as he brushed off his clothes.

Cipriano directed some of the others to start a fire and noted that both Johnny and Scott were walking their horses to cool them off.  By the time everyone was done taking care of the horses, the coffee was ready and much appreciated after the early start and all the effort.

Gratefully accepting a cup of coffee Murdoch settled on a log and noticed Johnny hovering.  “Sit down Johnny,” Murdoch said as he passed a coffee cup to his son.

“I was gonna go look at the horses,” Johnny answered.

“Sure son, we can go do that in a little while, but sit with me for a bit.”

Johnny hesitated and then sat on the log with his father.

Small steps Murdoch reminded himself as he realized that he and his son were starting to bond.

Murdoch reached out with a  tentative hand and gave Johnny’s shoulder squeeze. “I’m fine.  Accidents happen Johnny. We try to avoid what we can, but we couldn’t really predict that horse would jump 5 feet. It’s something to remember if we go after him again. Though we probably don’t want him in our herd if his instinct to be free is that strong.”

Murdoch finished his coffee, and said, “Let’s go check those horses out.” Johnny stood and Murdoch held up a hand so his son could help him up.  Murdoch bit the inside of his cheek as he made an effort to not show any weakness to his younger son. He didn’t want him to feel any more guilty than he already did.  He knew in his heart there was no reason for the guilt, but Johnny often took things on himself that he didn’t need to.

Both men climbed through the poles and walked slowly to where the rest of the men were standing and looking at the horses. They were milling around nervously at the sight of their enemy; men on two legs were to be feared.

Cipriano started to herd the rest of the man away back to the camp saying,  “Let’s let them settle down. They’ve got graze and water here. They’ll be fine overnight.”

“How are we gonna get him home?” Johnny asked.

Cipriano responded. “I’ve got six more men coming up tomorrow to help. Well separate the ones we don’t want and send some of the hands back to the ranch with the rest. We can look for the bachelors tomorrow.”

The next morning, Murdoch would only admit to himself that getting knocked down like he did yesterday was taking a toll.  Doing his best not to groan as he got out of his bedroll, he was relieved that neither of his sons were awake yet.

“Let them sleep a bit longer,” he whispered to Cipriano.  He pretended he didn’t see his segundo shake his head, but both men being of a certain age, didn’t need to be reminded that the younger men amongst them would bounce back quicker.

Once Murdoch had finished his ablutions, he nudged first Johnny and then Scott to get them to wake up.  “Coffees ready.”  is all he needed to say to get them rolling out of their bedrolls.

He took a sip of his coffee and enjoyed the boys groaning after sleeping on the ground and didn’t feel quite so bad.  Cipriano smothered his own grin as they both felt a little vindicated.

“I think I had a rock in my back most of the night,”Scott complained. 

“I think I had two,” Johnny added.

“How are you feeling this morning sir?” Scott asked.

“I slept like a baby,” Murdoch replied.  He turned away to fill his plate with his breakfast so he didn’t have to witness Scott’s skepticism.

By the time everyone had eaten, they heard and soon saw the remounts being pushed toward them by the six vaqueros who were there to take the wild herd back to the ranch.

“Daylights burning,” Murdoch stated. “Let’s get going and see if we can find some more horses.”

Day after day, they hunted for horses, and by the time they were into their second week, they were feeling sick and tired of sleeping on the ground and eating reheated beans. 

After conferring with Cipriano, Murdoch announced,  “We have enough bachelors for now. I count close to 60 which will keep us busy for the next couple of months, getting them broken and ready to go into the remuda.

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Later in the day, as they straightened camp, and restocked supplies brought by the vaqueros from the ranch, Murdoch said slowly, “While we’re out here,  I want to look for some of our mares.”

“Do you think they’ve gone wild?” Scott asked.

“Maybe yes, maybe no,” Cipriano responded.  “None of those mares came from a wild herd so if we can find them, we might be able to toss a rope over them and get them back. We just have to keep the stallion away.”

Throughout the evening, they discussed how they were going do that. Earlier in the week they had come across a band of mares.  Both Murdoch and Cipriano confirmed after looking at them with the looking glass, that it looked like eight of their mares may have been the ones that Pardee had run off. 

