Cormac McCarthy - Cities of the Plain

John Grady smiled. From the kitchen door you could see the late sun high on the bare ridgerock of the Jarillas. He shut the door and looked back at Billy and walked over to the stove and lifted one of the castiron eyeplates and looked in and lowered it again.

I may be wrong about this, said Billy, but it's my feelin that once they get used to lights and runnin water it's kindly hard to wean em back off again.

Got to start somewhere.

Is she goin to cook on that?

John Grady smiled. He went past Billy into the other room. Billy straightened up in the doorway to let him by and then stood looking after him. I hope she's a country girl, he said.

What do you say we ride back down on the back side and see what the old road looks like.

Whatever you want to do. We'll be late gettin in.

John Grady stood in the doorway looking out. Yeah, he said. All right. I can ride up on Sunday.

Billy watched him. He unlimbered himself out of the doorframe and crossed the room. Let's do it, he said. We're goin to be ridin back in the dark either way.

Billy?

Yeah.

It dont make any difference, you know. What anybody thinks.

Yeah. I know it too well.

That's a pretty picture, aint it.

He looked at the horses across the creek where they stood footed to their darkening shapes in the ford with their heads raised looking toward the house and the cottonwoods and the mountains and the red sweep of the evening sky beyond.

You think I'll outgrow whatever it is I got.

No. I dont. I used to but I dont no more.

I'm too far gone, is that it?

It aint just that. It's you. Most people get smacked around enough after a while they start to pay attention. More and more you remind me of Boyd. Only way I could ever get him to do anything was to tell him not to.

There used to be a pipe from the spring to the house.

You could run it again I would reckon.

Yeah.

I'd say the water's still good. There aint nothin above here.

Billy walked out in the yard and took a long drag on his cigarette and stood looking at the horses. John Grady pulled the door shut. Billy looked at him.

You never did tell me what Mac said.

He didnt say much. If he thought I was crazy he was too much of a gentleman to mention it.

What do you think he'd say if he knew she worked at the White Lake?

I dont know.

The hell you dont.

He wont know it unless you tell him.

I've thought about it.

Yeah?

He'd shit green apples.

Billy flipped the butt of the cigarette out across the yard. It was already dark enough that it made an arc in the fading light. Arcs within the arc. We better get on, he said.

H E DIDNT s ELL the horse to Wolfenbarger. On Saturday two friends of McGovern's came out and they leaned on the fender of their truck and smoked and talked while he saddled the horse and led it out. They straightened up when they saw the horse. He nodded to them and took the animal out to the corral.

Mac came from the kitchen and nodded to the men.

Mornin.

He crossed the yard. Crawford introduced him to the other man and the three of them walked out to the corral.

That looks like the horse old man Ch++vez used to ride, the man said.

As far as I know there's no connection.

That was a funny story about that horse.

Yes it was.

You think a horse can grieve for a man?

No. Do you?

No. Still it was a funny kind of story.

It was.

The man walked around the horse while John Grady held it. He put his hand behind the horse's front leg and he looked into its eye. He backed up against the horse and picked up one hindleg and put it down again but he didnt look at the hoof and he didnt look into the horse's mouth.

You say this is a three year old?

Yessir.

Ride him around some.

They stood watching while John Grady rode the horse up and back and turned the horse and backed him and then cantered him around the corral.

How come the boy wants to sell him?

Mac didnt answer. They watched the horse. After a while he said: He just needs the money. The horse is sound.

What do you think, Junior?

You aint goin to pay no attention to me. Get me on Mac's wrong side.

It aint my horse, said Mac.

What do you think?

Crawford spat. Pretty good lookin horse I think.

What will he take for him?

What he's askin.

They stood.

I might go two and a half.

Mac shook his head.

It's his horse to sell aint it? the man said.

Mac nodded. Yes, he said. It is. But if he was to let that horse go for two hundred and fifty dollars I'd pay him off. I wouldnt want anybody that ignorant on the place. Liable to do themselves a injury.

The man toed the dirt. He looked at Crawford and he studied the horse again and he looked at Mac.

Will he take three?

Will you give three?

Yessir.

John Grady, called Mac.

Yessir?

Bring that man's horse over here and get your saddle off of him.

Yessir, said John Grady.

WHEN HE CAME IN that night Oren and Troy were still at the table drinking coffee and he got his plate from the warmer and filled his cup and joined them.

They tell me you're damn near afoot, said Oren.

Just about it.

I guess you decided that varmint was just too crazy to make a horse out of.

I just needed the money.

Mac said the man never even rode him.

He didnt.

I suppose the critter's reputation had done preceded him.

Could be.

You may not of heard the last from him.

Could be.

They watched him eat.

The cowboy thinks horses are sane and people are crazy, Troy said.

He might have a point.

You all have been around different horses from what I have. More likely we been around different people.

I dont know, said Troy. I been acquainted with some lulus.

How did you all get along?

John Grady looked up. He smiled. Oren was shucking a cigarette out of the pack. All horses are crazy, he said. To a degree. Only thing to be said in their favor is that they dont try to hide it from you.

He reached down and popped a wooden match on the underside of his chair and lit his cigarette and shook the match out and laid it in the ashtray.

Why do you think they're crazy? said John Grady.

Why do I think it or why are they?

Why are they.

They're just made that way. A horse has got two brains. He dont see the same thing out of both eyes at once. He's got a eye for each side.

So does a fish, said Troy.

Well. That's true.

So does a fish have two brains?

I dont know. I dont know that a fish has got any brains at all to speak oPS

Maybe a fish just aint smart enough to be crazy.

I think you got a point. A horse aint really all that dumb.

They're too dumb to shade up and a dumbassed cow will do that.

So will a fish. Or a rattlesnake for that matter.

You think a snake is dumber than a fish?

Hell, Troy. I dont know. Who in the hell would know such a thing? They're both dumbern hell in my opinion.

Well I didnt mean to get you stirred up.

I aint stirred up.

Well go on with the story.

It aint a story. It was just a observation about horses.

Well what was it.

I dont know. I forgot.

No you aint.

You were talkin about a horse havin two brains, said John Grady.

Oren pulled on the cigarette. He looked at John Grady. He leaned and tapped the ash into the ashtray.

All I was sayin is that a horse is a different proposition from what a lot of people think. A lot of what people take for ignorance on the part of the horse is just confusion between the righthand horse and the lefthand horse. Like if you was to saddle a horse and all and then walk around to his off side and start to mount up. You know what's goin to happen.