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Chapter 47

Chapter 47

Summary

Newt rides to Lorena's camp and can think of nothing to say; she tells him to go back, and he compromises by tying Mouse half a mile off and creeping back on foot to keep watch in secret. He falls asleep against a tree and wakes to the drumming of a stampede. Running for his horse, he finds Mouse gone with no broken rein — and sits down in the dark and cries, certain he is ruined. At first light Pea Eye finds him and reports that the outfit thought him trampled, since Mouse turned up in the herd; Newt lets the assumption stand that he was thrown. On the way in they meet the new cook, Po Campo — short, white-haired, walking ahead of his donkey because he thinks riding animals uncivilised. He talks about grass covering everything, offers to fry grasshoppers dipped in molasses, and puts a friendly hand on Newt's shoulder, which startles the boy: almost nobody touches him in friendship.

Analysis

The abduction happens in the gap left by a boy's small vanity — Newt hides rather than admit he was dismissed. McMurtry makes catastrophe hinge on embarrassment, not incompetence. Po Campo enters immediately after, a replacement voice arriving as the old order starts losing people.

Plates

Newt rides east alone through the dusk toward Lorena's camp, anxious enough to have given himself a headache.
00 Newt rides east alone through the dusk toward Lorena's camp, anxious enough to have given himself a headache.
Newt reaches Lorena's camp, finds her sitting with her back against a tree, and forgets everything he had rehearsed saying.
01 Newt reaches Lorena's camp, finds her sitting with her back against a tree, and forgets everything he had rehearsed saying.
Lorena, who does not want the boy there, tells him twice to go on back — "Gus can lump it."
02 Lorena, who does not want the boy there, tells him twice to go on back — "Gus can lump it."
Half a mile off, Newt loops Mouse's rein over a tree limb beside a boulder he means to use as a landmark — breaking the rule about never leaving your horse.
03 Half a mile off, Newt loops Mouse's rein over a tree limb beside a boulder he means to use as a landmark — breaking the rule about never leaving your horse.
Newt sits down against a live oak a hundred yards from Lorena's camp with his pistol drawn, and drifts out of his daydream into sleep.
04 Newt sits down against a live oak a hundred yards from Lorena's camp with his pistol drawn, and drifts out of his daydream into sleep.
Woken by the drumming and running for his horse, Newt is passed at close quarters by fifty or sixty stampeding cattle heading for the bluffs.
05 Woken by the drumming and running for his horse, Newt is passed at close quarters by fifty or sixty stampeding cattle heading for the bluffs.
He reaches the boulder and the limb is bare — Mouse gone, and no broken rein hanging to explain it.
06 He reaches the boulder and the limb is bare — Mouse gone, and no broken rein hanging to explain it.
Newt sits down under the tree where Mouse should have been and cries, certain he is ruined as a cowboy.
07 Newt sits down under the tree where Mouse should have been and cries, certain he is ruined as a cowboy.
At first light Pea Eye comes loping along a ridge on a horse white with sweat and tells Newt the outfit had him down for trampled.
08 At first light Pea Eye comes loping along a ridge on a horse white with sweat and tells Newt the outfit had him down for trampled.
Newt gets down and walks in with the new cook, and Po Campo puts a friendly hand on his shoulder — a thing that almost never happens to him.
09 Newt gets down and walks in with the new cook, and Po Campo puts a friendly hand on his shoulder — a thing that almost never happens to him.