Читать книгу Sagebrush Sedition - Warren J. Stucki - Страница 9

It is a rare gift—the subtle inflection, the deep resonance, the rolling modulation, the impeccable timing. With just the intimacy of his voice, he massages coarse unrefined noise into fine polished oratory, much like rare wine transforms an ordinary supper into a regal meal. Add to this the engaging warmth of his southern drawl, often spiced with random dashes of self-deprecating humor, and even the weakest of arguments often prevail with no more muscle than his matchless style.

A modern Demosthenes, some would readily compare him to William Jennings Bryan, some with John Fitzgerald Kennedy, while others would eagerly canonize him right alongside the immortal Abraham Lincoln.

“Someone ought’a kill that sum-bitch!” Bucky Lee Eakins snorted as he snapped off the radio then turned to face the others, his gray stubbled face pinched with disgust. Positioning a gob of tobacco juice on his ochre stained tongue, he spat through a quarter-inch gap in his yellowed incisors at a plastic spittoon bucket. Missed.

“Well, that might be a little harsh—”

“—Jesus,” Bucky Lee exclaimed, cutting off Douglas “Roper” Rehnquist, “they’se already own two-thirds the goddamn state.”

“But he—”

“—he didn’t even have the guts to give that speech in Utah,” Bucky interrupted again. “Even Teddy Roosevelt, when he deed’icated the Grand Canyon, did it at the goddamn Grand Canyon. That sum-bitch is at least a hundurd and fifty miles away. What a chicken shit,” Lee concluded, again expectorating. Again missing. On the rough-hewn plank floor, a puddle capped with mustard foam was beginning to circle the plastic bucket like a frothy moat.

“There’s a fine line between discretion and cowardice,” Douglas “Roper” Rehnquist volunteered, unhooking his boot heels from the lower rung of the kitchen bar stool. Standing, he stretched out his lanky frame, popping several vertebrae. “He’s afraid if he sets foot in Utah, some crazy redneck, like you Bucky, will shoot him.”

“Wouldn’t mind it.” Lee shrugged as he heaved a two-gallon galvanized steel-mixing tub and set it on the counter with a metallic thud. “Wouldn’t mind it one damn bit. He’s nothin’ but a hippie, a womanizer and a draft-dodger. Went to England instead of Nam, you know.”

“Oxford—University College, I think, but he didn’t inhale,” Douglas “Roper” chuckled, subconsciously rubbing his right hand over the stump where his left index finger used to be.

“Yeah, he’s a regular pillar of salt.” Lee spat again.

“What’s that supposed to mean—a pillar of salt?” Ruby Nez asked, not trying to hide her disgust, from her perch on the other kitchen barstool. “You talking about a pillar-of-the-community or Sodom and Gomorrah?”

“Neither. Don’t think for a minute this won’t affect you, Rube,” Lee said, positioning a hand-crank cast-iron meat grinder over the mixing tub and securely screwing it down to the counter lip. The manufacturer’s label, TSM, was prominently stamped on the side wall of the hamper. “Nothin’ better than these old TSM grinders. Can’t break ‘em with a sledge hammer.”

“What’s TSM stand for?” Roper asked idly.

“The Sausage Maker, what’da ya think?” Bucky countered. Once the grinder was securely fastened to the counter, he looked up at Ruby, frowned, scratched his whiskered chin then continued with his original train of thought. “And this heer is one time your looks ain’t gonna help ya none, Rubles. Don’t mean a damn thing to them BLM boys. They’se asexual.”

“Asexual?” Roper Rehnquist asked, arching an eyebrow.

“I’ve earned everything I’ve got. Looks had nothin’ to do with it,” Ruby snapped, her fine features turning flinty hard as black obsidian.

“Don’t hurt none your second husband happened to up and die and leave youse that bottomland on the Escalante and that allotment on the fifty.”

“That ranch was losing money till he married me, and that’s a fact.”

“Never did quite figure out how he died,” Bucky commented, “somethin’ strange about it.”

“Died in a hunting accident,” Ruby said unflinching. “Nothin’ strange bout it at all.”

“Only they never found the shooter or the gun.”

“They found the bullet, a thirty/thirty. You have a thirty/thirty, don’t you?”

