Excerpt
In fact, Joel remembered his mother had told him the story in
one of her few but precious letters he received shortly before she
passed away. From time to time, Joel’s dad would have to find
temporary work off of the ranch to make a go of things. It was
always tough to squeeze a living out of the Circle H and the family
had to continually live hand-to-mouth from the meager checks his
dad would mail them. One time, as the story goes, his dad had
been owed some money for work he did on an oil drilling crew
down in the panhandle—the wells came up dry and so did the paychecks.
Joel could remember his mother’s letter saying that after
being away for a month or so, his dad showed up late one day and
left the next. Apparently, he had come home for his rifle. It was a
long drive for weaponry, but I guess if you are going to take the law
into your own hands you may as well use your own weapon. His
mother had said that it was nearly two weeks before his dad
returned, and this time he had two fillies with him—one was a
flashy little palomino and the other was a petite bay.
That must be her, Joel thought. The flashy little palomino
grew up to become the old blonde mare.
The next morning Joel and Harry were ready to roll. And that
was exactly what they were doing; rolling down the highway leading
into the thriving mini-metropolis of Great Falls.
It was still early when they arrived at the livestock yards. The
sale wasn’t scheduled to begin until noon. Given that it was so
early in the morning, Joel pulled the old half-ton over to the side
of the parking lot at the stockyard and backed the trailer next to
the corrals. A quick reconnoiter confirmed that there was no one
around so Joel and Harry proceeded to catch a few z’s as they
waited for the office to open.
“What do you mean?” Joel yelled. He had been woken from his
sleep as the first trucks started to pull into the parking lot, and
after a few stretches,
Manolis Aligizakis 