Brave New Texas

By George Emerson Kinney

South Texas rancher Buck Stabler has had enough. The International Small Arms Treaty, which has been passed by the U.S. Congress and has in effect nullified the 2nd Amendment rights of all Americans, poses a direct threat to Stabler and his fellow Texans.
Homeland security tries to arrest Stabler at his ranch for violating the new anti-gun provisions, but instead Stabler kills the agents and escaoes to Mexico. Buck and his organization use this incident to escalate their plan for Texas to secede from the union and form a new nation.
But it doesn't come about without a price in blood .Enemies abound and ruthless drug cartels as well as loyal U.S. military contingents must be subdued in order for the new nation to become a reality. Throughout the action, however, Buck Stabler's newfound romance with the enchanting Mexican brothel proprietress, Mira Segura, develops into a strong and powerful love.
The new nation is founded upon radical new concepts in economics, religion and philosophy and enters the new age ready to provide a brave new world for its' citizens.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jul 23, 2013
• ISBN: 9781483669724

George Emerson Kinney

George Kinney spent his childhood hunting in South Texas with his father and his brothers,. He developed a deep love for South Texas, and became introduced to Mexican border town nightlife at an early age. The allure of Mexico and it’s rich cultural traditions became a major source of inspiration for the young author and he began writing short stories, songs, and poems to express his love of and interest in that enigmatic and mysterious land that begins just two hundred miles south of San Antonio. He received a liberal arts degree in 1979 from the University of Texas in Austin and graduated with honors in English. He has published two albums of original music and various articles for national publications. His professional career is diverse and he currently lives at The Land, his country home near Austin, with his wife, Nancy.

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Chapter 1

Wolves At The Door

A wolf is a shadow with teeth

H OMELAND SECURITY AGENT Ben Slusser sat shotgun in a black Lincoln Navigator as his partner, Dale Patterson, turned off Highway 59 just south of San Antonio, Texas, heading for Eagle Pass. They were on their way to serve a warrant on Buck Stabler, a Texas landowner who was allegedly in violation of a brand spanking new federal firearms possession law.

We’re about thirty minutes from the ranch, Ben. Anything you want to go over before we get there, Dale asked his partner.

Not really. It ought to go pretty smooth. This guy Stabler is apparently giving the department lots of grief and is head of a bunch of hicks who think Texas is tougher than the U.S. government. We gotta shut him down before he pulls some shit that might throw a wrench into the feds plan to confiscate all the guns these motherfuckers are supposed to have, Slusser replied casually.

He and Patterson had been partners for only a few months. They were part of a special team formed by Homeland Security to round up local dissidents in areas far from the agent’s home states. The strategy was designed to minimize the feeling of community that might prevent some federal agents from arresting their fellow citizens for crimes that, according to the U.S. constitution, were not crimes at all.

I don’t know, man. I read his profile and he doesn’t seem like much of a criminal. Seems like a stand-up guy, actually. He just doesn’t feel like giving up his guns, Patterson said, turning slightly toward his partner. Just when he looked back to the straight, deserted stretch of highway, a jacaranda sprinted across the road in front of the Navigator.

Wow, did you see that? What the fuck was that? Patterson blurted.

I don’t have a clue. South Texas is full of weird shit. It looked like a cheetah or an ocelot. Goddamn wetback wildcat, sneaking up to Texas looking for a free rabbit or something. I wouldn’t mind shooting something like that and making a vest or something out of his hide, Slusser said.

"But as for Buck Stabler, don’t cut him any slack. He’s now an official enemy of the federal government and our job is to bring him in or eliminate him. And as far as I’m concerned, spending taxpayer money on a trial is a waste of money. He’s gotta follow the law like everyone else. I hate these fucking Texans anyway. They go all over the country acting like their shit doesn’t stink. It’s time somebody put ’em in their place once and for all. And by the way, Stabler lives alone, so there won’t be any witnesses if things get out of hand. Unless, of course, he has one of his famous Mexican beauties there to help him through the night. In that case we’ll have a little fun before we take Stabler out.

When we get there, just follow my lead. We’re fixin’ to rock this guy’s world. I love my fuckin’ job, Slusser pronounced, and then remained silent for the next half hour, gazing into the dark south Texas desert and trying to see another whatever-it-was run across the road.