“Yeah, an I’m a purdy damn good shot too. Won me some shootin’ contests in my time,” Bucky asserted, then reached in a counter drawer, pulling out three soiled, blue-ribboned metals, each bearing the inscription, first place. Proudly, he displayed them on the counter.

“They don’t say they were for shootin’,” Ruby contended.

“They don’t say they weren’t, neither,” Bucky retorted.

“So, you do admit to owning a thirty/thirty.” Roper suppressed a smile as he got directly in front of Bucky’s face and argued, trying to sound like a prosecuting attorney.

“Everyone does,” Lee smirked, pulling a hind quarter of venison from his propane refrigerator. “There’s more thirty/thirtys in the state of Utah than cell phones.” He paused momentarily as he plunked the meat down on the counter with a thud then looked over at Ruby. “Probably doesn’t matter what everyone’s been a sayin’?”

“Bucky, you best not go there,” Doug Roper Rehnquist cautioned.

“Yeah—yeah, no point in closing the barn door if’n the horses have gout.”

“Bucky,” Ruby answered, gritting her teeth, “most of the time I have no idea what the hell you’re talking about.”

“Well, all I’m a sayin’, is let them sleepin’ dogs die. ‘Specially them mean sum-bitches.”

“He had his good side,” Ruby replied defensively.

“Shore he did, Rube,” Bucky said sarcastically, “and so did Ted Bundy. But, all I’m sayin’, is all you ranchers is goin’ a be in a world of hurt by this here tree hugger.”

“He just got done saying there would be grazing,” Ruby contended testily.

“Yeah, for now.” Lee cut off a small chunk of meat, stuffed it in the grinder and began cranking. “That’s just to get the monument in place with the least amount of ruckus. Once things settle down, how long do youse think Gore and his flower-sniffers is goin’ to let youse desecrate them holy lands with your stinkin’, shittin’ cows? Hell, far as they’re concerned, them bovines are worse’n them friggin’ four-wheelers.”

“Nothing worse than ATVs,” Roper confirmed.

“Well, I’m not sayin’ I’m trustin’ ‘em,” Ruby said.

“I’d be just as worried about the Grand Canyon Trust buying up all the permits,” Roper argued. “I’ll be darned if I can figure out where they get all their money.”

“That’s pretty strong language, college-boy,” Lee mocked.

“Well, they just bought that big ranch outside of Moab and another on the Arizona Strip,” Roper declared, “so they’re getting their money from somewhere.”

“Bleedin’ heart liberals back east, and the Sierra Club,” Lee growled. He now had a respectable mound of ground meat, looking like a pile of extruded red worms, impossibly tangled in the bottom of the bowl. “And Robert Redford.”

“Why Redford?”

“If’n they have their way, you’ll all be a turning in your cowboy boots, chaps and Stetsons for fancy lace-up boots, ‘luminum walkin’ sticks and Spandex. Shit, he has some nerve callin’ hisself a Utahn.”

“Who?” Roper asked.

“Robert ‘where-the-red-fern-don’t-grow’ Redford!” Lee spat out the words, followed by another errant attempt at the bucket. “Who’d ya think?”

“I don’t think he’s so bad,” Doug Roper declared, “he means well. But, I suspect your little operation here is goin’ to suffer more than Ruby and me.”

“I’ll be fine,” Bucky Lee said, twisting off the top of his can of Skoal. “I’se gone and got myself diversified, like them Wall Street boys.”

“Diversified?” Ruby asked.

“I’se got a new line,” Bucky said, putting a pinch between his tongue and cheek, then went back to his meat. “Don’t youse worry none about me. Soon I’ll be making six figures and youse guys will be comin’ to me beggin’ for a loan and of course I’ll say no.”

“That’ll be the day,” Ruby muttered.

“How you going to make that kind of money?” Roper asked.

“Confidential,” Bucky Lee said. “Like they say in the marines, don’t show, don’t kill.

“As usual,” Ruby declared, “you’re all mixed up.”

“You’ll see,” Bucky Lee insisted, “All I can tell you it has something to do with rocks.”

“Rocks!” Ruby exclaimed. “Are you crazy?”

“Clinton definitely said there would be no mining,” Roper insisted.

“These ain’t just any rocks,” Lee explained. “These are rare and there’s no mining and that’s the beauty of it and that’s all I’m goin’ to say about that.”

