The Project Gutenberg EBook of Treasure of the Brasada, by Les Savage
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Title: Treasure of the Brasada
Author: Les Savage
Release Date: September 9, 2020 [EBook #63159]
Language: English
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TREASURE OF THE BRASADA
PERIL AND INTRIGUE ON THE BORDER
By LES SAVAGE, JR.
DELL PUBLISHING COMPANY, INC.
George T. Delacorte, Jr.
_President_
Albert P. Delacorte
_Vice-President_
Helen Meyer
_Vice-President_
261 Fifth Avenue
New York 16, N. Y.
Printed in U.S.A.
DESIGNED AND PRODUCED BY WESTERN PRINTING & LITHOGRAPHING COMPANY
Copyright, 1947, by Les Savage, Jr. Reprinted by arrangement
with Simon and Schuster, Inc., New York, N. Y.
[Transcriber's Note: Extensive research did not uncover any evidence
that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
Persons this _Story_ is about--
GLENN CRAWFORD, whose pallor and feverishly glowing eyes mark the three
months he has just spent in a hospital as the result of an accident
he suspects was planned, has the restless animal lines of body and
negligible hips of one who has been much in the saddle. Hotheaded, once
fearless, he is presently trying to overcome an unreasoning panic and
pain which rack his body whenever he goes near a horse.
MERIDA LOPEZ, whose presence at the Big O ranch is surrounded by
mystery, has a faintly exotic beauty and slumberous, provocative eyes
which both irritate Crawford and stir something primal in him. He
isn't sure of her game, but he knows a woman like Merida doesn't trail
through the wild brush country just for the scenery.
DR. FELIZ HUERTA, who looks as though he's in the process of
disintegration, has strongly arched brows and a graying peak of hair
which gives him a satanic cast. His eyes hold a dull, jaded lackluster,
and even the slightest movement seems to cost him infinite effort. For
his own reasons, he is extremely interested in Crawford's symptoms.
QUARTEL, come to wind up affairs at the Big O, is a huge hunk of thick
brown flesh with sensual lips and shoulders like sides of beef. He
boasts he can rope better, ride farther, drink more and cuss dirtier
than any hombre between Texas and Mexico City.
OTIS ROCKLAND, whom Crawford makes no bones about hating, is the
owner of the Big O. As Crawford looks at it, Rockland's dealings with
Crawford's pal, old Delcazar, were no less dirty for being legal.
DELCAZAR, who fears his friend Crawford is mixed up in the most
dangerous thing that ever hit the wild brush country, is an aged,
gnarled, and skinny Mexican who lives alone in the back country. He has
rheumy eyes in a face seamed as an old satchel.
CABEZABLANCA, so-called for his head of pure white hair, is one of the
Big O crew. He has a reputation for being deadly dangerous, but for
some reason Huerta seems to have him under his thumb.
JACINTO (LITTLE HYACINTH) DEL RIO, the big, fat, grumbling cook,
listened to his father when he told him there were two sins in the
world, working and fighting, and if he avoided both of them he would
surely go to heaven.
BUENO BAILEY, a tough bronc-buster, gaunt as an alley cat, has milky
eyes, and parts his long yellow hair in the middle, slicking it down
with bacon grease. Crawford suspects him of being responsible for his
"accident."
AFORISMO, who has a sinister proverb for every occasion, is a thin,
stooped man whose eyebrows, slanting toward the middle of his forehead,
give him a mournful expression. His favorite motto, cut into his
razor-sharp knife, is _Tripe is sweet but bowels are better_.
WALLACE TARANT, Otis Rockland's lawyer, has a broad-shouldered,
narrow-hipped frame, a square brow and a wide, thin-lipped mouth
which should have held a palpable strength. But his eyes won't meet
Crawford's, and his voice is small for such a large man.
SHERIFF ED KENMARE, weary lawman of San Antonio, whose duties hang
heavy upon him, has a bulbous nose prominent among heavy, weathered
features.
FORD INNES, Cabezablanca's saddlemate, is a red-bearded redhead with
shrewd little eyes and a short square body which holds all the lethal
threat of a snub-nosed derringer.
AFRICANO, a big black devil of a horse, is a killer nobody has been
able to break. Just the thought of him drives Crawford into a trembling
frenzy of fear, but he knows he must conquer Africano or go crazy.
What this _Story_ is about--
Being caught, bloody gun in hand, leaning over the body of the man he
had threatened to kill forces bronc-buster Glenn Crawford to turn up at
the Big O ranch, a weary, footsore fugitive with more than one score to
settle.
Even the murder of the ranch owner in San Antonio had not prepared
Crawford for the state of affairs he finds at the ranch. His sudden
presence there seems to scare some of the crew half to death and lead
others to try to kill him every chance they get.
For the moment, however, Crawford is more interested in the state of
affairs in his own body than in those of the Big O and the murderer he
is sure the ranch harbors. A veteran of the saddle, Crawford discovers
that since an accident which he suspects was planned, he goes into a
frenzy of pain and trembling panic whenever he gets near a horse. But
in spite of the torture it costs him, Crawford stays on at the ranch.
He knows he cannot be a free man until he finds the murderer of Otis
Rockland. Nor can he be a whole man until he conquers the black devil
of a killer horse, Africano. After he meets Merida Lopez, an exotic
beauty whose presence at the Big O is surrounded by mystery, he has a
third motive for staying around, although he stands to lose his reason
if not his life.
Trapped by forces which he cannot understand, and half-crazed by the
torturing pain and panic which he tries desperately both to overcome
and to hide, Crawford gets himself more and more hopelessly entangled
in what, as old Delcazar points out, looks like the most dangerous
thing that ever hit the wild brush country. Crawford is offered a
strange proposition by sinister Dr. Huerta; he listens to Merida's
spellbinding tale of Santa Anna's chests--and as he listens, the jagged
third of a map he possesses, plus a dying man's painfully gasped
out words, take on a new and important meaning; he waits, trapped,
weaponless, for a killer to come nearer, nearer--And he delivers to
his other pursuers the body of one sent out to kill him--only to
become more deeply enmeshed in new and still more terrifying trouble.
Crawford's irritation at being stirred by Merida, whom he alternately
respects and suspects of playing him for a fool, doesn't prevent him
from riding secretly with her in the night in search of a place so
malicious few men have ever stepped foot in it. Nor does it later
prevent him from risking an agonizing death to follow her into it.
Before the true murderer reveals himself, and before Crawford can again
call himself a whole man, much violent action takes place. Set against
the exciting background of the untamed Texas border country, this is a
thrilling brew of suspense, quick death, adventure, and love.
[Illustration: Map]
List of Chapters--
I. Circumstantial Evidence
II. Santa Anna's Chests
III. Huerta Was Right!
IV. Unreasoning Fear
V. Huerta Makes a Proposition
VI. "Tell Us What Happened."
VII. Sunday Celebration
VIII. Best Roper in the World
IX. Still in the Throes of Fear
X. Flight From Snake Thickets
XI. Old Friends Reunited
XII. Conqueror and Conquered
XIII. Violence in the Bunkhouse
XIV. Challenging Snake Thickets
XV. Treasure Hunt Climax
Treasure of the Brasada
_Chapter One_
CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE
Crossing Alamo Plaza, Glenn Crawford was almost to the Manger Hotel
when he became aware of Sheriff Ed Kenmare standing in the entrance
to the patio. Crawford felt the hesitant break to his stride. Then,
deliberately, he went on, feeling for the first time the sweat
glistening on his unshaven upper lip and forming dark blue spots in the
armpits of his faded ducking jacket. It might have been the sun. It was
a hot spring for San Antonio.
"How about the riding, Glenn?" asked the sheriff, casually.
"My legs are all right, Ed," said Crawford, halting momentarily.
"I noticed you still limped a bit," Kenmare told him. "You got off
easy, I guess. Horse mashed my cousin's legs rolling on him that way up
in Deaf Smith. He never did heal so he could ride any more."
"My legs are all right," said Crawford, turning to go past him and
through the patio gate.
"You got other things to heal besides your legs," said Kenmare,
shifting his dusty, tobacco-odored bulk in front of Crawford. "Why
don't you think things out a bit longer before you see Otis Rockland
again?"
"This isn't my idea," said Crawford. "Otis sent me word he was here and
wanted to talk."
Kenmare's watery gray eyes met Crawford's, and he put a gnarled hand on
the younger man's arm. "Then give me your gun, Glenn, before you go up."
A strange, defiant withdrawal drew Crawford's body up, accentuating
for the first time its restless, animal lines. In his brass-studded
levis, he had the lean catty legs and negligible hips of a man whose
work had been much in the saddle, and though his shoulders were narrow,
their muscularity was apparent beneath the denim jacket. His forehead
was high and bony and pale below the short curling black hair; and,
set deep within their sockets, his eyes held a sunken, almost feverish
glow, which could have come from the recent sickness, or something
else. His rope-marked fingers tightened about the brass receiver of his
old Henry.
"I'll keep the rifle, Ed," he said. "Now let me by."
Kenmare did not release Crawford's arm. He dropped his gaze to one
side, reaching up to rub the sweat exuding from the large, greasy pores
of his rather bulbous nose.
"Something I never did get straight, Glenn," he said, looking at the
worn boot he was scuffing in the earth. "This whole thing between you
and Rockland seems to have started with the way Rockland got hold of
Delcazar's land."
"Del was--"
"I know, Glenn, I know." Kenmare's fingers tightened momentarily on
Crawford's arm. "You and Delcazar was pretty close friends. And you
think Rockland gave Delcazar a raw deal."
