clayton drove cadilacs

clayton was a cowman of legand. he smoked big havana cigars, wore the best clothes , talked loud no matter where he was and was a first rate cowman. he bought cattle for toveras feedlots, managed some of the biggest ranches in arizona and knew every cowboy, rancher, cattle feeder and truck driver  by their first names. always ready for a laugh, at your expense or his, it didnt matter. his wife delores, was one of the most beautiful women ive ever seen. when traveling the west buying cattle she drove, and clayton kept his books and talked on one of the first satalite phones i ever heard of.  he was a high roller of the first order.

     once when i was unloading trucks at nite  at the maricopa yard he called to tell me some instructions on a specific load of cattle, all at once he went to hollerin watch out , watch out oooooh look out!!!! when he settled down iasked what the deal was. he said delores was drivin and the california traffic had them surrounded like a bunch of piss ants!!

   after i left toveras i got married, traveled around worked ranches and other feedlots. one day i woke up with no job, a wife and 2 kids with one on the way. some how clayton got word and tracked me down. he had taken over the managment of a bankrupt feedyard for a bank, he needed help.  he already had my friend pete there. so i went to arlington.  clayton always had good horses , real good horses.  when i got moved in i found i had my own horse corrals stocked with extra good two and three year old colt ready to start.  i had plenty to do. and clayton checked on me daily, to see how his colts were doin and to make sure i wouldnt  pull the picket pin and move on. he didnt know it but i was stayin as long as he would let me.
   
   that summer the dust in that feed yard was horrible, the cattle were getting sick on it as well as the employees who lived there. clayton somewhere got a hold of a 8000 gallon euklid water pull, a big tank with a moter on it!! not many people knew how to run that thing but they broke in a young mexican boy who was settlin the dust as fast as he could. clayton had just bought a new cadilac, as pretty a car as you could ever hope to see. he picked it up in pheonix and drove straight to the yard, parked in front of the scale house and was talkin to pete and me when around the corner came the euk, that mexican kid slowed down then turned off the key in preparation to stoppin. one problem, you  turn  off the key EVERYTHING  ceases to work!!! no brakes, no steering , nothin!! the tires on that thing was 8 feet tall and they just kept rollin, right over the top of that new cadilac!! smashed to about 4 foot tall with black tire tread  down the middle from trunk to hood. we  looked at clayton, his cigar was dangling at about 6 o clock a fire in his eye was starting to ignite!! pete looked at me and simply said time to go, we went.  clayton drove a pickup for a week or so until his special order car came in.  the mexican kid disapeared, and all vehickles were to park accros  the yard in a safe place!!