Big Enough
A collection of stories...
Chuck Tyrell
Smashwords Edition
Big Enough
Presented by Western Trail Blazer
Digital ISBN: 978-1-4659-1241-1
Copyright © 2012 Chuck Tyrell
Art Cover Copyright © 2012 Laura Shinn
Produced by Rebecca J. Vickery
Design Consultation by Laura Shinn
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Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author.
Big Enough is a work of fiction.
Though actual locations may be mentioned, they are used in a fictitious manner and the events and occurrences were invented in the mind and imagination of the author except for the inclusion of actual historical facts. Similarities of characters or names used within to any person – past, present, or future – are coincidental except where actual historical characters are purposely interwoven.
Table of Contents
Foreword (by C. Courtney Joyner)
Big Enough
Man of Iron
Kataki
Line Rider
The Kid and the Commodore
Death of a Hunter
Requiem for a Pig
A Father's Prayer
About the Author: Chuck Tyrell
Bonus Feature I – Vulture Gold
Bonus Feature II – Return to Silver Creek
Foreword (by C. Courtney Joyner)
I came to westerns by way of the movies, first as a ravenous fan, and then as a screenwriter. After years of writing my fair share of "B" horror flicks, I wanted to concentrate on westerns, an idea that didn't please my agents since Hollywood wasn't buying. But the West kept calling me, so I decided to forge into fiction, and put myself to the test as a "real writer." Writing a screenplay and writing fiction are entirely different skills, and shifting those gears isn't an easy thing. I had confidence in my visual sense and felt I could handle dialog, but that wasn't enough.
I can't think of a time when a dog-eared Frank O'Rourke, Elmer Kelton, or Will Henry story wasn't within easy reach. The love of the form was never a problem; an avalanche of paperbacks in my home could easily cripple the stoutest burglar. But how was I going to write my own? I decided the best course of action was to lose myself in the work of some great tale-spinners, put my enjoyment on hold (very difficult), and hopefully gain some clinical understanding of writing about the West.
It was during this quest that I discovered Black Horse Westerns and Chuck Tyrell – aka Charles Whipple.
I had heard about these cool, little hardback books published in England, but had never even seen one until I found several at a used bookstore. As fortune would have it, one was Vulture Gold, which, as I found out later, was Charles Whipple's first western, and a damn good one. The ones that followed did not disappoint, and I became a fan of Black Horse, and of Charlie's.
Charlie Whipple is a man of words, or more exactly, the right words. When Charlie speaks he says exactly what he means and when he writes, he does it with an economy that never sacrifices emotional power or depth of character. It's an enviable talent, and the stories collected here are a great example of Charlie's many and varied gifts.
Man of Iron is a tough, spare tale of a "good" bad man that recalls the best of Elmore Leonard, and highlights Charlie's knowledge of Native American history. I've returned to this story several times because it rings so solidly true. When Charlie digs into the cultural origins of a character, he makes damn sure he gets the details right so that when the gunplay starts, you're connected to his people. Violence bubbles behind every paragraph of Man, ready to explode.
The Kid and the Commodore shows Charlie's devotion to research, as he steps away from fiction for a factual piece on the amazing life of lawman Commodore Perry Owens. The facts are laid out cleanly, with a few surprises for even the most knowledgeable of historians. The fact is, Charlie knows his stuff.
"I knew the filly could run the minute I laid eyes on her," is how Charlie introduces the beautiful horse that is Big Enough. This story is the centerpiece of the collection, drawing on Charlie's love and understanding of animal grace and courage. One of the reasons I liked this piece so well is that it has so much heart, but is never sentimental or maudlin. That would be the easy approach, and Charlie's not that kind of writer. His depictions of cowboy life are real; you feel the leather of a worn saddle, the rope in your hands, the rain on your neck. That realism elevates Big Enough from simple "horse story" to one that lingers in memory.
I can't read Kataki without thinking of Bismarck, North Dakota. Charlie was diligently working on this story while also attending a Western Writers convention. I never saw him without his notebook, scrawling the words as fast as they came to him, when he could manage a few minutes alone between panels, lunches, and general writer's mayhem.
There was a signing at a local bookstore, and we were guests, along with about twenty or so other fine Western writers. Afterwards, we bussed to our hotel, yakking away about sales, the turn out, and the need for a drink. Charlie didn't join in, because he was back at work, notebook on his lap, bringing Kataki to its exciting conclusion. I complimented him on his work ethic and he looked up and grinned, "I think you'll like this one."