"You know he did," said Crawford. "Del had a small spread, but it had
the best water in that section of the brush. Rockland had to have that
water. And he got it."
"But he did it all legal, Glenn."
"Legal." Crawford's voice was bitter. "He knew Del only held his spread
with one of those old Spanish grants they call a _sitio_. His lawyers
found out that this one was so mixed up through the years that Del
couldn't prove ownership. He petitioned the state, had it declared
public domain, and got it for a song. Yes, it was legal all right."
"Those things happen," said Kenmare wearily. "It wasn't your spread,
Glenn."
"No. But Del was my friend. I was busting broncs for Otis Rockland at
the time. I went to him and told--"
That hand tightened again. "I know what you told him, Glenn. Maybe
you were right. Maybe Rockland even had that cinch cut on the black
killer so it would roll you. But listen, Glenn--" Kenmare took a weary,
wheezing breath--"this ain't the way."
"What isn't the way?" said Crawford with growing heat. "I told you
Rockland sent for me, Ed."
"There must have been half a dozen Big O hands heard you threaten to
kill Rockland after that bronc rolled you under," Kenmare told him
heavily.
"Don't you think three months in the hospital cools a man off some,
Ed?" said Crawford. "Now get out of my way. It's too hot for an
argument. I'll buy you a beer on the way out."
He shoved past the sheriff and into the tiled patio. The alamo tree
dropped its deep, dappled shade over the cattlemen sitting tilted back
in the line of peeling cane chairs against the adobe wall. Their lazy,
sporadic conversation died abruptly, and the only sound was the hard
beat of Crawford's heels against the tiles. His lips formed a thin,
bitter line against his teeth as he passed the speculation in their
lifted gazes and entered the foyer. The cool, inner chill struck him
with a distinct physical force, after the stifling heat of the day
without, and caused him to draw in a quick breath. He skirted a potted
palm and went up the broad, carpeted stairs to 211, the room Otis
Rockland always took when he came to San Antonio.
He had lifted his hand to knock, when the sound came from inside. It
was muffled and dim at first, rising to a thumping crescendo, with
someone calling something, the whole thing ceasing then, abruptly.
After a moment of silence, Crawford seemed to hear heavy breathing. He
let his knuckles strike the pine panel of the door. It rattled mutedly.
That was his only answer.
"Otis?" he called.
He waited a moment longer, then turned the knob. The door opened into
the sumptuous parlor of the suite. The wine overhangings were drawn
across the windows against the sun, casting into semi-gloom the spidery
pattern of white and gilt furniture in the room. He heard a shutter
clack in the bedroom and knocked his knee against a low marquetry table
in front of the sofa as he headed for the door. He took his Henry in
both hands and shoved open the door with its tip. The first thing he
saw was a pile of blue chintz on the floor. It was the hanging, torn
off the tester of the four-poster, and Otis Rockland must have clutched
it when falling, for his hand was still gripping it in terrifying
desperation. The portieres had been pulled back by an opened shutter,
and the avenue of bright light, splashing across the rich Brussels
carpet, touched Rockland's feet and led Crawford to turn momentarily
toward the window.
"No--Crawford--"
He wheeled back to see Rockland's eyes open. The man made some feeble
effort to rise. Crawford dropped to one knee beside him, laying the
rifle down.
"Delcazar?" he said.
Rockland's lips twisted in what could have been a smile.
"Like you, to think of that."
"I guess more than one has good cause to want you dead, Otis," said
Crawford.
"Yes." It came out of the man in a hoarse, strained way. But there was
a look of macabre humor or malice, or both, in his face as he spoke.
"They'll think it was Delcazar, won't they? Or you, Glenn."
"I'll get someone--"
"No. No." Rockland reached up to grab at his shirt as Crawford started
to rise. "Won't do any good. Too late." He fought for breath for a
moment, then went on, slowly. "Reach--inside--coat."
Crawford could see the thick, viscid blood forming beneath the back
of Rockland's iron-gray head now. There was a brutal slash across the
man's face, slicing deep into the bridge of his dominating, avaricious
nose. Even as Crawford watched, the eyes closed and the breathing grew
stertorous. The man was obviously beyond help. With a swift movement
Crawford reached beneath Rockland's expensive steel pen, drawing a
wallet from the inner pocket. He was starting to go through it, when
Rockland's eyes opened.
"Rip lining, Glenn," he whispered. "What he was after--you scared him
off--'fore he could find it."
Crawford fumbled with the soft doeskin flap of the wallet, finally
managing to rip it out, revealing a piece of faded, yellowed paper. He
pulled this out. Unfolded, it formed a triangle, the bottom straight,
the other two sides jagged and torn. "Looks like some kind of a map,"
he said.
"Yes," said Rockland, feebly. "_Derrotero._ Santa Anna's chests."
"Whose chests? What are you talking about, Otis?"
Rockland's lip drew back over his teeth, more a grimace than a smile.
"Don't lie, Crawford," he murmured. "Why else were you so het-up when I
got Delcazar's spread? You knew about this _derrotero_ then."
"About what?" said Crawford hotly, clutching him. "How is Del mixed up
in this?"
But Rockland's head had fallen back once more; and for a moment
Crawford thought he was gone. Suddenly he found himself shaking
Rockland in a fever of impatience. "Otis," he cried, "Otis, did Del
give you this? Where did you get this map?"
Once more Rockland's eyes opened, but a glaze was on them. "Mexico," he
whispered. "Mexico City."
Suddenly Crawford knew. The Delcazars had come from Mexico City
originally. And their family papers must have been in the hands of a
lawyer there. When Rockland got Delcazar's spread, he had sent his own
lawyer down there to make sure there was nothing to obscure his title
to the land. Evidently Tarant had found this part of the _derrotero_
among the papers. But this was only a third of it. Where was the rest
of it? The light grew brighter. So this was why Rockland had sent for
him. He thought that he, Crawford, knew about the map--knew, perhaps,
who held the missing pieces. Santa Anna's chests, Rockland had said,
Santa Anna's chests. All at once he found himself muttering the words
aloud, "Santa Anna's chests--"
As though the words were a magic Sesame, Rockland opened his eyes.
Drawing on some hidden reservoir of strength, he pulled himself to a
sitting position. "Where's the rest of it, Glenn?" he gasped. "Does
Delcazar know? Glenn, Glenn, where's the rest--"
Crawford caught at the man as Rockland sank back. "Otis?"
It was the muted footsteps, then, coming across the Brussels carpet
in the outer room. Crawford had allowed Rockland to drop back when
Ed Kenmare's bulk filled the doorway. A vague pain moved over the
sheriff's heavy weathered features.
"The manager heard a ruckus up here," he said. "I guess he was right.
No, Glenn--"
"Yes, Ed," said Glenn, violently, scooping up his Henry and whirling
back toward the man. Kenmare had his own six-shooter only half out of
its holster. He stopped that way, staring at the .44. There were other
men behind the sheriff now, several of the cowmen from the patio and
lobby, the hotel manager in a white morning coat.
"I guess there's no use denying it, is there?" said Crawford, through
his teeth.
Kenmare let his eyes drop to the Henry's wooden butt. Crawford felt it
then, sticky against his fingers, and realized the wood must have been
lying in the blood from Rockland's head. A nausea swept him.
"Ed," he said, unable to keep from it, "I didn't, I didn't--"
His bitter voice trailed off as he saw resignation in Kenmare's faded
eyes. "Listen, son," the man told him. "It won't do you no good this
way. Give me that gun now."
"No." The finger lever made a sharp click, cocking, and with his hand
holding it down, Crawford started backing toward the window. "Think
I'd have a chance? It's all here, isn't it? All right here, cinched up
tighter'n a bucking rig. No loose lashings even. Everything to hang me.
I'm not going to be taken for that, Ed."
"Glenn," said Kenmare, with that same weighty reluctance, "for once,
don't be a hothead. You go off half-cocked like this and bugger your
bronc every time. This just won't do you any good--"
"Don't do it, Jason," Crawford shouted, turning his gun toward one of
the cattlemen behind Kenmare. Harry Jason stopped trying to shift back
of Kenmare where Crawford wouldn't see him draw his gun, and moved his
hand carefully away from the wooden butt of the weapon. There was no
intelligent reasoning in Crawford now. Only a terrible consciousness of
that dead body on the floor, and a blind, animal urge to escape this.
He lifted his leg over the iron railing of the balcony onto the ledge
outside. There was the first violent movement among the men in the room
as he crouched down to drop off the ledge, and he heard someone shout.
Then he jumped.
It was not a long fall, and he broke it by catching the edge of
the balcony with his free hand and hanging there till his arm was
stretched out with his weight, then letting go. One of his high heels
turned under him as he struck the flagstones below, and he let himself
go down on his knees and then roll it off to keep from spraining an
ankle. As he leaped to his feet, Kenmare appeared on the balcony, gun
out. Crawford was already running toward the front entrance, past the
line of cane chairs. There were still half a dozen cattlemen sitting
there, and two of them were standing at the end, and Kenmare was
apparently fearful of hitting them if he shot.
"Stop him," shouted the lawman. "Crawford. He killed Rockland. Get him,
you fools--"
The men standing made an abortive shift to block Crawford's passage,
but he was already opposite them, and surprise held the other men in
their chairs till he was almost to the door. He saw several pulling at
their guns, but Mexicans and cowhands were passing by outside in the
street, or stopping farther beyond in the Plaza to gape curiously, and
a bullet might have struck one of them. There were half a dozen cow
ponies at a cottonwood rack in front of the Manger, and as Crawford
reached them he noticed that the reins of the first were tied in a
hitch that could be knocked free. He did it with the tip of his gun,
throwing the ribbons over the animal's neck. Excited by Crawford's
running up like that, the hairy little black started to whirl inward.
