Free Roughstock (A Gail McCarthy Mystery) by Laura Crum

ride saddle broncs together?" I asked, trying to get him talking.
    Bronc snorted. "Jack and I were roughstock riders-bulls, saddle broncs, bareback broncs-we weren't particular. Not like those prima donnas you see out there today."
    For a minute he was quiet, staring off across the barnyard, his expression unreadable. "I met Jack when I first went to work for his old man, right here on this place. I was twenty-five and flat broke from riding in the rodeos. Jack was a great big strapping kid of seventeen, just dying to learn how to ride a bucking horse."
    "And you taught him."
    "I damn sure did. His old man, Len Hollister was his name, hired me to break a string of horses for him. There were twelve of them, all big, strong geldings, anywhere from three to six years old. Never been touched." Bronc spat and cleared his throat. "See, how he came to have them was Len had a studhorse, a soggy-looking yellow horse, the kind of horse you don't see much anymore. He was big and quick, a cold-blooded son-of-a-bitch who would buck your ass off if he could. But he was a ranch horse-a horse you could part cattle on, or rope a steer, or ride forty miles in a day if you had somewhere to go. And his colts were just like him. Big and quick and double tough.
    "The reason the old man had a dozen of 'em standing around, all unbroke, is he didn't have anybody who could ride 'em. He was too old, and his hired hand was as old as he was, and the kid didn't know one damn thing about starting colts. So Len hired me for the summer to break them all."
    "And you stayed?"
    "That's right. I broke everyone of those bastards and worked my tail off with the cattle besides. The old man liked me. He asked me to stay on."
    "Did you teach Jack to ride broncs that summer?"
    "I didn't really have a lot of choice." Bronc laughed, his sharp old eyes lit with a memory I couldn't see. "The kid was dying to learn, wouldn't stay away from the bullpen where I worked those colts. I told him he was too big-he should have been a dogger, big men are good for that-but he wanted to ride roughstock. You never could tell Jack anything."
    Bronc seemed to run down at that, the light of his old memories dimmed by the darkness of recent events. I touched his arm gently. "I'm sorry about Jack. You must miss him."
    Bronc turned away abruptly and slapped the buckskin horse on the shoulder. "Willy, here, is the last of the old man's line. His mama was an own daughter of the yellow horse-Hondo, we called him."
    We both regarded the gelding with appreciation. Of course, I'd seen him before; he was the only horse I'd ever seen Bronc ride. Big for a Quarter Horse, all of sixteen hands, he was dark gold with a black mane and tail and black socks, and had the pronounced black dorsal stripe and zebra stripes on his legs and withers that were typical of buckskins. Despite Bronc's comments about the yellow stud and his ornery disposition, I thought Willy looked kind, and I knew he was a hell of a rope horse.
    "Willy's got a nice eye," I said.
    "Willy's a good one, all right. This sucker doesn't have a mean bone in his body. I had him standing out in the field here until he was four years old, just never had time to ride him. Then one day I got in a little early and saw him standing there and I said to myself, Well, I guess I'll ride the son-of-a-bitch.
    "So I took him down to the bullpen and I saddled him and damned if he didn't act like he'd been saddled every day of his life. So I just hung that snaffle bit in his mouth and climbed on. And off he walked, easy as pie."
    I smiled and agreed. "Some of them are like that."
    I doubt Bronc even heard me; he was rolling now, absorbed in his story, a trait I knew others found tiresome. I enjoyed listening to him, though-his stories seemed to bring another, earlier world to life.
    "So after I rode him around the pen a couple of times I just reached over and opened the gate and out we went. I rode him around that little twenty-acre hay field right over