He was right.
In Kataki ("bitter enemy"), Charlie deftly slices through the convention of the Western by bringing in the sensibility and action of the Samurai. Charlie lives in Japan, and his devotion to Japanese culture and history breathes through every page of Kataki. It's also a hell of a yarn.
Writing a forward for a friend can be a tricky proposition, especially if you like the person more than their writing. There's no such worry here. This collection is a real treat for fans of Charlie's work, and if you're a first timer, then you're about to discover a fine guy and a fine author, whose stories of the West will have a permanent place on your shelf.
– C. Courtney Joyner
C. Courtney Joyner is an award-winning writer of fiction, comics, and screenplays, with over 25 produced movies to his credit, including the cult films Prison, starring Viggo Mortensen, Class of 1999, directed by Mark Lester, and the new 3-D Captain Nemo for Page Four Productions, with Hugh Bonneville as Nemo. A graduate of USC, Joyner's first produced screenplay was The Offspring, starring the legendary Vincent Price. His other scripts have included TV movies for CBS, the USA Network, and Showtime. He has written action films and horror, as well as a number of films for Charles Band's Full Moon company, released by Paramount, including installments in the very successful Puppet Master series and Trancers 3, starring Academy Award winner Helen Hunt and Tim Thomerson. Joyner also directed this film, as well as the H.P. Lovecraft adaptation, The Lurking Fear. He co-wrote all 13 episodes of the series William Shatner's Fright Night for the SyFy Channel. Joyner's newest screenplay is the violent biography of the most notorious woman of the West, The Legend of Belle Starr.
Joyner's movie book The Westerners—Interviews with Actors, Directors, and Writers was published by McFarland in November 2010. A second volume is in the works, and he is currently writing Warner Brothers Fantastic: A History of the Studio's Horror, Science-Fiction, and Fantasy Films for the same publisher.
In the world of fiction, Joyner's western short stories have been anthologized in The Traditional West, A Fistful of Legends, and Law of the Gun. His crime and horror stories are featured in Hollywood Hell and Beat to a Pulp, Round 2.
Joyner is a member of the Western Writers of America, and was honored as the recipient of their President's Award in 2011. He is also a member of the Horror Writers Association, and The International Thriller Writers. He lives in Los Angeles.
Big Enough
Chapter 1
Everyone around here just calls me Kid because I'm the youngest of the four McCullough brats. The other three are Kane, who's oldest, tall as a ponderosa pine, and thick through the chest. Then comes Kenigan, tall as Kane, but slender and wiry as a red willow tree. The McCullough boy just older than me is Kris. Middling size, but tougher than a basket full of wildcats.
Pa came west as a teamster with Amiel Whipple's survey party and he returned to the Blue Mountains of Arizona when the survey was finished. Ma was a Spanish girl, third daughter of Miguel Rodriguez Diaz y Rojas, who owned a ranch across the line in New Mexico. Spanish she was, Amanda Rodriguez, with flashing black eyes and ivory skin, but I remember her little because she died in the winter of '66 when I was just three years old. Back then, we farmed some and hunted a lot, and our clothing tended to be buckskin as cash money for store-bought clothes was hard to come by. The army set up camp at Fort Apache and Wells Fargo doubled its run through Navajo Springs. All of a sudden people wanted to buy the horses we caught from the wild and tamed at our spread below the alpine divide in the Blues.
I knew the filly could run the minute I laid eyes on her. She was just a colt, pushing two years old maybe; one of the bunch that followed the tough old strawberry stallion we called Big Red. No one had ever caught Big Red, but once in a while you could get some of his mares and their colts.
"The black filly with the white socks's mine," I said out loud, and Kane laughed.
"You catch her, Kid, and she's yours," he said.
Big Red always led his bunch down Sycamore Canyon to water so I figured I could make a horse trap just south of their watering hole. I didn't care if I never caught Big Red, so long as I trapped that black filly with the socks. My, but she was fine.
My brothers helped and in two weeks we had brush walls along the trail into water, with one gate at Sheep Creek and one at the mouth of the canyon. Two more weeks and Big Red's bunch got used to going through the two gates to water. Kane and I stood by the gates as the sun rose, waiting for Big Red to lead his mares and colts into our trap. But that old stallion was a canny one. He must have smelled us, 'cause he kept the mares from coming in that day, and the next. All we could do was wait for that strawberry stallion to decide we were just part of the scenery.