Crawford jumped for the stirrup with one foot, letting the centrifugal
force slap him into the saddle as the horse whirled on around.
"Hey," shouted one of the cattlemen, streaming out of the patio behind
him. "Get off that horse, Crawford, he's mine--"
But Crawford was already turning the animal into Blum Street. Halfway
down the block he cut through an alley onto Commerce and turned at
the corner of Commerce and Alamo, wheeling into another alley that
led directly down to the river. He crashed through a line of washing
hung behind a squalid Mexican hovel and scattered a bunch of cackling
hens, tearing a white _camisa_ off his head, his hat going with it. A
Mexican woman ran from the hut, waving her arms and squealing at him,
and behind that he could hear the dim sounds of running horses. He had
gone down Blum to make them think he was heading west out of town, and
hoped they would not discover his true direction till he had left by
the south. He slid the pony down the stone coping banking the river,
letting the current carry him beneath the Market Street bridge before
trying to reach the opposite bank. He got out of town following back
alleys and side streets, and then broke into South Flores Street. And
now, as he pushed the laboring pony toward the twin spires of Mission
Concepción, it began to come.
There had been no room for it in the violent excitement of those first
few minutes, with all his concentration on escape. But now, with the
steady beat of running hoofs beneath him, it began to grow in him.
First, perhaps, it was a consciousness of that steady shuddering
pound of hoofs beneath him. Then, the constant, heated movement of
the horse's muscles, the dim sense of its flanks, rising and falling
with the heavy breathing, the feel of its shoulders beneath the saddle
moving back and forth. And finally, more than the movement and the
sound outside him. Something within. He did not know where it started.
In his legs, perhaps. Or his groin. Somewhere down there. A strange,
thin, hollow sensation.
"No--"
He didn't know whether it had been in his mind or whether he had said
it. He turned in the saddle, staring down the road behind, trying
to blot it from his consciousness. He was past the fields of white
niggerheads about Concepción, and was approaching the second mission,
San José de Aguayo, which had been established by the Spaniards here in
1720. But it was growing in him. He was sweating beneath the armpits
now. It was recognizable now. Pain. More than that--hollow, nebulous
sickness at the pit of his stomach. Pain. Pinpricks of it, shooting up
his legs. A hoarse, strained sob escaped him. How could it be? They had
told him, no. He was healed. How can it be? _I'm healed, damn you, I'm
healed._
The roof of San Aguayo had fallen in, and only a few windows were left
in the south wall, protected by the remains of delicate iron _rejas_,
their tarnished panes flashing dully in the sun as Crawford passed
by. He was barely conscious of this. He was sweating now, his fists
gripping the reins so desperately the knuckles gleamed translucently
through the skin. The pain seemed to have sound now. His head was
roaring with it. He was shaking violently now, and the horse felt it
and began reflecting his lack of control, breaking its stride, shifting
from side to side down the road.
The stepped belfries of San Francisco de la Espade rose into view.
The last ruins of the _baluarte_ built for the defense of the mission ran
parallel to the road, sections of this bastion crumbling off into the
ruts of the highway. The horse changed leads to side-step some of the
adobe fallen onto the road, and Crawford lurched out of the saddle,
barely recovering himself. He heard someone making hoarse, guttural
sounds, and realized it was himself. And now, more than the pain,
something else was rising in him. The hot, sweaty fetor of the horse
filled him with a violent nausea. He had a wild impulse to escape it.
He caught himself actually stiffening up to throw himself free of the
running horse.
"No!"
Again, he did not know if it was in his head, or if he had shouted
it. The very sound of the running horse seemed to fill his brain now.
Each thundering hoofbeat was a separate note of agony. And more than
the agony which filled him, that other something he could not define,
or would not, so confused with the pain now he could not tell the
two apart. Finally he could stand it no longer. Brutally, he reined
in the horse. The animal brought himself to a series of stiff-legged
halts that almost jolted him over its head. He swung off the lathered,
heaving animal, and then, standing with his face toward its hairy wet
hide, he was filled with that nausea again. He wheeled away from the
horse, stumbling across the road to a pile of rubble that marked the
remains of the aqueduct. With a hoarse exhalation, he lowered himself
weakly to the adobe, dropping his head forward into his hands, so that
the black hair fell through his grimy fingers in dank, sweaty tendrils.
"I _can_ ride," he said aloud, in a desperate voice, "I _can_ ride!"
_Chapter Two_
SANTA ANNA'S CHESTS
It had a million faces. At dawn it was a dim, foggy mask. At noon it
leered in brassy, burning malignance. At night it was a cunning visage,
sometimes filled with bizarre mutations by the caprice of moonlight,
sometimes cloaked in the unrelieved sin of utter blackness. This was
the _brasada_.
Glenn Crawford did not know how many weeks of weary travel lay behind
him since he had left that cow pony by the mission and had struck out
on foot for this borderland which had provided sanctuary for so many
fugitives. Now, crouched in a thicket of black chaparral, with the
late afternoon sun falling through the branches to cast a weird shadow
pattern across his back, Crawford was filled with an oppressive sense
of its infinite mystery. It was a Spanish word, _brasada_, and there
was no English equivalent. For it was not brushland in the ordinary
sense. Not scattered clumps of mesquite dotting an arid prairie,
or small thickets of sage in a sandy plain. It was a jungle. A dry
jungle, as vast and unexplored as the Amazon jungles, stretching
through southern Texas between the Nueces River and the Rio Grande
for uncounted miles, in many places so thick as to be impossible of
penetration.
Until he had reached its safety, Crawford's primary instinct had been
the simple animal urge of escape. But once within its borders, a desire
to get at the root of this thing, and to clear himself, began to grow
in him. And though he knew the dangers involved, it had inevitably
drawn him to the Big O, where the whole thing had started.
Otis Rockland's father had established the spread here in the _brasada_
just before the Texas Revolution, shipping lumber for his house from
New Orleans. It was a strange building, in a land where most structures
were low adobe hovels. Its two stories rose gaunt and lonely against
the dark horizon of brush, the flat gambrel roof supporting a pair of
glassed-in cupolas over the front. Crawford had been here since noon,
watching it, not yet knowing what he had meant to do when he reached
the spread. The sun had burned bronze streaks through his shaggy mane
of black hair, and a scrubby, matted beard grew up into the hungry
hollows beneath his high cheek-bones, rendering his face gaunt and
wolfish. His whole body jerked with the sudden crackle of brush behind
him, and he started to whirl and rise from his hunkers and pull his gun
around all in the same violent movement.
"Never mind, Glenn, you'd never do it in time," said the man standing
there. He waited a moment, grinning, and then spoke again with a
deliberate, slow irony. "If you'll drop that Henry, we'll be able to
talk comfortably."
Crawford let the rifle slip reluctantly from stiff fingers, and then
straightened his legs out until he was standing, faced toward the man
they called Cabezablanca for his head of pure white hair. His face
was as smooth and unlined as a coffee bean, and he wore a pair of
tight buckskin leggings they called _chivarras_ this near the border,
and a blue cotton shirt, and Crawford had never seen him without the
Winchester he carried now.
"It's been a long time since you busted broncs for the Big O, Glenn,"
said Cabezablanca. "Ain't you going to say something? _Buenos días_,
for an old _amigo_, or how are things?" He waited a moment, the smile
slipping from his thin, beardless lips. "You better be civil to me,
Glenn. I'm a very dangerous man." He halted again, and when he realized
Crawford would not answer, a sullen anger tightened his lips. "Very
well, let us go and see what they want to do with you."
Crawford turned around, moving from the screen of brush in stiff, catty
steps, the tense forward thrust of his shoulders giving them that
narrow appearance. He was aware that Cabezablanca stooped to pick up
the Henry as he followed. Crawford had been watching the crew working a
bunch of horses in the corrals, and now, as he drew near, he saw that
they had pulled a new animal into the tight chute between the smaller
pen where the animals were held and the larger one where they were
worked. It was a big black animal the Mexicans called a _puro negro_,
throwing itself crazily against the bars of the chute, the whole
structure shuddering with its violent struggles. Crawford was not aware
that he had stopped till Cabezablanca came up beside him.
"Yeah, Crawford," said the white-headed man, watching him narrowly.
"Africano. Sort of brings back things, doesn't it? That black devil's
still rolling them, and nobody's broke it yet."
A man threw a dally rope over the top of the chute, noosing the black
animal's neck and pulling it tight against the bars. The beast fought
wildly a moment, banging its skull against the cedar poles. The corrals
shook again, and yellow dust rose about that section, obscuring the
horse. When the dust settled, the _puro negro_ had quit battling, and
stood with its forelegs stiff, breathing heavily through its nose. A
tall, slat-limbed Mexican climbed to the top of the chute, and the
men below handed him up a double-rigged Porter. He dropped the heavy
saddle on the horse, and a man below reached through the bars to get
the front girth, pulling the latigo through the cinch rings and yanking
the girth tight. Africano squealed shrilly, trying to jerk away again.
Then another Mexican climbed up the bars of the chute and stood at
the top, pulling his belt up. He was so broad he appeared short,
his close-cropped hair beginning to gray at the temples. His great
shoulders bunched like sides of beef beneath the strained wool of a
faded _charro_ jacket with a few tattered remnants of what might have
been gold embroidery on its lapels. He wore a pair of tight rawhide
leggings, and the rolling muscles of his thighs had burst the seams in
several places between hip and knee.
