Free to Drink the Wind

PROLOGUE

It had been a long trip. Home never looked so good. He had lost it a few miles back – went to sleep on the sandy trail leading to the ranch -- wandered off over the prairie.  It was a bumpy trek for the truck and trailer before finally he got back onto the road. Probably a good thing his arms and legs hurt so much from driving, or he never could have stayed awake at all after he left the interstate.

He angled the pickup and its trailer carelessly in front of the barn, and with a great sigh, shoved the gearshift into PARK and turned the key to kill the engine.  He sat for a few heartbeats, took a deep breath, then opened the door and jumped awkwardly from the cab.  He wished he hadn’t.  His bad knee was stiff, and it buckled from the jolt.  It took a while to get upright, but finally he stood -- a stringy, aging cowboy whose jeans almost slipped past his shirttail when he stretched his arms in the air to take away the ache from the road.

A rough, low whinny came then through the night from the fifth-wheel trailer that was attached to the bed of the pickup.  The man relieved his nagging bladder while leaning against the fender of the truck, then he limped his way to the back, opened the trailer door, and pulled the ramp in place.  Painfully, he climbed inside, detached the stallion’s halter from the front pin and backed the tired horse out of the trailer onto the gravel.  

They took two miserable turns around the yard, then he tied the animal to the back of the trailer, so he could check him over in the misty yellow glow of the yard light.   Wearily, he leaned his shoulder against the horse’s shoulder to shift the animal’s weight to the other side, then he squeezed the back of the leg he wanted to lift.  The stallion raised his foot, so the man could examine it. 

After he had seen to all four hooves, he was reassured that the Mexican farrier he had awakened from his siesta outside Trinidad in southern Colorado had done his job well; the shoes had been removed, and each hoof had been expertly trimmed and cleaned. Firmly he stroked the iridescent darkness of the great animal’s back, then he bent to run his hand over the horse’s hocks, knees and forearms. The slender legs were quivering slightly, but the horse seemed solid otherwise.  He couldn’t detect any swelling.  If there had been more time before they left, he would have re-wrapped the stallion’s elegant legs in fresh soft cotton under the elastic support bandages, but at the time, he was under pressure.  He felt he just couldn’t take the chance, because he was in a hurry and might do a poor job. The horse’s veins were so close to the surface, and a bad wrapping could cause circulation problems.

Thankfully, the old man took up the halter rope, and as he leaned his head on the smooth pillow of the big animal’s shoulder, he took a deep breath, relishing the rank, sweet smell of his coat.  Tenderly, he stroked the stallion’s muzzle as if to say, “I’m sorry.”  The man knew it wasn’t right, asking a horse to stand in a trailer for almost two days with only a few short walks for relief, but there hadn’t been any other way of getting him here.  He and the horse had been running from something so underhanded that the back of the man's neck kinked up and he wanted to kick something whenever he thought about it.

Holding tight to the halter, he drew the animal’s broad forehead down to his own for a few seconds, then led him over to the horse tank and tied him there so he could drink.  When the horse raised his head from the tank, John walked him over to the corral behind the horse barn.  He opened the gate, led the horse through, and closed it behind them.   He and the horse then hobbled to the far end of the split-rail enclosure where he opened the gate that led to the winter pasture. 

It was a good place for this horse – a mid-size ranch in what some smug city people would say was the middle of nowhere – 20,000 acres of rich native grasses dotted with stubborn clumps of prickly yuccas and a smattering of sage.  To those people his place would seem immense and boundless, but it was really just a decent size speck in the miles and miles of the rolling sand hills of what was once the vast ocean of Nebraska. The tired man smiled slightly as he worked his hands purposefully, slowly, up the lead rope to the halter, unbuckled it and freed the horse.  

“Git,” He said softly as he smacked the stallion’s rump.  “Lots a friends and some a your cousins waitin’ out there.” He pushed testily at the horse’s thigh when it didn’t move.  “Go on now, but jist don’t be too hard on the ladies.”  The horse stepped aside, paced a few yards, then stood motionless, sniffing the sharp night air.  A cold autumn half-moon silvered the grassy dunes beyond the corral, and in the east, the first gray light of the new day was creeping over the horizon.   The cowboy hooted and slapped his hat on the fence. “Git!” he repeated. Finally, warily, the tired horse retreated at a trot.  When the man could no longer make him out in the great shadows that hovered against the hills, he turned to go to the house – where he threw off his boots and collapsed onto his familiar, unmade bed.