# Car 54

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© 2005 / revised 2014
K Pelle

### Chapter 54:
Caution Farming Area - Intermittent Farm Traffic

By the middle of March, I had managed to repair and refurbish almost all the machines and tools I'd bought at auction the year before. As well as that I'd even worked on several of the old machines that had been on the ranch when I had taken over managing the place. The only thing I might need that I hadn't finished working on was the swap of the engine out of Grampa Bender's old pickup with the old one in my two-ton Ford truck. I felt I still had time to do that, and started work on the engine around the middle of March and in a few days I was making very good progress.

Then, on morning of Tuesday, the 24th of March Grampa Bender suffered a major heart attack and the matron of the hospital called Mom to let the family know that he was in trouble. As soon as we heard that most of the family dropped whatever they were doing and headed for the hospital, even though all we could do was pace around the waiting room.

Sandy and I had seen Grampa Bender only a few days before, once again dropping in to talk to him after buying our groceries on Friday afternoon. He'd seemed to be in a good mood then, laughing and talking, even giving Sandy and I a rough time about turning Mile High Ranch into a goat farm. Over the years it had been Grampa Bender's policy to go out with a mower every once and a while to clear back the scrub brush that tried to invade the grazing areas of the ranch. With the new rules on the lease about modifying leased land I wasn't sure I could do that now and the idea that we'd gradually lose grazing land worried Grampa Bender. Sandy had smiled at him and mentioned that she was planning to buy a half dozen young does and a buck from a farm in Montana. They were called Spanish Cashmere Goats and had a very good reputation for clearing scrub brush from grazing land, while being very easy to care for. For some reason those goats seemed to prefer the taste of broad leafed weeds and small bushes to grass, so they not only trimmed back the brush but they'd be turning it into fertilizer for the native grasses as well. That way Sandy would be able to have cashmere wool to card and sell, and at the same time the goats would be clearing back the scrub brush. Grampa Bender seemed to think the idea was hilarious.

"Dang it, yer doin' it agin," he laughed. "I spent donkey's years mowin' an' cleanin' up that brush as it grewed up, jes wishin' fer a better way ta do it, an' you two has come up with a way thet takes hardly no time nor work aytall. I gotta say, thet's a purty dang impressive way ta use yer noggins. Yer gonna buy four legged mowers that turn the dang scrub brush into fertilizer and spread it around, all in one go."

"Well, thank you, Gramps. I've been doing a lot of spinning and knitting, so when I happened to hear about those goats, it sounded like a good idea to get a few and try them out. I passed it on and Chris thought it was worth a try. I'm glad you like the idea too, so when we get them in July or August, we'll have to bring you out to see them," Sandy leaned over and gave him a hug. "Making you happy is a good part of what we're doing, because I think we love the ranch as much as you do and we want it to do well."

I was glad we'd had that pleasant chat then, especially while I was sitting in the hospital waiting room and holding Sandy's hand while we both worried about him. At the moment though I was just hoping he'd be around to see those goats when they arrived, but from what the one nurse had said, it didn't seem likely. She had been trying to sound optimistic, but she'd had a hint of fatalism in her voice that really worried me, so I found the long hours of waiting and worrying very hard to take.

We never did get to talk to Grampa Bender again, because although the doctors and nurses in the hospital had done their best, they were unable to save him. Dr. McGraths told us that Grampa Bender had suffered a massive heart attack and there was simply no way he could be kept alive.

The following announcement appeared in the local newspaper later in the week;

> William Tobias Bender passed away of natural causes at 2:45 PM, on Tuesday, March the 24th, 1970. Born on January 16th, 1888, on a small farm in Tennessee, Toby Bender moved to the Mountview area in 1907, accompanying his father, two brothers and their families. At that time Toby and his first wife, Antoinette, established Mile High Ranch. He resided there for sixty-one years, until poor health brought about his move to the local hospital and extended care facility. His family has requested a private burial, but a short memorial service will be held at Cenotaph Park on Saturday, March 28th at 1:00 PM. and a memorial lunch will follow at Mountview Community Hall. All friends and family are invited to attend.

Our family lawyer had the unpleasant job of sending out an official notice of Grampa Bender's death, but Mom and I were able to provide him with names, addresses and phone numbers. We had something of a problem with that announcement for two reasons. The first reason concerned Lucille, who was taking a nursing course in Calgary at the time. Since she would be in the midst of midterm exams, we didn't want to add any additional pressures to her life. Besides, we knew that she'd be done her tests by that Thursday night and that she was planning on coming home for a week long break. Our second problem concerned our citified relatives, since we expected them to instigate a legal challenge to Grampa Bender's will the moment they received word of his death.

"I don't see either situation as a major problem," Cyrus stated flatly. "If you have the number for the hospital where Miss Bender is studying, I can contact them to learn the earliest date and time when contacting her will have the least effect on her studies. As for the more recalcitrant and uncooperative members of your family, Tobias and I had a long and involved discussion on that situation when we were adding the pertinent clauses to his will. My duty is exceedingly simple; I shall only announce his passing and the date of his burial, but nothing more. If they ask questions concerning the reading of the will, I shall tell the inquisitive person that the date has yet to be fixed, but that they will be advised of that date once it is known. The one thing Tobias insisted I was not to do was to warn them that if they challenged the will in any way they would be eliminated from any benefits. He felt certain they would automatically challenge the will as soon as they heard of his death and he wished the result of their actions to remain a surprise. I must say that in that respect Tobias seemed somewhat resentful of their past actions."