Crawford licked dry lips. "Who is it?"
"Quartel," said Cabezablanca. "When you killed Rockland in San Antonio,
a lot of the Big O crew drifted. Bueno Bailey and me are about the
only ones left of the old bunch. Rockland didn't have no heirs. So
his lawyer was given the job of cleaning up the estate. There's a lot
of cattle to be choused out of that brush and Tarant had to get a new
ramrod. And Quartel's him."
"But--" Crawford moved his hand vaguely toward the horse--"Africano--"
"The nigger sort of fascinates Quartel, I guess," grinned the other.
"He's been trying to break it ever since he got here. That black devil
almost stove him up a couple of times."
Quartel was straddling the bars of the chute with his feet, leaning
down to tug at the saddle a couple of times and test the cinches. They
finally got the bit in and pulled the rawhide reins up to where Quartel
could take hold of them. He waved his free hand, and the man below
pulled out the drop bar which held the door of the chute closed. Then
they untied the rope from the black's neck and swung open the door. As
the beast lunged forward, Quartel dropped into the saddle.
Africano was larger than most brush horses, though not any taller,
standing maybe fifteen hands, with a prodigiously muscled rump that
indicated more than a little quarter blood, and a savage, vicious
action to its every movement. The animal boiled over almost before it
had left the chute. Quartel had not found his right stirrup as the
beast erupted, but by the time Africano hit the top of its first buck,
the man's foot was in the oxbow, and when the black stiff-legged down
into the ground, Quartel was set for it.
Even then, his broad, heavy body trembled to the awful jar of it.
Crawford's face twisted, and his hands were gripping the bars of the
corral with a strange desperation.
The black raced down the corral with a high, collected action and then
stopped abruptly with its forelegs jamming the ground like ramrods,
pin-wheeling in its own billow of dust. It was all balance with
Quartel. Crawford did not think he had ever seen such a relaxed seat on
a bucker. The man shifted his weight back and forth almost delicately,
gauging each violent movement of the horse to perfection.
"There it goes," said Cabezablanca.
Crawford rose up on his toes against the bars. Africano had started to
roll. Quartel stepped off with an incredibly lithe movement for his
heavy body, as the horse went down. The black rolled completely over,
and Quartel was there ready to swing onto its back again as the animal
came up, jamming his feet into the stirrups and raking the animal's
dusty, lathered flanks with great Mexican cart-wheel spurs. The black
screamed in a frenzied, crazy way as it realized the man was still
on its back. With a shrill whinny, it began rolling again, madly,
cleverly, devilishly, watching Quartel out of its glassy eyes, heavy
chest briny with lather. Crawford watched with a terrible fascination,
unaware of how tightly he was hanging onto the bars or how loud and
harsh his heavy, labored breathing was.
On its fourth roll, Africano twisted while still on its back and
switched ends before coming up, kicking at Quartel with its hind feet.
Quartel dodged the kick, shouting something, and slapped the animal's
rump to come up over the legs as they struck the ground, hitting the
saddle with a jar that drew a gasp from Crawford. Africano raced
forward, halted abruptly, pivoted on one hind foot. Quartel was thrown
off balance by the spin, and while his weight was still on the off
side, the black reared up and fell back deliberately. Quartel had to
kick free and jump to keep from being mashed beneath twelve hundred
pounds of vicious black demon, and he lost control completely.
The animal came up with a triumphant whinny, whirling toward Quartel.
The dust billowed up about the dim shouting movement filling the corral
then, and Crawford could see only dimly what happened. A red-bearded
hand was galloping in on one of the cutting horses to try and reach the
black before it trampled Quartel. But the rider spun the big loop over
his head once before throwing it, and the wily black saw it coming and
wheeled away.
"Damn you, Innes, why don't you go back to snagging fence posts,"
shouted Quartel, stumbling to his feet and lurching for the rope. He
caught that end and jerked it violently, almost unhorsing Innes as the
rope was torn from his hands. Then Quartel whirled around, snaking
in the rope with quick, skillful flirts until he had the other end.
The red-bearded rider had wheeled and was trying to run into Africano
broadside now to force it away from Quartel. But Africano leaped ahead,
dodging the man, and wheeled toward Quartel again, that maniacal intent
plain in its bloodshot eyes. "Get out of the way," Quartel roared
hoarsely at Innes. "I swear you don't know any more about handling
horses than a woman. Get out of the way----"
The Mexicans called it a _mangana_, and not many men could have done
it in such a position. The black horse had outmaneuvered Innes, and
was racing a dead run at Quartel. Quartel stood there with the rope
in both hands, not even spinning it, a confident grin on his face.
When the black was so near it looked certain to run Quartel down, the
man made his toss. It was a California throw, down low without a spin
so the horse could not spot it until the loop was actually in the
air. Quartel snapped the rope behind him at his hip, then dragged it
forward with a swift flirt of his wrist, hand pointed down and the
loop swinging out so that it practically stood on edge. It was timed
perfectly. Quartel took one step away like a bullfighter, and the _puro
negro_ thundered past him, so close its lathered shoulder twitched
his _charro_ jacket, and ran headlong into that loop standing there.
Quartel turned away with the rope across his hip, and his thick body
jerked hard as the horse snapped the rope taut and fell headlong. Then
he casually dropped the rope to the ground and walked away, while other
hands ran in with the short tie ropes they called peales, to hog-tie
the vicious beast while it was still down.
Crawford realized only then how his fingers ached. He released them
from the cedar-post bar. His shirt was sticking to his back with
sweat, and he heard that heavy, labored breathing. Him? And something
else. The same thing he had known on that cow pony up by San Antonio.
Not pain exactly, though there were those little spasms twitching at
his legs. But something more insidious than that, down in his belly
somewhere, a thin, nauseating consciousness. His eyes went to the
black horse, still kicking and squealing as they hog-tied it within
the corral, and a new wave of it swept him. He turned away, clenching
his teeth, trying to drown it with anger. Then he became aware of how
Cabezablanca was looking at him.
"What's the matter, Crawford? You look like it was you riding the
African instead of Quartel." The white-headed man waited, that sly
grin fading as he saw Crawford was not going to speak. He indicated
the house, finally, with the tip of his Winchester. "Let's go. Maybe
Huerta will want to see you."
"But I've already seen him," said a heavy, jaded voice from behind
them. "I've been watching him for some time now."
* * * * *
The overdrapes of green striped satin had been pulled aside from the
front windows of the dining-room to let the last shafts of afternoon
sunlight cross the dark Empire Aubusson and gleam brazenly on the
brass-headed nails which studded the green morocco upholstering of the
chairs. The man who had stood behind Crawford and Cabezablanca at the
corrals was Doctor Feliz Huerta, and he followed Crawford into the
dining-room now.
Crawford did not think he had ever seen such infinite dissolution in
a face. The minute pattern of blood vessels was faintly visible in
Huerta's heavy lids, giving them a bluish cast. His eyes, when they
were visible behind these lids, held a dull, jaded lackluster in their
black pupils, and his flesh was smooth and soft-looking, lined about
the mouth and eyes like an old satchel. His black hair was parted in
the middle, graying at the temples and receding there to form a peak
down his forehead which, added to the strong arch of his brows, gave
his features a satanic cast.
"You may go now, Whitehead," he said.
Cabezablanca shifted uncomfortably. "Listen, you don't seem to
understand. This is Glenn Crawford----"
It seemed to cause Huerta infinite effort to turn toward the man. For
a moment, their eyes met. Whitehead's mouth was still open from his
words, and he drew a small, surprised breath through it. Then he began
to back out of the room.
Huerta moved his glance around to Crawford when Cabezablanca had left.
"They say he is a very dangerous man," he murmured, moving languidly
to the old English sideboard. Lifting one of the brass rings on the top
drawer, he pulled it open, taking a silver plate out and putting it on
top. There was a small pile of reddish beans, and he selected one from
this, popping it into his mouth. "You'll excuse me. An old complaint."
Crawford could retain it no longer. "What kind of horse you on?"
Huerta's face revealed some small surprise. "I thought you might like
to have dinner with us. Jacinto will bring it in a few moments."
"No," said Crawford, moving his hand viciously. "Something else. What
is it, Huerta? What are you doing here?"
One of Huerta's sardonic black brows lifted quizzically. "You are such
a suspicious man, Crawford. I have known Otis Rockland for some time.
He invited me to visit him. I arrived to find him murdered in San
Antonio. It was quite a shock. Ah--" his glance had passed Crawford and
was focused on the doorway--"Merida, Wallace, I'm glad you've come. We
have a dinner guest."
Crawford turned around. Wallace Tarant had been Otis Rockland's lawyer
a long time, and Crawford knew him well enough. But it was the woman
who commanded his attention. Her beauty struck him with such an impact
that he felt a distinct physical reaction pass through his body. Not
many women could have worn their hair in such a severe coif without
detracting from their allure. It was so black it looked blue, parted
in the center and drawn back to a shimmering bun at the nape of her
neck. It gave accent to the faintly exotic planes of her face. Her only
jewelry was a large cabochon emerald in an onyx brooch that rode the
mature swell of her breasts just below the low-cut top of her black
silk dress.
Her slightly oblique eyes held a candid interest, meeting his. The
blood thickened in his throat. A vague irritation swept Crawford that
she should affect him so strongly.
"This is Merida Lopez, Crawford," said Huerta. "She came with me from
Mexico City."
"Crawford." It escaped her on a throaty breath, and those large black
eyes took in the tense line of his body, and a faint smile stirred her
rich lips. "I imagined you, somewhat--like this."
