Chapter 2

She had full, rouged lips and wide–spaced eyes, heavily made up. Her fingernails were red. Her hair hung in little rolled clusters, like sausages.

The bunk house was a long, rectangular building. Inside, the walls were whitewashed and the floor unpainted.

“Well, that glove’s fulla vaseline.” “Vaseline? What the hell for?” “Well, I tell ya what—Curley says he’s keepin’ that hand soft for his wife.”

And these shelves were loaded with little articles, soap and talcum powder, razors and those Western magazines ranch men love to read and scoff at and secretly believe.

in and out of the beam flies shot like rushing stars.

Sure. Ya see the stable buck’s a nigger.

Well, that was a lie. An’ I’m damn glad it was. If I was a relative of yours I’d shoot myself.

Yeah. Nice fella too. Got a crooked back where a horse kicked him. The boss gives him hell when he’s mad. But the stable buck don’t give a damn about that. He reads a lot. Got books in his room.

“He can do anything you tell him,” said George. “He’s a good skinner. He can rassel grain bags, drive a cultivator. He can do anything. Just give him a try.”

He’s my … cousin. I told his old lady I’d take care of him. He got kicked in the head by a horse when he was a kid.