The Tao of Spartacus Jones

I went to Max's farm to have a look at an 1904 McClellan saddle he was selling "in mint condition."
It proved to be a size 12, just what I needed. It had one tiny place along the cantle where some stitching had given up the ghost, but I could repair that easily enough. Like the weathered leather of Max's face, it was in hard-used but well-maintained condition. Certainly worth the $300 he was asking.
Cash, of course.
No need to get Uncle Sam in on the deal.

Naturally, after spending 10 minutes on the saddle, we spent the next couple of hours talking horses and sipping cowboy coffee makes expresso seem like Kool-aid. And I got the twenty-five cent tour of his place.

Max's farm was about 10 acres' worth. Had a barn with four stalls and a hayloft, a 12X12 tack room jam-packed with saddles and tack and old lariats.

One stall was empty. In another was an appaloosa belonging to his wife (who was at least 30 years younger that he was, god bless him). In another, a fine bay quarterhorse. In the last was a sway-backed old boy with swollen fetlocks and who appeared to be blind in both eyes. His stall had a Dutch "back door" that opened out into a separate paddock.

"That there's Oscar," Max told me. "He's coming up on 34 years old." It seemed to me there was something special in his voice when he spoke that horse's name.
Now, not many people would keep a wheezy, blind, thirty-four year old horse with arthritis. A lot of people would put him down or sell him off to the butchers when the price of horsemeat was high. I remarked on it to Max. I told him I admired his loyalty.

"Well, he ain't going to end up in a can, that's for dang sure." I'd never heard anyone use the word "dang" before. "You see that?"

Max pointed to Oscar's left flank. Just back from the point of his hip were three long, thin white-hair scars and a fourth, slightly shorter. They looked like they might have been made by a rake.

"Let me tell you a little something about loyalty, son," he said. The way he said "son" got my full attention. Maybe because it was something my father had never called me.
He offered me a chew, which I declined.
And then he told me a little something about loyalty...

"I was working at this little spread outside McClusky, South Dakota. Years back it had been a working cattle ranch; now it was a dude ranch. I guess they had 40 or 50 horses. Something struck me about Oscar. He was way down on the pecking order. Maybe I took a liking to him because I've been down there myself. He was just the gentlest, calmest horse — bombproof, some people like to call it. He was always first pick to be some little kid's first ride. Kind of an ambassador of good will.
I don't want to make him sound like a tired old plug. He was about eight at that time and could show some spark if you took him out and let him know you wanted to do some running. He had real good feet, too. I'd bet he had some Arabian in him. He needed shoes like we need more half-wits in congress.

"One particular day, after a hellacious storm, I was going out to ride one of the trails, just to see what's what and I decided to saddle up Oscar for the trip. I figured it would take all morning anyhow, so I packed up a lunch to take along.
It was a cool, windy day, the kind that often follows up a period of heat and humidity like we'd been having, and it was a lovely ride. Oscar and I got along right away and I was riding him just by thought.
Or maybe he was riding me; he sure knew the way as well as I did.

"About mid-day we came to a nice spot where there was a little meadow and some woods, and I decided we'd take a little rest. I ground-tied Oscar to let him graze — he ground tied like he had an anchor on the end of that rein — and I took my lunch over to a bit of shade.
I remember sitting there with little gusts of wind blowing in my face, carrying the sound of Oscar's munching along to me. There's no more relaxing, peaceful sound, to my mind, than a horse chewing contentedly away.

"Well, I always sort of blamed the sardines. Had a couple of sandwiches loaded with sardines and French's mustard. I can just imagine the scent of those sardines wafting right over to that bear's nostrils.

"She wasn't forty yards away.

"Stood up on her hind legs and bellowed. I nearly wet my drawers. I jumped up and looked at her, saw her looking right at me. She was a giant, even for a Grizzly. When she bolted toward me, I got an impression of a ripple of muscle from her nose to her rump, a ripple of power. People see bears lumbering along at an easy waddle and they think bears are slow and clumsy. It ain't so.

