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| The view of the roads, one early Chicago morning, December 2015 |
It feels good to get back to work after a long break. Also, I'm looking forward to getting back to writing and finishing my next book, Williamsburg Hill...it was coming along nicely until a little thing called "moving" happened.
January 2016 is an anniversary of sorts for me. Four years ago, I started this blog and thought it wouldn't last. But I'm still around and posting stuff. Thanks for reading my stories and musings. I hope you enjoy Cowboy Ridge and Honor and, as always, copyright applies (©Veronica Randolph Batterson)
Cowboy Ridge and Honor
By Veronica Randolph
Batterson
(©Veronica Randolph Batterson)
His horse pawed
the earth, scraping away snow and foraging for grass to eat. Spring thaws were starting and bits of
green, suddenly awake after a long winter’s sleep, sprouted through the slush. Soon the ground would be a muddy mess and
he’d be digging muck out of hooves, boots and from more things than he cared to
consider.
“Not much to eat
here, old boy,” he said, patting the neck of the gelding that had been his
companion for over a decade. The
horse looked up at the sound of his voice, its ears swiveling.
It wasn’t far now.
The old schoolhouse was just around the bend; he imagined smoke billowing from its
chimney, and the bell ringing through the hollow signaling the start of a
school day in what was now an abandoned structure. He guessed Honor had remembered it that way, too, as it had
been the man’s history.
It had taken him
nearly a week to complete this final trip with his friend. “Six days, thirteen hours and roughly
twenty minutes,” he muttered, glancing at the pocket watch Honor had given him. It was almost over. Soon he would be home in the arms of
his wife and sitting by a warm fire.
He’d been rough
around the edges all those years ago when he first met Honor; he had plucked
himself straight from the Chicago streets and landed in a hellish Montana
winter without knowing a soul or understanding why he’d done it. Smiling, he recalled his attempts at
fitting in. His new, brand-named
outerwear didn’t fool anyone, nor did the shiny, leather cowboy boots that were
in dire need of breaking in. His
feet had hurt so badly. He
recalled his first meeting with the man who would become his mentor.
“You ain’t from
these parts, are you?” came the raspy drawl. The man was leaning against the checkout counter of the only
grocery store within a fifty-mile radius.
“So it’s that
obvious,” he had replied.
“Well, I know most
folks from around here, and I don’t know you. So the odds of you being a stranger are pretty good,” the
man smiled, lines deepening around his eyes and the tips of his full mustache
lifting with his grin.
“And I thought the
way I was dressed was the giveaway,” he’d said.
“To some it would
be. To me, it looks like you’re
trying too hard,” came the reply.
“Trying too hard
at what?”
“Only you know
that answer. Maybe to blend in,
maybe to get a fresh start at something new. Nothing’s wrong with either one.”
“Guess I’d like to
do both.”
“Well, let me give
you a bit of advice. You really
going to eat that?” the man had nodded toward the food he held in his hand.
“Why else would I
be buying it?”
“Maybe to kill a
stray cat. Look, old Sally runs a
good store here, and she can generally cook a decent meal, but I wouldn’t say
sushi is her specialty. That ain’t
exactly something that flies off the shelves. Some might get a good laugh out of the city slicker who got
sick off of old Sally’s concoctions.”
He’d looked down
at the wrapped package and thought it appeared less appetizing than
before. A wave of homesickness
washed over him at that moment and he wondered what had made him think he could
ever make it out west. Setting the
food back on the shelf, he turned to the stranger.
“Thanks,” he’d
said.
“My pleasure. Name’s Honor, by the way,” the man had
replied, extending his hand.
He remembered shaking
Honor’s hand and thought how that one gesture could sum up a person as a human
being. Honor’s handshake was an
indication of just who the man was.
Genuine, strong, dependable and devoted. He’d known his friend for many years and Honor never swayed
from being anything other than decent and good. The name had defined him.
“How’d you end up
with the name Honor anyway?” he recalled asking the man once.
“Left on the
doorstep as a babe with the word pinned to my blanket. I was raised by some good folks who
simply used the name out of respect for whoever left me,” Honor had replied.
“You never wanted
to find out who that was? Where
you came from?”
“Why? I am who I am.”
And that was
Honor. From the old buckskin coat
with the torn fringe, to the weathered cowboy hat he wore, you knew what you
were getting. And when his old
friend, who never asked for any favors, drew his last breath, he knew what was
needed. To honor a request that
had come from the heart.
“The woman I loved
told me that I was as mule-headed of a man she ever met, but she loved me in
spite of it,” Honor revealed once, and had laughed at the memory.
“Didn’t know you
were ever married.”
“Didn’t say I
was. She and I never made it legal,
but we lived together as man and wife up near a place we called Cowboy Ridge.”
“That far from
here?”
“Pretty far. You can only make it by horse. Hard as heck building that little
cabin, but we did it. Just the two
of us.”
“Where is she now?”
“She’s buried up
there. Should’ve made it
legal.” Honor had hung his head at
the regret.
His mind came back to the present as he
and the horse crossed into the valley.
There stood the remote and dilapidated schoolhouse that Honor had
attended, standing stubbornly against time and the elements. It had survived all who had crossed its
threshold and served as one final visual of his friend. He would probably never pass this way
again.
“Promise me
something,” Honor’s voice gasped, as he had struggled to form the words at the
end.
“Anything.”
“Spread my ashes
at Cowboy Ridge. I need to rest
with her.”
He carried out his
friend’s wishes in a manner he thought best. Two days to make Cowboy Ridge, a couple more tending to the
property and cabin, two additional days to get back. The ashes were scattered without fuss near the gravesite of
the woman Honor had loved, as rushing water from a nearby stream provided the
only sound. He was certain Honor
would have been pleased.
“Time to go home
now,” he said to the horse, as he gently nudged the animal onward. “Bet there’ll be some nice mash
waiting. Beats mud and weeds,
don’t you think?” The horse
nickered in response, nodding its head as if understanding.
The schoolhouse behind them, he didn’t
look back. He’d done the right
thing by Honor, who never regretted anything other than not marrying the woman
he had loved. A sense of urgency filled
him, as if time were limited. Soon
his cabin appeared in sight, the warm glow of lights through the windows
illuminating the twilight and warming his soul. His wife was waiting for him.
©Veronica Randolph Batterson
