Roscoe turned a page on his clipboard and read the name on the brand transfer filed in Carson City last month, the one that was not Codys. And Myrtle grabbed my arm so hard it hurt, because the name was hers. My own sister. Codys mother.
My nephew forged a bill of sale to steal my cattle, but it was my sister, the one who kept telling me to let it go because hes blood, who filed to take the Rocking V brand itself, the mark my hands have carried since 1966.
Roscoe had already stopped the auction. These cattle carry the Rocking V, he said, that brand is registered with the State of Nevada to Virgil, not Cody. My little card was the brand certificate, renewed every cycle since 1966, and in Nevada cattle dont leave a ranch or sell at a barn without a brand inspection. Cody had shown a bill of sale with my name on it. Roscoe held it up, Virgil, that your signature? I cant hold a pen steady since the fall, I said, thats awful neat handwriting. Sales off on these, the auctioneer said, every head goes home. A rancher stood up, then why d you forge it, son.
Then Roscoe said there was a transfer on file in Carson City, not for the cattle, for the brand itself, and the name was not Codys, and he read it, and it was Myrtles.
I am Virgil, seventy-nine. I have run cattle outside Elko since I was nineteen, black Angus mostly. My wife passed in 2019, and last winter I broke my hip on the ice by the water tank. My sisters boy Cody offered to help while I healed, and I was grateful, but by April he called it our operation, by June he was telling the feed store I had lost my marbles, and one morning I looked out and he was loading my cows, selling em, old man, you cant take care of them anyway, youll be in a home by Christmas.
Myrtle said hes your blood, let it go before it kills you. I did not argue. I opened my wallet to the little brand card, soft as cloth, that I have carried since 1966, and I called an old friend for a ride to town.
A brand registered to me since 1966 cannot be transferred without my hand, and a forged bill of sale is not my hand. The cattle were mine, and they went home, every head.
But the brand transfer in Carson City was the colder thing. Cody wanted the cows. Myrtle, my own sister, had filed to take the Rocking V itself, the mark my father helped me register when I was a young man, so that the family name on the hide would be hers and her sons, not mine. She kept telling me to let it go because she needed me to let go of it. A forged brand transfer is fraud against the state, not just against me.
Cody and Myrtle faced the law, not my anger. The sheriff called, as Roscoe said he would, and the forged bill of sale and the fraudulent brand filing were both undone.
Youll be in a home by Christmas, Cody told me. I am still on my place, with my cattle and my brand, the Rocking V, carried on this ground since 1966. It grieves me what my sister did. But a brand is a mans word burned into the world, and I was not going to let anyone, blood or not, take my word and call it theirs.