Wallace Tarant took a step that placed him at the woman's side. He
had a broad-shouldered, narrow-hipped frame that looked good in
his tailored town coat. His face, with its square brow and wide,
thin-lipped mouth, should have held a palpable strength. But his eyes
would not meet Crawford's. His voice was small for such a large man.
"What's the idea, Huerta?" he said.
"Whitehead found him in the brush watching the house," said Huerta.
"I thought perhaps we might like a little talk with him. You, as
Rockland's lawyer, should appreciate the value of that."
"Isn't it a little dangerous," said Tarant.
"I think Crawford knows how little chance there is of escape," said
Huerta. "By whatever door a man leaves this house, he has to cross
several hundred yards of open compound before reaching the protection
of the brush. At the present moment, there are half a dozen men out
there, just waiting for the chance. As for his presence among us, you
aren't afraid of him, are you, Wallace?"
Tarant flushed, moved stiffly to pull out a chair for Merida. Crawford
could not tell if it was deliberate, but in passing him the woman's
body touched his hip. His whole frame stiffened with the momentary,
warm, silken pressure, and he could not help the sharp breath he drew.
Then she was by, and he saw the faint, ironic smile twitch at Huerta's
lips. Crawford turned angrily toward the table, but before he could
reach a chair, the whole room began to tremble. He knew who was coming
before the man appeared. Jacinto del Rio had cooked for the Rocklands
as long as anyone in the brush could remember. The three dominating
factors of his life were apparent enough as he rumbled into the
doorway from the entrance hall. His prodigious belly was a remarkable
edifice to _tortillas_ and frijoles. The blue network of broken
veins patterning his flushed jowls indicated a singular capacity for
tequila and pulque. The reluctance of his every movement reflected his
veritable passion for the national pastime of siesta. He held a great
silver tureen of soup on a tray high before his face, and it prevented
him from seeing Crawford at first.
"_Trabajo, trabajo_," he grumbled, "always work. First it's breakfast
in the bunkhouse. 'Hyacinth cook some more eggs.' 'Hyacinth this coffee
tastes like alkali.' Hyacinth this, Hyacinth that. Then breakfast for
the big house. 'Hyacinth you're late.' 'Hyacinth you didn't put enough
clabber in the biscuits.' Hyacinth this, Hyacinth that. Me, who was
made for nothing but wassail and song and laughter, sweating like an
_esclavo_ all my life. You know what my father he tell me?"
"Yes, yes," said Huerta wearily. "If you don't set that tray down soon
we'll be eating breakfast instead of dinner."
"He tell me, 'Hyacinth, there are two sins in the world--working and
fighting, working and fighting--and if you avoid both of them, you will
surely go to heaven.'" Jacinto set the tray down, his eyes rolling
upward in a fat face. "Por Dios! it looks like I'll never get there
now. My poor _padre_ must be turning over in his grave to see how I
have desecrated his wishes. To think of me, little Hyacinth of the
River, meant for nothing but----"
His eyes had focused on Crawford for the first time, and his words
ended in a bleat. He held up a fat hand, trying to say something, but
nothing would come out. He turned toward Huerta, sweat rolling down
his face with his effort to speak. He whirled back to Crawford, his
whole body twitching. Then he looked to Huerta again.
"_Por Dios!_" he croaked. "Doctor. Please. Crawford. That's him. I
was born for laughter and wassail and song. You aren't going to do
anything. How did he get here? No _violencia_. Please. My delicate
sensibilities would revolt. You won't--"
"My dear Hyacinth," said Huerta. "There won't, I assure you, be any
violence. Now please go and bring the rest of the meal." Jacinto backed
out of the room, sputtering, and Huerta's sardonic glance slipped
around to Crawford. "Won't you sit down? You make me nervous."
Crawford moved across to pull out a chair across from the woman,
feeling her eyes on him, and lowered his tense body onto the green
morocco leather. They were all watching him now.
"Would you serve, Wallace?" said Huerta, leaning back in his chair.
He surveyed Crawford for a moment. "You know," he said finally, "most
people think your motive for killing Otis Rockland was revenge. But
somehow, that doesn't satisfy us."
"Doesn't it?" said Crawford.
The woman's laugh was as throaty as her voice. It caused his glance to
shift to her face with a jerk. She sat there with that smile, making no
effort to explain her amusement. It drew a reasonless anger from him.
He gripped his knees with his hands, beneath the linen cloth.
"Did you ever hear the story of Santa Anna's chests, Mr. Crawford?"
Merida Lopez asked, finally, a strange, obscure mockery coloring her
voice.
"No," answered Crawford stiffly.
She tasted her soup, eyes still on him. "In April of 1826, at the close
of the Texas Revolution, General Santa Anna had led his Mexican army
halfway across Texas after General Houston's forces, finally catching
him at San Jacinto. There were two major political parties in Mexico
at that time, the Federalists and the Centralists. The Centralists
had been trying for some time to break Santa Anna's growing power in
politics. For four or five months they had managed to have the army
pay withheld, but Santa Anna finally got a pay train sent from Mexico
City. The battle of San Jacinto was in progress when this mule train
arrived, and a party of Texans cut it off before it could reach the
Mexican army, chasing it westward into the brush somewhere south of the
Nueces. The Texans finally caught the Mexicans, and in the battle that
followed the greater part of the Mexicans were killed. But the mules
had disappeared. They have not been found since."
"Neither has the Lost Nigger Mine, or Steinheimer's millions," said
Crawford. "I been listening to windies like that since I was a button."
"Ah, a skeptic." Again that mockery, more palpable this time. She toyed
with her soupspoon. The faint movement of her wrist drew his glance,
and he found himself wondering how the soft white skin would feel.
"And still, Crawford, doesn't it intrigue you?" Her voice penetrated
his attention, and he raised his gaze self-consciously. Just her hand.
Just the movement of her hand like that. What the hell? "Five months'
pay for an army, Crawford. Does a man like you have any conception
of that kind of money? Men would kill for it. Even governments. And
there is more than just the story. There is what the Mexicans call a
_derrotero_."
She let her eyes lift momentarily from the spoon, but he had kept his
face carefully blank. He was beginning to notice her enunciation now.
The accent was discernible sometimes. Her careful precision seemed an
effort to hide it.
"This _derrotero_," she said. "Literally a map, a chart. It was made
by the captain of the mule train. When he realized the Texans would
inevitably catch him, he secreted the pay chests somewhere in the
brush, making the chart. Fearing that, if he entrusted the whole of the
chart to one man, that man might be captured, he divided it into three
portions. Thus, if one or even two of the men were caught, the chests
would still be safe, for the hiding place could not be located without
all three portions. One section he sent with an Indian to Santa Anna
himself at San Jacinto. The second part he gave to his lieutenant, to
carry to the Federalists in Mexico City. The third he kept himself."
"Yeah?" said Crawford.
"Yes," she said, smiling in dim amusement at his acrid reticence. For
a moment, her eyes were half-closed, studying him, and they held a
slumberous, provocative temptation. It stirred something primal within
him. He had felt it before. But not this way. Not just looking in a
woman's eyes.
"The captain of that mule train was the uncle of your friend Pio
Delcazar!"
It went through him with a palpable shock, and it was not till after
she had finished speaking that Crawford realized what she had been
doing, with those eyes. They had turned hard and speculative, now, and
with the spell broken, Crawford felt the twisted expression her words
had drawn to his face. He tried to regain that inscrutability, but knew
it was too late. There was a certain triumphant satisfaction in the way
Merida allowed her gaze to drop to the table as she began eating the
soup again. And now the two men were watching him. He felt the sweat
break out on his palms.
"_Carne adobada, carne adobada?_" said Jacinto, waddling in. "You don't
know how long I pickled it in brine. I fry the spices and chile till
the juices stream out of the pork, and--" he trailed off, seeing how
they were all watching Crawford. He turned to Huerta, wringing his
fingers. "Doctor, please, I beseech you--"
"The coffee, Hyacinth, the coffee," murmured Huerta, waving a languid
hand at the cook without looking away from Crawford.
Jacinto almost choked on the breath he took, and backed out, staring
wide-eyed at Crawford. "_Sí._ The _café_. _Sí._"
Tarant began to serve the meat dish Jacinto had brought. "When you had
that ruckus with Rockland in the living-room here, Bueno Bailey said it
was over Delcazar," he said.
"You know what it was over," said Crawford. "You got Del's land for
Rockland that way."
Huerta leaned forward slightly. "Was it just the land?"
"Del's my _compadre_," said Crawford. "You're Mexican. You know what
the word is."
"Crawford," said Huerta, bending farther forward, "we should, of
course, send you back to San Antonio. But there are other things which
could be done."
"You're riding a muddy creek."
"A colloquialism," murmured the woman. "How quaint."
Crawford's narrow, dark head turned toward her with an angry jerk.
She was watching him from beneath her brows in that mocking way, chin
tucked in, and it formed a small crease in the rich flesh beneath her
jaw. There was something concupiscent about it.
"We think your quarrel with Rockland was over more than the way he
acquired Delcazar's land," said Huerta.
Crawford found it difficult to take his eyes off Merida. "Do you?"
"Oh, Huerta," the woman muttered petulantly, "can't you see you'll
never get anywhere beating about the bush with him--"
"You'll never get anywhere with him anyway," said Wallace Tarant. "I
know Glenn Crawford, Huerta. We'd better send him back to San Antonio
right now."