There was a menacing, persistent pounding at the front door of Buck Stabler’s remote south Texas ranch house. Stabler was angered by the intrusion, especially at this hour. It could only mean one of two things: his call earlier to Sheriff Bob Boswell had either been ignored or the agreement between the sheriff and Stabler had been overruled. Either way, this was not good and Buck Stabler sensed he was about to enter a phase of his life previously only imagined in his wildest and most paranoid dreams.

The call to Boswell earlier had been a last ditch effort to avoid the current confrontation, and Stabler trusted that his lifelong friendship with the sheriff would mount to something, after all. Something must have gone wrong. For now at least, he was on his own.

Earlier in the week, Boswell had notified his friend of a pending warrant to be served at his ranch house regarding a alleged violation of a new federal firearms regulation and control law that had barely passed the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, in spite of fevered opposition. The vote had been railroaded through both houses of congress late at night without proper notice. The vote reflected the will of the federal government to tighten the death-grip on civil liberties all over the country, especially in Texas.

Stabler and his fellow Texans knew that the real source of the conflict was the United Nations and the new International Small Arms Treaty the world organization had negotiated with the U.S. president and ramrodded through congress. The final ratification of the treaty went into effect only months ago. Most Americans still didn’t really understand the dire implications of the treaty, especially the fact that in effect it nullified the 2nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

But many staunch patriots throughout the country did understand what was happening and were launching stiff, determined opposition to the treaty. Most groups thus far had stopped short of armed resistance and conducted their battles in the courts, trying to overturn the treaty on legal grounds. But a few states did not believe that the treaty could be peacefully amended or repealed. Texas was the leader in such belief, and Buck Stabler was the leader of the Texan opposition.

Texas Governor Perry Boothe had opposed the gun control law adamantly, but in the end the great obsessive desire for public control of everything and a tragic subliminal fear-based commitment to complacency, sparked and maintained by well intentioned but naive liberals, had won out. The Texas Governor had immediately ordered the state’s attorney general to issue a legal suite against the federal government declaring the new law unconstitutional and therefore null and void.

Talk of secession was rekindled and burned like a wildfire across the state. Local and state law enforcement offices were being briefed to expect the worst, and most state troopers, sheriffs, and police were ready to defend Texas citizens against all comers. Those state and local agents who had chosen not to defend the state’s sovereignty had been gradually terminated over the last several of years.

The governor was currently in heated negotiations with the Texas National Guard commanding officers. The U.S. military, still the best in the world but consistently losing ground to the Chinese, had been spread so thin during the previous twenty years of war in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere, that it was rapidly becoming impotent in its mission to protect the homeland from enemies, foreign or domestic.

The attrition of competency was a direct result of the economic disasters of the last decade, which were caused for the most part by the oil peak realities and the devastating effects it had on the worldwide economy. Armies depend upon vast financial resources and those resources had dwindled to dangerous lows. The top 1% of the financial elite had managed to raid the national treasury and the banksters had siphoned off most of the country’s wealth and secured it in off-shore accounts and investments, protected from regulation or seizure.

The U.S. military runs on petroleum. The leaders in charge of transitioning to renewable energy sources for military equipment had sold out to oil interests and had waited too late to re-tool the energy industry for alternative fuels. Now, with the economy in the tank, the money to develop solar and other renewable energy sources just wasn’t there. Thus, the U.S. government was dangerously vulnerable to foreign attack and ripe for revolution within and among the states.

Texas, on the other hand, having been the leader in domestic oil production, had taken steps early on to prepare for the demise of the oil-based economy, and had created several well-armed and well-trained militias under the command of top-notch ex-military combat trainers, including a Delta Force retiree, Brigadier General Scotty Callahan.

Commander Callahan came from a long line of military combat leaders that dated back to the Revolutionary War with Britain and included family members who had fought at the Alamo and San Jacinto in the Texas war with Mexico that had originally established Texas as an independent nation. After Texas became a nation, and later a state, Callahans had been in vital leadership roles in the Texas Rangers and in the U.S. military for all subsequent wars.

Now, Scotty Callahan found himself training Texas patriots for a possible conflict with U.S. troops under the banner of liberty and in support, somewhat ironically, of the U.S. Constitution. Vast funding and several years of training had placed the militias in a high state of readiness. There were six state sanctioned militias plus an increasing number of county militias and many small, rural militias that served remote areas. In addition, the militias were formed so that the individual members could legally own and carry weapons, regardless of any current or future legislation by the U.S. Government.

