I Brought My Ewes Home With A Deputy Counting Tags

Celia Trent met us at the holding yard with a clipboard and the order releasing my property.

"The agency has withdrawn its ownership claim," she said. "The court approved the return this morning. The disputed charges remain frozen."

I read the order twice.

There were no grand words. Just my name, the trailer number, twenty-four ewes, and a direction to release them by noon.

It was the best thing I had read in years.

Saskia went into the barn first. I followed with a halter and a bag of hay leaves. A deputy stood by the door with our tag list.

"One at a time," I said.

Vale leaned against his truck.

"You know they won't load that way."

"They'll load."

I put Thimble at the front and gave her a handful of leaves. The rest followed her up the ramp, noses low, hooves knocking on the wood.

Juniper came last. Saskia had treated her foot during the hold. She still walked with care, but she carried weight on it.

The deputy called the final number.

"Twenty-four."

I closed the gate myself.

The deputy signed beneath my count. I asked for a copy before we left, and he went back to the office to make one. I had learned how much could happen between a thing being true and somebody putting it on paper.

My trailer had a bent rear light guard and a fresh scrape down one side. I took photographs. Celia added them to the condition report.

Vale held out an invoice for $2,170.

"Feed, handling, trailer storage. Somebody owes it."

Celia did not let me take it.

"Send that to the review office."

"My yard isn't free."

"Neither is her property yours."

It was the first sharp voice she had used.

I drove the flock to a small place along Prairie Dog Creek where I had leased a shed and two paddocks for spring. The owner, Alma Keene, had put fresh straw down while I was in court.

"Pay me when you can," she said.

"Our rent is due Friday."

"Then Friday can learn patience."

We counted noses again after unloading. I set out hay, checked water, and sat on an overturned bucket until the ewes quit watching the door.

That night, Thimble ate beside my boot as if no one had ever put a price of $180 on her.

I should have slept.

Instead, I walked the fence once more with a flashlight. Every latch held. Every ewe had room to lie down. Only then did I take off my boots.

Instead, I spread bills across Alma's kitchen table. Lawyer deposit, lab work, missed shifts, sample courier, fuel. My cash loss already stood at $5,346, with more legal bills coming.

Ruth called as I reached for a pencil.

"We can seek those losses," she said. "Keep every receipt. Don't put a price on worry and call it a bill."

"Worry hasn't sent one yet."

"It usually charges interest."

I laughed, then cried before I could stop myself.

She waited.

"Getting them home doesn't finish the false papers," she said at last. "You can let the investigators work. You don't have to carry every piece."

The next morning, I went to the feed store for mineral. At the counter, a man I knew from shearing days looked at me, then at the floor.

"Heard you got caught," he said.

I put the release order beside his receipt.

"Read the first page."

He did.

"Didn't hear that part."

"Now you have."

I left copies with two customers who had canceled shifts. One called me back before supper. The other said he would wait and see.

Paper could travel slowly when shame had gone ahead of it.

I spent that evening at the lambing shed. I had finished the striped ear warmer and started another, green and orange this time. I could hold needles while I watched a ewe's breathing. I could not hold a grudge and keep an accurate birth record at the same time.

At nine, a truck rolled into Alma's yard.

The driver was a woman in a canvas coat with a torn cuff. She stood outside the shed until I waved her in.

"I'm Nell Avery," she said. "I keep sheep east of Buffalo. Alma said you might listen."

She saw the ewes and stopped.

"You actually got them back."

"Yes."

"Dace told me nobody ever did."

She took a folded packet from inside her coat. The creases had gone soft from being opened and shut.

"I signed mine," she said. "I thought there wasn't a choice."

Her packet listed sixteen breeding ewes transferred to Basin Stock Recovery for $180 each. From that price came holding fees, hauling fees, and a handling charge.

Nell had received a check for $94.

Behind her transfer agreement was a notice with a handwritten line across the bottom.

Sign today or lose your hauling clearance.