"I can't say I blame him for being resentful," I snorted. "Lucille's father is a perfect example, and in my mind he doesn't deserve to inherit a damn thing. He's an accountant, but when Mom asked him for help over the farm accounts, he turned her down, even though he'd signed an agreement to help with farm problems. Of course what really pissed me off is that afterward, he bragged about turning her down. For some reason he seemed to think he was better than those of us on the farm and he did his best to make sure we knew it too, but he was the first one to have his hand out to grab his share of any family income."

Cyrus just nodded his head, so I knew he'd heard the story before, probably from Grampa Bender.

So, we had tried to ease Lucille's pain and sorrow concerning Grampa Bender's passing, but we didn't succeed. While our family and our lawyer had attempted to protect her from having her studies interfered with by his death, her adoptive father had been far less considerate. When he first heard the news on Wednesday morning, he'd tried to have Lucille paged while she was taking an important test. Then later he'd called back to rant and rave at the hospital administration, demanding that she return his call instantly, if not sooner. Since Lucille was writing an important exam, she wasn't even told of his call until several hours later. Then instead of calling 'dear old uncle' William, she called Cyrus. In turn Cyrus suggested that she call either Mom or me, so in the long run I was the person who had to break the news to her about Grampa Bender's heart attack. I didn't expect her reaction to the news to be what it was though.

"Do you mean that my former father tried to have me called out of an important exam to tell me that? Surely to God he'd know that would upset me and make me lose concentration? The only reason I can think of for the bastard doing that is that he wants me to fail this course," she screamed in anger. "I'm going to phone him and tell him that I'm going to ace this course and that when I'm finished it, I plan to completely sever my relationship with him in any way."

"Whoa, gal, calm down. Don't call your old man right now, call Cyrus instead. One of the things Cyrus will tell you is not to mention the clause in Grampa Bender's will which states that if anyone sues over the will, they get completely cut out of any benefits. That will is probably the reason your old man phoned you, not just to rile you. He's probably already trying to get the will overturned so he can get a larger share than he deserves and I imagine he wants everyone who lives away from home to join his lawsuit. From what little I've had to do with the greedy bugger, that's what I'd expect him to do."

"You know, you could be right about that," she snorted then, almost a laugh. "It would suit me just fine if he stabs himself in the ass over the will, but I'm still going to find out from Cyrus if I can officially divorce him or unadopt myself, or whatever it might be called."

Actually she sounded very angry right then, but at least she said goodbye before she hung up, and I was quite sure she was in a hurry to call a lawyer, probably Cyrus. When Sandy and Mom heard about the situation, they were both fuming about how Lucille had been treated and were almost ready to go to Calgary to kick some butt. Dad just grinned and told them both to wait, he was certain that whatever Lucille did, it would hurt William a lot more than any kick in his fat hind end ever would. I had to agree with Dad, but I felt I might just put some thought into revenge myself, then realized that Uncle Willie just might hurt himself more than I ever could. I'd wait to find out more about the situation before putting my oar in the water.

When Lucille finished the last test before her midterm break on Thursday, she drove straight to the ranch and virtually leaped into Sandy's and my arms. The combination of hearing of Grampa Bender's death, followed by her old man's insistent demands had really upset her. On top of that she seemed to feel guilty that she wasn't working in the hospital at the time of Grampa Bender's heart attack, even though she knew there was nothing she could have done. That night and the next day she craved love and affection, so much so that Sandy and I were close to being worn out both mentally and physically. I'm not certain if the physical act of making love is a anodyne for grief at the passing of a loved one, but it seemed that was her preferred treatment and who was I to argue with a practising nurse?

We buried Grampa Bender in the family plot on the 28th of March, choosing a Saturday so any of the family who worked during the week could still attend the service. The funeral itself was very simple since Grampa Bender had never been a strongly religious person and to be honest, neither were the rest of the Bender clan. The ceremony started at eleven in the morning, and we were leaving the grave site less than half an hour later. It was rather telling that the only member of the Bender clan from Calgary to attend the simple funeral was Lucille. Yet later in the day at the memorial service there were close to a thousand people who came to say goodbye and pay their respects to that old man. That show of respect illustrated the way people in our area felt about Toby Bender. Even though he'd lived most of his life in relative isolation, he'd still had a reputation for fairness and honesty in all his dealings with others and that was deeply appreciated.

I was having a very hard time controlling my emotions that day. I was feeling grief, but as people talked about Grampa Bender I also felt pride in the way he had lived and I drew comfort from my family and friends. In many ways though I was upset that I was being treated as the 'heir apparent' for the 'Bender fortune' by several of the local social climbers and their fawning attitudes annoyed me quite a bit. In fact it reached the point where I just wanted the whole thing to be over and done with, so I could leave and be alone with people that understood the real situation.