"A Grizzly can cover a hundred yards faster than the fastest human being on earth, change leads better than the best reining horse you'll ever see, climb a tree like a cat.
It couldn't have taken her ten seconds to get to me. Probably more like five.

"Your mind can do a lot of racing in five seconds. I tried to remember all that bear advice I'd heard.
Turn and run like hell? No, that's prey behavior for sure, and I couldn't outrun her, anyway.
That would've been my instinct though, if I could have made my feet move.
Play dead? That just seemed like I wouldn't be playing for very long.

"About the time she was nearly on top of me, I got unfrozen, threw my sandwich at her and starting digging at my belt for my knife while I back-peddled as best I could.
At a time like that, if there's something you can trip on, you'll find it.
I did.
Fell on my ass, twisted my ankle hard — pretty sure I heard it go, or maybe just felt it pop. Couldn't get to my knife now — I was laying on that hand. Only thing left was to cover my face and throat with my free arm, curl up my free leg to cover my belly, or maybe to kick at her with.

"When that bear bellowed and charged, I could hear Oscar give a long, shrill whinney followed by the thud of his hooves on the soft ground. Oddly enough, I found that comforting. I thought to myself, looks like my time has come, but at least Oscar is getting away to safety. I was pretty certain he'd head right back to the barn, too, which meant that people would come looking for me. If there was anything left to find.

"I think I started a little chat with God as I squeezed myself into a tight, hard ball and waited for the impact of that enormous body, the tear of those six-inch claws, the clamp of those powerful jaws.
But it never came.
A shadow fell across me like a cloud crossing in front of the sun. At first I thought it was the bear, but it wasn't.

"It was Oscar.

"He screamed and snorted and stood over me flailing at the bear with his front hooves then spun and kick out at her with both hind feet. Kind of amazing, I guess, that he didn't trample me.

"I heard it more than I saw it. I could hear him connect. Sounded like somebody slapping a tree with a sockful of wet sand. I can't give a blow-by-blow account. I was feeling shocky — nauseous and dizzy and a cold sweat. I don't know how long it lasted. Could've been two seconds. Could have been two hours.

"Somewhere along the line, I felt Oscar's soft muzzle gently nudge my cheek and I came around. The bear was gone.
Ankle throbbed and hurt like a sonovabitch, but other than that, I seemed to be all right. Soon as I propped myself up on an elbow, Oscar nickered and grabbed up a mouthful of grass. I think he saw that I was basically ok and when it's over, it's over. Time to eat.
That's the way horses do.

"With the help of a lot of swearing and sweating, I got to my feet and Oscar stood close by while I climbed up into the saddle. Had to mount from the Indian side, which was awkward, but he was steady as they come. I saw then that he had some real deep scratches on the side of his rump.
Real deep.
That bear had landed one good swipe of her paw, anyway.

"I had my ankle in a cast for six weeks, during which time I became the champion one-legged manure shoveler of the West. I told my boss I'd be real interested in buying Oscar. Turned out, she gave him to me as a gift."

Max and I watched Oscar sniff his way over to some clover and nip it down to the roots. He raised his head up while he chewed. His ears pivoted back toward us. Maybe he knew we were talking about him.

Cowboys are notorious for tall-tales.
I'd heard a few.
"That's one hell of a story," I told Max.

He nodded and spat tobacco juice.

"I've never quite understood it, myself. It's a horse's nature to run from danger. That's how they've survived. And Oscar wasn't even my horse at the time. Ain't like we'd spent a lot of time together or anything like that. I don't know why he adopted me as his herd to look after. Maybe he'd have done the same for anyone. Or maybe he just didn't have no use for bears."

Max leaned on the paddock fence, watching old Oscar nibble some white clover.

And I got the feeling that every word of that story was true.