' ' Plot

[Kaite]

Duke Hills has always been a nice place to live if you were poor or middle class. There were good public schools, friendly police officers, and the people were kind, neighborly, even. And the landscape was dramatic and peaceful and wonderful. Duke was built on a rocky out-cropping (often called The Rock) over-looking miles and miles of planes, that, if you clime high enough into the mountains behind the town, you can almost see the ocean miles away. At night, you can see every star in the sky.

Recently, the wealthy have discovered this heaven, and have flocked here in droves, bringing their private school kids and their Manhattan ideas. They built a large, shiny, expensive facility at the northern base of the rocky outcropping for their shiny, expensive horses called Keatings Park

This greatly angered the locals. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) had a lucrative contract with Southaven Ranch that brought in thousands of dollars into the local economy. The contract stipulated that Southaven would set aside about 10 acres for the Mustang round-up. BLM paid for a large, aluminum pipe corral and twenty stalls in the same material, which they granted use of to Southaven. This made Southaven the regional show grounds, bringing in more money to the small town. Many in the town worry that Keatings Park, with her grand, indoor show and auction ring, three training round pens with twelve-foot walls and acres and acres of turn-outs, will steal the contract from Southaven and the needed economic boost from the town.

And their fears are not based in fantasy, either.