Jessie King had made her decision. Guest ranching, like cattle ranching for Henry, had become an empty place for her. It wasn’t who she was anymore, and perhaps it never was. Either way, she finally knew an old chapter of her life was getting ready to close, and a new chapter was about to begin.

Mrs. Rodriguez, who had been watching her since she was a little girl, could only shake her head and wonder why it had taken her so long.

CHAPTER 47

Henry had seen the note while he was still almost one hundred yards away from the line shack. The white paper that had been stuck between the door and the age-darkened wooden doorjamb stuck out like a beacon in the night. He could only assume it was probably from Topher, or one of the other hands from the ranch. He eased the big red gelding up to the shack, dismounted and dropped the rein on the ground, a signal Henry had taught the horse during the months they had spent together to mean, “Stand still.” Without moving, the gelding dropped his head and began munching on the fresh green grass that was sprouting up everywhere. Spring had finally arrived at Wild Basin, and while moisture had been hard to come by up till now, there had been just enough rain in the past week or so to brighten things up a little.

Henry stepped up on the porch and pulled the note out without having to open the door first. It was written in pencil by someone with a slightly shaky hand…Topher, he guessed. It read: Took shortcut. Packhorse broke leg. Bring packhorse. Mile ½ into canyon.

It was almost mid April and Topher was apparently two days early with the last of Henry’s supplies. Henry had been horseback since before dawn scouting the positions of the herd in anticipation of moving them back to the ranch for branding. He was tired and had hoped to get a nap in, as had become his daily ritual when time allowed as this day had, right up until now. As Henry went to get the dun from the pen, he wondered why Topher decided to take a shortcut with his pack string, especially since he was actually two days early to begin with. But then, there was no telling why Topher did most of the things he did, and in the end, Henry retrieved the dun, gave the red gelding some grain and a long drink from the water tank, mounted up and headed for the canyon.

The canyon was little more than a ten-mile long, two-hundred-yard-wide ditch carved in gray rock to the north of Henry’s line shack. It had formed when prehistoric waters receded from the area over a million years before, leaving in its wake the canyon with a box canyon in its far end. The floor of the canyon was flat and mostly sandy, and its sides rose from a height of ten feet at its mouth, to nearly seventy feet a quarter mile in. About a mile from the mouth, where Topher had apparently had his accident with the packhorse, the sides of the ravine were nearly one hundred feet tall, steep and rocky.