Three days later, Big Red let the mares drink. We just sat still and let the horses be. They'd come back, and next time, or the time after that, we'd shut the gates and take our pick of Big Red's herd.
The horses cat-footed over the brow of the saddleback and headed single file down the trail to water. Just inside the far gate, Big Red stopped and stood off to one side, head high and nostrils flared. He still didn't like the smell, I guess.
The mares and colts filed past, headed for water. That fine black filly kept to the middle of the herd, tossing her head and testing the wind. She didn't like the smell any more than Big Red did.
When the filly got half-way to water, I slammed the gate shut. "Close it, Kane," I hollered, and my big brother slid the poles of the far gate shut. Big Red led a rush toward Kane's gate and a dozen horses, including the stallion, leaped the two bars Kane put up and escaped before he could get the third bar in place. But the filly with the socks was caught, and that's all I really cared about.
Kenigan rode his lineback buckskin down to have a look at the horses we'd caught. "That old red stallion sure sires a fine colt," he said. "Almost too good to sell to the army," He broke a twig off an aspen to chew at. "What ideas you got in that head of yours about that filly with the socks?" he asked.
I tried to sound like I knew what I was doing. "Oh, I'll see how she trains up. I reckon she'll be faster than any horse you've got, big brother."
He laughed. "Don't get uppity, Kid," he said. "You and that filly've got a long way to go yet."
My brothers spent the days getting the dozen and some horses we'd caught in shape to haze back to the ranch. I built myself a little camp down by Sheep Creek. I'd be up here a while, getting used to the black filly and letting her get used to me.
The day they took off with the new horses, Kane rode by my camp on his way out. "You keep an eye out, Kid. Pa'd spit horseshoe nails if anything happened to you, Ma dead and all."
"I been out on my own more'n once, Kane. I've got my Winchester and a bunch of cartridges, and I've got that Army Colt you gave me. Nothing's gonna sneak up on me without getting a slug through its hide, man or beast. Don't you figure I'm soft, just because I'm a girl."
Kane grinned. "You're a girl all right," he said. "One so tough there ain't nobody in Arizona who'd get sweet on you." His face took on a serious look. "Kid, any man coming down the pike's gonna be some bigger than you. I figure you oughta shoot first and ask questions after. You hear?"
I scuffed a moccasin toe in the dirt. "I'll take care, Kane. Never you worry."
"Soon as we make the ranch, I'll send Kris up with grub and such." He neck-reined his long-legged dun gelding away, raising a hand in farewell. Made me feel good to have brothers that cared after me like that.
Chapter 2
With men and horses gone, that left us females. Me, my three-color paint mare, and the black filly. Patches the paint was a pet. I hoped some of her gentle ways would rub off on the filly.
Before my brothers left, they helped me build a holding pen for the filly and Patches. I could let Patches out to graze because she came when I whistled, but the little filly with the white socks had to stay in the pen until she and I could get to know each other and she learned how to behave.
I had me a bag of oats and a gunnysack nosebag that Patches loved. She could hear me rustle oats in that nosebag from half a mile away, and she'd come on the trot. After a couple of days, the little filly decided Patches was her herd, and she began to watch what Patches did. On the third morning, when Patches ate her bait of oats from the nosebag, the filly came up on her off-side and had a good smell of that bag. She nipped at it; she wanted to get to the good grain inside. Before long, she'd be hooked.
Mustangers break horses. My brothers do it. Everybody does it. They ear a horse down, slap a saddle on his back, and rough-ride him until he gives up. A broke horse may be right for a cowpoke hired for the roundup or a green cavalry recruit, but I prefer horses like Patches. She likes me. She does what I ask because she thinks I'm one of her herd. Oh, she comes looking for treats and she can be stubborn, but at the end of the day, she's a friend.
I didn't want to break the black filly, I wanted to be her friend. I wanted her and me to be a team, and when the bets were on the table, I wanted her to give me all she had.
By the time Kris showed up with supplies, the filly wore a halter and she'd let me move my hands over her face, into her mouth, and up around her ears. She'd lift whichever foot I stood by when I said, "lift it," and I'd already started cleaning her frogs and trimming and rasping her hooves so they'd be nearly ready to shoe when we got to the Flying M, our place in the Blues.
"Hey, Kid. You look like a gun with legs," Kris said.
"Don't like to be out in the holding pen working with the filly without protection," I said. I reached back, grabbed hold of the Colt's butt while thumbing back the hammer, stood spraddle-legged, ready for man or beast.