“If I were you, I’d be more worried about the BLM closing down some of my old but profitable businesses,” Roper said.

“What’a youse mean?” Lee asked, as he sliced off another hunk of venison and continued cranking the grinder.

“Hell, Bucky,” Ruby cut it. “Even before the Monument, what you were doing here was illegal.”

“What’a youse talkin’ bout?” Bucky placed meat-flecked hands on his hips, feigning shock.

“I doubt this will come as a surprise, but there’s laws against selling illegal hides and pelts,” Roper answered.

“I don’t sell nothin’ but what I’se got government permits for. There ain’t no law agin trappin’ an I know, there ain’t no law agin making deer sausage or salami any more’n there’s a law agin you makin’ that awful homemade wine of yours, Rube.”

“You’re right,” Ruby agreed. “But there is a law against poaching and you can’t sell wild game in Utah and you can’t transport it across state lines either.”

“I don’t do neither,” Lee declared brashly, wiping his hands on his Levis. He finally had the mixing tub two-thirds full of ground meat. “I make meat products for my own use and when I do occasionally do a little retailin’, I just charge a small processin’ fee, no charge at all for the meat. You know, for my time and the pork filler. Nobody gives me free pig meat.”

“Some might call that splitting legal hairs,” Roper concluded as he looked over Lee’s shoulder, eyeing the tub.

“Or some might just call it plain bullshit,” Ruby said.

“You can’t make bulls out’a bullshit,” Bucky replied.

“Jesus,” Ruby said, crossing herself in the traditional Catholic way. “Just once, I wish you’d make some sense.”

“Well it’s no more bullshit than those cougar hides you bring in for me to sell. I suppose you got a permit for all them?”

“I thought you just sold your own trappings,” Roper said, breaking into a disarming grin that seemed to instantly expunge the sadness from his eyes and fill the empty hollows of his cheeks.

“I have a right to protect my calves,” Ruby retorted quickly, ignoring Roper.

“Is that what you call it?” Lee sneered. “It’s just fortunate, I guess, that one cat hide brings youse more money than a whole yearlin’ calf on the hoof.”

Plainly irritated, Ruby turned and stomped away, weaving around clumps of floor debris. A half dozen rapid steps and she was clear across the one room cabin, another half dozen and she was quickly back.

“If it’s so risky, why do you fence them? And why is it you always have fresh sausage meat year around?”

“I have my sources,” Lee said, unperturbed. Deftly he cut a slab of pork loin and began pushing it in the hopper with one hand and grinding with the other. “You need to add a third of pork, venison doesn’t have enough fat.”

“It’s September eighteenth,” Ruby persisted, “a full month before hunting season. How is it you’ve got fresh venison?”

“Like I said, I got my sources. Hell, Rube, you’re part Injun. You of all people ought’ta know not everyone needs a huntin’ license.”

“I’m a quarter Cherokee, you know the Trail of Tears. Not related to the local Indians.”

“The trail of what? Well anyway, that’s almost like being part Injun.”

Ruby shook her head in disbelief then added, “so the Utes just give you their meat?”

“More like sell it. Navajos too.” The mixing vessel was now full and Lee used a large manual mixer to blend the ground pork and venison. “Looks good, huh?” he said, smiling through his stained picket-fence teeth.

“So the Indians sell you their deer meat,” Roper said thoughtfully. “But when you retail, you just charge for processing and not for the meat. Sounds like you’d need an extra high processing fee just to break even.”

“S’mantics,” Lee said, adding some sage and red pepper, “word games. I’ll fry up some fresh and let youse try it. S’on sale to my friends, youse know.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet it is,” Ruby snickered.

“Just need to add my secret spices,” Bucky divulged as he retrieved a Mason jar from the cabinet directly behind him. Opening the jar, he took a pinch of what appeared to be a mixture of various kinds of dried leaves, pulverized them by rolling back and forth in his palms then sprinkled the flakes on the ground meat.

“Smells like sage,” Roper suggested.

“No, it smells more like sagebrush and after a good rain,” Ruby declared, as the piquant musky odor diffused through the cabin.

Suddenly the over head lights flickered off then came back on for a moment then abruptly went dead.

