Cattle Brands
Andy Adams
Paperback
(Independently published, July 27, 2020)
Cattle Brands is a collection of 14 entertaining short stories depicting not only the life of cowboys in the wild, wild West, but also the harrowing skirmishes with banditos, thrilling shoot-outs, attempt at and the recapture of stolen chattel from fierce desperados, and much, much more exciting accounts that make one think it all actually happened. The story covers a drive which began in Texas on the Mexican border and went to the Blackfeet Indian Tribe in Montana. They provide a more realistic look at the life of lawmen and outlaws in the old west. The first night they camped the Mexican murdered them both, took the money, and crossed into Mexico. He hid their bodies, and it was months before they were missed, and a year before their bones were found. He had plenty of time to go to the ends of the earth before his crime would be discovered. "Now that Mexican would never think of betraying the banker, his old friend and patron, his "muy bueno" amigo. There were obligations that he could not think of breaking with the banker; but these fool sheep men, supposing it was simple honesty, paid the penalty of their confidence with their lives. Now, when he rode over this same road alone, a few months before, with over five thousand dollars in money belonging to these same men, all he would need to have done was to ride across the river.