The next day, Favor rode into town, leaving Rowdy in charge. The herd moved along at its usual, brisk pace. By the time for noon camp, the drive had covered almost three miles.
Favor loped in to the remuda, but he wasn't alone; a stranger rode right behind him. Mr. Favor and the stranger dismounted and headed over to the chuck wagon. Pete, surprised, hustled over to them.
"Hey boss, how was town?" Pete cheerfully inquired as he studied the new man.
"Just fine," Favor bit into a biscuit. "Mushy! Get the supplies off my horse." When Mushy complied, he turned back to Nolan. "Oh, Pete, this is Dan Bailey. He says he can help us find a safe crossing for the herd." After Pete and Bailey had exchanged greetings, Favor spoke to the new hire. "Pete's my scout. Once you finish your meal, my ramrod will find you a place. You'll work there until we hit the river."
"Okay, Mr. Favor," the man easily agreed, then turned to fill his plate. Pete eyed him distrustfully; he wasn't too keen on someone encroaching on his job. He followed as Favor ambled away.
"You sure he knows this river?"
"He says he does. Says he's been all over this part of the country. Rode the Sedalia trail a couple years ago. And he needs the money, and we need to get across the river."
"Yeah boss, but—"
"—And even if he doesn't know a crossing, every extra hand will help us."
"Well, that's true I guess." Pete accepted Favor's explanation, but only because it made sense.
Favor switched topics. "How did it go this morning? Rowdy do all right?"
"He did his job fine, and gave the right orders, but—"
"—But you're still worried about him," Favor finished.
"Yep," Pete stated honestly. "He's still in a strange mood, boss."
At that time, Rowdy rode into the remuda, dismounted and, seeing Mr. Favor was back, headed over.
"Hey boss, how was town?" he asked quietly.
"Fine. Got the supplies we've been needing, so maybe Wish can cook a decent biscuit for once."
Pete grinned. "I doubt it, but we can all hope." Rowdy didn't even crack a smile.
Favor jerked his head back to the chuck wagon. "Picked up a new man, claims to know the river we'll be hitting in a few days. He says he's been up a trail once before, so see where you want to put him until we hit the river."
"Sure boss," Rowdy mumbled as he gazed at the new man, who was chatting amiably with Mushy. The man was tall and well-built with dark brown hair escaping out from an old, dirty brown, crumpled hat. The relaxed posture was familiar, one hand gesturing about, and the other resting easily and unassumingly on top of his gun, thumb looped into the belt.
"What did you say his name was?" he asked carefully.
"Bailey. Dan Bailey."
"Bailey," Rowdy muttered quietly. He stood silent for a second, then he frowned and tramped over until he was only a couple of feet behind the new man, feet spread wide, and his hands resting on his belt. When he spoke, he projected his voice over the whole camp. "Mr. Favor, don't tell me that you hired this no-good, dirty rotten liar to guide us across the river?!!"
Dan Bailey whirled around at the loud voice, his hand still on top of his gun, only no longer resting unassumingly. But when he saw who his accuser was, his posture slowly and methodically relaxed back into one of supreme confidence. "Oh, it's you kid, I thought it might be someone to actually worry about." The drovers eyed each other at this insult.
Bailey glanced over at his new boss. "Mr. Favor, you don't mean that I'm going to have to work with this low-down, yellow-bellied tinhorn—"
"Work with him and take orders from him," Favor interrupted, not sure exactly what this was, but instantly ready to guard against the trouble that was brewing. "He's my ramrod and—"
"Rowdy Yates, you're a ramrod?!"
"Yeah," Rowdy smiled evilly. "And I decide where you ride tomorrow."
"Oh-ho. I'm scared now," the stranger grinned back.
Rowdy quickly closed the distance between them, grabbed the other man's hand and slapped him heartily on the shoulder. "How you been Dan?"
"All right. Been drifting from town to town mostly."
"Why'd you sign up for a cattle drive?"
"Money," Dan replied honestly. "Lost most of mine a couple towns back and finally ran out and got stuck in that hole in the wall. Mr. Favor agreed to let me hire on for a little while to gather enough for stage fare, in return for helping y'all cross the river."
"Speaking of Mr. Favor," Favor broke in, and slowly and articulately (which was always dangerous) continued, "would you two mind explaining to me what just happened here?"
The two men grinned. Rowdy explained. "Mr. Favor, Dan here is a childhood buddy. We grew up together, fought in the war together-"
"and I joined him on a pleasant jaunt up to Yankee prison."
"Pleasant jaunt? Dan you're crazy," Rowdy playfully shoved the older man as he grabbed his own plate of food, and then the two of them walked away, talking with and over each other, not noticing the other men in the drive staring after them.