"Oh, no," said Huerta, leaning back. "Not at all. I think if we kept
him here long enough, we would find a way of convincing him that it
is to his advantage to--ah--" he moved his hand, as if seeking the
word--"cooperate, with us. Yes. Co-operate. Don't you, Merida?"
The woman's laugh held a husky sensuality. "Perhaps. Even if not--it
would be interesting."
Wallace Tarant put down his fork angrily. "Don't be a fool, Huerta.
Having Crawford here is like sitting on a keg of powder with a lighted
match. What would Kenmare do if he found we'd caught Crawford and
hadn't notified the authorities?"
"Kenmare won't find out," said Huerta, turning toward the man, "unless
someone tells him. Ah, our coffee."
Jacinto set the urn down hesitantly, glaring about at them. He started
to speak, then caught Huerta's eye, and backed out of the room,
muttering to himself. Smiling faintly, Huerta indicated that Tarant
should pour. Then he held out a cup.
"Mexican style, Crawford. Perhaps you'll like it. Boiled in milk and
water and sweetened in the pot with _poloncillo_, our brown sugar. I
was surprised to find how few of the hands here drank it like this. I
know Quartel sweetens it with molasses sometimes." His eyes dropped to
his own cup, and he stirred it absently. "Speaking of Quartel, that was
quite an exhibition this afternoon, wasn't it? I don't think I've ever
seen such a vicious horse. And what a magnificent beast a man would
have if he could break it." He looked up abruptly. "Oh, excuse me,
Crawford, I--" he moved his hand in an apologetic gesture--"I wasn't
thinking--"
The woman frowned at him. "Hm?"
"The horse," said Huerta, looking at Merida, "the horse."
"What about the horse?" she said.
"I don't mean that," said Huerta. "I--"
"Never mind," said Crawford. "My legs are all right."
"Oh?" Huerta's arched brows rose. "I got a different impression. You
weren't riding."
"I lost my horse on the Flores Road."
"It was hit?"
"I lost it, that's all," said Crawford.
"Oh." Huerta took out a jade cigarette holder, fitting a smoke into it.
He leaned back, looking at Crawford. "You were watching Africano out in
the corral, that way."
"What about the way I was watching it?"
Huerta's eyes dropped meditatively to the coffee cup, and he allowed
twin streamers of smoke to leave his nostrils. "I guess I got the wrong
impression, Crawford. You'll have to pardon me."
"Impression about what, Huerta?" said Tarant.
Huerta seemed to rouse himself with an effort. "Ah, nothing. Nothing,
Tarant. You're not drinking your coffee, Crawford. Is it too sweet
for you? Pour him another cup, Tarant." The woman was watching him
narrowly now, and Huerta let his eyes meet hers momentarily before he
leaned forward to put his elbows on the table. He took a sip of his own
coffee, looking down the middle of the table in that meditation again.
"They say a man is getting old when he starts reminiscing, but I can't
help being reminded of an instance I ran across in Monterrey some years
ago. After the war I chanced to be employed by a Mexican firm with
interests in a mine north of the city. I had been company doctor some
months when one of the lower shafts caved in, killing half a dozen of
the men. I managed to patch up most of those who escaped with minor
injuries. There was one miner, a huge giant of a fellow, whose legs had
been crushed somewhat beneath the slide. My operations were singularly
successful, and within five or six months he was as good as new, the
bones knit perfectly and the muscles gave no sign of the damage. During
his convalescence, there had been no pain. Yet, the very first day he
went back to work, he experienced the most acute agony in his legs."
The little muscles jumped out all along Crawford's jaw suddenly. Huerta
looked up, smiled faintly. "Yes--the most acute agony. I could find
nothing organically wrong with him, absolutely nothing. In my office,
he did not feel the pain. I took him back to the mine. As he approached
the mouth of the shaft in which he had worked, the agony returned. All
the symptoms of genuine pain. Sweating, trembling, tears in the eyes. I
could not account for it. There was utterly no reason for him to feel
the pain. I administered drugs, enough to deaden the greatest agony. It
had no effect. Then I took him away from the mine. As soon as it was
out of sight, the pain receded, disappeared."
Merida's face had lifted as he spoke, a tight furrow appearing between
her brows. "You mean--his mind--"
"_Sí_," said Huerta. He was adjusting a fresh cigarette carefully in
its holder. "I came to that conclusion finally. The mind plays funny
tricks on us sometimes. That cave-in had been such a ghastly experience
that he actually felt pain when he returned to the scene. And worse
than the pain. Fear. He could never work at his trade again; he could
never get near a mine without feeling that pain. And that fear. He
tried to fight it. He had been a brave man once. He tried to force
himself back into the mines. But in the shaft he became a sniveling,
gibbering coward, crying and puking like a baby, unable to speak
coherently even. Yes, the mind does play funny tricks on us--" Huerta
held his cigarette holder out abruptly. "Crawford, you've spilled your
coffee!"
_Chapter Three_
HUERTA WAS RIGHT!
The bunkhouse and cookshack stood a few hundred yards south of the
house, two adobe structures connected by a covered dog-run. Rockland's
father had put them up to live in while his large dwelling was being
built, constructing their walls not with mud bricks but by the older
Indian method of making forms out of willow shoots and cotton sheeting,
pouring the mud into these forms, and peeling off the cotton after the
adobe had dried. Unless these walls were replastered every six months
or so, they began to crack, and the inside of the cookshack was already
beginning to show a network of minute fissures across its whitewashed
surface. It was here Crawford had spent the night, an oppressive sense
of the hostility which surrounded him keeping him from much sleep.
After breakfast, all the crew had left the bunkhouse but Bueno Bailey.
He was gaunt as an alley cat, and he parted his long yellow hair in
the middle and slicked it down with bacon grease, and he sat in the
stilling morning heat of the shack, idly spinning the cylinder of his
six-shooter.
"Will you stop that, Bueno?" snapped Crawford.
Bailey looked up at Crawford, who had been standing against the
doorpost, staring outside. "I've seen cattle look out between the bars
of a pen that same way, Glenn," he said, putting his long forefinger
against the cylinder of his gun to give it another, deliberate whirl.
"You don't need to get ideas. Why do you think they left me here?"
"I'll bite," said Crawford. "Why?"
"They haven't decided what to do with you yet," murmured Bailey.
"Tarant was for taking you right back to San Antonio, but Huerta didn't
want that, for some reason. Either way, it's a cinch they don't want
you to get away. _Sabe?_"
"What's Huerta got to say about it?" said Crawford.
"He's some friend of Rockland's," Bueno told him.
"That doesn't seem to me enough reason for the way he assumes authority
around here," Crawford muttered. "I thought Quartel was the ramrod."
"There's some kind of deal between Huerta and Tarant," Bailey answered,
giving the cylinder another spin. "Quartel's tried to buck Huerta a
couple of times and Tarant stood behind the doctor. Quartel almost lost
his job the second time. Tarant gave us the idea we'd better do what
Huerta liked if we wanted to keep on working here."
Crawford glanced at the gun. "I asked you to stop that."
Bueno leaned forward on the three-legged stool, placing his elbows on
his knees to look up at Crawford. "So you had to come back, Glenn," he
said. "Why?"
"Maybe I came back to pay a few debts," said Crawford thinly.
The oily click of the cylinder stopped abruptly. "You owe somebody
something?"
"Still snipping cinches, Bueno?"
The stool crashed to the floor, and Crawford whirled from where he
had been standing in the doorway to meet Bailey as the man came up
against him. The only thing that prevented their bodies from meeting
was the gun Bailey held against Crawford's body. The man's milky eyes
were slitted, and the smell of that bacon grease in his hair nauseated
Crawford.
"Chew that a little finer," said Bueno, through his teeth.
"Africano never could have rolled me under if that rigging hadn't
come apart," Crawford said thinly. "I saw the cinch on that saddle
afterward. It hadn't pulled loose by itself."
"Glenn--" Bailey let it out on a hissing breath--"I think you better
change your mind about that."
"I know who did Rockland's stable jobs for him," said Crawford.
The gun dug into his belly. "Glenn--"
"Yes?" said Crawford. "Make it a better job than that first time,
Bueno."
Bueno stood there a moment longer, his breath hot and fetid against
Crawford's face. Then his weight settled back onto his heels. He turned
around and set the stool upright and lowered himself onto it once more.
He began twirling the cylinder again with his forefinger. Crawford saw
it tremble against the blued steel.
"When the time comes, Crawford," said Bueno, not looking up, "I will
make it a better job, you can depend on that. I'll finish the job."
The harsh laugh from the doorway caused Crawford to turn back that way.
He wondered how long Quartel had stood there. The man moved on into the
room, a pawky smile on his sensuous lips. The pores of his cheeks and
nostrils were large enough to be clearly discernible, and they exuded
a heavy sweat, lending a greasy look to the thick brown flesh of his
face. He stuck his thumbs in the waistband of his dirty _chivarras_,
leaning back slightly.
"It seems that you haven't got one friend left on the Rockland
_estancia_, doesn't it, _Señor_ Crawford?" he said.
"_En la cárcel y en la cama se conocen los amigos_," said the man who
had come in with Quartel.
"Did I ask for any of your stupid proverbs, Aforismo?" said Quartel.
"It is just a saying they have in Durango," said Aforismo. "In jail and
in bed we know our friends."
He was a thin, stooped man, Aforismo, his white cotton shirt soiled
with dirt and horse-droppings, his eyebrows slanting upward toward the
middle of his forehead to give him a habitual expression of mournful
complaint.
"Maybe you got a proverb that tells how to find out where a man pins
his badge," said Quartel, looking at Crawford.