“Generator’s outta gas,” Bucky announced as he pulled a gas can from the cabinet under the sink. “This won’t take but a minute.”

Bucky disappeared out the kitchen door and five minutes later the lights flickered back on. Bucky reappeared at the door then went back to his sausage bowl.

“Well, I’ve gotta be going, anyhow,” Roper said. “Cows won’t move themselves.”

“Are you moving them off the Fifty down to the Bench already?” Ruby asked.

“Nah, just moving them from my East Spring pasture to my Tank Springs pasture,” Roper explained. “You know, BLM makes me rotate every two months.”

“Seems awful early,” Ruby insisted, looking puzzled, “I’m not rotating mine for at least another month.”

“Yeah, but with the drought, my feed’s mostly gone,” Roper answered. “Your pasture probably is in better shape.”

“Brisco ask you to move early?” Ruby asked suspiciously.

“Nah,” Roper replied. “Feed’s just gone. Cow’s can’t eat dirt.”

“This is way early,” Ruby persisted. “You’re going to run out of winter pasture way before spring.”

“Just have to sell some early.” Roper shrugged.

“Who’s this guy, Brisco?” Bucky interrupted, mashing the sausage into patties and grabbing a frying pan out of the sink. “I’ll cook youse up a batch.”

“He’s the new head of the BLM,” Ruby replied,” and he’s a she— Judith Brisco. She took over for Egan.”

“Can’t say that I’m sorry,” Roper said, sitting back down on the stool again. “Didn’t much like Jon Egan. Never knew where he stood.”

“Well,” Lee said, dropping meat patties into the sizzling hot skillet. “This is just the beginning, mark my words. First they’ll ask you to move early, then they’ll ask you to voluntarily drop allotments, then they’ll just seize ‘em. Be just like the little Battle of the Bighorn.”

“Nobody asked me to move,” Roper replied, a hint of irritation laced his voice, “and I’m not moving all three hundred and fifty. Anyway, I don’t see any similarity to the Little Bighorn.”

“If they restrict my allotment, I won’t be able to make it.” Ruby frowned and removed her black Stetson, then untied the red-checkered bandana that bound her coal-black hair. “Not the way beef prices are droppin’.”

“You an Roper ought’ta go on and join up outfits—less overhead and youse are across-the-fence neighbors anyway,” Bucky advised. “R and R ranching, sounds good.”

“Well, it’s a bit more complicated than that,” Ruby said, still fussing with her hair.

“Not that complicated. Youse two are already shackin’ up anyway, ain’t you?” Bucky Lee sneered.

“No!” Roper blushed, quickly averting his copper blue eyes to the smudged fireplace at the far end of the disheveled room. The rancid aroma of hot grease and frying sausage permeated the room, making the cabin feel, in spite of the clutter, a little more homey.

“Can’t believe you’re such a prude,” Lee smirked as he forked sausages onto a paper plate. Almost instantly, a grease halo appeared on the plate encircling each patty. “Youse ain’t no saint, even if ya don’t cuss and yer old man was a Mormon Bishop.”

“Whether we are or not, is no business of yours,” Ruby cut in fiercely.

“Bucky, I’ve never claimed to be like my father.”

“Youse absolutely right,” Lee smirked, “and youse certainly ain’t. He was a real cowman. Here, try some of this, Rube.” He offered her the paper plate. “Use your fingers—I ain’t washin’ no dishes.”

Not waiting to be invited, Roper plucked a hot patty out of the frying pan then quickly tossed it from one hand to another while it cooled. Gingerly, he took a bite. “Hot!” he wheezed, hurriedly sucking in cold air. After a moment he continued, “you know the one I feel sorry for is Angus Macdonald.”

“You mean that stumpy Englishman?” Bucky asked as he wolfed down a sausage.

“With a name like that,” Roper scoffed. “No, not English, Scottish. He’s about as English as haggis.”

“What’s the difference?” Bucky asked. “Either way he’s a limey.”

“Scotland was settled by the Picts and the Scotti in the north and Angles and Britons in the south,” Roper answered matter-of-factly. “England, on the other hand, was settled by various invaders including the Kelts, Romans, Angles, Saxons and the Normans. That’s the difference between them, that and about a thousand years of war.”

“Jesus, college-boy, that’s a hell-uv-a-lot more than I wanted to know,” Bucky growled.

