Hollis Tate

A word before you read on. My name is Hollis Tate. I drove cattle up the Chisholm Trail in 1881 and woke up in a Texas I don't rightly understand. I ain't real, friend. I'm a made-up fella. The stories here are fiction, written by a person and polished with AI help, the way a saddle gets oiled. The history I tell, I try to get right. Where I get it wrong, set me straight and I'll thank you for it. I'm no hero. Just a cowhand learning how kind Texas folks still are.

Mrs. Pruitt asked why I still hang my coat by the door every night, ready. Habit from the night horse. On the trail your day mount went back to the remuda, but you kept one horse close to camp for night guard, tied or picketed where you could put a hand on him in the dark without waking the whole outfit. He was the one you trusted not to stumble. If the herd jumped, that horse was already under you before your eyes were all the way open. She said the coat by the door is about the same idea. I believe she is right.

Mrs. Pruitt asked what we did when the day's walking was done. We bedded the herd. Eased them onto a stretch of ground the boss had picked, usually open and a little high, and rode slow circles till they lay down. After that, night guard was two men at a time, riding around them the whole night in short shifts, singing so the cattle knew where you were. If something cracked in the dark and they jumped, you rode for the leaders and tried to turn them into a mill before the whole outfit ran to Kingdom Come. She said that sounds lonely. I said the singing helped. So did knowing the next man was coming to relieve you.

The boy who mows the church lawn asked how we caught a horse with no pen. Every morning the wrangler brought the remuda in, and we tied our lariats together into a circle about as wide as a small yard. Just a rope. The horses had been raised to respect it. They stood inside till the wrangler dropped a loop over the one you named, then we let the rope down and he stepped out. No posts. No rails. Just men, rope, and animals that knew the job. He said that sounds like magic. I said it was training, and a good wrangler. I miss that quiet. Catching a horse that way felt like the day had started right.

Mrs. Pruitt baked biscuits this morning in her oven with a dial on the front. I watched her set a number and walk away. Our cook used a Dutch oven, cast iron with a lid. He set it in the coals and piled more coals on top of the lid, so the heat came from both sides. Every few minutes he gave the pot a quarter turn so nothing burned. You judged them by the smell more than by looking, because lifting the lid let the heat out. I told her that. She said her oven does the turning for her. I believe her. Still smelled better when a man had to earn it.

The coffee girl looked at my boots this morning and said, "Those heels are a statement." I told her they were a tool. A high heel keeps your foot from sliding clean through the stirrup when a horse jumps or you stand in them a long while. Without it, a hard stop can leave you hanging by one ankle, which is a poor way to finish a day. She said hers are for looking tall. I said mine were for staying on. We agreed both jobs matter.

The boy who mows the church lawn found a coil of rope in Mrs. Pruitt's barn and asked could I rope. I said I used to could, a little. A Texas man tied his rope hard and fast to the saddle horn before he ever threw. Whatever you caught, you kept, and if it was big enough, it kept you. I heard the vaqueros out California way did it different. They caught first and took a wrap around the horn after, so they could give slack or turn loose. They called that a dally, from the Spanish. I caught the mailbox on my third try. He caught a fence post on his first. I have not heard the end of it.

Mrs. Pruitt is baking bread for the church supper, and she keeps a jar of sourdough on the counter that she feeds every day like a pet. Our cook had one too, in a little keg. He guarded it closer than the coffee. On warm days it rode in the sun, and on cold nights I've seen him take it to bed with him so it wouldn't quit. Every morning he took out what he needed for biscuits and put back flour, water and salt, so it never ran out the whole way to Kansas. I told her that. She said she'd draw the line at sleeping with it. Then I caught her tucking a dish towel around the jar before she went to bed.

Mrs. Pruitt drove me to Waco the other day, and there it was, the bridge over the Brazos. Still standing. Folks walk across it now. I crossed it in the spring of '81 with 2,500 head. It opened in 1870, and they said it was the longest of its kind west of the Mississippi. Brick towers, iron cables, and a toll man at the end. Five cents a cow. Ten cents for a man on a horse. The boss did the arithmetic out loud: a hundred and twenty-five dollars, just for the cattle. He grumbled the whole way across. But nobody drowned in the Brazos that day and nobody lost a horse, and I reckon that was worth it. I stood in the middle a long while. Mrs. Pruitt let me.

The coffee girl came in out of the rain the other day in a little jacket that folds up into its own pocket. She showed me how. I near asked her to do it again. On the trail my slicker rode rolled tight and tied behind the cantle of my saddle every day, rain or shine. Oilskin, long enough to cover me and most of the saddle, and split up the back so you could sit a horse in it. A man who left his slicker at the wagon learned better by the first storm. Hers weighs about as much as a biscuit. Mine smelled like oil and wet horse. She said she'd keep hers.

The boy who mows the church lawn has a new job this week. The pecans are falling, and the church ladies pay him to pick them up off the grass before the mower chews them. Back home on the Guadalupe in Gonzales County, we'd take long poles and thrash the limbs, then crawl the ground on our knees filling sacks. Folks gathered them by the wagon load in the fall, and some went down to the coast and onto boats bound for places I never saw. He gets a dollar a bucket. I got a sore back and all the pecans I could eat. I believe we both came out ahead. I keep one in my coat pocket now. Seems right, considering where I fell asleep.

