partment, went to his car, and headed for the last time to the Cow Palace

Then he left the apartment, went to his car, and headed for the last time to the Cow Palace.

CHAPTER 20

When Monty had positioned the truck and trailer where they could exit the grounds quickly after the performance, he and Laura started toward the main building. The Cow Palace itself was up on higher ground, with the building used currently as a horse barn attached to the west side. The two cattle barns and the acres of open pipe corrals were down below to the south. As they started uphill, Monty glanced at his watch and said, “Rounding up my 5 bulls took longer than I thought. It’s already 8 o’clock and the performance always starts right on time at 8. I’m glad you got to see the opening last night, because it will be pretty much the same tonight – maybe a little more because it’s Cattleman’s Night. But let’s hurry anyway”.

He took Laura’s hand and they walked briskly up the slope and entered by the wide doorway where the livestock were taken into the ring. The sharply-pitched seating around the area meant that there was a lot of space under the stands, all around the oval of the building. Vendors and food concessions were wedged back in the smallest space, leaving a wider path for customers to circulate, checking the wares and searching for the right tunnel-like entrance which led up a dozen steps to place them in the spectator area, from which point they could go up to their seats. If they were among the favored few, they went down instead of up, down to box seats in the first six rows nearest the action. As Monty and Laura started along this circular path, they could hear someone welcoming the guests over the loudspeaker, although they couldn’t distinguish the words.

A few minutes before they reached this point, Ranny had come the same way. He had entered by the employee gate, flashing his old ID badge. Since he had just been fired late that afternoon, the grapevine hadn’t yet gotten the word to everyone, and the guard on that gate wasn’t aware that Ranny was no longer an employee. He did wonder at the way Ranny was dressed, since it wasn’t really cool enough this evening to warrant such a long coat, but shrugged it off as just another thing marking that particular employee as being a strange one.

Ranny breathed a sigh of relief at getting into the place so easily – he was afraid that if he’d tried to come in through the normal entrance to the building, there might have been metal detectors. But he was in, and had his badge pinned in front of his coat to give legitimacy to his presence here, as he hurried, head averted to try to avoid detection by anyone who knew him. He had timed his arrival so that he would be getting to his selected seat area entrance tunnel right at 8 o’clock. He knew the schedule from previous years, and it never varied. The Cow Palace president would be in a special announcer’s box at the south end about 5 rows up from the arena wall, at a small table where a few invited guests sat. All the lights would be suddenly and dramatically completely darkened, leaving only a soft spotlight shining on him, and he would greet everyone, welcome them to the Cow palace on Cattleman’s Night, and jokingly ask if everyone had had enough to eat. Then he’d announce the opening of the evening’s performance, and in the still-black Cow Palace arena, the spotlight would shift to the open gate at that end of the ring. One by one, the 7 flags which had flown over California would be spotlighted as a cowgirl carried it, racing at top speed around the ring.

At least, that was the normal sequence of events.

Tonight, Ranny had arrived at the bottom of the tunnel steps right at 8 o’clock, just as all the lights in the arena went black. He stepped quietly up the steps, and was relieved to see through the darkness that the older female usher stationed at the top of the stairs was on the side away from the speaker’s podium, whispering seat directions to a couple of latecomers blinded by the sudden darkness. Ranny’s position was about 75 yards from where the president stood in the pale spotlight. Ranny couldn’t make out the man sitting next to him, but he’d overheard the maintenance manager boasting to a foreman that he’d been invited to sit with the president tonight. That was the manager who’d fired Ranny this afternoon.

The president, standing tall under the spotlight in his well-cut Western suit, started his speech: “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the annual Cattleman’s Night at the Cow Palace. I saw a lot of you enjoying the delicious barbeque earlier, and I hope –“.