“I was just trying to explain.”

“It don’t do no good showin’ off heer. Nobody’s impressed,” Bucky said sourly, “an if’n youse was so good at college, why din’t you stay?”

“No good jobs for English history/literature majors,” Roper said, staring down at his now leathery hands and again massaging the finger stub. Certainly, they were not the hands of an English history professor. “And I couldn’t stand being cooped up.”

“Well anyway, what about Angus?” Ruby interrupted. Suddenly, she seemed interested.

“Din’t you date him for a while?” Bucky asked

“It was nothing,” Ruby declared. “Just sat with him a couple times at the bar.”

“That’s not what I heer’d,” Bucky said. “I heer’d he was sweet on ya and still is, and youse just up and dumped him.”

“No,” Ruby protested, shaking her head, “we were always just friends.”

“They’se say he had it bad.” Bucky turned off the gas on the stove. “They’se say he used to follow youse everywhere. A regular midnight stalker.”

“No,” Ruby insisted again, firmly. “We were then and still are, just friends.”

“Well it don’t matter. What about Macdonald, anyway?” Bucky Lee asked Roper. “What’s he got to do with this heer daisy-pickin’ liberal’s folly?”

“He owns Highland Mining and Mineral. They’re just a small outfit, not like PacifiCorp or Andalex. Really don’t think he has other assets other than his Kaiparowits coal leases.”

“Well then he’s just plain dead in the water,” Lee said flatly.

“I suppose, like a canoe without a paddle,” Ruby said sarcastically.

“No, more like a mallard swimmin’ next to an aviary,” Bucky said.

“It’s not just us and Angus goin’ to be affected,” Roper continued. “What about loggers, hunting guides and prospectors? All of them will be affected.”

“Your president made it clear there would be no minin’, prospectin’ or loggin’,” Lee said. “An who knows for sure bout huntin’. What a prick!”

“I didn’t vote for him,” Roper asserted. “But I do feel bad for Angus. He’s a nice guy.”

Stone-faced, Ruby concentrated on her sausage and didn’t comment.

“Nice guys always get the shaft,” Lee said, his face immobile. “That’s why I’se constantly worried about myself.”

“Yeah, I worry about that too,” Roper said dryly.

“What’ll he do?” Ruby ignored Lee, as she gingerly forked another patty.

“I suspect he’ll have to move, or find another way to make a living,” Roper answered, shaking his head. “Maybe I’ll teach him to cowboy.”

“Like I said, somebody ought’a shoot that sum-bitch.”

“Who—Angus?” Ruby asked.

“No, pay attention. The Pres.”

“I hope you’re kidding,” Roper said, standing, looking for something on which to wipe his greasy hands. Finding nothing he used rumpled newspaper stacked on the edge of the filthy Formica counter.

“I never joke about my’s good ideas.”

“Guess that means you never joke,” Roper said grinning.

“You’d never get within a hundred miles of him,” Ruby asserted. “Maybe you could kill him with voodoo or telepathy. Or your stupid parables.”

“Killin’ his representatives would be like killin’ him—”

“—Jeez,” Roper cut in. “Let’s change the subject. You’re starting to spook me.”

Ruby stood up and tossed her empty plate into the already full wastebasket. They all watched as it bounced off the heap, then glided to the floor.

“Bucky,” Ruby groaned. “Why don’t you clean up this dump?”

“Why?” Lee shrugged as he dumped the grease from the frying pan into an empty Pork-and-Beans can, then he tossed the frying pan back into the cluttered sink. “You want to take some home? Custom sausage is hard to find. ‘Specially this good stuff—five bucks a pound.”

“Processing fee?” Roper asked sarcastically.

“I’ll take a couple pounds,” Ruby said, a hint of embarrassment in her voice. She glanced over at Roper and shrugged. “Well, I’m getting damn tired of hamburger with my eggs.”

“Oh, what the heck,” Roper sighed. “Give me a couple of pounds too.”

Dividing the sausage into roughly two portions, Bucky Lee wrapped each with wax paper then he snatched the faded newspaper from the counter and double-wrapped, taping both bundles securely with duct-tape.