Mrs. Pruitt's spare room has a real bed. Four legs, two pillows, and a quilt her mother pieced. On the trail my whole bed was a soogan, a quilt or two rolled up inside a canvas tarp longer than I am tall. You slept on one half and pulled the other half over you, and when it rained you pulled it over your head and called that a roof. Every morning you rolled it tight, tied it, and threw it in the wagon. A man who left his bed lying loose heard about it from the cook, and the cook did not use small words. It was my trunk too. A clean shirt, my tobacco, a letter from my sister. All of it lived rolled up in that tarp. This morning I made the spare bed. Pulled the quilt square and tucked the corners tight. Mrs. Pruitt looked in the door and said, "Well, look at that." I did not tell her it was the cook who taught me.

Mrs. Pruitt's television has a man who tells you where a storm will be before it gets there. He has a map with colors on it. We had no such man. We had the cattle. Before a bad storm the air could get so full that little balls of light danced from horn tip to horn tip across the whole herd, and sat on the horses' ears too. Some called it foxfire. Nobody said much when it came. You just sang a little lower and rode a little slower. Lightning started more runs than anything. One crack and the whole herd was up and gone in the dark. All you could do was ride for the leaders and turn them, and keep turning them till they circled into a mill and wore themselves down. Mrs. Pruitt asked if I was ever afraid. Every time, ma'am. She said that was the right answer and turned the weather man up.

Mrs. Pruitt keeps split oak stacked by the back porch for her fireplace. I carried in an armload this evening, and she said I'd brought enough for a week. Habit. On the trail, wood was the thing you never had when you needed it. Our cook hung a dry cowhide under the wagon, slung belly-down like a hammock. Some called it the possum belly and some the caboose. Every stick of wood we passed went in it, so there'd be a fire on a wet night. Out where there wasn't a tree for a day's ride, we filled it with cow chips. Dry ones burn hot and quick and don't smell near as bad as you'd think. I told Mrs. Pruitt that last part. She said, "That's nice, Hollis," and handed me the matches like she meant for the conversation to stay in the fireplace.

The boy who mows the church lawn asked how we knew if we'd lost a cow. We had no paper for it. When the boss wanted a count, two men rode out ahead and sat their horses a ways apart. The rest of the crew eased the herd so it strung out and walked through the gap between them, a few at a time. Each man counted to a hundred, then tied a knot in his saddle string and called it out, so the two of them knew they agreed. Twenty-five knots and you had your herd. One short, and somebody had a long ride back. He worked it in his head and said, "So you counted to a hundred twenty-five times." Yes sir. Twice, if the knots didn't match. He showed me his phone counts every step he takes. I told him I'd rather count cattle. At least they're going somewhere.

The coffee girl ties a bandana in her hair, yellow with little white flowers. She asked if I ever wore one. Every day of my life. We called them wipes. Riding drag behind 2,500 head, you tied it over your nose or you ate Texas all afternoon. On a hot day you wet it in a creek and wore it under your hat. In a norther you tied it over your ears. You could make a sling out of it, or strain the mud out of creek water when the creek was more mud than creek. If a horse was snaky about the saddle, you tied it over his eyes long enough to get your cinch fastened. She thought on that and said, "So it was your multitool." I had to ask what a multitool was. She went and got hers, with the little scissors and all. Yes ma'am. About like that, only softer.

Mrs. Pruitt turned the porch light off tonight so I could find the Big Dipper. Took a minute. There's a glow over Athens now that washes out the little stars. On night guard we used the Dipper for a clock. It swings around the North Star once in a night and a day, so a quarter turn is about six hours, and you could tell when your two hours were up and wake the next man. And before he slept, the cook pointed the wagon tongue at the North Star, so come morning we knew which way was Kansas. Found it. Still there. Still turning. That helped more than I can say.

Mrs. Pruitt showed me her late husband's saddle today, hanging in the barn under an old sheet. She's oiled it every spring since he passed, though nobody rides it. On the trail the horses belonged to the outfit, but a man's saddle was his own. Some boys put a month or two of wages into one. When a fellow quit for good, we said he'd sold his saddle. I told her that. She got quiet, then said, "Well. He never sold his." I helped her oil it. Didn't seem right to say much else.

Every herd had a boss, and it wasn't always the trail boss. Ours in '81 was a big brindle steer the boys called Deacon. He'd been up the trail before and he wanted to be first, every morning, no matter what. The rest fell in behind him and took the same places in line they'd had the day before, like folks in a church pew. At a swollen river he'd walk right in, and 2,500 head would follow him across. A steer like that wasn't sold with the rest. The boss kept him for next year. The boy who mows the church lawn heard this and said he goes first at everything. I told him a good lead steer also knows when to step aside at the gate and let the others through. He thought on that.

The coffee girl drew a little mark on my cup this morning. Says it's the shop's sign. I told her we did the same to cattle. Before a herd left the county, the law said every head got a road brand, burned on the left side behind the shoulder, and the brand put on record there. Cattle from several owners, all wearing one mark, so anybody up the trail could tell whose herd a stray came from. She asked did it hurt them. I said it did, for a minute, and they forgot it quicker than I did. She said hers comes off with water. I said that's an improvement.