It was becoming crystal clear: Texans just weren’t going to surrender their guns voluntarily. And Scotty Callahan had a powerful ace up his sleeve. He had developed his militias to operate on alternative energy, primarily solar and hydrogen technologies which had been developed by the Stabler and Sanchez enterprise, Luz del Sol. Thus, while the rest of the world struggled to maintain adequate military proficiency due to the devastating effects of the reduction in oil production, the Texas militias were thriving in an abundance of effective weapons, vehicles, and planes that ran on renewable energy.

What was Boswell thinking? Stabler wondered as he cautiously but confidently approached the increasingly obnoxious knocking and tightened his grip on the .40 Berretta automatic and flipped off the safety. Through the opaque glass side panels of the doorway, Stabler could see the black uniforms of two homeland security agents, the first of whom was about 6' 2" and weighed, Stabler estimated, about 220 pounds… all of it buffed out muscle. The second agent was a clone of the first and stood directly behind him, just slightly to his side.

The lead agent was shouting into the house, demanding immediate entrance as he continued to pound on the door. Both agents had drawn their weapons and held them pointing down at arms length behind their backs. Buck Stabler opened the the door few inches, to the end of the chain lock, and greeted the agents with his famous smile and flawless teeth: How can I help you, officers?

You can back up and get on your knees, motherfucker, unless you want this to get really nasty, really fast, agent Slusser replied with as much venom and hatred as he could muster.

Slusser loved this part of the game. It always worked. No matter how hypocritical or self righteous the perp, pure unadulterated hatred and brazen disregard for any form of dignity or respect always rendered the victim stunned and helpless, at least for a critical moment, giving the officer a brief but reliable advantage to do what needed to be done. Agent Slusser, as it turns out, was not one hundred percent correct in his assessment of the validity of this technique.

Stabler silently unlatched the chain lock and opened the door half way. Then, with one swift, deliberate motion, Stabler pointed the Berretta and shot Agent Slusser precisely between the eyes and the second agent in the temple. Both agents dropped like frozen stones onto the granite floor of the porch, kicked a few times, gurgled some thick, dark blood, then lay as still and silent as the starry, south Texas night.

And so it begins, Stabler thought to himself, as he replaced the two rounds into the clip of the Berretta, and made a call to his ranch foreman, Johnny Rodriquez, who lived in the bunkhouse only a half mile from Stabler’s main residence.

The Stabler Ranch, officially titled the Border Star Ranch, was a 100,000-acre piece of cactus and mesquite paradise, which bordered Mexico for twenty miles along the lazy, muddy Rio Grande River. Buck Stabler’s great grandfather, Milo Stabler, was the first Anglo to claim ownership of the ranch, which was deeded to him prior to the Texas Revolution by Santa Anna himself, for services rendered to the Mexican government.

The exact services, no one remembered, but they must have meant something to Santa Anna because giving such a large parcel of land to a gringo at that time was rare, especially in view of the fact that Milo Stabler was a key financier of Sam Houston’s Texan army. At any rate, the deed was granted and so began the Border Star Ranch.

Milo Stabler was just the man for the job of developing a cattle ranch on the Texas/Mexico border at that time. He was ruthless, ambitious, and had a natural ability to command men around him to serve his will.

After the Texas Revolution in 1836, The Border Star quickly became a thriving cattle enterprise and the family wealth and prestige began to grow rapidly. Milo Stabler was a man who had few enemies because he killed most of them without regret or hesitation whenever they stood in his way. With wealth and land to bolster his quenchless thirst for prosperity and power, Milo became one of the most prominent cattle ranchers in Texas and Mexico.

By the time Milo died and his son Silas took over the reins of power on the ranch, everything was going pretty well. And just when it seemed that it couldn’t get any better, oil was discovered on a parcel of the Border Star and Silas signed lease agreements worth millions with the U.S. oil cartel, run chiefly at that time by Standard Oil. The oil leases took up only a small fraction of the land comprising the Border Star, and the rest was still used for cattle ranching, hunting, and other recreational activities.

