THE BIG HORN 3

for the next three das con rode day lite to dark.he checked all the dirt tanks and ponds he could remember. all but two were dry. at the dead horse well he found the wind mill pumping but the stream of water was small. it needed leathers. at the antelope well there was plenty of water in the storage tank. lots of cattle tracks and sighn. he at times would ride up on small bunches of cattle only to have them stampede away. but one thing he did find was there were more unbranded cattle than branded. lots of the young unbranded heifers were nurseing calves, there was plenty of cow work to be done and the income from those cattle would more than pay for the improvements. but the improvements had to come first, corrals and liveing quarters. a couple of truck loads of hay to hold the sale cattle on while the brands peeled. the cattle were framey and lean, mostly brahma crosses. but they seemed healthy. con hadnt found a lot of areas with much feed growing. the ranch was pretty much grubbed out. he did find a few carcasas of cattle that had died off, but not many. the cattle needed to be cut back on their numbers and soon. every night he would write down what he had seen dureing the day. then work on the cost of improvements. corrals were what he needed and in a couple locations.summer was comming on and you could easily kill cattle and horses in the heat. with good corrals and fenced waters he could trap cattle when they come to water. he would need a crew of four or five men and some equipment. the bill was adding up.he didnt know if these dudes were going for the deal. on the sixth day he was out of hay for his horses and had seen enough to know what needed doing. he didnt know what these folks had paid for the ranch but he thought it had better be a cheap price. he loaded up and pulled out for town. one thing he had found was a well used trail of foot traffic from the south, straight accros the narrowest part of the ranch. it hadnt been used much of late. he decided to keep that info to him self for now. but the thought of all thos slick cattle there made his mouth water. he hadnt seen that many on one outfit ever. his best guess was 700 head. there were some of the branded cattle still there in that count. but the calf crop from 3 years of neglect was running the numbers up. he had to get his salesman britches on when he met up with george and fawn. he fingered the business card from george as drove back to casa grande.

THE BIG HORN 2

two days later cons faded gray dodge pick up pulling a goose neck stock trailer pulled off the hiway into the yard at the bender, the old headquarters of the big horn. for years it had been a truck stop and cattle rest to suppliment the ranch income. the old house was close to the hiway and was just a crumbling shell of warped lumber. con looked at it with memorys running through his mind. on back of the house was a large set of corrals that were falling down. but the water trough was full. the old concrete storage tank had a good ly amount of water." well thats something"con said as he climbed back down the old steel ladder. in the corrals was a few cow tracks around the water trough. "at lest theres a few cattle here some place" con mumbled as he unloaded his horses.he started setting up camp. it was going to be a long week. the big horn was a hundred sections of some of some of the nastyest desert in arizona. it had 4 wells, and a dozen dirt tanks to catch and hold rain fall.. each well had a set of corrals. con was sure that each and all would need rebuilding. he hadnt been in here in years.the land was covered with aheavy growth od cactus and palo verdie, the draws had mesquite and iron wood. how marion and gerty had come by the ranch he had no idea. he had been abandoned at the gas pumps when his birth parents had fueled up and driven off leaveing him there. marion and gerty had no children so he fit right in. in later years he had heard a story about some folks named bender who left oklahoma after they were accused of hijacking truckers and tourists. he never saw anything like that here as he grew up. but marion always seemed to have plenty of cash for what ever he needed or wanted. when con was 20 he had decided to try working for other ranchers. while he was gone the benders had sold out to the druggies and dropped from sight. con had roamed the state going to one ranch then another.but this was always considered home. starting tomorrow he would start prowling the ranch checking for cattle and looking at the water improvements.