His announcement was cut off by a staccato burst of fire from an automatic weapon, and he crashed forward onto the table, then slumped to the side against the maintenance manager who had pitched back in his seat, blood streaming from fatal wounds in the head and chest. Ranny, hidden in the darkness, had quietly reached inside his long black coat with his left hand just as he had practiced in his apartment. He had grasped the M-16 by the front stock, swung it quickly to his shoulder, this time with his finger inside the trigger guard rather than outside it, and fired a quick burst, killing not only his two targets but also an unfortunate wealthy rancher sitting in the private box behind them, and wounding several people. He dropped the gun, supported by its shoulder sling, rushed down the steps, and headed out the passageway toward the nearest exit at the south end.

Monty recognized the sound of gunfire immediately, and grasping Laura’s hand more firmly, said urgently “Someone’s shooting in there! We need to get out of here, fast!” and turned back the way they’d come.

As they ran toward the south entrance, they were joined by others who had left their seats and were already starting to stream out of the tunnels. They could hear screams from inside, and people yelling –

“Get an ambulance into the ring!”

“Get a paramedic up here!”

“Does anybody see who was shooting?”

And someone who had commandeered the president’s microphone urged “Take cover by your seats – there’s too many people trying to leave at once and you’re going to get injured”.

Some saw the wisdom in that, and crouched down where they were, trying to stay below the seat back in front of them. Others tried frantically to escape, crowding the stairwells, panicked by recent incidents across the nation where random acts of gun violence had resulted in many deaths in a suburban shopping mall and in a rural high school. But people began to calm down when they realized that the shooting had stopped, and the initial chaos was being replaced by a more orderly evacuation.

Since Monty and Laura had not yet entered the stands, they were in the forefront of the mob of people rushing out the south entrance. They had started to slow down once they were well clear of the building, when Monty suddenly felt something hard pressed against his back. Ranny had pulled his .38 from his pocket and used the flap of his long coat to help conceal it as he stuck it in the back of the tall cowboy ahead of him.

“Keep running to your car, or you’ll be as dead as those two bastards back in there!” Ranny hissed. “You two are my ticket out of here”.

Monty partially turned his head and said over his shoulder, “Alright, just take it easy and I’ll get you to my truck down by the cow barns, but let the girl go”.

“Forget that” Ranny snarled. “Two hostages are better than one, and don’t get any ideas about being a hero or your girlfriend will get it first”.

“She’s someone I just met, and she shouldn’t be involved in this” Monty protested, as all three ran down through the dim light past the cow barns.

“She’s coming too, so shut up!” was Ranny’s furious response.

When they got to the truck and trailer, Ranny sized up the situation quickly. He had been around these rigs for years, and he saw that Monty’s was a fifth wheel hitch, with a small enclosed compartment which extended over the pickup bed and above the hitch. It had a door just large enough to squeeze in a couple of bales of hay or a couple of saddles, and had a small sliding window in the front which could be opened to provide ventilation to the animals in the trailer.

“I’m going to get in there to hide, and then you’re going to drive me out of here. If you get any smart ideas about tipping off anybody, I’ve got this and I’ll sure use it again” and Ranny flipped his coat open to let them see the M-16. “Now give me your cell phones!”.

Laura, still in shock from this sudden terrifying turn of events, pulled hers out of her purse without thinking and handed it to Ranny, who stuck it in his shirt pocket. Monty said “I don’t have one – there’s no service out where I live”.

“Good girl. Now, both of you stand right here until I get inside that compartment, and remember this gun has 30 rounds. Then you, girly, stand by the passenger door where I can see you, and you, cowboy, close this door behind me, then both of you get in the truck and drive out of here. And no hero stuff or you’re both dead”.

He stepped from the truck’s rear bumper over the tailgate, then unlatched and opened the little door on the side of the compartment. He waved the revolver menacingly at the two standing beside the truck, then stepped up onto the pickup’s side to get close to the opening and awkwardly backed into the tight space. Ranny was thankful, for the first time in his life, that he wasn’t a large man, because the space was small. Still pointing the revolver out the compartment’s side door at his two hostages, he slid open the small window in the front of the compartment and wriggled around from his prone position to get the M-16 pointing toward that opening.

“Now close this door and get in the truck and drive out of here. And remember that this gun is covering your girl” Ranny hissed. “And open that window in the back of your cab so I can yell at you if I need to”.

