Cassie and Jasper. Bryn Fleming

edge of losing the ranch,” he finally said; a coyote howl of an announcement, defeated and sorrowful.

      “The place was all paid for a long time ago, but, well, I’ve had to borrow against it during bad years. Now there’s a mortgage needs to be paid every month.”

      Money, I thought, in the grown-up world, it was always money.

      He went on, “Winter’s coming early. Snow level’s dropping.” He nodded toward the window where we could see the white snow line straight as a ruler across the foothills and the peaks beyond. “The cattle need to be brought down from the mountains right away, before the storms hit.” He paused so we’d feel the weight and coldness of the problem.

      “I’m in no shape to ride.” He knocked his glass gently against the top of his cast, halfway up his thigh, indicating the source of our troubles.

      Fran spoke up. “Can’t we hire somebody?”

      Pa shook his head and smiled a slow, thin-lipped smile. “Truth is, girls, there’s no money. With all the rain at cutting time, the hay crop didn’t bring much.”

      Money, again.

      His face was slack and dark. “I’ll need to sell the herd where they are, take a loss, let the new owners bring them down from the mountains. It’s the only way.”

      I stared at him. “Sell the herd?” The cows and calves had been fattening up on the mountain pastures all summer. Pa and I and the ranch hands usually brought them down to the lower fields for the winter. We sold the young steers to keep us going over the winter and auctioned some of the heifers in the spring.

      “What would we live on after that?” Fran asked.

      “That’s the thing,” Pa said. “No cattle, no money, no mortgage payments, no ranch.” He tried to lighten his voice then, like he was giving Fran and me some good news, instead of squeezing the life out of us, well, out of me anyway.

      “I’ve been offered a construction job in Bend. We’d move there and I’d start work when my leg healed up.”

      Fran’s face brightened. “Really? Live in the city?”

      I knew my sister. I could see it spinning through her mind like a carnival ride; the bigger school, more boys, the movies and malls. She was a traitor to the ranch. I hated her right then.

      Me? I felt my face go red and my hands begin to shake. I stood so suddenly, my chair clattered to the floorboards. I didn’t care.

      “No! Pa, no! We can’t leave the ranch!” My throat tightened like I was being strangled. “What about Rowdy and Pet? What about my friends?”

      “The horses would have to be sold.” Pa didn’t meet my stare. “You’d make new friends.” He swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple rising slowly, and turned even further away.

      Fran just sat there, a smug smile cutting her face in two. I wanted to slap her.

      I closed my eyes tight, wanting the whole scene to disappear. Fiery tears gathered behind my eyelids. I opened my eyes, let the tears slip down my cheeks, a punishment for Pa, and stomped out.

      I grabbed the bridle from the barn and caught Rowdy. He nickered and nuzzled my shirt pocket, looking for a peppermint or a carrot.

      “Oh, Rowdy,” I pressed my face to his face and felt his eyelashes whisper across my wet cheek. “How could I ever leave you?”

      I couldn’t even think about someone else owning my horse; brushing him, riding him, or worse yet, neglecting him. I thought of poor thin Glory, the horse Jasper and I had rescued, saw her sad eyes, ragged coat, and overgrown hooves. No, I couldn’t let that happen to Rowdy. I wouldn’t.

      My hands shook as I buckled his cheek strap and pulled the saddle cinch tight. I lodged my foot in the stirrup and swung up.

      My thoughts raced ahead of us as Rowdy and I took down the hill behind our house in long reaching strides. My horse felt my anger, my sadness; I know he did. He knew me deeper than anyone, even Jasper.

      When we reached the ridge crest, I pulled Rowdy to a halt. He blew hard and danced in the bunchgrass. I patted his neck under his black mane and kept the reins tight.

      I skimmed my eyes over the land below me; the John Day River Valley, Sutton Mountain flat-topped and stern, the distant, darkening humps of the Ochoco Range to the west, the Strawberry Mountains layered green on darker green to the east. The mountains watched over me all my life.

      This was my home; the patchwork hay fields, the river cutting through cliffs. I was part of the land. It made me “Cassie”: rider, ranch kid, cowgirl.

      I looked around at our neighbors. Jasper’s family’s ranch hunkered in its bowl just down the winding gravel road from ours. Carter’s cattle ranged their pasture where Sutton Mountain leveled out into the valley. The John Day River, flat and calm and green, wound out of the mountains, twisted through the valley, and dwindled away out of sight.

      How could I leave this place for city streets and traffic, lights and noise and people everywhere? I’d sooner sleep in a cave in the mountainside with the bats squeaking in and out and the rattlesnakes wanting into my warm bedroll. I’d sit in the mouth of my cave and look down on this valley and no one could ever make me leave.

      But I was just a kid. Parents made the decisions. Until I was eighteen, I might as well be in jail for all the choice I had in my fate. I felt angry tears ready to overtake me again, my stomach roiling like I’d eaten something bad.

      I swung down off Rowdy and sat cross-legged in the dust on the ridgetop, wiping my runny nose with my sleeve.

      There had to be a way to stay. Had to. Had to.

      I ran through it in my mind, turning it over like a piece of river rock, looking for a speck of gold in the gray granite.

      Pa’s words came back to me: “no money, no ranch.” The whole conversation repeated itself painfully in my head, over and over. I thought hard, tried to turn my useless anger into a solution.

      If we absolutely had to sell, maybe whoever bought our ranch would let me stay on as a hired hand. After all, I knew every draw and canyon a cow could hide in. I could rope and ride and cook and clean. I’d do anything.

      Or maybe I could live at Jasper’s. At least I’d still be out here, not in the city. I could keep Rowdy. I could still work cattle. And Jasper’s folks were nice.

      But, being next door, I’d have to see whatever strangers bought our place coming and going every day, see their horses in our corrals, some other kid getting on the bus at the end of our driveway, knowing her saddle sat on the rack Ma made just for me. Nope; I didn’t reckon I could stand it.

      “This stinks!” I shook my head and said, “Come on, Rowdy.” I stood and swatted the dust from the seat of my jeans and wiped my sleeve across my face again. I wrestled my sadness into determination.

      I had to figure it out, but I was drained dry of ideas, like a stock pond at the end of summer: just a little pool of damp at the bottom, everybody, ranchers and cattle, looking skyward, praying for rain.

      I scratched Rowdy under his forelock and whispered, “Let’s go see Jasper. Maybe he can think of something.”

      Chapter 3

      As I rode down the hill, the scene in Jasper’s barnyard was so calm and peaceful, I almost hated to stir it up with my problem. Seemed like I had no choice, though, and what are best friends for? I’d helped Jasper get his dog, Willie, after all. Now I was the one who needed help.

      Jasper was brushing Tigger’s dun coat with a rubber currycomb, making big circles to loosen the hair and dirt. Tigger munched her hay. Jasper was singing something sweet to his mare as her tail swept the dirt.

      Willie drowsed in the shade of the tall poplar tree by the barn. He raised his head and wagged his tail slowly, flop, flop in the dust when he heard