A Hewey Calloway Adventure, Book 5
Western Adventure
Date Published: 12-03-2024
Publisher: Forge Books
Elmer Kelton’s Hewey Calloway, one of the best-loved cowboys in all
of Western fiction, returns in this novel of his middling years, as he looks
for work―but not too much work―in 1904 West Texas.Hewey Calloway had
intended to pass straight through Durango, Colorado, en route to visit a
friend several miles northeast of the city. He had left his home range about
a year before, with a herd of young horses. It was supposed to be a
relatively straightforward affair; deliver the horses, collect the payment,
and return home with the money. Things got out of hand, however, and there
he was in Durango a year later with plans to go north rather than south. Oh,
well, he thought, he had always wanted to see new country.
It isn’t long before his travels lead him to a cabin on a rainy night.
There he meets a young man, sick as a dog, who weakly tries to send him off.
And for good reason: the man has smallpox, and soon enough, Hewey catches
the deadly disease. The man cares for him in turn, and it’s just as he is
feeling better that the man disappears. The next morning a Pinkerton
detective turns up with posse, looking for a wanted bank robber.
As he travels north, Hewey seems to run in with both the young man who
tended to him, as well as the detective. But something seems off about the
Pinkerton detective, and Hewey keeps his mouth shut. When he reuinites with
his friend Hanley, they do everything they can to get to the bottom of the
mystery that threatens both theirs and this young man’s life.
EXCERPT
At daybreak Hewey was tying up his bedroll, preparing to head out, when he heard a loud voice from outside.
“Hello the house! Whoever’s in there, show yourself!” The voice was commanding and not a bit friendly.
Hewey opened the door and stepped out onto the broken- down little porch. He saw better than a half-dozen riders arrayed in front of the cabin, all armed to the teeth. They were not pointing those guns at him, but they were all casually standing ready. That prompted a momentary urge to jump back inside and bar the door, tempered by a sudden recollection that the cabin door didn’t even have a bar.
“What can I do for you?” Hewey asked the man who appeared to be in charge.
“The name’s Murphy. I’m with the Pinkertons.” Hewey took an immediate dislike to the man who called himself Murphy. He dressed more like a town dude than a cowboy or lawman, but it was his manner that rubbed Hewey the wrong way. He had small, mean eyes that made Hewey mistrust the man instantly. Hewey had always felt he could read a horse by its eyes, and in his experience the same usually worked on a man.
“We’ve been trailing a bank robber for better than two weeks, and we received information that he was holed up near here. Maybe in this very cabin. For all we know, you’re him.”
“You got the wrong man,” Hewey replied, “I’m Hewey Calloway. But I suspect I might’ve spent some time with the feller you’re after.” Hewey explained how he came to be there and to become well acquainted with their quarry.
“Smallpox, you say,” answered the Pinkerton man.
Hewey stepped in the saddle, and Steamboat never moved. He settled into the saddle, mashed his heels down
and pointed his toes out. He had the hackamore reins crossed over Steamboat’s neck, and he held the reins in both hands about a foot apart. When he was ready, he nodded his head and said, “Turn him loose!”
Murray let go of the ear and jumped back, and the snubber turned Steamboat loose. The sorrel stood still for a moment, and Hewey felt him take in a deep breath. He tucked his chin, knowing something was coming.
Steamboat exploded forward, taking several running steps. The flank cinch grabbed him far back, and he ducked his big head and began bucking. The first jump jarred Hewey’s teeth. The big-headed sorrel was serious. Steamboat began making his trademark sound, a sound similar to a straining steamboat engine pushing its load up a fast- moving river. The unusual sound might have unnerved Hewey had he the time to think about it, which he didn’t just then.
Hewey rode through the second and third jumps, but Steamboat’s kicks kept getting higher and the landings harder. Feeling confident, Hewey reached forward with both feet and raked his spurs along Steamboat’s shoulders. The horse hit the ground, changed leads and spun to the right suddenly. Hewey hadn’t expected the move and felt his body slide left, loose in the saddle.
Steamboat had been born with a natural ability to buck, and most of those who knew the horse felt he enjoyed it. But all of them agreed that the horse was as good as any bucking horse going at feeling a weakness and seizing
it.
Steamboat felt one such weakness when Hewey got loose
and his weight shifted left. The steamboat sound grew more intense, and the horse leaped in the air and sunfished, his body nearly parallel to the ground, his left side six feet off the hard surface of the arena. Steamboat’s body seemed to hang in the air, then he kicked his feet and righted himself on the way back down.
When Steamboat hit the ground Hewey was without his right stirrup. He still had both hands on the hackamore reins, fighting for his balance. There had been a moment when he might have recovered if he had grabbed the saddlehorn, but sure-enough bronc riders disdained to claw leather, particularly in public. That moment had passed anyway, and both Hewey and Steamboat knew it.
Steamboat jumped forward, landing hard on his front feet and kicking up with his hinds. There was talk later from knowing spectators that they had never seen him kick so high. Hewey might have ridden through it, had he begun the move with a good seat and both stirrups. As it was he
was shot over the front of the saddle, clearing Steamboat’s big head by several feet.
The ground had been packed hard by the hooves of the horses and the boots of so many cowboys, and it did not give as Hewey’s body slapped into it. All the air left his body with an audible sound, and it took several excruciating seconds for his lungs to reinflate. Wilson and Murray helped him to his feet.
Murray was grinning ear to ear. “That was some bronc ride, mister! I never seen a horse buck like that!”
Breathing was becoming a little easier, and Hewey was beginning to feel better. “I reckon that ol’ bronc knew he had to bring his best to unseat me.”
“Well, I’d say it worked,” Wilson said stoically.
About the Author
John Bradshaw is a native of the small town of Abernathy, Texas. He is an
award-winning journalist with well over a thousand published stories. Elmer
Kelton’s The Familiar Stranger, co-authored with Steve Kelton, is his
first book.
Bradshaw attended South Plains College followed by Texas Tech University.
He spent several years shoeing horses for a living as his writing career
progressed.
While the desire to write books was always there, Bradshaw first pursued a
career in journalism. He wrote numerous stories for ranching, horse and
horseshoeing magazines.
Growing up, Livestock Weekly came in the mail once a week, as it does for
most in the livestock industry. Writing for Livestock Weekly was always a
goal, and in 2005 Bradshaw’s first story was published. It was a
profile of Brownie Metzgar, a humorous cowboy still working in a feedlot
while in his late 80s.
In 2007 Bradshaw accepted a fulltime position with Livestock Weekly. While
with the paper he had over a thousand stories published, as well as enough
market reports to give him permanent nightmares.
Horses have always played an important role in his life. The son of a
horseshoer, he has spent a significant amount of time either on or under a
horse. He still shows in both ranch horse and reined cow horse
competitions.
He and his wife, Sara, live outside Abernathy. Sara owns an architecture
firm, SK Architecture Group, and they raise Spanish goats, hair sheep and
cattle.
In 2013 the couple had a stillborn son, Fox Joaquin Bradshaw. After several
years of heartbreak they adopted an infant boy, whom they named Julian Boone
Bradshaw. Boone died in his dad’s arms following an accident at the
barn five days before his sixth birthday.
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