I'm Off to Montana for to Throw the Hoolihan (Code of the West) by Stephen Bly Page B

“I’ll go buddy up to him and see what I can learn.” He hiked halfway across the yard and then turned back. “You got yourself a gun in the house?”
    “Do you think I’ll need it?”
    “I’d feel better if you had a little protection. Until we figure this out, we’ve got to be cautious.”
    “I’ve got Tap’s Greener loaded by the door.”
    “That ought to do. Just don’t point both barrels at me. I don’t want nothin’ to cause me to miss my own weddin’. You know, I had a dream last night I was late for my weddin’, and Selena got so mad she up and married someone else. Don’t that beat all?”
    “That is every nervous groom’s nightmare.”
    “It is? Well, I’ll get there on time one way or another.”
    “That you will. Now I’ll go warm up some dinner for our guest.”
    Pepper saw very little of Odessa or Sugar Dayton after that. Lorenzo insisted on feeding the man in the bunkhouse, informing her “hired hands and drifters don’t eat in the big house—ever.” Odessa escorted Dayton on horseback to the east in the middle of the afternoon.
    At sundown she was slicing apples for a pie when she was startled by a voice from the yard. “Ho, in the big house.” She expected it to be Lorenzo or even Tap and Angelita coming back from Billings. But a short man wearing a round hat stood by a tall, thin white horse.
    I didn’t get this many visitors when we lived in Cheyenne.
    She opened the front door, stepped out on the porch, and shaded her eyes. “May I help you?”
    “Evenin’, ma’am. I didn’t want you to go takin’ no potshots at me. I’m your new bunkhouse cook and headquarters man. Is that the cookhouse over there?”
    “Eh , yes.”
    “You cookin’ supper already?”
    “Yes, I’ve—”
    “That’s okay. But if there ain’t any hands around, I can do the cookin’ for you all.”
    Wearing an apron and holding a tea towel, Pepper walked gingerly down the steps and across the yard toward the man. “Did my hu sband hire you?”
    “Yes, ma’am. You’re Mrs. Andrews, ain’t ya?”
    “And you are . . .”
    “Howdy Renten.”
    “Howdy?”
    “That’s my Christian name. Mama named me after the first thing my daddy said when he saw me.”
    “So Tap hired you today in Billings?”
    “Yes, ma’am. Me and Tap go back to Arizona t ogether. I wrangled horses and cooked chuck down on the Flying 11 Ranch. Tap and me worked several roundups. Sure was surprised to stumble across him in Billings. Told me he’d pay me a dollar and a half a day, providin’ I took a bath once a week.”
    “Can you toss a hoolihan?” she questioned.
    “Eh—yes, ma’am,” Howdy affirmed.
    “Good. That’s very important, you know.”
    “Yes, ma’am.”
    Pepper waved her arm toward the buildings on the far side of the yard. “There’s a little bedroom off the cook shack, I think. That’s for you. I really haven’t examined it. Our for eman, Mr. Odessa, is out on the ranch, but he’ll be back soon.”
    “Odessa? Lorenzo Odessa? He’s still alive?”
    “Yes, he is.”
    “Don’t that beat all? Did Tap ever tell you about the time I had to ride into Nogales and spring the two of them out of that Mexican jail after they got caught in Alcade’s daughter’s be droom closet?”
    “I don’t think he mentioned that.”
    “No, I don’t reckon he would. I can tell you one thing, Mrs. Andrews.” Renten spat a wad of tobacco ten feet. “You got two men with sand at this ranch. They won’t back away from anyone or anything. I reckon I stumbled into a mighty good layout. Yes, indeed, a mighty good layout. I’ll go settle in now. What time’s supper?”

“I’m waiting for Tap and Angelita to return from town.”
    “Oh, I plum forgot. Ol’ Tap ran across a little trouble in Billings. He won’t be coming home tonight.”
    The skin around her eyes tightened. “Is he all right?”
    “Yeah. There wasn’t much shootin’. Nothin’ serious. A couple hombres on the prowl. I ain’t much