I wasn't the only person having a rough time that day though, if anything Lucille was in worse shape. What with all the fuss and bother of the day, first with the funeral, then the memorial service and finally the lunch, Lucille almost fell apart. She took Grampa Bender's death the hardest of all of us since she felt she should have been at his bedside to help, but unfortunately there wasn't much my family could do for her. She seemed to be growing quite morose until Jerry Dolens took her aside to talk with her. I don't know what he said, but he managed to calm her enough that she was able to handle the remainder of the memorial lunch.

For the rest of the week that she was home, Lucille spent most of her time very close to various members of the family, especially with Sandy and me. She did spend some time in town, visiting with her coworkers at the hospital and a few friends she'd made around town, but she was always back at the ranch every night. During those evenings with Sandy and I, she was quite intimate and a very energetic lover, claiming that she was 'stocking up for the drought' she'd have to live through until July. On the last day of her ten-day break, after she was in her car, with the engine running, she rolled down the car window and looked up at Sandy and me with tears in her eyes.

"I want to thank you for the last week, but I need to tell you that I feel as if I've been very naughty," she murmured quietly. "You see I know in my heart I was adopted and although you've accepted me as part of your family, I still feel that I shouldn't be here. Besides, I want something more, so I thought you should know; I think I've met someone and it could get serious."

Then, before Sandy or I could say anything, she rolled up the window and drove away.

Although he might have been able to do it sooner, Cyrus arranged to have the reading of Grampa Bender's will on the 25th of April, another Saturday. In this case it was so Lucille could be there, since that was a day when she had no classes and no practical case studies happening. It was certainly not done for the convenience of other out-of-town 'guests' or 'casually' involved people. In fact, if a person happened to be an accountant, it was one of the busiest weeks of the year, so while having it fall on a Saturday in late April made little difference to the rest of us ... When I leaned over and mentioned that to Lucille, who was sitting beside me, she broke into a giggle, then bit her lip as Cyrus frowned at her. The giggle was back a moment later though as her father rushed into the room, but the smile on her face disappeared as the next man entered the room.

"Shit, that's B. J. Pratt, Father's lawyer," she whispered. "It looks as if 'dear Daddy' came prepared for a fight."

"Well now, we know something he doesn't, don't we?" I whispered back ,then looked at 'Uncle' William, shook my head and rolled my eyes, which drew a heavy scowl from him.

I think he was actually going to approach Lucille and me to say something, but just then Cyrus cleared his throat, then began to speak.

"Ladies and gentlemen. I've called you together to read the will of William Tobias Bender and normally I would begin with his first words and carry through from there, however I see that we have visitors from out of town who might appreciate my acknowledgement of their presence. One is a very high priced accountant, and the other is a high priced lawyer, but to my knowledge there is no possible reason why they would both need to be here today. Gentlemen, could you please explain your presence?"

"Well Cyrus, as you know my name is B. J. Pratt and, I represent sixteen members of the Bender family who are challenging the will of William Tobias Bender. It is our contention that he was coerced into placing far more of his lands and investments into the hands of an underage child than he would have done had he been privy to the actual value of those lands and investments."

"Oh, wonderful!" Cyrus crowed, which seemed to absolutely astound the nattily dressed visiting lawyer. "May I see your legal writ please? It may save some time and will certainly simplify matters greatly if I have all the names of those involved in this protest prior to going forward with these proceedings."

Pratt was scowling as he marched up to Cyrus' desk and slapped a sheaf of papers in front of him.

Cyrus paged through them rapidly, then grinned as he shook his head and raised his eyes to meet mine. "Chris, you and your Grandfather were correct. Every living Bender relative who does not reside in this area signed these, but for three people, Miss Lucille Bender and Mrs. Elizabeth Crawford's parents, John and Martha Bender. It would seem that I owe you two dollars."

"Just what does this falderal about assinine wagers have to do with the reading of the Bender will? This is becoming a farce and I do not find it to be amusing in any way, shape or form," Pratt barked loudly. "Are you going to commence with the reading of the will or not? I may well have to modify those writs to ..."

"Oh, no!" Cyrus snorted as he tried to hide a laugh. "There won't be any need for you to modify these writs in any way. The people listed there have already done what Toby expected them to do and since these writs have been presented to me in front of all these witnesses, you will soon be made aware of the result of that action. You see Toby knew the character of his adopted grandson, William, quite well and he made provisions for just such an action. Approximately eighteen-months ago he asked me to write a boiler proof clause into his will because of his suspicions about the avaricious nature of the man in question. That clause provides that if any party attempted to overturn the will, they were automatically eliminated from any and all benefits or bequests which had been mentioned in any previous will. Since I had ample time to research that provision, I called upon some of the greatest legal minds in Canada to make absolutely certain that the clause covered each and every loophole which might possibly be used to overturn the final document. I even consulted with four members of the Supreme Court of Canada to make absolutely certain that it was utterly untouchable in any way."

