By then Monte was out of excuses so he untied the horse he’d brought that was tied to the willows so he could still eat some grass. He didn’t mount him though and just lead the horse through the south gate.
Monte thought that might not panic the Palomino.But he was wrong. As soon as he saw them the Palomino started trotting along the fence line again throwing its head and tail.
Monte mounted up and started to shake out his rope. Which wasn’t really accurate. Monte did not carry a rope like everyone else made out of nylon or hemp. Monte was definitely the last man on the mountain and maybe the last one in the state to still carry a “riata.” Which is a rope made out of braided rawhide.
Monte’s riata was what they call a“long rope” in the South West meaning it was about 75 feet long. The Spanish had come up with them in the southwest in the 1500’s to rope wild cows in the brush country with lots of wind.
Monte swore by his riata. It was just as strong as a nylon rope but heavier so it worked better in the wind and could be thrown further.And Monte could throw it all. There was speculation the real reason Monte carried a riata was because he longed for the cowboy days of 100 years before. But Monte stuck to his reasons or maybe excuses as the case may be.
But in the meantime the Palomino had seen Monte getting his riata down and knew it was a rope. And picked up his panic pace in the small closed in space. Which needs some description.
It was only about two acres at most. But odd shaped not a square, rectangle, or even triangle. It had good fences on all sides but they ran to a corner on the north side. Then the fence kind cut back to the south west to the road and gate and down to the next corner. Then south east a little down to the south corner and back across the road and a little ways past it to the north corner. Which meant it didn’t really have any corners at all. As in corners that were at a 90 degree angle that might have worked to comer the Palomino.
But the fence was not the real challenge.The lay of the land was. Bridger Creek which was only between four and six feet wide and mot much more than a food deep ran almost down the middle of the encloser pretty much in a long meandering “S” curve. To the east there was maybe about 40 feet of fairly flat ground before it went up a steep creek bank about 20 feet high with the fence just a few feet off the top of the bank. There was even less flat ground on the west side of the creek before it ran up another bank to the north making kind of a bowl. The road ran to the north and south to cross the creek and had steep banks on each side of it. And there was a tiny patch of flat round on the south west side before it ran into big willow bushes. The south east fence then ran back across the rode up another steep bank.
Monte looked around 360 degrees and thought if he was going to find a place to front foot a horse or even work one he could not have picked a worse one.
But the die was set. So Monte pulled his peaked cowboy hat down hard, gritted his teeth put his riata and reins in his left hand and his loop in his right hand, turned his horse towards the Palomino and the running battle was on.
And on and on and on. Monte chased the Palomino all over every inch of the odd sapped enclosure at mostly a full run. There were very few places he could even throw loop. Then when he could he either missed or the chain tangled his loop to keep from getting around the Palomino’s front feet.
Both Monte and his horse were in a lather when he ran the Palomino up the steep creek bank again. But with the fence right there the Palomino had to pivot and try to jump over the top of Monte and his horse. And almost made it. But wrecked instead and all of them went sliding back down the bank in a kicking pile.
Monte spit dirt a bit and decided that was definitely enough excitement for one day. He checked his horse to make sure it wasn’t hurt. But didn’t need to check the Palomino. He was the first one up and running again just fine.
Monte didn’t even bother to mount his poor exhausted horse again and just led him the little more than 100 yards back to his truck and horse trailer in total defeat.
And while it can sometimes be a problem to get a horse to go in a horse trailer that horse just rushed into the trailer like it was the most welcome place he’d ever seen. They were both just worn out.
Driving down the creek Monte admitted o himself it was a bad plan to begin with. But hell, even bad plans worked out for him sometimes because he was nothing if not resourceful. But this one had turned out to be an impossible plan.