Kris held up both hands. "Don't shoot, Kid. I'm friendly."
I slipped the lead rope off the halter and let the filly loose. "Thanks for bringing grub, Kris. I was down to a last bit of bacon. Flour ran out yesterday. Hope you loaded some grain for my horses, too."
"That filly's sure a little thing," he said. "Built nice, though."
"I'll tell you, big brother, that filly's plenty big enough, and she'll out run any horse you ride."
"Big enough, eh?" He laughed. "Big enough. That's good." And that became the filly's name. Big Enough.
Kris's face lost its laughter. "Kid," he said. "Two men busted a hardcase named Mort Eggertson outta jail in Saint Johns the other day. Sheriff Hubbell's out chasing them with a posse, but Pa'd just as soon you come home."
"I ain't ready. The filly ain't ready. I'll come home when I can ride her home."
"Kid, don't be stupid-ass dumb. Three men who'd have their way with you and then slit your throat are in these mountains. They ain't got food. They ain't got spare mounts. You got both. And you not weighing more'n a hundred pounds in wet buckskins. Now you listen to what Pa says. Come on home. You can finish up with the filly at the Flying M."
I may be the only female of the McCullough brats, but that doesn't mean I don't have my own streak of pure stubbornness. "The filly ain't ready," I said. "And I'll keep an eye out."
"Like you did with me?" Kris had a point. I'd not been aware of him until he spoke. "I could have had you two ways from sundown."
"I'll be more careful." I could hear the pout in my own voice. "Not going home," I said. "Not yet."
Kris shrugged. "I'll tell Pa I tried. He won't be happy about it. You just may see him before long, so you'd better work your filly up good and fast." He slipped the panniers off the pack mule and rode away with the docile john on a ten-foot lead.
I talk big and brave, but at heart I know I'm just a little kid: Five foot and a smidgen in moccasins and, like Kris said, maybe a hundred pounds after a big meal.
When I turned back to the holding pen, Big Enough wanted to play. She loved to run and knew that when I put a long rope on her halter, she would be allowed to trot and gallop and flat-out run in circles within the pen. Patches grazed on the banks of Sheep Creek until I whistled that Big Enough and I were finished for the day. Both of them came begging for the nosebag, but I had to break out another sack of oats from the panniers before I could feed them. Patches ate first, as was her right for being my number one horse. But Big Enough pushed and shoved and tried to get me to pay more attention to her than to Patches.
Kris brought me flour and bacon and beans, along with salt and saleratus powder and coffee. I was fixed for ten days or two weeks, but if need be, I could get trout from Sheep Creek, eat cattail hearts, steam clover, and maybe even plink a rabbit or two, though I didn't really want to shoot. The sound of a rifle carries almighty far in the thin mountain air.
Big Enough was a smart little horse, so by the time I finished rubbing her all over with a saddle blanket, flapping it around her legs and up under her tail, she'd learned that moving things were not necessarily dangerous and that I wouldn't ever hurt her. In fact, I was the source of those good oats and a satisfying scratch around her ears and under her jaw; and she knew a whistle from me meant something good to eat for her. She'd come at the run and slide to a stop on stiff forelegs, her nose touching my stomach. And wasn't she a beauty when she ran?
Chapter 3
I never built a fire I couldn't cover with my hat. Only one of me so three or four slices of sowbelly bacon and a couple of thick saleratus biscuits cooked in a frying pan made as good a breakfast as a body could want. I'd just soaked a biscuit in bacon grease, slapped a thick slice of sowbelly on it, and taken a big bite when Patches whickered. She stood head high, ears pointed, facing west. Big Enough stood in the shadows almost out of sight. Her mustang blood told her to hide. I reached for my Winchester.
"Lay the rifle down real slow, little lady. Real slow."
I heard a hammer ratcheted back, so I let the rifle fall. I tried to keep my knees from shaking.
"That's a good girl. That grub you've fixed up smells mighty good. Got enough for visitors?"
"Quit lollygagging around, Mort. All we need is a horse."
Taking a risk, I gulped a big breath and turned toward the voices.
Two horses in sore need of rest and feed. Three men, likewise. A tall broad-shouldered fellow with what looked like a three-day beard stood beside the right-hand horse. All three held revolvers: two top-break Smith & Wessons and one Colt Peacemaker. When you're a McCullough, you know guns.
"You must be Mort Eggertson," I managed to say to the tall man without my voice trembling much.
"I am."
"Why was you in jail?"
"Killed a man."