While watching Bucky, Ruby struggled to retie her hair. Giving up, she stuffed the red bandana into her Levi’s pocket and replaced the black Stetson over her tousled head. Mesmerized, Roper watched these antics out of the corner of his eye.

“Doug, you still planning on helping me with my brandin’ day after tomorrow?” she asked, heading for the door.

“If’n they’se not branded by the time they’se six months, they becomes property of the county,” Bucky said.

“Really?” Roper said sarcastically.

“Anyway, they’re not six months yet,” Ruby said. “And nobody enforces that law. How can they, it’s Fifty Mile Mountain.”

“Like I said, I’ve got to move my cows to my Tank pasture that morning. Can we get yours done in the afternoon?”

“Only got about twenty head, but at four to five months, it’ll be a rodeo,” Ruby smiled. “Tell you what, I’ll give you a hand moving your cows, if you’ll help me in the afternoon.”

“Deal.” Roper grinned.

As they stepped for the door, Bucky gave Ruby and Roper their packages.

“How’d you know this is two pounds?” Roper asked skeptically, “you weigh it?”

“Nah, I can just tell,” Bucky muttered. “Bin in this business too long.”

“Well, we’ll be seein’ you.” Roper nodded to Bucky as he ducked through the door.

“I mean it, we really shouldn’t let him git away with this horse shit,” Bucky mumbled at Roper’s back.

“What?” Ruby asked, looking sharply at Bucky as she took her parcel.

“We should do somethin’ to stop him.”

Roper stopped in mid-stride and turned around again.

“For hell’s sake, stop who?” Ruby pushed on by.

“Whose the hell we bin talkin’ bout?” Lee demanded, a drop of spittle stuck in the gutter of his chin.

“Stoppin’ it now is like stopping a train after the caboose has already passed,” Ruby declared backing down the walkway. “But if you figure out a way, let me know.”

“There’s nothing we can do,” Roper insisted, his brow furrowed. “It was done perfectly legal. He invoked the Antiquities Act.”

“Antiquities Act, my ass! This is about as legal as my marriage, or my divorce for that matter,” Lee hissed through the cleft of his clenched teeth. “An it’s immoral. Only in the west does the federal government own this much land. It wasn’t supposed to be that way. When territories become states the federal government is supposed to give back all federal lands to the state. That’s the way it was in Texas and back east. That’s the way it was everywhere exceptin’ here in the west. Did ya know the federal government owns more’n sixty percent of this goddamn state?” Lee paused for a breath. “Youse gotta figure somethin’ out college-boy, or we’ll all be gatherin’ our belongin’s, like dust bowl refugees of the Great Depression, and jumpin’ trains or road-hitchin’. Either way, we’ll be out of heer a beggin’ for jobs.”

“John Steinbeck revisited, huh?” Roper said.

“Who?” Bucky glared back.

“Forget it. There’s nothing we can do, not now—not now in nineteen ninety-six,” Roper said firmly. “Like I said, the Antiquities Act makes it all legal.”

“We’re startin’ to get a group together,” Bucky said confidentially, pausing to fire a wad at the bucket, again hitting high on the sidewall. The yellow slime stuck momentarily then slowly slid to the floor. “Informally, of course. Either one of you interested?”

“Nah, I don’t think so,” Roper said, shaking his head and scowling.

“Youse think about it, Roper. How bout youse, Rube?”

“When you get things organized and decide what you’re all about,” Ruby said hesitantly, “let me know. Then I’ll decide if I’m interested.”

“I’ll tell youse two right now, might don’t make right and legal don’t mean eagle, “ Bucky Lee snarled.

“Christ Almighty!” Ruby crossed herself again then stared incredulously at Bucky for a moment. She started to say something, abruptly changed her mind, pivoted on the heel of her boot and quickly stomped away.

“Who put a burr under her saddle?” Bucky asked, feigning offense.

“Sometimes you just have that effect on people,” Roper smiled, shaking his head.

“Like the prophets of old, I’se just tell it as it is,” Bucky Lee replied, staring at Roper with bleary eyes. “This heer ain’t no popularity contest.”

“Well then, Bucky,” Roper said testily, raising everted palms skyward in an apparent show of frustration. “What’s your answer?”

“All I’m sayin’ is it’s time to stand up and be confounded. Somebody’s gotta take back this country from them friggin’, bleedin’ heart liberals.”