A TRUE Hart

By J. David Jaax

Meet the Jude Harts; a family of nine, born and begun during the lulls before and betwixt the Great Depression, the two Great Wars, and beyond. A simple family saga following one northern Oklahoma family through good times and hard times, with descriptive incidents of what it took to just survive in the good 'ol days. Humorous twist at the end.

• Language: English
• Publisher: J. David Jaax
• Release date: Aug 23, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310184307

Book preview

A TRUE Hart

by J. David Jaax

A True Heart

by J. David Jaax

Copyright 2015

Smashwords Edition

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Chapter 1

Twenty-year old Jude Hart rode the piebald gelding through the uprights and into the ranch yard of the Reddick place, seemingly in no hurry. Just a slow walk up to the bunkhouse that set this place apart from most of the other ranches along the Cimarron River in Northwestern Oklahoma. Most places around here you slept in the barn unless you were kin. Sitting along the porch that ran the length of the simple windowless structure were, as you’d expect, cowboys. Six of them. Doing what cowboys do at the end of the day on a working ranch. Sitting, spitting, and telling lies. It was the Fall of 1937.

The unexpected arrival of a stranger had not gone unnoticed. A yard-dog, one old enough to shirk the duties of coyote-control along the river-bottom, signaled the approach with the low, booming 'Wroof, Wroof' passed down from his sire. Fifteen years earlier a huge purebred Great Pyrenees had been brought in from the East for a single purpose. That of fathering coyote killers.

Though a half-breed, this aging animal was also huge. Standing close to two-and-a-half feet at the front shoulders and still weighing right around one hundred and twenty pounds, his most noticeable attribute was his head. "Massive" was the word that came to mind. Massive and mangy like the rest of his slowly emaciating body now sustained on a diet of table scraps and horse shit. Dogs weren’t very high on the list around these parts. At least, not old dogs.

True to his self-appointed position as keeper of the ranch-yard, the beast came from under the porch where he now spent most of his time and, hearing 'Sic ‘um Dog', moved in on the intruders. Hackles up and head down, he emitted a low guttural sound that quickly got the undivided attention of both horse and rider. The dog then began a slow sidewinder’s stalk around to his right. That same skillful track had resulted in the elimination of well over four hundred coyotes during his eight year tenure as a kill-dog out in the brush.

The gelding side stepped to his right. The rider moved as one with his horse, shifting in the saddle just enough to cock the 45-70 Winchester rifle cradled, unnoticed ‘till now, across his saddle horn.

Jude hadn’t really meant to hit the old dog. Just wanted to back it off some. Shooting across the saddle like that didn’t allow for much accuracy.

The piebald gelding remained rock-solid as the saddle-gun’s roar split the crisp stillness of the September dusk. It backed the dog off, all right. Way off. Had the bullet not hit solid bone, the muzzle velocity and the short distance to the target would have left a fairly clean hole clear through the animal’s body without much carnage. But, whether due to the slight movement of the rider in the saddle or the 'click--click' of the rifle hammer being cocked, something made the skulking dog raise its head at the last second. The slug slammed into the wide forehead of the beast, dead center, with such impact that both bullet and skull fragmented and shattered. Exiting out the right side of the animal, lead and bone fragments acted like a load of double-aught (00) buck shot, instantly expanding outward in a pattern that near’ blew both right shoulder and front leg clean-off. The old dog was dead before it skidded to a stop just short of a clump of buffalo grass and sand-burrs five feet away.

All six cowboys sprang to their feet. The door to the bunk house was kicked opened, and out rushed the ranch foreman.

John Doonan was a tough, grizzled cowboy who made foreman, and remained as foreman, by being tough and grizzled. He was carrying a 'Greener'; a short, double-barreled, twelve-gauge shotgun that he kept handy just inside the door of the bunkhouse. Before he could finish with his, 'what the hell...', Jude Hart, in one motion, jacked another shell into