"I know one about a stitch in time--"
"Knew a Texas Ranger once who pinned it to his undershirt," said
Quartel.
Bueno Bailey had looked up. "What saddle you in now?"
"It would be a good reason," said Quartel. "He had to have some reason."
"Listen," said Bueno. "That's Glenn Crawford. Sure he had some reason.
A lot of reasons. But not that. He's--"
"I know who he is," said Quartel.
"Then why--"
"Innes took Tarant back to San Antonio last night," said Quartel.
"Innes heard a lot of talk. There's rumor of a government marshal in
the _brasada_."
"If that's so, it's because of Crawford," said Bueno. "Kenmare couldn't
get him. I wouldn't doubt they'd send a marshal after him."
"Maybe you got it inside your boot," said Quartel.
"What makes you so touchy about a badge-packer?" said Crawford.
Bailey had stood up. "Listen, Quartel, can't you get it through your
thick skull, whatever Crawford is, he ain't a lawman."
"Isn't he?" Quartel studied Crawford a moment. Then he threw back
his head to emit that short, harsh laugh, so loud it seemed to rock
the room. It died as swiftly as it had come. His glance dropped to
Crawford's legs. "So you got reasons to come back. Africano, maybe?"
"_You_ haven't broken him," said Crawford.
Quartel flushed. "I will. There isn't any horse I can't break."
"He would have rolled you if you'd been a second later with that
_mangana_ yesterday."
"Well, I wasn't a second later," said Quartel. "Did you see that
_mangana_? Nobody else could have done it so close." He thumped his
barrel chest with a hairy fist. "I'm the best damn roper in the world,
Crawford. I can rope better and ride farther and drink more and cuss
dirtier than any _hombre_ from here to Mexico City. Now let's go. I got
a lot of cattle to clean out of that brush and I'm not wasting a man
here to guard you."
Jacinto had come through the covered dog-run from the kitchen in time
to hear Quartel. "The _señorita_ will not like that," he said.
Quartel turned angrily toward him. "You in Merida's _corrida_ or mine."
"Yours, Quartel, _madre de Dios_, yours," said Jacinto. "Still she
won't like that. Only last night I heard her say--"
"_Punta en boca_," said Quartel. "Shut your mouth. All right, Crawford.
We got the horses saddled."
Crawford's boots made a hesitant scrape on the hard-packed adobe floor;
then he took a breath, and walked toward the door. Jacinto waddled
after him, sweat glistening in the wrinkles between the rolls of fat
forming his face. He caught Crawford's arm, trying to stop him.
"Listen, _señor_," he said breathlessly. "Don't let them take you out
there. Merida is against it. I heard her and Huerta arguing about it.
Just wait till I tell her and she'll stop Quartel. Don't let them get
you out there." Quartel had moved outside to let Crawford through
the door. The heat of the sun struck him like a blow on the face as
he stepped out with Jacinto still tugging at him. "I'm telling you,
_señor_, don't be a fool. If they get you--"
"Dammittohell!" screamed Quartel, and stepped in to spin around with
his arm held out. The backhand blow caught Jacinto squarely in the
face. Jacinto's hand clutched Crawford's arm spasmodically as the blow
knocked him backward, jerking Crawford off balance. Then Jacinto's
three hundred pounds of sweating brown flesh struck the wall of the
bunkhouse. The building shuddered, and a shower of pale adobe flakes
descended on the huge Mexican as he slid to the ground.
Quartel stood there a moment, his face diffused with blood till it
looked positively negroid, his whole body shaking with rage. For the
first time, the utter, primal violence of the man struck Crawford.
Without a word, Quartel turned and walked across the compound.
The true suffocation in all this heat seemed to close in on Crawford
as he moved to follow Quartel. He found himself breathing with a heavy
effort. Cabezablanca was standing by the group of horses near the
corral. The white-headed man held his Winchester tenderly.
"How are you, Crawford?" he said softly. Crawford glanced at him
without answering, and Cabezablanca's eyes narrowed and he ran one
finger up and down the gleaming barrel of his carbine. "You still
refuse to be civil with me. That is unfortunate. I am a very dangerous
man, Crawford."
"That's your horse." Quartel nodded at a ewe-necked old paint standing
near the corral fence. It had rheumy eyes and rope scars all over its
gaunt shoulders and a saddleback the shape of hickory bow and the
weediest legs Crawford had ever laid eyes on. Yet, standing even this
near the animal, Crawford could feel that nebulous excitation begin to
rise in him. Or was it excitation? The sweat broke out on his palms. In
a sudden burst of anger, he clamped his fists shut.
"What kind of crowbait is this?" he said.
Quartel shrugged. "I thought--I mean your legs--"
"I told you that was over." Crawford did not know whether the anger was
at himself or at Quartel. He might not have said it under more control.
"I can ride anything you can!"
"Africano?" said Quartel. He saw Crawford stiffen and grow pale, and
his laugh had a scraping sound. "Never mind, Crawford, never mind. You
won't have to fork the _puro negro_. He ain't broke yet. You saw that
yesterday." Then the laughter left Quartel. He jerked a thumb at the
paint. "Get on."
"The hell." Crawford had bent forward slightly, his whole body rigid.
That bitter intensity had drawn the flesh taut across his cheeks
beneath his scrubby beard. He turned abruptly toward the corral.
"Where you going?" shouted Quartel.
"To get a decent horse," said Crawford, without turning back. "You want
to try and stop me?"
* * * * *
He was sweating again. It was a little sorrel pony with a running walk
so relaxed Crawford could hear the teeth pop at every step like a
Tennessee walker, and a rocking-chair would have been harder on a man.
Yet he was sweating again.
"They say the _hombres_ who curse the _brasada_ most love it the best,"
said Aforismo. "You must love it like a woman."
Crawford turned his head sharply toward the man. He hadn't realized
he had been swearing out loud. It hadn't been at the brush. It was so
confused now, inside and out. It was hard to breathe, and the muscles
across his stomach were tight as a stretched dally, and he could feel
the pain spreading from his hips. _All the symptoms of genuine pain._
Was that what Huerta had said? _Sweating, trembling, tears in the
eyes._ The doctor's voice was in his ears, suave, insidious. _The mind
plays funny tricks sometimes._ It couldn't be. Not his mind. Not _my_
mind, Huerta, not _my_ mind.
"Yeah," grinned Bueno Bailey, forking a big dun on Crawford's other
side. "There never was a man could cuss the brush like Crawford. I'd
rather listen to him talking his way through a _mogote_ of chaparral
than hear music."
Crawford hardly heard him. The perspiration was sticky beneath his
armpits, his shirt clung to his back with it. And now it was that
other, stirring in him, so confused with the pain at first he could
not define it, or would not--the same thing he had felt there at the
corral, watching Africano. _And worse than the pain._ No. He wasn't
afraid. _I'm not afraid, Huerta._ How could he be? _How could I be?
Living with horses all my life. How could I be?_
"Take it easy," snapped Bueno. "What's the matter?"
Crawford jerked the reins against his horse, realizing he had allowed
it to sidle into the dun. The sorrel shifted uncertainly the other way,
thumping into Aforismo's animal. This time Crawford's reining was even
more violent and it caused the sorrel to shy.
Crawford was clenching his teeth now with the effort at control. His
knees were like vises against the animal's sides. Just a trot, and his
knees were like vises. _Oh, damn you, Crawford. Just a trot, and you're
bouncing like a satchel in a spring buggy._ He felt a desperate relief
sweep him as Quartel drew up ahead of them, running a finger around the
inside of the red bandanna he wore.
"God, it's like a furnace," he said.
"The drier the spring the more mesquite beans in the summer," said
Aforismo.
Quartel glanced keenly at Crawford, then waved his hand at a big
thicket of black chaparral starting a few yards away. "That _mogote_
covers two or three miles. We been through once, but it's so thick
a lot of the _cimarrónes_ got away from us. Crawford is riding with
Bailey and me. Whitehead, you take a line through the north flank of
the _mogote_. Meet us at Rio Diablo about sundown."
Cabezablanca looked at Crawford before he wheeled his horse and trotted
off into the brush, followed by Aforismo. Quartel forked a big brown
animal with white hairs in its tail; they called it a _pelicano_. He
reined the horse violently around, flapping his stirrups out wide. He
did not have to kick the animal. As soon as the _pelicano_ saw those
feet fly out, it bolted into a wild gallop straight for the thicket.
Crawford nudged the sorrel with a heel and followed, stiffening in the
saddle as he broke into a trot. Quartel made a great ripping sound
tearing through the first thin fringe of mesquite. Then they were in
the dry heat of the thicket.
There was no more wily animal in the world than the _ladino_ of the
_brasada_. These outlaw cattle made nests for themselves in the
thickest _mogoles_, lying there for days at a time when hunted, their
food the very thicket that surrounded them. They ate off the prickly
pear and other brush within the _mogote_ until it formed a veritable
room, with the walls and roof of entangled chaparral and mesquite so
dense that they were invisible from without. This larger thicket the
men rode through was in reality formed by many smaller thickets, with
game trails and open patches throughout the thinner brush surrounding
the minor _mogotes_. Quartel followed one of these game trails for
some time without any apparent effort to find sign. Then, abruptly, he
pulled up on his reins. The heavy _pelicano_ reared to an instant's
stop, head jerking up to the brutal jerk on its cruel spade bit.
Quartel leaned toward the _mogote_ of black chaparral and Crawford was
close enough now to see the man's thick nostrils flutter.
"_Cimarrónes_ in here," whispered the Mexican, finally. "Outlaws. You
go around to the other side, Bueno. You'll get the first chance at
whatever Crawford and I scare out from here."
