“What the blazes is going on here?!”

            John Cannon’s roar made seven heads turn in his direction, though only for a moment. Finding Buck, Blue and five of his hired hands sitting around outside his kitchen door was the last thing Big John had expected on riding in from his early morning rounds. But here they were.

            He dismounted, hastily looped the horse’s reins over the hitching rail, and stormed over to repeat his question. Before he could, however, Victoria’s voice – a very angry voice – echoed from inside the kitchen.

            “How could you, Manolo? You knew how important last night’s dinner was to me! You knew Papa would be here! You knew and yet you could not be bothered to attend!”

            “Ay-yi-yi, Hermanita, por favor,” Manolito’s weary voice responded. “Not so loud. My head is splitting.”

            “Well perhaps if you had not spent the night in Tucson drinking mescál, it would not be! And now you come skulking into my kitchen to steal a bottle of sherry? ¡Quítate de mi vista antes que me enoje contigo y te dé más dolor de cabeza! Estoy avergonzada llamarte mi hermano. ¿Me oyes? ¡Avergonzada”

            “She is ashamed to call him her brother,” Pedro translated from his perch on a pickle barrel just outside the door. “And she offers to do worse than split his head.”

            On the barrel to his left, Reno nodded, pulled a one dollar note from his shirt pocket and passed it to Ira, who added another and passed both to Joe. Joe handed the notes to Sam, who tucked them into his own pocket and made a note on a small scrap of paper. Joe handed him a silver dollar. “That’s on Mano,” he said. Sam snorted, pocketed the dollar and made another note.

           
            “For the last time, Victoria, I am a grown man and will do as I please!” Manolito was shouting now as well. “¡No soy responsable a ti ni a ninguna otra persona! ¡Soy un hombre – un hombre libre!”

             “He says he is a free man and that...” The rest of Pedro’s interpretation was drowned out by a furious shriek and a loud stream of rapid-fire Spanish from Victoria.

            John decided he’d had about enough, and began a determined stalk toward the door, only to find his path blocked by a black-gloved hand pressed gently to his shoulder. “Brother John,” Buck admonished, “I really, really wouldn’t go in there if I was you. I really wouldn’t. This here’s what you call a guerra pequeña. A little war. Muy peligroso – dangerous – to interfere. Comprende?”

            On the heels of his warning, a plate sailed through the door and shattered against one of the kitchen porch’s support posts, narrowly missing Blue’s head. John’s son scrambled off the crate he’d been sitting on and shuffled awkwardly to his father’s side. “Uncle Buck’s right, Pa. Better stay outta there!”

            Victoria’s rant had gained still more volume. “¡Eres un gallo borracho que se terminará en una manera muy mala!”

            “¡Y tú eres una mujer consentida que siempre está entremetiendo y que insiste que todo el mundo corresponde a su voluntad!”

            “She calls him a drunken rooster,” Pedro said, “and he calls her a spoiled woman who wants all the world to...”

            He was cut off by Victoria’s indignant scream of rage, followed by the sharp crack of breaking glass. Another moment, and a dripping wet Manolito appeared in the doorway. Rivulets of pale pink sherry ran from glass shards in his hair onto his forehead, and streamed in rose-colored puddles onto his rumpled gold shirt. He shook an angry fist at no one in particular and bellowed, “I will not be...!” At which point his eyes rolled back into his head and he collapsed into an unceremonious heap at Big John’s feet.

            The latter looked up to see his outraged wife in the doorway, hands defiantly planted on her hips. “And what are all of you gawking at?” she demanded. “Have you no work to do? No ranch to run?” Her hands flew upward, and she vented another throaty cry of disgust as she turned and stormed back into the house. “Men! ¡Nunca los voy a entender ni siquiera si Dios me deja vivir cien años! Nunca!”

            “She will never understand men if she lives to be...”

             Sam interrupted the translation. “Never mind, Pedro. We get the idea.”

             Buck gave his nephew a playful slap on the back and then pointed to the “body” on the ground. “Gimme a hand here, Blue Boy.” They each grabbed an arm, hauled a moaning Manolito to his feet and dragged him toward the nearby watering trough.

            “Well?” John’s booming voice brought all five hired hands to their feet in a hurry. “You heard the lady. Fine day on the range you’re starting, sitting around on your backsides. What are we running here, a ranch or a sideshow? Get to work!”

            “Yes sir, Mr. Cannon. Right away.” Sam tipped his hat to the boss as the lot of them headed for the barn to saddle up – and no doubt to redistribute their ill-gotten gains.

            John contemplated the kitchen door for a moment longer, then decided that a retreat back to the range might be the better part of valor at that. On the way to his horse, he deliberately ignored the splash, shriek and indignant sputter coming from the watering trough. He mounted up and rode proudly through the gate posts of his hacienda in the Arizona desert.

            Yessiree, it was gonna be a fine day on the High Chaparral.