Laura was standing by the passenger door as she’d been told, so Monty had no choice but to do as directed by this madman with his guns. They got into the truck, Monty slid open the small window in the pickup’s cab behind their heads, and Laura slid across the wide bench seat close to Monty. He fired up the truck, and the deep rumble of the dual exhausts provided some cover so they could talk without their voices carrying to Ranny’s station about 8 feet above and behind their heads.

“Oh, Monty, what are we going to do?” she questioned quietly, her voice quavering slightly despite her effort to keep it even. She lived in a big city, but Montreal was so crime-free compared to most American cities that this violence was something entirely outside of her experiences to date.

“From what he said, it seems like he had a grudge against specific people in the Cow Palace. I think if we stay calm and do what he says until we can find a way to get clear of him, we’ll be OK” Monty replied seriously, hoping that what he said was accurate and not just something to calm their nerves. Laura twisted her legs away from Monty’s side so that he could use the floor-mounted stick shift, and they started rolling toward the exhibitors’ exit gate.

The gate guard ran out of his booth and waved at them to stop – he had just gotten a phone call telling him there had been a shooting in the building. Monty was contemplating just accelerating past him instead, although that might have provoked a chase. That decision was taken away from him when a black and white CHP cruiser, with siren shrieking and all lights flashing, swerved in off the street with rubber burning off the tires as he braked hard. The way was blocked, and Monty had to stop, which he tried to do smoothly so as not to arouse suspicion. He whispered to Laura, “Try to stay calm, and I’ll try to get us through this. If there is any shooting, drop to the floor under the dashboard”. He squeezed her hand, and rolled down the window.

The CHP officer had his gun out in his right hand, his heavy flashlight in his left, as he cautiously approached the truck. When he saw Monty’s tall figure with his cowboy hat, he relaxed slightly, but still held his gun ready.

“The report said the shooter was a small man with a long black coat, and that doesn’t look like you”, he said to Monty. “But I can’t let you leave until I get your name and address, and check your trailer. Let’s see your driver’s license first, please.”

“No problem, officer” Monty said, fishing his wallet out of his pocket and flipping it open to the license. “But if you need to get that for everyone here, it would be a lot quicker if you just recorded our exhibitors’ number because the Cow Palace has all our information tied to that number”.

“Good suggestion” the cop replied, handing back the license, as he copied down the number from the yellow parking sticker in the bottom left corner of the truck’s windshield. “Let me check the trailer and then you can be on your way”.

The trailer had solid metal sides about 4 feet tall, and a metal roof with sides slightly curved down. Between the side walls and roof was a foot or more of open space for ventilation, with a couple of horizontal iron bars to keep animals from sticking their heads out. Fearing that the shooter might have hidden in the trailer, the CHP officer crouched down as he approached the side. He turned on the flashlight and cautiously raised it in his left hand, sticking it in the open space above the solid wall, illuminating the inside. Holding the light at arm’s length to keep his head well away from that spot in case there was someone in the trailer, he slowly lifted his head up to peer inside, holding his gun up to the opening with his right hand.

The bull nearest that point, curious to see what was going on, lifted his head at the same time. The officer, instead of seeing emptiness or a fugitive, was suddenly confronted instead with a massive black bull head. He leapt back, and only his training kept him from firing his gun reflexively at such a startling sight.

“You should have warned me about the bulls” he said to Monty, laughing shakily. “I guess no one would dare hide in there with those big brutes”. The start he had gotten from that encounter had rattled him, and it didn’t occur to him to check the small compartment above the trailer hitch. “You can leave with your load, but if you think of anything that might help, call us.”

“Thanks, officer. We were loading the bulls and didn’t see anything until people started running out of the building” Monty said, hedging the truth, but finally able to relax the tightness in his back. He had been half expecting the hidden man to panic when he saw the cop and start shooting, so it was a huge relief to be cleared to leave.

He put the truck in gear again, starting off slowly to avoid jostling his load – his load of 5 bulls which he wanted, and one man whom he definitely didn’t want.

