River in the Sun

About the Book

RIVER IN THE SUN takes place in the West, in the time frame of 1890s to New Mexico statehood in 1912 and a little beyond. It is not a “formula” western but there are cowboys and Indians. Bert and Aggie Bodrey, ex-circus employees, steal two infant sons of a man in Oklahoma Territory who is suspected of causing the death of his young wife, a Kiowa. The motherless boys, a year apart in age, have little chance of survival if left with their drunken father, a white man. Aggie is half-Comanche and the infants are half-Kiowa. Bert is white.

The Bodreys raise the boys in secret, as their own, and move from Oklahoma to Mobeetie and Tascosa, Texas, then to Tucumcari, New Mexico, a new railroad town that becomes a trade center at the crossroads of four rail lines and four highways. The life of the region is related to the South Canadian River (the river of the title). It is a land of lots of sunshine and not much rain, where life depends on whims of the elements.

The Bodreys are employed for a time at Altorito, the large ranch of Pablo and Ana Baca, descendants of Spanish conquistadors. The families remain friends and neighbors.

In 1901, the arrival of the railroad brings in thousands of homesteaders, merchants, and new ranchers. Tucumcari town is established on the new railroad, near an old landmark, Tucumacri Mountain, where nomadic Comanches used to roam. The Bodreys file on a homestead and leave Altorito. Gradually they acquire more land and build up their cattle herd. Their Kiowa sons grow up accustomed to ranch life.

There is always the recurring fear that Hazen Gruler, father of the stolen boys, may appear. Aggie never can get to the point of telling them that they are not her own sons. She does manage to tell them a little of her past—that she was a rider, in a circus, where she met Bert, a blacksmith, and that they ran away to get married.

The gradual growth of Tucumcari is described in sub-plots dealing with some of the town citizens—Grace Newton, Eli Random, Cora Litten, Eric Vocal song, Bernita Diles, and others. In addition to his ranch duties, Pablo Baca is justice of the peace, at Revuelto, a village near his ranch house.

After 18 years of marriage, Bert and Aggie are surprised to have a son, Rand, and two years later, a daughter, Neoma.

The Kiowa brothers, Qlee and Robin, in their early teens, and Pablo Baca, their teacher in riding and shooting and cowboying, are caught in a prairie fire on Baca’s vast ranch. The brothers save themselves by outracing the fire and reaching a familiar spring-fed pool at the Canadian River. Baca is trapped in a prairie dog town, and to escape the fire, kills his horse and crawls inside its disemboweled carcass.

Hazen Gruler appears. Bert and the two boys are on Tucumcari Mountain that day. A snowstorm blows in. Aggie, drawing on her circus riding experience, makes a wild ride to try to reach the mountain before Gruler, to warn her husband. She fails.

Gruler kills Bert Bodrey, and, without knowing that Gruler was in fact his own father, Qlee kills Gruler. Later, Robin tells his brother that he, too, fired at the same instant, at the stranger he had seen killing Bert.

Aggie has alerted Pablo Baca, and the two of them make it to the mountain scene too late. At last, she tells Qlee and Robin that they are not her sons, and she blames herself, now a widow, for the bad fortune that has come to her family.

Qlee, more so than Robin, is hurt by Aggie’s deception about kidnapping the Kiowa boys so long ago, and her failure to tell them. He runs away, briefly, and goes to Fort Sumner, New Mexico, where he spends some time thinking at Billy the Kid’s grave. He returns to Aggie, and without Bert, the Bodreys face the future together.

The author’s book, LEAN INTO THE WIND, set in New Mexico during the Dust Bowl Days of the 1930s, picks up the story of the Bodreys again. It was published in 1997.

About the Author

Troxey Kemper is an ex-newspaperman who worked as reporter and copydesk editor on papers in New Mexico, with almost 18 years on The Albuquerque Journal. He is a graduate of the University of New Mexico and also attended college in Saltillo, Mexico. He has lived in Los Angeles since 1969.