Part 1: Chapters 16-18 Summary

Call manages to collect four boys in his first day out hiring and not one is eighteen years old yet. Swift Bill Spettle and his younger brother Pete, and Jimmy and Ben Rainey will all be ready to leave Lonesome Dove by the end of the week. Bill and Pete already set out on foot in the direction of Lonesome Dove with their bedrolls, and Maude Rainey promises Call that her sons will be there by week's end. Call heads back home and takes a circuitous route, thinking he'd check on the horses on his way. He rides to where he thought they'd be, and the land is quiet and empty, so he continues home. He finds Gus on the front porch with his jug. After minimal preamble, Call asks why the horses are back so soon. Gus tells...