The Night His Cattle Got Out

The Long Middle

The first forty went fairly well. Dutch would bring a bunch along the ditch, I’d turn them at the gap, and they’d go through.

Sometimes a cow would balk at the wire on the ground and the whole bunch would stall.

When that happened, I’d stand still and wait. My grandpa used to say the cow will usually do the right thing if you give her a minute to think about it. Most of the time he was right.

Around forty, my gloves froze stiff. They were leather work gloves, the kind I wear in the shop, and once they got soaked through, the sleet glazed them over until I could hardly bend my fingers.

I took them off and put them on the dash vent for a minute.

I put my bare hands under my armpits. Then I put the gloves back on, half thawed, and went back out.

Some of the cows went in one at a time. Those were the hardest.

A single cow, alone and scared and still bawling for her calf, does not want to go anywhere except back to the last place she smelled it.

There was one young cow, maybe a three-year-old, who went past the gap four times.

Every time Dutch turned her, she’d duck back. On the fifth try I just stood beside the gap and talked to her.

I don’t know what I said. Something like, “Go on, mama. He’s sold. He’s fine. Go on home.”

She stood there blowing steam at me for a whole minute. Then she walked through like she’d meant to all along.

At fifty-eight, the wind shifted a little to the northwest and the sleet came straight across the highway. The deputy’s flashlight beam looked like it was full of white bees.

I counted fifty-eight and went looking for more, and there weren’t any. Not near the gap. Not in the ditch. I walked a quarter mile each way with a flashlight. Nothing.

“I’m short five,” I told the deputy.

He looked sick. “You sure?”

“I’m sure. Ray runs sixty-three. He’ll count them in the morning. I’m not going to let him come home and come up five head short.”