Lonesome Dove

Despite their near-constant annoyance with each other, Gus and Call have an unbreakable bond. It is not a romantic relationship, but it is deeper than a typical friendship. When Call decides to go on the cattle drive, Gus offers mild protestations, but as he later tells Clara, “Me and Call have always liked to get where we started for, even if it don't make a damn bit of sense” (780). He never seriously considers leaving Call. Even when he tells Clara that he would stay with her if she asked, he knows that she will not accept his offer. This improbable loyalty to one another is even more obvious for readers of Dead Man’s Walk, Comanche Moon, and The Streets of Laredo, which each provide greater insight into Gus and Call at different times of their lives, as well as how they think about the other.

They are inseparable, the primary evidence being that Gus chooses to follow Call on the cattle drive when it represents the opposite of everything he stands for. Also, Call makes the arduous trek to return Gus’s body to Clara’s orchard because it is his friend’s dying wish. He knows that it is irrational, and he knows that Gus probably made the request because he enjoyed the theatrical nature of it, but he is loyal enough to his friend to honor it.