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Chapter 16

Chapter 16

Summary

Call goes hiring. At the Spettle place he finds a barefoot widow raising eight children on a dirt floor and takes her two eldest boys, Bill and Pete, paying a month's wages in advance; the boys set off for Lonesome Dove on foot with one broken Navy Colt between them, and the family stands in the yard crying. At the Rainey ranch, loud, fat Maude feeds him a table of meats including her varmint stew, and he secures her two oldest sons. Riding home he frets that Gus may have lost the horses, but finds them safe — and learns why Pedro Flores never came: Pedro is dead, news Jasper Fant carried in from a vaquero. The death empties Call out the way Kicking Wolf's did years before, and for once his lifelong sense of hurry deserts him. He says they might as well go to Montana, the fun being over here. Augustus points out that Call has never had fun in his life, and that what he really needs is somebody to outwit.

Analysis

Pedro Flores dies offstage, emptying the border of its last antagonist — which is what actually frees Call to leave. Augustus names the mechanism aloud: Call needs someone to outwit. The drive is established as a search for purpose, not profit, before a single cow moves.

Plates

Call rides up to the Spettle creek-bottom farm north of Pickles Gap, hiring boys.
00 Call rides up to the Spettle creek-bottom farm north of Pickles Gap, hiring boys.
"Take 'em," the widow Spettle says, looking at her two eldest boys as if she wondered why she'd borne them.
01 "Take 'em," the widow Spettle says, looking at her two eldest boys as if she wondered why she'd borne them.
Call pays the widow a month's wage for each boy, knowing she will need it; her bare feet on the bare dirt floor.
02 Call pays the widow a month's wage for each boy, knowing she will need it; her bare feet on the bare dirt floor.
"We've never shot airy other gun" — the Spettle boys refuse to leave behind the Navy Colt with half its hammer knocked off.
03 "We've never shot airy other gun" — the Spettle boys refuse to leave behind the Navy Colt with half its hammer knocked off.
The boys walk off toward Lonesome Dove on foot while the mother and six remaining children stand in the hot yard, crying.
04 The boys walk off toward Lonesome Dove on foot while the mother and six remaining children stand in the hot yard, crying.
Call makes the Rainey ranch by sundown; Maude hollers about the shoat before he can even dismount.
05 Call makes the Rainey ranch by sundown; Maude hollers about the shoat before he can even dismount.
Supper at Maude Rainey's crowded table — beefsteak, pork chops, chicken, venison and the varmint stew with a possum in it.
06 Supper at Maude Rainey's crowded table — beefsteak, pork chops, chicken, venison and the varmint stew with a possum in it.
Call sleeps in a wagon in the Raineys' yard, kept awake by the pigs and a barn owl that will not stop calling.
07 Call sleeps in a wagon in the Raineys' yard, kept awake by the pigs and a barn owl that will not stop calling.
Riding home worrying the horses have been lost, Call finds them grazing upriver with Deets, Newt and the Irishmen holding them.
08 Riding home worrying the horses have been lost, Call finds them grazing upriver with Deets, Newt and the Irishmen holding them.
On the porch, told that Pedro Flores is dead, Call sits down with the jug and his lifelong hurry deserts him — "We might as well go on to Montana."
09 On the porch, told that Pedro Flores is dead, Call sits down with the jug and his lifelong hurry deserts him — "We might as well go on to Montana."