Five of the mares had foals at side, and one looked like she was pregnant.  There were a number of younger horses.  Murdoch drew in his breath as Cipriano pointed to three palominos. 

“It’s them Patron.  The lost mares,” he said softly.

 Murdoch nodded, “Let’s try to get the whole herd.  Once we get them, we can turn the stallion back out along with the ones we don’t want.”

“Why not keep them all?” Johnny asked.

“Some of them may be too old or not what we want for the ranch.  Besides in a few years, there will be more young horses for us to round up.”

This raised a smile with Johnny as well as the other vaqueros.

After a long week, the six tired men herded the 15 mares and foals in front of them.  At Johnny’s shrill whistle, Paco swung the gate open, and the horses went into the corral.

Murdoch stretched his back out and said, “I’m looking forward to a good nights sleep in my own bed tonight.”

Scott nodded and responded. “I’m looking forward to an hour soak.”

Johnny looked over at them with an expression that they were missing the most important thing. “A bath and a soft bed sounds good but more important to me is a good hot home cooked meal.”

Neither older Lancer could argue that logic as their stomachs growled in response

“I think you’ve got a point there son let’s get washed up and get some of that good food in us and then we can take care of the other things.”

“Can we eat in about an hour, Murdoch?” Scott asked.  “I really would like to take that bath.”

“What?  Two days ago a dip in the creek wasn’t enough?” Johnny teased.

“Don’t remind me, brother. Waving away polliwogs while I tried to get clean was not exactly my idea of a relaxing bath.”

Chuckling at the memory, Johnny had to agree with his brother. 

“Go ahead son, and get clean and I’ll see if there’s something in the kitchen that will tide us over until we sit down for dinner.”

Later that evening, Murdoch looked over at Johnny and Scott and Teresa sitting at the big dining room table. The stock book was between them and they were filling it in. He’d given them as much information as he could. He knew about the older mares that they had recovered, and they were adding the fillies that they had brought back to the stock book. They were fairly certain that all the palominos were from their stock, but the younger horses that were born this year were all from the wild stallion.

Scott looked up at Murdoch and asked, “Should we cull all of those foals since they’ve got wild blood or do we wait and see how they turn out?”

Murdoch took a puff of his pipe and contemplated. “We’ll add all the colts to our herd, but let’s keep a close eye on the fillies and see which ones might be good to breed with in the future.”

“What about the palominos?” Johnny asked. 

“Same thing, let’s let them grow up a bit and then we’ll decide. There’s one has some potential.”

“He reminds me a lot of Barranca,” Johnny added.

“He should,” Murdoch responded. “They have the same mother and father. Let’s see how he grows up and if he looks good, he may be our future sire.”

“From what you’ve told us, if we keep that palomino colt as a sire, those chestnut mares could be bred to him. What do you think about looking for some other chestnut mares with the palomino background?”

Contemplating Scott’s question, Murdoch nodded and said,  It’s definitely something we should keep an eye out for. I’ll send a few letters out to people I know that are breeding palominos so if they get a filly that would cross well we could make a deal.”

“Maybe they’d trade us one of our chestnut fillies for one of theirs,” Johnny said thoughtfully.  

“That’s a good idea Johnny,” Murdoch replied. “Unless they have an unrelated palomino stallion, they’re going to need to sell off some of their fillies and get other bloodlines.  The same with us.   In the past, we have traded with some of the other breeders, but as you know with Parties attacks, our whole program was decimated.”

Clearing his throat, Murdoch said tongue and cheek, “Even with all this talk about getting back into breeding palomino horses, gentleman don’t forget we have a cattle ranch to run.  The look on his two sons faces made it hard for him not to smile. Talk about throwing a bucket of cold water on someone. Still, he thought to himself as he settled more comfortably in his favorite chair, he wouldn’t have traded the last several weeks rounding up horses with his sons for all the cattle in California. 

Wishing his family goodnight, he made his way upstairs to his nice soft bed and slept a dreamless sleep knowing in the morning, his life would be what he always dreamed it would be.

The end
March 2026

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