Michael McGarrity - Nothing But Trouble

“You’re not driving, are you?” Kerney asked, as the bartender approached with the whiskey bottle.

“Hell, yes, I am,” Johnny said as he slid his fresh drink closer. “Stop sounding like a cop. I never figured you for one back in the old days.”

“It’s an honorable profession,” Kerney said. “Tell me what you’ve been doing since you stopped rodeoing.”

Johnny swirled the ice in the glass, deliberately took a small sip, and smiled. “There, is that better? I don’t want to get in trouble with the police chief.”

He put the glass on the bar. “Hell, I didn’t want to stop saddle bronc riding. I was in my prime on the circuit. But after I got kicked in the head for the sixth time, the doctors said if I had one more head trauma it could kill or paralyze me. I had to quit.”

“I’m sorry to hear it,” Kerney said.

Johnny shrugged and downed his whiskey. “Back then, twenty-five, thirty years ago, nobody wore protective gear. Nowadays, all the boys wear vests and some are wearing helmets. If that had happened in my day, we would have laughed them out of the arena. Those boys with the helmets look like they should be riding motorcycles, not bulls and bucking horses. But times change, and it’s a damn hard sport on a man’s body, that’s for sure.”

The hostess came to escort them to their table, and they were seated next to a group of eight women loudly discussing a planned fund-raising event for a local charity. Over their noisy chatter Kerney again asked Johnny what he’d been doing over the past years.

“Sports management, for one,” Johnny said, taking a menu from the server, “and media relations. Most of my clients are pro rodeo cowboys, but I’ve got a few up-and-coming country singers in my stable, and some minor league baseball players who have the talent to make it to the big show. But I’m branching out. That’s why I wanted to see you.”

A server appeared with menus and recited the specials. Johnny ordered a salad, steak, and another whiskey. Kerney went with the asparagus soup and lamb. “Are you in town on business?” he asked. “Or just to see me?”

Johnny leaned back and grinned devilishly. “Both, but it’s all business. I met with the director of the state film office yesterday and the governor today. You’re the last person on my list.”

“So are you going to tell me what business you have with me or is it a secret?” Kerney asked.

“You’re gonna love it, Kerney. I’ve just brokered a deal to film a movie in New Mexico. It will be produced by a Hollywood film company, costar two of my clients, and be shot entirely in the state. The governor and the state film office are putting a chunk of money into it.”

“Sounds like quite an undertaking.”

Johnny spread his hands wide to match the grin on his face. “It’s big, and it’s gonna be a hell of a lot of fun. I want to bring you in on it.”

“Doing what?” Kerney asked, as the server brought Johnny his whiskey.

“First let me tell you the fun part,” Johnny said. “The movie is a modern-day Western about a rancher who’s facing bankruptcy due to drought and the loss of grazing leases on federal land. He decides to fight back by mounting a fifty-mile cattle drive to dramatize his plight. But when he tries to drive his cattle across closed federal land, the government bars his access. The story takes off from there.”

“I’ve always liked a good Western,” Kerney said. “Let me know when it hits the theaters.”

Johnny laughed as the server placed his salad on the table. “Hear me out. The fun part is that we’re filming some of it on my father’s ranch in the Bootheel, and we plan to hire as many New Mexico cowboys, wranglers, stuntmen, stockmen, extras, and qualified film technicians as possible. That’s part of our deal with the state. I want Dale Jennings to be a wrangler and you to be a technical advisor on the film.”

“So that’s why you talked to Dale,” Kerney said. “What did he say?”

“He’s gonna do it.”

Kerney tried the asparagus soup. It was good. “You can hire whoever you want?” he asked.

Johnny, who hated tomatoes, picked them out of the salad and put them on the edge of the plate. “For the key, nontechnical New Mexico personnel I can. I’m an executive producer for the project. The story line was my idea. I’m even getting a screenwriting credit for it.”

“I’m impressed. When does all this take place?”

“In September, after the rainy season, when it’s not so damn hot.”

“I’ve got a full-time job, Johnny.”

“We’re talking about three weeks on location, maximum. That’s all you have to commit to. Use your vacation time. You’ll get top dollar, housing, meals, transportation, and expenses. Plus, you can bring the wife and son along gratis. In fact, we’ll hire them as extras. That’s what I promised to do with Dale’s wife and daughters.”

Johnny finished his greens and slugged back his whiskey. “We have a ninety-day shooting schedule. Three weeks in the Bootheel to do the major cowboy and rodeoing stuff, then some other location filming around the state in Silver City and Las Cruces. We’ll do the set work here in Santa Fe at the sound studios on the college campus. We’re hiring film students as apprentices.”

Kerney put his spoon down and wiped his mouth with a napkin. “Sounds like a major undertaking.”

“It’s big,” Johnny replied. “My sister, Julia, is in on it. You know, you broke her heart when you came back from Vietnam and didn’t marry her.”

Kerney laughed. “Get serious, Johnny. Julia didn’t want anything to do with me.” A year younger than Johnny, Julia had been one of the prettiest, most popular girls in high school. A great horsewoman in her own right, she’d won the state high-school barrel-racing competition the year after Kerney, Johnny, and Dale graduated.

Johnny grinned and raised his hand to the sky. “I’m telling you the truth. She totally had the hots for you.”

“What has Julia been up to?”

“Pretty much taking care of Joe and Bessie, now that they’re older. What do you think about my proposition?”

“I’d need to know a lot more about it before I decide,” Kerney answered. “What kind of technical assistance would you have me do?”

The main course arrived, and Johnny asked for a glass of expensive red wine before cutting into his steak. “Cop stuff,” he said. “You’d make sure anything to do with law enforcement is accurate. The story pits a rancher against agents of the Bureau of Land Management. When he decides to move his cattle illegally across public land, federal agents and the local sheriff try to stop him. The chase turns into a stampede when the cops try to turn back the rancher and his neighbors who are driving the herd across BLM land.”

Kerney’s lamb came served on a bed of polenta. It looked perfect. “It doesn’t sound like there would be much for me to do,” he said.

Johnny chuckled. “Now you’re thinking straight. It would be a working vacation, Hollywood style. Besides that, when was the last time you went on a real cattle drive? I’m not talking about moving stock from pasture to pasture, or gathering cows for shipment. But a real cattle drive, pushing three hundred and fifty head across a mountain range.”

“Can’t say I’ve ever done that,” Kerney said.

“Doesn’t that sound like fun?” Johnny asked.

“Yeah, it does.”

“You think about it,” Johnny said, fork poised at his mouth. “Talk to Dale. Talk to your wife. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for us to do something we used to dream about back when we were kids.”

“You were always good at organizing grand escapades,” Kerney said.