Cyrus broke into open a chuckle as he paged though the will to the appropriate passages and placed the sheaf of papers so Pratt could read the words which were written there. Pratt leaned forward then, obviously reading from the will and I could see his shoulders slump. Then he turned and walked out of the room, not even pausing to look at Uncle William, who he leaped to his feet and followed Pratt outside. A few seconds later you could hear loud, angry voices, but even though the two men were speaking quite loudly, the actual words were muffled, so although I tried to listen closely, I couldn't make out exactly what was being said.

The entertainment was finished at that point however, and it was time for Cyrus to get down to business, so he set about reading Grampa Bender's last will and testament. For me, the first major surprise in the will came when the shares of Mile High Ranch and the water rights were stated. Grampa Bender had been extremely crafty, because at some time in the past he'd divided the area he owned in Mile High Valley in half. One quarter section contained the house and all the ranch buildings and I inherited that outright. The other quarter section was the site of the artesian well which was the source of the water rights for the extended valley and was to be divided into shares held by members of my generation. I was given majority control with 52% of the shares, but Wil, Beth, Tom and Jasmine each received 10%, while George and Lucille were each bequeathed 4%, providing they lived locally and became a supporting members of the ranch in some way. I looked over at Beth and she winked, so I knew she'd been aware of the change in her shares and Lucille's portion. Since Beth and George had gotten engaged at Christmas and were both members of the sublease agreement on the lower section of the main lease now, the changes made complete sense. Obviously Grampa Bender had wanted to give Lucille a pat on the back for 'rejoining' the family and Beth had seconded the motion. Lucille seemed to be astonished and turned to look at me in surprise, but all I could do was shrug my shoulders, letting her know that the decision was a surprise for me as well. When I thought about it, Grampa Bender had passed control of the water rights to the younger generation, but allowed all the former leases to stand as they were with no changes.

I was somewhat surprised by the fact that George now had a share of the water rights, but it dawned on me that his family brought more land as well as the water rights to another creek into the situation. That crafty old man had acknowledged that fact and had effectively brought the Grant family into the overall picture so that everyone could legally benefit.

Another surprise for me was that Grampa Bender acknowledged that Charlie Engels was part of the family and included him in the dispersal of Grampa Bender's savings, stocks, bonds and other funds. The will gave Charlie an equal share of 'fluid' assets as that of any of Grampa Bender's other grandchildren, but it didn't involve him in either the ranch or the lease agreement. Truthfully those 'fluid' assets weren't a large fortune or anything, but it was the thought which counted in my books.

There was one further surprise for me in the will as well though. It seemed that Grampa Bender had bought a house in town recently, and not just any house either. He had purchased the house that Marjory Deloitte had owned. She was the animal activist who had been killed by her dog and after her death her brother had put her house on the market, but no one had come forward to buy it for some reason. Since the woman had died on the back steps, some wag had decided it was now 'haunted' and had started a rumour about seeing her ghost wandering the back yard of the house. Somehow Grampa Bender had arranged to buy the place, probably at a very low price, but that house was now mine. Even in his will, Grampa Bender had teased me, saying that since I could turn "a chunk of dead dry dirt' from a money pit into a money maker, maybe I could do the same with a 'haunted' house." I think everyone in the room had a laugh at that comment, but I'll be honest, while the comment made me chuckle, it also brought tears to my eyes.

After the reading of the will, and after we had all signed our names to several documents, we all headed up to the Chinese café for a coffee and a snack. Lucille didn't plan to stay long, she only wanted to stop at Frank Dolens to get gas for her car and then was going to head back to Calgary. However since I'd been given the keys to the Deloitte house, I suggested we all go have a look at the place, and Lucille was curious, so she decided she'd join the rest of the family to see what it was like.

What we found in that house was a surprise. The Deloitte family had left behind the majority of the furniture, only removing Miss Deloitte's personal belongings and cleaning up any sign that she had lived in the place. Since the heat, light and water were still working, it looked to me as if I could rent that house at a moment's notice as a fully furnished residence. Lucille astonished me because after looking the place over, she took me aside and asked if she could rent the place.

"Chris, I'm not superstitious and I don't believe in ghosts, so if you don't manage to sell this house right away and it isn't rented by the time I finish my course on July first, I'll rent it from you. However since I'm not really into ranching, if you want to trade for my shares in the water lease, I'll buy it from you right now."

"Lucille, I'm quite sure your water lease shares are worth a lot more than this house is," I answered almost instantly. "If you want to rent it though, I'll hold off and rent it to you in July, but there are three months between then and now, so do you see any improvements you'd like to have made before you move in?"

"Just like that?" she looked at me in surprise, then she was hugging me tightly.

When we let my family know that Lucille was going to be renting the place, but that we'd be fixing it up a bit between now and July, the whole family jumped on the band wagon. In seconds they were offering to help with the repairs and improvements needed to fix it up for her, which brought her to tears. Needless to say she postponed her return to Calgary for an hour or two and she got together with Mom and Aunt Alice to decide exactly what she wanted done to the place. What they decided on really wasn't that extensive, just paint throughout the house, new flooring in the kitchen and a few minor improvements in the main bedroom and bathroom. However, when I suggested she might like new cupboards and appliances in the kitchen, I was thronged with ideas from Mom and Aunt Alice. Lucille was strangely silent and thoughtful, then she took me aside again.

