Free Showdown at Buffalo Jump by Gary D. Svee Page A

be that I can pick up some cattle cheap this winter. Maybe some proven homesteads next spring.”
    â€œYou seem terribly pleased at the prospect of your neighbors’ misfortune.”
    â€œI know how to live on this land. Some don’t.”
    â€œSome don’t want to.”
    The muscles of Max’s jaw tightened. “No market for winter beef,” he continued through clenched teeth as they walked toward the southern edge of the rim. “If I don’t buy their cattle, the owners will butcher them. But they can’t butcher their whole herd, so some drift against a fence, and the wind cuts the life out of them.
    â€œOr they maybe starve down weak, and coyotes get at them. I came up on a bunch of coyotes eating a steer one time. They were having so much fun they didn’t even hear me. They had already opened his belly, and two or three were playing tug of war with his guts. One coyote had his head right inside that steer’s belly. I don’t know what he was chewing on in there, but it was good enough that he didn’t even know it when those other coyotes scattered.”
    â€œI walked up on that animal same as I would a ranch dog. He heard me just as I got there, and jerked his head out—all bloody, it was. I had him then. He was growling and snapping, but I was so mad I held him by the nape of the neck, and I hoisted him into the air and cut his throat, slow and easy.”
    â€œIt ain’t a kind thing to die like that steer did alone on the prairie. No kind thing at all.”
    Max stopped a moment to take off his hat and wipe his dry forehead with his shirtsleeve. He didn’t look at Catherine. Instead his eyes were fixed on something in the distance.
    â€œ You try to tell some rancher next winter that he will have to watch his cattle die because you don’t want to take unfair advantage of him by giving him money for something that ain’t worth spit froze to death. Tell him that while he watches the herd he nursed from calves die, and he can’t do nothing to save them. You tell him that, miss high and mighty Boston lady, and see how much he’s impressed with your neighborliness.”
    Catherine sagged from the force of Max’s words. “I’m sorry.”
    â€œYou ought to be sorry. Never knew anybody who could learn anything with his mouth open, and near as I can tell, you haven’t shut it since you came here.”
    Catherine’s temper flashed.
    â€œMr. Bass, I am sorry I falsely accused you. You have so many real offenses against you, there is no need to imagine any. And anytime you get tired of me, please feel free to send me back.”
    â€œMadam, trains don’t go where you came from.”
    Catherine’s eyes narrowed, and her hands knotted into little fists. “Oooooh,” Catherine said, poking both fists into the sky, “Lord, give me strength.”
    Max stepped back.
    â€œNo, Mr. Bass, I wasn’t going to hit you,” she said, the anger turning to exasperation in Catherine’s voice. “Go ahead and show me what you want to show me. This place is unbearable.”
    They walked together to the edge of the rim on the southern side of the butte. They were standing at the base of a shallow U cut back into the sandstone rim, arms stretching south as though to embrace the winter sun.
    â€œSee down there, the green? That’s a spring. That’s where the real ranch is going to be. It faces south and has protection from the wind on the other three sides. It’s got water. After I work over that spring, there’ll be plenty of water for the house and stock, too.”
    It was a magnificent homesite. Sandstone cliffs overlooked the little valley. A lifetime would be well spent watching light and shadow play across the face of those rocks. Giant boulders, shaken from the rim by cataclysmic forces or the final drop of centuries of rain and ice, lay imbedded in the valley below. A