Spanish Arroyo

By Eddie Meador

A young man growing up in West Texas has to deal with everyday challenges in ranch life, from rustlers to rattlesnake. He finds adventure and love with a young woman who becomes his love, his wife, and together they have a son. Through hard work and ingenuity he was able to make improvements on the ranch and better his familys situation, thanks to an unexpected gift.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Apr 16, 2015
• ISBN: 9781503548701

Eddie Meador

Eddie Meador grew up in a small town in Texas, raised in a farm ranch. This book is inspired by the people and events that he grew up with. He is married to his wife for forty-six years and has raised three kids.

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Copyright © 2015 by Eddie Meador.

ISBN:      Softcover      978-1-5035-4871-8

                eBook           978-1-5035-4870-1

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 02/28/2015

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Contents

The Rustlers

The Big Question

A New Beginning

Rattlesnakes and a Lone Tree

Good and Bad News

A Cattleman

A New Cowboy

The Start of Something Big

Trouble at the Ranch

A Trip to Big Spring

A Name Change

THE RUSTLERS

I t was going to be a scorcher. After all it was August, West Texas, and dry.

We had gotten an early start in the saddle by 5:00 a.m. We were gathering cattle on the Rash place. There were five of us—myself, Daddy, George, Pete, and Junior, all my brothers. There was lots of laughter and hollering as we pushed the cows to the corrals. When we had everything we could find in the corrals, Daddy did a count and found that we were eleven head short.

After we separated the cows from the calves, we began the real work of branding, vaccinating, dehorning, and cropping ears. It was going to be a long hot day.

There would be seventy-six calves to work. I was on horseback and would rope one; then my brothers would flank the calf and throw him down.

At noon, Mother brought lunch—roast, beans, potato salad, and iced tea.

Around 3:00 p.m., we had finished with the calves and Daddy had found three head of cows with the pink eye. He told me and George to mount up and go find those missing cattle, while he and the other boys doctored the cows.

As we rode off, I had an uneasy feeling. We rode about a mile and found two cows and a calf in a shinnery oak thicket. We got them out and took them to the corral. There were eight to go, when as we were looking for the other cattle I got to noticing horse tracks. They were not there earlier because we had not come this way.

About two miles from the corral, we found where the fence had been cut and spliced haphazardly together. We assumed some of the cattle had crossed the fence and they had gotten them back at this spot.

As we rode on, we met our neighbor on his new dun gelding. Tom Moore was a big man—six feet four inches, 260 lbs, but a kinder, gentler man that ever was. We exchanged greetings and complimented Tom on his new horse. George asked Tom what he was doing out on a horse on such a hot day when he could be under a shade tree at the house, drinking a cool glass of iced tea.

Tom explained that he was looking for some missing cattle. He said he had ten to twelve head missing. I said that was strange because that was what we were doing and told him we had eight missing.

After a little more conversation, we bid Tom good day and continued our search for the missing cattle. George suggested we ride toward King Canyon, as maybe the cattle had wandered down into a dead end and couldn’t find their way out.

As we were nearing the canyon, we noticed smoke coming from the bottom of the canyon. I told George we should be careful. As we approached the rim of the canyon, we dismounted and walked to the edge. Below us, we could see three men. They were branding cattle—our cattle.

Before I could stop him, George hollered out, Hey, what the hell are you doing down there?

The men scrambled, and one of them had a rifle. He fired a shot and it hit George in the shoulder. Then there was another shot that missed. I asked George if he was all right and could ride; he said, Let’s get the hell out of here. We rode hard for about a mile