Noon camp broke up a little while later, with Mr. Favor having to physically jar the two men out of their conversation. Rowdy reluctantly gave Dan the position of drag, since that was the typical new man's position, and Dan didn't complain.
But, as Favor observed, Dan didn't have much to complain about anyway. Rowdy hadn't left his side since the drive started up again, they didn't pay any attention to the cattle, and Bailey didn't even have to deal with the dust of the drag position: he and Rowdy kept drifting sideways and closer to flank, the dust apparently not a very welcome addition to their non-stop conversation.
"Whoaa," Favor gently crooned to his horse as he spotted Pete spurring up to him.
"What's the matter?" he asked, though he was pretty sure what it was.
"It's Rowdy and that friend of his!" Pete complained, "they're not working at all, just jabbering away at each other." He was going to continue venting his frustration, but Favor interrupted.
"I seem to recall just yesterday you were complaining to me that Rowdy wasn't talking enough," the boss chided.
"Well it was different then," Pete defended.
"Oh?"
"Yes it was. Rowdy might not have been himself, but at least he was getting his work done. Now he's not working, and the new guy's not doing his job—"
"—And we're not doing our job when we just sit here talking about them, either, are we?" Favor lightly provoked his scout.
Pete scowled at the ribbing. "Well, if you're not going to do anything about it, I certainly am." He made to gallop off, but Favor took hold of his arm.
"Aww, let 'em go Pete."
"But Mr. Favor," the scout persisted.
"Just this once," he ordered. "But don't worry," he smiled, letting go of his pretend annoyance at Nolan and revealing his truly devilish mind, "they'll both pay for it tomorrow."
Pete shook his head, but surrendered reluctantly to the promise of payback. "Whatever you say, boss. But honestly, it's like Rowdy's never had a friend before." Pete rode off, but his offhand comment brought Favor up short.
Was that Rowdy's problem? He didn't have any friends? Well, that was nonsense, he had plenty of friends in this outfit, pretty much every man liked every other man (Favor knew he was lucky with the drovers he had gotten for this drive).
But then again, the trail boss mused, everybody in this camp was a new friend for Rowdy. Not one man in this outfit had Yates known before. Favor had known Pete in the war, Quince and Scarlet—when had they ever been anything other than Quince and Scarlet?—and many other hands had signed up with a friend, but Rowdy had known no one until he the first day of the drive. And even if there were others who signed on alone like Rowdy, they at least had the experience of a trail drive. Rowdy had none. Favor shook his head at the irony; his ramrod was the only greenhorn in this outfit.
At camp that evening, the men all crowded around Rowdy and Dan, as each regaled their audience with tales of the other's exploits during their childhood and the war.
"One time," Dan began with a twinkle in his eye, "as we were being hauled to the prison camp in Arizona, we were let out for a bit before we were herded onto the next cattle car," he spit those words out, "there were some Yankee nurses who were taking care of the wounded. Well, we hadn't had any real chow in a long time, and the nurses kept bringing plates of steaming food for our guards and, big surprise, nothing for us. But then we see this beautiful young girl carrying a huge plate of apple pie, and we just couldn't take it any longer. So we decided Rowdy should try, since he's pretty handy with the ladies." He said the last part as if he were giving Rowdy a nice little and untrue compliment, but the guffaws of agreement from the drovers told Bailey they knew the hard-core truth of the statement.
"So," Dan picked up the story again, "he walks up to this girl, and very politely says howdy to her. And that girl wrinkles up her nose and exclaims, 'Why is it that all you Johnny Rebs smell so disgusting?'"
"Naw, the word she used was 'vile,' I think she wanted to impress us with her fancy-soundin' phrases," Rowdy corrected as he sipped his coffee.
"Well anyway," Dan continued, "Rowdy gives her that aw-shucks smile of his," Rowdy glared at him, the others nodded, "and then he says, 'Well, ma'am, I suppose that's 'cause Yank women are looking after us. I'm sure with your lovely help we'll smell just as…revolting,' (he threw his own big word back in her face), 'as your own born and bred blue bellies.'"
Murmurs of approval followed this story. "That's telling her Rowdy," Jim Quince congratulated.
"Yeah," Pete chimed in, "but if you had kept your mouth shut you might have gotten the apple pie."
"Oh, he still got the pie," Dan added, grinning from ear to ear.
"He didn't?" Scarlet asked incredulously.
"He did. He smiled some more, and after a bit that girl handed him the pie like he was Abe Lincoln himself, and then Rowdy got her to go and steal from some of the guards. And then every time after that, whenever we ran into a girl, we sent Rowdy and he got us some meals. It got so good for us and so bad for our guards that the Yanks took to locking him up and out of sight whenever anything female came around."