It was only after 1920 that Buck’s grandfather turned the management of the ranch over to his son, Buck’s dad, Stanley, ‘Stan the Man’, Stabler. Stanley was a chip off the old block and soon the ranch’s holdings expanded into Mexico, Brazil, Venezuela, Argentina, and Columbia. Particularly relevant is that Stanley bought an additional 30,000 acres just across the river from the Border Star in Mexico, thus consolidating the Border Star’s claim of being a multinational ranch in literal terms.

Such a convenient situation was conducive to all sorts of illegal activities, but the Stabler’s kept every thing on the up and up for the most part. It was rumored that they allowed a few shipments of goofy bush up through the ranch that might have otherwise been confiscated at the regular border crossings.

Stanley’s view was that business was business. He figured if you couldn’t stand the heat you oughta stay out of the kitchen.

If my Mexican friends want to smuggle a little smoke to the U.S. in exchange for some new shoes for baby, who am I to complain about it? A toke of weed in the morning makes a man as strong as stallion in the breed barn, he used to say. The money is good and it keeps life interesting.

Buck Stabler was the apple of Stanley’s eye. Stanley’s wife, Judith, had died young, while Buck was still an infant and Stanley had raised the child on his own. The old man wanted Buck to have all the things wealth and power could deliver and he saw to it that his wishes became realities. But he never babied Buck or spoiled him in any way. If fact, he was harder on Buck than he was on most the other hands at the ranch. Buck had to come up from the bottom, Stanley figured, if he was going to be the future ramrod of the Border Star.

And indeed, when Stanley Stabler died, Buck took the bull by the horns and the empire was in sound financial condition and operating smoothly when the unfortunate incident occurred that resulted in the deaths of the two-homeland security agent’s on the front steps of the Border Star ranch house.

The events that led the two agents to the Border Star that fateful night was a long string of injustices imposed upon landowners and citizens in Texas which had been going on for several generations. The latest episode, other than the small arms treaty, was the demand by the Texas Department of Transportation to acquire millions of acres of land from the Mexican border up through the pan handle, declaring it public domain, for the purpose of constructing the Trans-Texas corridor, a proposed super highway that when completed would stretch from the southern point of origin in Manzanilla, Mexico, all the way up to Kansas City, Missouri.

The proposed pathway for the corridor would pass right through the middle of the Border Star Ranch and Buck Stabler had sworn on the steps of the state capitol in Austin, in front of national news media, that it would happen only over his dead body. To the astonishment of everyone, he then pulled his pistol and laid it across his chest for emphasis.

Many of Buck’s neighbors supported his opposition to the proposed roadway, and as the project came closer to fruition, landowners all along the corridor began to protest and threatened violent resistance if the plan continued. Enough opposition was mobilized that TXDOT put the whole plan on the back burner and the citizens in opposition were placated for the moment. The state governor had seen the error of his ways and renounced his earlier support for the corridor. Many Texans suspected that it was Buck Stabler who had convinced the governor to change horses in mid stream.

For Buck Stabler, however, the elements in the state government that wanted more federal control and eventually a North American Union, had shown their hand, and the more he investigated the issue it became clear to him that the movers and shakers of the proposed highway were not Texans at all, but a financial consortium comprised of Chinese financiers working in partnership with Spanish construction and toll road management firms. The further he looked, the more of a conspiracy to undermine U.S. national sovereignty he found.

The dollar was in the tank, and why? Thousands of jobs were going overseas, and why? US trade deals with Canada and Mexico through NAFTA were only benefiting the CEO’s and top management officials of multinational companies, and why? Who were these banksters and what was their agenda? Stabler looked further and further and the deeper he looked the worse it got.

The huge body of evidence that his organization had compiled pointed ultimately to the United Nations as the control center for the global efforts to dismantle the United States government’s position as the world’s foremost economic and military power. It was traditional wisdom that a free, armed citizenry was a major thorn in the ass of would-be totalitarian regimes. Hence, the new International Small Arms Treaty.

Conspiracy theory? Of course. Conspiracies abound in all societies, from high-level political consortiums to local PTAs. Joe Blow conspires with the fresh produce manager to take over the frozen food isle at the local H.E.B. So on and so forth, all the way up the food chain to top figures and department heads in local, state and federal government. The difference in only in degree and potential consequence. The new arms treaty would have enormous and life changing consequences for the entire global community.

