The Case of the Most Ancient Bone. John R. Erickson

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      Perhaps you’re asking yourself, “If it was an unidentified pickup, why didn’t the dogs bark at it?” Great question. As you know, barking at strangers is an important part of our job on this outfit, and very seldom do we miss an opportunity to do it.

      This time, we did. Why? Too hot. But it would have been a waste of time anyway, because it turned out that it wasn’t an unidentified pickup after all. The pickup belonged to our ranch. Slim and Loper had come back to the machine shed for some supplies or equipment.

      When they stepped out of the pickup, my keen eyes picked up an important clue: Loper was having a bad day. He looked mad and disgusted.

      The moment his boots touched the ground, he growled, “The stinking windmill pumped all winter and never missed a stroke. When we didn’t need the water, it gave us water, water, and more water. Now it’s hot and what does it do? It quits pumping and we’ve got fifty cows, standing on their heads at the tank, trying to get a drink!”

      Slim nodded and shifted his toothpick to the left side of his mouth. “It don’t seem fair, does it?”

      “No! It makes me so mad . . .”

      Slim waited to hear the rest of the sentence. When it didn’t come, he said, “But you know what? I think a hurricane might be worse.”

      Loper turned halfway around and stared at him for a long moment. “What?”

      “If we ranched down on the Gulf coast, we’d have hurricanes and then we’d have to worry about floods. Your cows might be swimming around and hung up in the tops of trees. You wouldn’t like that either.”

      Loper turned his gaze to the ground and shook his head. “Slim, that is the dumbest thing you’ve said in two weeks.”

      “No, it ain’t. All I’m saying is that a man shouldn’t complain about his problems, ’cause there might be worse problems in this old world.”

      “Slim, this is my ranch and if I want to complain about a busted windmill in the middle of a heatwave, I’ll complain about it.”

      “I know you will, ’cause that’s all you’ve been doing for the past thirty minutes.”

      “The Constitution of the United States of America gives me the right to complain about ignorant windmills.”­

      “Loper, every now and then, a man ought to stop whining and count his blessings.”

      Loper gave him a ferocious glare. “Whining, huh? All right, buddy, I’ll count my blessings: one, two, three. There, are you happy?”

      “No, you didn’t say what they are.”

      Loper began slashing a finger through the air. “Blessing Number One is that you’re not twins. Blessing Number Two is that at the end of a long hot day, I don’t have to eat your bachelor cooking. Blessing Number Three is that I’ve got a radio in that pickup, so when you start yapping about blessings, I can turn up the volume. There!”

      “Loper, you’re worse than a mule. You didn’t say a word about being grateful that we don’t have floods and earthquakes and bluebonnet plague.”

      “Yeah? Well, I’m not. I’m mad at the windmill and I plan to stay mad until we get it fixed . . . speaking of which, do you suppose you could start gathering up our windmill tools?”

      Slim shifted his toothpick over to the other side of his mouth. “Well, I probably could, but I still say . . .”

      “Good!” Loper whirled around and headed for the machine shed. “We’ll need the block and tackle, a box of windmill leathers, a chain, wrenches, a socket set . . .” He vanished inside the barn, and his voice became a faint rumble.

      Slim heaved a sigh and looked down at me. “His momma enrolled him in charm school, but he flunked out. Pooch, you want to go in my place and help Uncle Scrooge fix the windmill?”

      Uh . . . no thanks. I had attended a couple of windmill-fixing episodes and that was plenty.

      With great effort, Slim pointed his bony frame toward the barn and began walking. At the entrance, he glanced back at me and winked. “Watch this.” He turned toward the barn door and yelled out, “Loper, I just have a feeling this is going to be a wonderful day.” He flinched, waiting for the thunder and lightning.

      It came. Inside the barn, Loper’s voice boomed, “Slim, when you get fired from this job, which could happen any day now, you can go into preaching full-time. Until then, please dry up and try to make yourself useful!”

      Slim chuckled and shuffled into the barn, and for the next ten minutes, the air was filled with the sounds of clanging and banging as the men gathered up their tools. They made three trips from the barn to the pickup, lugging ropes and cables and heavy boxes of windmill parts.

      Slim was still trying to make conversation. “Loper, do you know how many cowboys it takes to screw in a lightbulb?”

      “No.”

      “You’ll love this. It takes four—one to hold the lightbulb and three to turn the house. Heh.”

      Loper dumped his load onto the pickup’s flatbed, jerked a red bandana out of his hip pocket, and . . . this was pretty amazing . . . stuffed the two ends of the rag into his ears. He gave Slim a fanged smile and went back into the barn for another load.

      Slim dumped his tools onto the flatbed and shrugged. “I always liked that joke. It’s the only one I could ever remember.”

      Moving at his usual pace (slow motion), Slim went sludging back into the barn. At that very moment, who should come walking up but Little Alfred, my most favorite pal in the whole world. On a normal day, I would have leaped to my feet and given him a few licks on the face, but today . . . I, uh, whapped my tail on the ground and called it good.

      “Hi, Hankie. It’s kind of hot, isn’t it?”

      Right. Very hot.

      Slim and Loper came blundering out of the barn again, loaded down with gear. Alfred said, “Hi, Dad.” Loper didn’t hear, so the boy tried again, in a louder voice. “Hi, Dad!” Alfred looked closer at his dad. “He’s got a rag in his ears!”

      Slim said, “Don’t pay him any mind, Button. He’s on a crusade to make this the worst day since the volcano went off at Palm Play. I tried to cheer him up with one of my best jokes but it only confused him.”

      Alfred went to his dad and tugged on his pant leg. “Hey, Dad, you’ve got something in your СКАЧАТЬ