CHAPTER 21

For the first few minutes, neither Monty nor Laura spoke, each too shaken by this totally unexpected, unsettling, and unfamiliar experience to say much. When the silence was broken, it was Monty who spoke first.

“Laura, I can’t tell you how sorry I am that this has happened. I wanted to treat you to a good experience for your last night in San Francisco, and instead I’ve dragged you into a nightmare”, he said sadly.

“Oh, Monty, don’t apologize, please” Laura begged, putting a hand on his arm. “None of this was your fault, and I heard how you tried to get him to let me go. That was very brave of you.” Then she brightened, despite the danger they were still in. “Besides, I did love the Santa Maria barbeque tonight, and it was every bit as good as you said. And I really enjoyed helping you load your bulls. That was definitely a unique experience, and one I won’t forget.” Then her mood changed again, and she added soberly, “I guess I won’t soon forget this part of the experience, either”.

“When we get a bit further out, I’ll see where he wants to go and maybe we can get rid of him” Monty said hopefully. “We’ll just have to hope for the best, try to not anger him, and we’ll get this behind us”.

As they drove south, several times they were met by police cars from different jurisdictions racing north with lights and sirens, obviously heading toward the scene of the shooting. When they had driven several miles south, into a more deserted area of industrial buildings, Monty swung the truck in to the curb and left the engine idling. He checked to ensure that there were no pedestrians around, turned his head to the small opening in the rear window, and yelled back to Ranny, “Do you want out in South San Francisco, or San Jose, or where can we drop you?”

“Are you headed south?” Ranny yelled back.

“Yes, but I’ll be happy to take you wherever you want to go” Monty replied.

“Mexico is south, and that’s where I want to go” Ranny, yelled back, having been thinking for the past few minutes about a possible destination. “But we’ll go to your place tonight and I can make my plans there. Let’s get going!”.

As they started up, heading in the direction of the freeway, Monty said unhappily, “Well, so much for getting rid of him quickly. No idea whether he expects to take the truck to go to Mexico, or whether he plans to take us with him as protection. It doesn’t sound as if he’s thought this all the way through”.

“But if he just takes the truck and leaves us, wouldn’t he be afraid we’d put the cops on this trail? Doesn’t that mean he might shoot us?” Laura asked fearfully.

“I really think he just had it in for certain people, and I don’t have the feeling he’ll shoot us unless we try to escape or alert the police. I think he’d just tie us up securely if he leaves us, rather than shooting us. But we have about 2 hours’ drive, so let’s see what we can come up with to try to get out of this” Monty said, with more assurance than he felt.

They were silent with their thoughts for a while, and then Laura said, “I wonder if I should write something on paper and drop it out the window?”

“There’s so much other trash along the freeway I doubt it would be found, and I’m afraid he might see it blowing out the window and get angry” Monty replied, not voicing his fear of what that anger might turn to. “But thanks for giving me an idea, Laura. In about 100 miles, there’s a highway rest stop. We could say you need to use the restroom, and when you’re in there, you could leave a note where someone would be more likely to see it”.

“We should be thinking about what kind of message to write while we’re driving. I have a pen in my purse, and there will be toilet paper in the restroom” Laura said, quickly reverting to her normal habit of analyzing a problem and coming up with possible solutions. “But also, let’s talk to take our minds off what’s in the trailer behind us. You go first, Monty. Tell me about your ranch, and what work you do there, besides chasing bulls into trailers. Do you do the calf roping and bronc like riding we saw last night?”

“Bronc riding, no”, laughed Monty. “I’m not sure whether I’m too old, too chicken, or too smart for that. I have a well-trained horse who does everything I need him to do, without any bucking. As for calf roping, we definitely do that, but not the way they do it in competitions. Neighbors are always more than happy to get together to help, and they enjoy showing off their roping and riding skill, but any cattleman who saw his calves treated that roughly would kick the offending cowboy off the ranch immediately”.