As a result of his queries, Stabler had began to assemble a close-knit circle of trusted friends and family members with whom to debate, discuss, speculate, and strategize possible responses and resistance to what he now firmly believed was an international conspiracy to bring down the U.S. government and replace it with a global authority, financed by multinational corporations and operated as a soft ambiguous, nefarious blend of socialist/ totalitarian/fascist systems of governance.

The group of sympathizers he assembled included a societal hierarchy of members ranging from ranch hands, mechanics, doctors, architects engineers, and teachers to big landowners on both sides of the border, politicians and businessmen with whom he had transacted multiple million dollar deals over the years.

The latest enterprise with whom Stabler had initiated a partnership was a solar technology firm based in Guadalajara, Mexico. The firm, Luz del Sol, Inc., was the brainchild of Mexican multimillionaire, Fernando Sanchez. He had managed to secure patents on extremely advanced solar energy technology and also distribution rights for all of Mexico, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Brazil, and Venezuela.

The real keystone of the new technology was a revolutionary battery that could store huge amounts of solar produced electricity for long periods of time. In addition, La Luz del Sol had developed a more efficient solar cell made of a new substance, raydon, that was capable of transducing eighty percent more electricity than silicon cells. The new cells were capable of producing nearly the same efficiency of solar conversion as photosynthesis in nature.

Stabler had purchased half interest in Luz del Sol back when the firm was little more than an idea floating around in the entrepreneurial mind of Fernando Sanchez. Today the company was worth trillions and promised to become the major supplier of energy for most of the western hemisphere when and if the global oil cartels could be convinced or coerced into releasing the world economy from its strangle hold of fossil fuel dependency.

It was to be part of Stabler’s job to make sure the U.S.became a major customer of Luz del Sol. Already, Texas had surpassed California, Arizona, and New Mexico in solar energy usage thanks to Stabler’s efforts and had become the number one producer of solar energy in the United States. In short, he had powerful friends and lots of money to work with. The makeup of the solar battery itself, and the innovative application of radon remained a mystery, patented corporate secrets known only to a handful of engineers, Sanchez, and Stabler himself.

But, in spite of his connections and wealth, Stabler was wise enough to realize it was going to be an uphill battle from the get go. The fundamental problem was that the federal government for many years had been undermining the civil liberties guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Moreover, especially since 9/11, which many now believed to have been an inside job of terrorism orchestrated by the globalists, things had started moving much more rapidly… after decades of planning, the end game was finally in play.

Through media control and public policy modifications, the public had been systematically and gradually desensitized, dumbed down, as it were, into a level of complacency that rendered them vulnerable and ripe for either a complete totalitarian takeover, or at least a radical shift in the essential power structure.

The Patriot Act and the Military Commissions Act were treacherous nails in the coffin of protection under the Bill of Rights. At this juncture, all it took was any officer acting in behalf of the federal executive branch of government to accuse any citizen of terrorism and that person immediately lost all civil liberties formerly enjoyed as a citizen and faced indefinite imprisonment without trial or contact with legal representation.

The Act might have been a good idea if one could naively assume that the executive officer and his cabinet would always act in the best interests of the citizens, but in view of the deplorable decline in responsible leadership within the top echelons of government, no one in his right mind could possibly make that assumption.

Thus, the immense difficulty any resistance group faced, regardless of how well organized or powerful they might be, was that their activities could easily be defined as acts of terrorism, and they could be subject to arrest at any time for a plethora of infringements limited only by the imagination of the accusers. And in Stabler’s case, the possession of weapons was the primary violation for which he was to be taken down.

Although he had become the poster child for resistance to the deterioration of the Constitution and individual liberty, Stabler was by no means alone in this endeavor. Many U.S. senators, congressmen, military leaders, business people, and influential members of all walks of American society sensed the coming of a significant change and were preparing to lend their support when the time came to act in defense of the ideals they all held dear.

Even top C.I.A and state department personnel were beginning to see the writing on the wall and in many states, well regulated militias were being formed at the highest levels of official state participation. The Tea Party movement had evolved to include even many influential liberals who were fed up with the senseless and wasteful intervention of the federal government into all aspects of the lives of citizens.

