Their Bones

He’d been a purely dangerous man in earlier years, but a good woman and married life had settled him down. He raised cattle now and led packing strings through the Sierra passes for pay.

She begged him to stay, but he refused, knowing the Basque herders had been cut-off from town by the consortium. And a man true to his word, he’d promised to help those shepherds, should push come to shove.

She’d cried that she could feel trouble brewing deep in her bones. He wishes now that he had  listened, as his bones lay mouldering on the mountainside, unseen.