“So how do you handle the calves differently, then?” questioned Laura, eager to add to her knowledge of a field completely new to her and happy to have something to take her mind off the predicament they were in.

“Well, it actually involves teams of 4 or 5 people, usually. The best ropers catch the calves, one roping the head, the other the hind feet, but they don’t chase them any more than necessary, and don’t drag them once they’ve been roped. Someone on the ground, often a woman or a younger person, grabs the calf and throws it, which is fairly easy when it’s roped at both ends. Once on the ground, that person kneels on the calf to hold it down and loosens the rope on its neck enough to slip one front foot through the loop also. That ensures the rope won’t choke it, and helps to keep the calf down. A fourth person runs over with a branding iron and stamps the brand in the right spot for that ranch owner, on the hip, ribs, or shoulder. The same person, or another, depending on how many people are available, gives any vaccination or medication, and if it’s a bull, castrates it”, Monty explained.

“A couple of questions”, Laura laughed. “First, you said it was often women or kids holding the calf. Do you mean only big macho men get to do the fun stuff like roping?”

“No, we’re not male chauvinists at all” Monty protested. “Far from it. Some of the best ropers are women and kids, and they’re always welcomed. But some people are not as skillful, because roping really is harder than it looks, especially for catching the heels, and others just prefer to work on the ground crew”.

“OK, next question. Do you mean you brand the calves without any type of anesthetic?” Laura asked, concern in her voice.

“Check the thickness of the cowhide on those new boots of yours, and I think you’ll find it’s pretty thick. The iron is very hot so it’s only held for a few seconds. I don’t expect it hurts much more than when you got those pretty little earlobes of yours pierced”, Monty teased.

“Well, I’ll not believe it doesn’t hurt them until I see it. If I ever get that chance”, Laura added wistfully, thinking of how nice it would be to spend time with this wonderful man on his ranch, but fearing that the outcome of this trip might mean that she wouldn’t be experiencing much of anything any more.

Then Monty turned the tables by asking her about her work, and she described briefly what it was that she did in the field of information technology. Since it was so technical, and not really interesting to someone not in that field, she wrapped that up quickly and instead told him about her city. She described her favorite restaurant, in a stone building in Old Montreal, a building older than any in California. She told him about the nighttime parade through the streets, honoring St. John Baptiste, Quebec’s patron saint. Mount Royal’s sloping parkland was her favorite urban hiking spot, and a great place for watching any fireworks displays. She described the views from the top of Mount Royal, and how from her office window she could see the mighty St. Lawrence River through spaces between the skyscrapers. The swift, silent, and clean Metro subway was another thing she liked abut her home town.

But enthused as she was describing Montreal, she was aching to know more about Monty’s life. She was saddened to hear how his parents had died in the tragic accident which had made him ranch owner at such an early age, and she put her hand again on his arm in sympathy. She pressed him to describe the ranch, although it seemed she would be getting to see it if their unwanted passenger had his way

. He told her how the little river ran through the middle of the ranch, making water available for the cattle to drink so that he didn’t need many storage tanks or wells. Unlike most California rivers, which spent most of the summer and fall as dry sand beds, this one was fed by a reservoir upstream so carried water year-round. Unaccustomed to describing the ranch, he drew on his memory of what he saw as he rode Buck up hills and down swales, through foothills dotted with oak trees, and up to the top of the highest peaks on the ranch. He described the wildlife he saw frequently: coyotes, deer, bobcats, rattlesnakes, possums, even a mountain lion glimpsed one memorable morning years ago. He told her of the cycle of life in a year on the ranch. In the late fall, the calves were born so that the nursing cows would have feed when the rains started. By spring, the calves were also eating grass, and had grown big enough that it was time to gather the cattle in. Then the calves were branded and decisions were made about keeping the best heifers to put back into the herd while culling out any old, crippled, or barren cows. The cattle leaving the ranch were either hauled by the owner to be sold at the local auction, or if there were many steers and heifers, sold as a lot to buyers who came with huge double-decked cattle trucks. Those were sold by weight, with the truck being weighed empty and again loaded, to determine total weight of the livestock.