I put on my stone face. "Then you deserved jail," I said.
"Ah, but he'd of killed me if I'd been a hair slower with this S-n-W." He waved the Smith & Wesson, but never far enough away for me to make a move.
"Come on, Mort. Them guys with Hubbell cain't be all that far behind us. Let's git."
"I could whip up a bit more bacon and biscuits if you want," I said. The longer I could stall them here, the closer the Sheriff's men would be, I reasoned.
I unbuckled my gunbelt and put it on the ground by the rifle. "Just so's you won't get any wrong ideas about me," I said.
"You don't seem all that scared of us, missy," Eggertson said.
"Mort Eggertsen, you seem to be a better man than you make out. Were you all bad, I'd already be dead. I can see you don't like killing, and I reckon at other times you've rode with the posse your own self." Still, I had a shaky feeling deep in my guts.
He smiled.
Good-looking man, as men went.
I put my biscuit and bacon on the grub box and built another sandwich from the makings that was left. I handed it to Eggertsen. He gave it to the man on the hindmost horse, and he piled into it like he'd not seen food for a couple or three days.
"Go ahead, missy. Fix some grub." Eggertsen kept his pistol on me.
I just nodded and set to stirring up some more biscuit dough. In two shakes of a dead lamb's tail, I had biscuit and bacon sandwiches for the other man and for Eggertsen. Without asking, I went ahead and set a pot of coffee on to brew. No man in this wide world can refuse a good cup of coffee.
Not having planned on company, I had only one coffee cup. I filled it and handed it to Eggertson. "The others'll have to wait on you," I said.
He grinned and took a sip. "Strong enough to melt horseshoes," he said. "Just my style."
He passed the cup on and I filled it for the next man. Did the same for the other gunman.
"What's your name, missy?" Eggertsen asked.
"Kimberly," I said, "but everyone calls me Kid."
"Kid what?"
"Kid McCullough."
Eggertsen took a half step back away from me. "You kin to the McCulloughs down below Alpine?"
"Family," I said. "You been around here long, you'd know 'em. They're m' brothers. There's Kane and Kenigan. Then there's Kris. And I bring up the rear. Oh, and my pa's Kieran McCullough."
"Mustangers."
"Among other pursuits," I said.
"Well, Kid," Eggertsen said. "We're gonna have to borrow one of your horses."
I said nothing, but my displeasure must have showed.
"I'm not about to die when I've done nothing wrong."
I stared at him.
"If I didn't kill that man, I'd of been killed myself. A man has a right to protect himself."
"Come on, Mort. The kid don't make no never mind."
One of the gunmen was only three or four inches taller than me, and looked all sinew and bone. The other had a full beard and a full belly, though he weren't near as tall as Mort Eggertsen.
"Cy, you saddle the paint," Eggertsen said to the little man. "I'll ride the bay, and Jess, you stay with the sorrel."
I didn't want those clodhoppers clomping around in my holding pen, upsetting Big Enough while they tried to catch Patches.
"I'll get the paint," I said.
I stood at the gate and whistled, and Patches came trotting over, followed by Big Enough. I bridled the paint and led her out of the pen.
"Nice filly," Eggertsen said. "Use that saddle, Cy. Let's get the mare ready to go."
The man called Cy scrambled to do what Eggertsen commanded.
While Cy saddled Patches, Eggertsen raided my stores. He took all the flour, the bacon, the beans, and the coffee. Then he loaded the sack of grain behind the cantle of his sorrel's saddle. "This'll keep us going for a while, Kimberly," he said. "Maybe we can get out of that posse's way. We'll move on around Escudilla and into New Mexico. And if we have to, we'll run for El Paso and Ciudad Juarez. Now, if you'd please turn around and put your hands behind your back..."
With all those guns pointing at me, there wasn't much else I could do. I turned around.
"Hate to do this. But we can't have you running for the posse and helping them find us." Eggertsen tied my hands behind my back with a piggin string and made me lie down. He rolled me onto my side and tied my ankles and looped them to my wrists. No way I could get up; just lay there like a calf trussed up for branding.
"Kimberly," he said.
I looked Bowie knives at him.
"We didn't take your black filly, and we never hurt you. Remember that, girl."
"The filly ain't broke to ride," I said.
He shrugged. "Let's go," he said to the other men. They took off over Sheep's Crossing and lit out like they were headed for Alpine, past Escudilla, and on to Alma in New Mexico. Those three men just rode away and left me tied up on the ground.