Page 50 of Hell and Halos

He’s sittin’ on a big rock at the edge of the grass with a cigar between his fingers, smoke driftin’ off toward the breaks. Behind him, forty-seven thousand acres of irrigated Ashby land that only just went brown a couple weeks ago.

In front of him, the badlands start. Bare rock. Crags and gullies the color of old bone. Nothin’ growin’ that didn’t fight for it. Cash sits right on the line between the two, lookin’ out at the dead side like he’s countin’ it.

I climb up and sit beside him. He doesn’t offer me a cigar. I don’t ask for one.

“Phone quit ringin’,” I say.

“Around eleven.” He blows smoke toward the breaks. “They’ve called the lawyers.”

He says, voice low and gruff, "Do you understand what just happened, Legion?" His eyes slide to the side, meetin' mine halfway.

"You won?" I laugh.

And he smiles, so it's true. He did win.

But that's not what he's askin' me. He's askin' if I understand that the world I lived in yesterday and the world I live in today bear no resemblance to each other at all.

And I do.

I guess.

But not enough to explain it to no one. So I let out a breath in the silence he's created, and say, "Not really. No."

Cash nods and goes back to starin' at the craggy, beautiful badlands. "Well, you understand how the water works around here, right?"

“It comes out of a ditch. Some people have those ditches, some people don't.”

He almost smiles. “True enough. It's a little more complicated than that, but not much. It's called first in time, first in right. Whoever filed on the water first gets to use it first. It doesn't matter how big your operation is, or how much seed you've got in the ground, or how many animals will die if your ranch doesn't have it—this is the law. In a dry year, the man who has the oldest rights to the river will call it. Like poker, right?"

I nod at him. I do understand poker.

"And then," Cash continues, "every other rancher downstream of him is forced by law to shut his headgate."

"The water stops," I say.

"It does."

"I've watched that happen all my life around Drybone." Then it's my turn to side-eye him. "But not here, right?"

"No," Cash admits. "It never dries up around here. Aside from the artesian wells, which have no indication they will ever go dry, the Ashbys are first in line on the river. We will always be green. My great-grandmother secured those rights and they are ours as long as the laws exist."

"OK," I say. "But are we still talkin' about water?"

Cash chuckles. "No, Legion, we're not. We're talking about oil. Which runs a little different than water, but only marginally. You see, that whole Bakken operation was built on shell companies. And shell companies are built on lies. At the very least, they are built on secrets. Government secrets. And we both understand those secrets, right?"

I nod. He doesn't need to explain that part.

"This is how men get rich," Cash says. "First in line, secrets, and always, always, always lies. Because they buy things on credit because the government won't tax a loan. It's free money if you've got the collateral."

"Collateral. Like this ranch?" I say, pannin' a hand to everything around us.

"Kind of," Cash says. "Yes. Men with a ranch like this will call the bank and say, give me a loan on this land. I'm good for it. And because he is, and the land is worth a lot, the bank will do that. Forty million, a hundred million. Whatever the number is, it's free money. You get me?"

I nod. "I do. It's free money but they give up power to get it."

"Exactly," Cash says. "That's exactly it. If the bank owns your debt, the bank owns you. And that's normal these days. Almost every rancher, anywhere, runs his business just like this."

"Almost," I say.