"Chris, I don't want you to go to a lot of extra expense over this," she frowned.

"Lucille, you're a member of the family. You are the antithesis of what we have come to expect from one of the 'city' Benders and my family wants to make you welcome to the clan. To us a brand new kitchen is peanuts, nothing more than a thank you for all the care and comfort you gave to Grampa Bender while he was in the hospital."

"But, I told you, I think I've found someone else," she sniffed, on the edge of tears, admitting what she'd mentioned a few weeks earlier.

"Wonderful," I grinned and teased a little. "Then you can go back to being my kissing cousin and I might get some sleep at night."

"That's going to cost you a new kitchen, mister," she snapped, then giggled through her tears and hugged me once more.

In the long run, the cost of the kitchen wasn't that bad. She wanted a new stove and refrigerator, and she wanted to have a dishwasher installed. The cupboards all got new doors and we installed new counter tops, a new sink and new flooring, but that was it. Oh, the whole house got painted, both inside and out, then we replaced the water heater and had a new tub installed in the bathroom, one that included a shower, but other than that the house was virtually unchanged.

From what Lucille had said after the funeral, I wasn't really surprised when the rumour reached me several weeks later that Jerry Dolens was spending most of his spare time in Calgary.

I hadn't been sitting still while the world had been going around either. I'd finished repairing Grampa Bender's old engine and had installed it in the two-ton truck before the weather broke and spring arrived. Then it was time for cows to calve and the mares to foal. It was also time for Sandy's first batch of incubated eggs to hatch and for the old sow to have another batch of piglets. For about a month there were new arrivals happening all over the ranch and I was busy as a one armed paper hanger in a high wind.

Our cattle herd increased by over a third in the next four weeks. On April first we had 35 purebred polled Shorthorn cows, 28 yearling heifers and one bull. By the first of May we had an additional 36 calves, because one cow had twin calves. I realized that with those calves as well as 35 cows and 28 heifers I was going to have to think about buying another bull and splitting the herd before too late in the year. Either that or I was going to have to sell some stock, which was actually the route I had originally planned to take, but any decision on that subject was going to take some consideration.

Not long after the last of the Shorthorns calved, the Jersey cow had her calf, so now I had to start milking her each morning and every night. I only let the calf feed from her mother for five days, then it became a pail-bunter and we started having fresh cream in our coffee. Between the calf and the nine piglets, they could easily use all the skim milk that we'd have left after we used what we wanted in the house. Then Sandy decided she was going to make her own butter so Mom loaned her an old churn, but that job was up to Sandy, not me. Luckily I'd gone to an early spring auction and found an electric powered milk separator that was in working condition, so Sandy or I wouldn't have to borrow Mom's old hand cranked separator either.

The twelve Quarter Horse mares did quite well that spring too. Between them, they had a eleven foals, but one of them was injured the day after he was born and although I took him to the vet, we ended up putting him down. That hurt, because he'd been an excellent colt from very good stock. I can only guess that he was either kicked or stepped on by another horse, since he had a broken hind leg and was also injured internally.

Sandy did well for her first try at using an electric incubator too. On her first hatch she managed to get 92 chicks out of eight dozen eggs and they were all healthy, so she set another four dozen eggs for Carissa. I just chuckled about that. I found it slightly humourous that Carissa would want to raise chickens, since her initial introduction to live chickens had been while helping Beth and Corrina muck out Mom's chicken coop.

Just about the time that the stock had finally finished calving, foaling, hatching and whatever, I got a call from the Mountview County office. It seemed they hadn't forgotten my discussion with them about using caragana hedging plants in place of snow fences. Unbeknownst to me, they had come out to the ranch to see how our hedging experiment had worked during the previous winter and had been very impressed with what they'd seen. So, with the help of the District Agriculturist, they had gotten a grant to try hedging parts of a two mile stretch of our section of the county road. Most of it was on property I either owned or leased, so they needed my permission to do the planting, but as well as that they wondered if I wanted to add to their order for hedging plants. Their price was about a quarter of what mine would have been, so I jumped on the bandwagon and ordered enough to do the worst areas along the upper road and next to the hydro lines. However they told me that the hedging for that section of roadway was being ordered and planted by hydro. So I backtracked and only ordered enough to provide hedging around the two ten acre leases and the section near them that neither hydro nor the county were planning to plant.

When those plants came from the nursery I had them delivered on a Friday, then called up several friends and arranged for help on Saturday. Friday afternoon I used the flail mower to cut a double wide strip through the grass and weeds where I wanted the hedge to go. Then on the Saturday morning I used the tractor and a single blade plow to cut two furrows along the areas I wanted to plant with the caraganas. That way I and my helpers only had to alternate the placement of the plants in the two furrows, then shovel the freshly plowed soil back around them and give them a dose of water to settle them in. With the four McAdam brothers helping me as planters, we had all the plants in the ground by late Saturday afternoon and they were all watered then too. Sandy used the old truck we'd rigged up the year before to haul the water, but she'd coerced Carissa and Jackie into helping, so they'd used two hoses to water the plants and they almost kept up to the planters.