The new approach to an impassioned patriotism was making strange bedfellows indeed. And the movement was not without mysterious elements; it was becoming more and more apparent that folks from all over the world who sought to live the kind of life promised in New Texas were beginning to migrate to Texas, and persons opposed to the formation of the new nation were leaving in huge numbers.

A special temporary agency was set up to screen potential immigrants according to their skills, philosophical leanings, and willingness to pledge loyalty to a basic creed of moral and ethical principles. Everybody allowed in had to either speak fluent English or be willing and able to learn the language quickly.

Fortunately, in spite of the tremendous difficulty and dangerous implications of his activities in recent months, Stabler had managed to work out a reasonable exit plan that with a considerable amount of luck might allow him to escape arrest and enhance his opportunities to continue to resist the globalist’s coup. Stabler had served as a Navy SEAL, and been trained in the use of a variety of weapons. He was also known to possess advanced skills in a plethora of martial arts. He had also logged in hundreds of hours flying an impressive array of aircraft.

As a commando in various Persian Gulf clandestine operations, he had been responsible for several key assassinations. He had found that contrary to the popular Hollywood myth that it was inherently more difficult to kill a human being than an animal, he had no real problem ending the lives of his enemies. To him, it was just like killing anything else. Once you made up your mind, you just went into the ‘zone" and everything progressed more or less automatically.

Of course you had to practice enough to be competent with weapons or fists or feet, but beyond that, it was no big deal. Any moral issues were instinctively trumped by his love for individual and collective liberty and his sense of duty as a true patriot of the United States of America, and especially as a Texan.

It was an interesting paradox to Stabler how his primordial instinct to survive could be overridden by his desire to protect his values. In a way, it was simply that his concept of what constituted his life had expanded to include a more dynamic, comprehensive cluster of dimensions. Nature and nurture had somehow become integrated, congruent forces, which were forming a complimentary code of conduct that became sacred and flexible at the same time.

All he said to his foreman in that late-night phone call was: Get over here, Johnny. It’s time to get the hell out of Dodge.

Chapter 2

J OHNNY RODRIQUEZ WAS fast asleep when the call came. His live-in girlfriend of many years, Amada Sanchez, lay delightfully naked beside him after an enjoyable evening of celebration in honor of Johnny’s pay raise and the announcement by his boss, Buck Stabler, that he was going to renovate the bunkhouse to the specifications determined by Amada and Johnny. Amada had whipped up some of her famous cole slaw and baked beans and Johnny had barbecued some pork ribs on the rusty CharKing smoker in the front yard. After the feast, they smoked a joint, downed a couple of cold Modelo Especials, and then hit the sack for some lively lovemaking.

It’s funny how quickly things can change. When Johnny heard Stabler summons him over the phone, he immediately woke Amada up, jumped out of bed, threw the go-bags into their four wheel drive GMC pick-up, which was already loaded up with gear, gas, non-perishable food and weapons, and headed to the Stabler residence.

Rodriquez was the son of a horse wrangler who had emigrated from Michoacan, Mexico with his father and mother, and had worked most of his youth on a large ranch on the Texas/Mexico border, farther south, near Laredo. Johnny had learned the trade well, and had met Buck Stabler as a youth during a fistfight in a bar in Laredo.

Buck had gotten into a fight with some banditos up from Mexico illegally, and Johnny had come to his aide just in time to prevent Buck from being seriously injured or killed. After the fight, Stabler and Rodriquez ended up having beers with the banditos, whom they discovered were not such a bad lot after all. In fact, as it turned out, the leader of the banditos, Emilio Sanchez, was kin to Johnny through the marriage of one of his cousins still living in Michoacan, and was an uncle to Amada Sanchez. Neither Emilio nor Amada were known to be directly kin to Fernando Sanchez, though a genetic correlation could not be ruled out.

From their ensuing conversation, Johnny learned who Stabler was, and the more they talked, the more they realized how much they had in common, regardless of the relative disparity in their social status. Stabler offered Rodriquez a job on the Border Star and Johnny accepted. After a few years of service, the young wrangler became Stabler’s lead hand and soon he more of less took over the duties of running the ranch as far as the actual handling of the horses and cattle went.

In addition to his salary, Stabler had deeded a thousand acres of land to Rodriquez for his personal use. Stabler used the time afforded him by having a trusted manger run the ranch to develop his network of