And people in Safford were taking notice of them. While they didn't step off the sidewalk to let the Powers past them, the townsfolk didn't push them off the sidewalk, either. The Powers were poor, undereducated Gentiles, and they were outsiders. But people were starting to think that they were outsiders that had to be reckoned with.

He was sleeping on the afternoon of the third day when he heard the whistling and shouting from the creek below. He heard cattle scrambling and crashing through the brush, making their way up the hillside as the riders came through, driving them from the creek. He had to put himself behind a tree to keep from being trampled as a couple of steers came his way.

He made his way to his horse, dodging frightened cattle. He had dealt with bears and a lion or two and all kinds of snakes, but there was little that scared him quite so much as a frightened cow. A thousand terrified pounds coming at you, trying to get away from something behind it, and you were just an obstacle in its way, an obstacle small enough to just run over. And if you did get run over, you were in terrible trouble.

The horse was unsaddled but bridled with a hackamore so it could graze. He could ride it with the hackamore, but he needed the saddle and the Winchester that was in the scabbard of the saddle. The horse was no less worried about the charging cattle than he was, and he had the devil's own time getting the saddle cinched to the belly of the shying horse. But when he got it cinched, he was up and off, heading for the creek, the cattle now separating and making way for the charging horse.

The first rider he came to didn't even hear him coming with the noise of the cattle all around him. Tom simply swung the Winchester by the barrel, catching the man across the shoulder, likely breaking it, sending him crashing to the ground and rolling into a ball as more steers came running past him.

When Tom got to the creek bottom, he fired off three shots in quick succession into the air. The shots added to the general confusion, but the other riders stopped what they were doing and wheeled and turned toward him. He shouldered the rifle and moved the sights from rider to rider as they brought their horses to a standstill and, one by one, raised their hands, none of them seeming to be armed, though only a fool would ride into Aravaipa Canyon without some kind of firearm.

“Just what the hell do you think you are doing?” he yelled. Then, “Stop. You're under arrest by the United States Forest Service. This here is open range, and you got no right to do this. You're all under arrest.”