Sandy and I happened to be up there, scattering some fertilizer around the plants when the hydro crew showed up on Monday morning to plant their section. They couldn't believe how much we'd done over the weekend until I explained our methods. Almost immediately their crew chief went to Carissa and Jackie's to borrow the phone, then came back and hired me to mow and plow the planting furrows for his crew. While he was at it, he tried to hire Sandy to water the plants, but she turned him down. She just laughed and told them that Carissa and Jackie had arranged to borrow the old truck and water tank to look after the hedge we'd planted around the two leases and they'd be using it all summer. So the crew chief offered the deal to Carissa and she jumped on the idea, then she negotiated a deal to water the hedge plants at least once a week, all summer long.

By that fall there was a scraggly three foot high hedge surrounding both of those small leases and stretching all the way along the county road to the top of the big gully at the lower edge of the upper plateau. That hedge wasn't very thick or very effective the first year and it wasn't continuous, because we never hedged the areas which were protected by clumps of trees and bushes, but even that immature hedge helped. We had far fewer snow drifts on the road than normal that winter and in three years time the drifts that did reach the road were minimal. In fact most of the time I was able to clear the snowdrifts from those sections with the small plow I had mounted on the front of my Jeep. Unfortunately because the sections that the county had planted on the other side of the road or on other people's property weren't continuous and because the county hadn't arranged for summertime watering in those areas, their other trials were far less successful. Where the hedge had grown in well, it was quite effective, but in the areas with stunted hedge plants or the open areas between their hedge sections the wind funnelled the snow into even worse drifts than before. It took four years for them to act on those problems, but eventually we had a continuous hedge on both sides of our access road and our winter drifting problems were dramatically reduced.

However, once the hedging plants were in the ground that initial spring, I spent as much time as I could before haying season on the half section of land I owned on the upper plateau. I referred to that chunk of property as the 'Frenchman's' half section and it was a mess when I started. Most of it had been plowed and planted to grain more than fifty years before, but since that time it had been left untouched so it had grown over with patches of scrub brush and occasional clumps of native grass. That original plowing had turned the thin layer of topsoil under and exposed clay subsoil to the surface, but that clay didn't allow water to penetrate to any depth so erosion was a problem. I had high hopes of turning over two-hundred acres of the relatively level areas of scrub brush into a hay field, but I knew that was going to be a long term project.

That spring I managed to use the brush hog behind the old International tractor to mow most of the brush down to only a few inches high on the workable area of the southern quarter section. I scraped together most of the twigs, branches and rocks that the flail mower had left behind using a rock rake. Then I scooped up the resultant piles using the front end loader, then dumping that rubbish into several of the smaller erosion gullies. By doing that I was creating small dams that would trap the runoff and hopefully refill some of those gullies with the silt from the runoff. After that I used my little John Deere crawler pulling a sub-soiler, which was little more than a vertical blade. It was meant to break up the clay hardpan about eighteen inches down and by staying to the more level areas, but keeping parallel to ground contours, the loosened soil should absorb any surface water and keep it from flowing away from the area where it fell. I wanted the natural moisture from falling rain and melting snow to sink into the subsoil instead of feeding those erosion gullies and causing them to grow.

I didn't even try using the Noble Blade at that point since the hardpan was almost at the surface of the soil, and there was no way I could have pulled a wide blade through that. In the first place I didn't have a machine with enough power to do the job and secondly I felt it would only sink down deep enough to disturb the surface soil and do more damage than good right then.

By the time Matt and John were home from school I was so tired it wasn't even funny, but then I'd been working six and sometimes seven days a week from dawn 'til dusk for about six weeks solid. Once they were there to help I took a few days off, but asked Matt to mow the first cut of alfalfa and had John finish the last of the subsoil ripping on the south section of the 'Frenchman's' half section. It isn't that I wasn't working at all, but I only had to do the normal chores around the ranch, which took about four or five hours a day, still it felt almost like I was on holiday for a few days. Then we had to put up the alfalfa hay, but we weren't even finished baling the field when a dairy farmer drove into the yard and bought over half of the bales right where they sat. His crew would pick up the bales where they fell and haul them away, so all we had to handle was the other half of the crop and we needed those for winter feed anyway.

We used the time we saved to advantage though. Sandy and I hopped into the two-ton and loaded two yearling bull calves, then delivered them to farmers who wanted to improve their stock by breeding to good bloodlines. While we were in their area we happened to notice there was an auction close by, so we stopped in to have a look around. While we were at the auction I bought a trailer loaded with three-inch aluminum irrigation pipes, complete with sprinklers, as well as a huge pump with enough capacity to provide the water for the sprinklers. Sandy got into the auction mood too, buying a nearly new John Deere garden tractor with an underslung mower deck and a removable rototiller attachment. Then she bought a small garden trailer and a snow blower that also fit the little tractor. Even after deducting for our purchases though, we made more money on those two young bulls than we spent at the auction. Not only that, but now Sandy had a tractor she could use for her garden and yard work, meanwhile I could irrigate that alfalfa field, which meant we'd get even more hay on the second cut of the year.

Life wasn't standing still for our friends and families either. Tom and George had both graduated from grade twelve, meanwhile Beth, Jackie, Jean and Jess had all finished grade eleven. At the same time Lucille graduated her nursing course, came home and moved into her house. The first weekend after she was home though, she came out to the ranch for a visit, but she was hanging on Jerry Dolens' arm and sporting an engagement ring, which didn't really surprise me. They had set the date for the wedding to be on the 8th of August, and Lucille was planning to ask Dad to walk her down the aisle, then give her away. I think everyone, including Sandy, expected me to take that announcement harder than I did. To be honest, I'd seen a friendship developing between them ever since Jerry had talked his father into letting Lucille drive out to the ranch with the pickup Frank wanted to sell me. Then at Grampa Bender's funeral no one seemed to be able to console Lucille until Jerry Dolens appeared out of nowhere and took her aside to speak to her. As a result I was neither surprised nor upset by their engagement. In fact having Lucille marry Jerry Dolens simplified my life and left me with a situation that felt much more reasonable. I was actually the first family member Lucille and Jerry told and I think I surprised Lucille when I broke into a grin, then offered them my sincere congratulations. What did astonish me was to learn from Sandy that Lucille was three months pregnant, the dates didn't quite add up since she hadn't started to see much of Jerry until after Grampa Bender's funeral. When I considered the timing I had to wonder just who had fathered that unborn child, was it Jerry or was it me?

Right then I didn't have much time to worry about it though. That same day we'd gotten word about those goats Sandy wanted to buy and heard that there was a problem on the seller's end of the deal. Senor Nunez had been evicted and had to be off the property where he'd been keeping the goats inside of two weeks. He was being forced to sell all his goats and although he'd managed to sell his older does, he'd kept the five youngest does and the buck we'd planned to buy, but he also had six yearling kids to sell, all of them does. Sandy wanted to take them all and although this was short notice, we decided we could work with it. However, while we could easily drive down to Montana and pick them up, we had jump through several legal hoops to bring them home because we were importing them across the border.

First a US veterinarian had to check the animals within 30 days of our importing them so he could certify that they hadn't come in contact with any animal that had been carrying a communicable disease within 60 days. On top of that the females had to be certified as originating from 'A Negligible Risk Premises,' and that certificate had half a dozen or more clauses that had to be met, mostly meant to prevent the importation of animals carrying a disease. The one they seemed to worry about most was called Scrapies. Even after we got them home, we had to keep them in an isolated area and away from our livestock for a few weeks, but within 72 hours of arrival they had to be tested for Brucellosis & Tuberculosis by our local veterinarian.

We worked with the District Agriculturalist again and he must have pulled some strings, because a few days later Sandy and I were on our way to Montana. I was taking the pickup and a horse trailer that was big enough for two horses, and I'd washed that as clean as I could get it, then even rinsed it with bleach so there wouldn't be any problems with it at the border. I was certain I could get a dozen small goats into that trailer, but I wasn't taking any chances, so just in case we needed more space, I threw the stock racks on the pickup and washed the truck box down as well.

We headed south early on a Tuesday morning and crossed the border at Carway with narry a problem. The first town we were looking for was only a few miles from the border, then we turned west, heading up toward the mountains. It's a good thing we had exact directions to where we were headed though, otherwise we would never have found Juan Nunez and his goats. I'll be honest, I suspect that Juan's 'homestead' was actually inside the boundaries of Glacier National Park and that might be why he had to get rid of his goats. They had certainly cleaned up all the underbrush around his cabin and I didn't think the US park service would like the risk of those goats getting free and running wild in the park. However since Senor Nunez had all the necessary paperwork, and since it was signed by the veterinarian that our District Agriculturalist had told me would check the animals, I didn't ask embarrassing questions.

Before we could load the goats though, Senor Nunez had to tell us why they were so special. In a rambling tale that mixed an occasional Spanish word into his heavily accented English, he assured us that these were not ordinary Spanish goats. Instead they were something new which he had been breeding and developing for twelve years. He had moved to this area years before with a small herd of normal Spanish goats which he had brought there from Texas. Then twelve years ago he had managed to buy a Himalayan buck, imported to America from Tibet. It was a Zhongwei goat which had long curly hair with an undercoat of very fine wool, so it could survive in extremely cold weather. He explained that in the spring the Tibetans had combed the undercoat out of the longer overcoat of Zhongwei goats to sell to the Chinese, who resold the wool as Cashmere. All of the does we were buying were descendants of that first Zhongwei buck crossed with Spanish goats. The present buck was a descendant of a Chinese Xinjiang buck crossed with a doe which had come from San Clemente Island, off the coast of California. He said when we felt we needed another buck we might have to buy another Spanish goat, because he didn't know of anyone else who had a either a Xinjiang or a Zhongwei goat.

All the time he had been talking Sandy had been making notes, meanwhile I'd been wondering and worrying about loading the goats. I needn't have worried though, the older goats were tame enough that Juan Nunez simply slipped a loop of thin rope over both of each older goats horns, then led it up the ramp into my horse trailer and tied it there. With the small kids, he just scooped them up in his arms and carried them to the back of the truck. I even helped with the little ones. Since the stock racks weren't really high enough to prevent the kids from trying to get out, we fastened a tarp over the top and sides of the stock racks to stop them from trying, but it would also reduce the wind blowing on them. There was no fuss, no muss and no bother about loading them, so I paid Juan for all his goats in cash, even using American bills which I'd picked up from our local bank the day before. He looked so woebegone then that Sandy took sympathy on him. She drew a map of how to find the Mile High Ranch and told him he could come visit the goats any time he wanted. Then we hopped into the pickup, then drove off down the twisting trail from his 'homestead' and headed back home.

We arrived back at the border about four hours after we'd come through in the other direction and we were questioned about our short trip. After I explained why we'd made the rushed trip and showed the papers for our goats, we were allowed to cross the border with no problem at all.

Once we were home, we unloaded the goats in a five acre patch of scrub brush on the far northwestern corner of the 'Frenchmen's' half section, where we'd temporarily strung a six foot high, four strand fence connected to a battery powered electric fencer. The buck immediately checked out the fence, touching it with his nose, and made an astonishing backward leap of about ten feet when he got jolted. It was so funny I couldn't help laughing and the buck seemed to glare at my amusement, but ten minutes later he came over and rubbed against me as if he wanted to be scratched. Meanwhile the does were busy giving the scrub brush a taste test and what they found seemed to suit their palates. Sandy and I wandered over to check the water tank we'd set up for them, making sure it didn't leak, then looked at the little temporary shelter Matt and John had built. Darn if all the goats didn't follow us around, snacking on the occasional weed or bush as they tagged along. They didn't seem to like it when we went out through the gate and left them behind though.

We drove home and I called the vet, arranging for him to come out to do his tests the next day. That was fun and games. We had no trouble catching the older goats to do the tests, but the kids were another story. They had five acres of snowberry and scrub willow bushes to play hide and seek in and they made the most of it. Just in case you're wondering, five acres is over two-hundred-thousand square feet and I think those six young goats led us back and forth over most of it, but we finally cornered the last of them. One or two of them tried out the electric fence, but they didn't appreciate it any more than the buck had and their leaps were almost explosive when they did get jolted. I was surprised that the vet was still in a good mood when he finally finished his examination, but he had samples of blood from each goat when he left. Of course once he had driven away, Sandy began to worry about the results.

Since the temporary electric fence was being run on batteries and since we had to check their water, but wanted to keep a check on the goats anyway, Sandy got into the habit of going up to see them every day. Meanwhile Matt, John and I did our best to make all the ranch fences goat-proof and we only had a few weeks to do the job. We redid many of the fence posts or added new ones and we had to make certain all the fences were at least six feet high. Not only that, but those fences had to be strung with page wire to keep in the goats, as well as barbed wire to hold back cattle. For the first time ever the ranch had a fence which stretched all the way across the valley floor, separating the barn, the corrals and pastures from the house, the garden, the equipment sheds and the alfalfa field. We even improved the fences on all the erosion gullies that came down the cliffs, adding fences to some smaller gullies and several other places that we'd never fenced before.

Three weeks later, when we were given a clean bill of health on the goats, the four of us hopped on horses to herd them home. Actually, when Sandy opened the gate to their temporary pen they followed her out, so she rode off leading them and the rest of us just trailed along for the ride. When we crossed the bridge over the creek, John rode ahead and opened to gate into the barnyard. Sandy led them right through the barnyard and out into the first pasture. I'm not sure what they thought of all the open space or what they made of all the horses and cattle they saw, but once Sandy managed to get away from them, they were soon wandering off in a tight little bunch as they checked things out.

The strange thing was that when Princess saw Sandy was involved with the goats, she immediately assumed that they had been brought there just for her to herd. She was in seventh heaven and while Duke thought the goats were interesting, he had never seen any sheep or goats before, so although he tagged along with Princess for a few moments he soon lost interest, then wandered back to be with his master. Since I wasn't involved in herding the goats, he wasn't interested either and when I went off to do other things, he followed along.

A few evenings later we were just heading into the house to eat when the phone rang. It was Carissa.

"Chris, there's a really old man, a little bitty woman and a young kid here. The old geezer says he wants to talk to you about your goats," she rattled off excitedly. "He's driving a really beat up old truck and hauling a ratty looking old trailer that he left parked in front of my driveway, so it's blocking my way in or out. The old guy talks funny and he has a very strange accent. I can hardly understand him, but then I think he might be Spanish or Mexican."

"Ask him if his name is Juan Nunez," I chuckled, remembering Sandy telling the old guy he could come visit.

After a short break she was back on the phone. "Yeah, he says that's who he is. Do you know him?"

"Yeah, just show him the road to the ranch, but you might have to show him how to open the swing gate too. I'll tell Sandy we have guests coming for a visit so she can add some water to the soup. Oh, and thanks for calling."

After hanging up, I warned Sandy about our visitors, then went out on the front porch to greet them when they arrived.

### Chapter 55