Bailey pulled his dun around and cut through an opening between this
smaller _mogote_ and another, disappearing. Quartel wiped sweat off his
face with the back of his hand. He grinned pawkily at Crawford.
"How's the sorrel?" he said.
"Good enough," said Crawford. He tried to relax. But he knew what was
coming. It would be fast now. If there were _ladinos_ in there, it
would be fast.
"Hola!"
Quartel's hoarse shout startled the sorrel so much it almost pitched
Crawford off. Grabbing wildly with his legs, Crawford saw the Mexican's
stirrups flapped out that way. The _pelicano_ bolted into a headlong
gallop and crashed bodily into that dense mass of chaparral, ripping
a great hole in the _mogote_. Crawford knew a moment's painful
hesitation, fighting his spooked sorrel, then he gave the animal its
head and booted it in the flanks.
The horse went through the hole Quartel had left. The brush formed
but a thin wall, and the sorrel burst into the opening beyond with a
startling abruptness. In these first few moments Crawford felt nothing
but a blurred impression of externals. He saw Quartel's _pelicano_
ahead, trailing white brush from its scarred hide and dripping mesquite
berries in its wake. He had a vivid picture of three gaunt cattle
leaping to their feet beyond, and knew a faint, transitory surprise
that he should notice such an insignificant detail as the hair rubbed
off the knees of the white heifer, showing that she had been crawling
the brush instead of walking, in order to remain hidden from the recent
roundup. Then the trio of _cimarrónes_ had wheeled away from Quartel's
horse and crashed through the opposite wall. The deafening sound and
the swift, blinding movement stunned Crawford's senses as he went
through after Quartel.
"_Bueno!_" screamed Bailey, appearing from somewhere beyond with his
dally rope spinning in a California throw, coming up from underneath
so it would not catch on the overhanging brush, "_bueno_," the loop
snaking about the forefeet of the lead steer. The ground shook as the
steer went down and Bailey's horse was stiff-legging to a stop, Bailey
swinging down to run for the kicking steer with a peal. He had done the
whole thing with such incredible speed that before Crawford had passed,
Bailey had the steer's hind legs hog-tied with the short rawhide peal
and was dragging him to a coma tree, where he would leave him hitched
until they were ready to take him back to the spread. Then Bailey was
behind, and Quartel and Crawford were smashing through a thin stretch
of mesquite after the other two.
No riding in the world could compare with popping the brush. A
_brasadero_ might easily take a job on a spread outside the brush and
make good, but a hand used to the prairies seldom succeeded in becoming
a brush hand. It took consummate skill to ride at a dead run through
the brush after cattle like this. And Quartel had that skill. Ahead
of Crawford, he made a bobbing swaying figure on that big _pelicano_,
rarely holding his seat on top of the saddle, incessantly swinging off
to the side or ducking down forward or jerking back and forth. The
two _ladinos_ raced beneath a post oak branch so low it scraped hide
off their backs, and Crawford expected to see Quartel rein violently
around it. But the Mexican merely swung one leg off and hung down the
side of his horse like an Indian, his thick right arm hooked over the
_pelicano's_ neck. The oak branch knocked Quartel's sombrero off his
head--he would have lost it but for the tie-thong--and tore at the
cantle of the saddle so violently the whole rigging shrieked. There was
a great mass of thorny junco just beyond the tree, growing as high as
the _pelicano's_ head, and a less skillful man would have been ripped
to bloody shreds before he got back onto the saddle. Crawford could
hear Quartel's violent grunt and thought sure the man was swinging up
too soon and would be knocked back down by that branch. But Quartel had
gauged it to a nicety. His spasmodic lurch upward took him back into
the saddle just in time. The junco merely scraped his left leg as he
thundered by.
"Hola," he shouted wildly, "hola, you crazy _cimarrónes_, I'm right on
your tail, hola!"
Something within Crawford rebelled as he neared that spot Quartel had
passed through. He felt his hands tugging on the reins, and the sorrel
lost all its collection, thrown off balance as it tried to pull out of
its mad gallop into a trot. Crawford was panting in a heavy, frustrated
way as he shifted through the spot beneath the post oak branch and past
the junco bush. And now it was strong enough in him to have a palpable
grip, like a great hand squeezing his vitals. The first action had been
violent enough to carry him along with it, but now that was over, and
slowing like that had been the final error.
The muscles across his stomach were knotting with nervous tension, and
his legs quivered against the side of the sorrel. He leaned forward,
and the horse gathered itself to break into a gallop ahead. But somehow
he could not move his feet against the animal's side. Somehow his hands
would not relax their hold on the reins.
"What's the matter, Crawford?"
It was Bueno Bailey, tearing in from behind, and Crawford realized
he had been sobbing to himself, huddled over his horse that way.
"Nothing, damn you, nothing," he shouted and booted the sorrel so hard
it whinnied in surprise and pain, rearing up and then bolting headlong
after Quartel. Crawford had one more glimpse of the Mexican before he
disappeared from sight, chousing after those two animals. A malignant
branch of chaparral reached out for Quartel's head, and he dodged that
and then swayed back the other way in time to miss being blinded by a
clump of mesquite berries. Then he reined his horse around a growth of
prickly pear and swung down off the flank as the animal burst through a
last dense growth of chaparral with branches so low the _ladinos_ had
found trouble going through, and then he was out of sight.
_Keep your eyes open, keep your eyes open._ It kept spinning through
Crawford's head like that, the fundamental dictum of brush-popping. If
a man closed his eyes once he was lost. Crawford had seen more than one
hand knocked from his horse because a branch appearing suddenly out of
nowhere had caused him to shut his eyes and dodge blindly.
The sorrel was going at a frenzied, headlong pace now, caught up in
the wild excitement of the chase, with the drumming pound of Bueno
Bailey's dun off to the flank and the deafening crash of mesquite and
chaparral echoing about them. All he could do was dodge and duck. He
found himself gripping the horn with one white-knuckled hand. Cursing
bitterly, he tore it off, jerking violently aside just in time to miss
being raked by a thick mat of mesquite. And all the time it was going
through him, _keep your eyes open_, and he couldn't.
A branch of chaparro _prieto_ loomed before his face and he jerked
aside and blackness blotted out sight. He heard someone yelling and did
not know it was himself till he had opened his eyes again. It could not
have been from pain because he had missed the chaparro. But the instant
he opened his eyes, leaning off to one side that way, junco and retama
were clawing at his face. With his eyes open he would have been able to
see them in time to dodge. As it was, the myriad claws of the allthorn
raked his flesh like the stroke of a jaguar's paw. Again his eyes
clamped shut, and he tore himself out of the tangle. If it had been a
post oak it would have knocked him off.
He did not know whether the screams were inside his head now or whether
he actually voiced them. He felt his hands jerking desperately on the
reins, but the sorrel was running wild, and he had lost control of the
horse as well as himself. He was swept with violent, spasmodic waves of
virulent anger at himself and pain that grew more knifing each time it
struck from his loins and fear that turned his mind to a kaleidoscope
of uncontrolled sensations. He was clinging with both hands to the horn
now, his eyes closed, sobbing and screaming. The sorrel sideswiped
a post oak. A low branch knocked Crawford backward with the blow.
He reeled back to an upright position, swimming in a stunned agony.
Somewhere, dimly, in what was left of his consciousness he realized
there was only one thing to do. If he tried to keep on the horse any
longer this way he would be battered into pulp. Yet, knowing it, there
was no will left in him to act. Even that swift thought of it caused a
new spasm of awful fear.
Reeling, swaying, his eyes clamped shut, his ducking jacket ripped
and torn, he rode on madly through the thicket. He crashed through a
mesquite thicket, and the brush clawed his cheeks to shreds. Chaparral
beat him aside time and time again. His screams were hoarse and
incoherent now, hardly human. The lathered, frothing wild-eyed horse
was in a frenzy, its hoofs drumming the ground in a dim tattoo beneath
the deafening, incessant crash of brush. Then that last blow caught
him, square across the belly. It must have been a low branch. His
desperate grip was torn from the saddle horn, and he was swept over
the cantle and off the sorrel's rump, doubled over. He had one lucid
thought before his head struck the ground, blotting out all thought.
Huerta was right!
_Chapter Four_
UNREASONING FEAR
Dusk held its own singular aspect. There was something hushed about the
brush at this time. Not the dead oppressive silence of noon. There were
many small sounds, but the bizarre, velvety clutch of twilight seemed
to subdue them. A hooty owl called tentatively from a hackberry down in
some yonder draw. An invisible jack rabbit made a dim, staccato thump
hopping through a distant clearing, then halted. Nearer by a lizard
rustled sibilantly through the foot-deep layer of decaying brush, which
for eons had been dropping from the bushes to pile up on the ground.
It was these sounds, one by one, which impinged on Glenn Crawford's
consciousness. Then the fetid odor of the mold beneath him. His face
felt stiff and painful. It caused him a great effort to reach up to his
cheek. The rips and tears made great gaps in his beard and his whole
face was covered with dried blood. Finally he sat up, shaking his head
dully. Three hours? Four hours? What time had it been? It was hard to
think. He shook his head again. Early afternoon anyway. And this was--
That brought him up straight. They hadn't found him? It was strange.
It was wrong, somehow. They hadn't found him. Wrong. They were better
trackers than that. All of them. If Quartel could ride like that he
could track like that.
He got up with great difficulty and fell down again. His head was
spinning. When he got to his knees once more, the shreds of his ducking
jacket bound his arms, and when he fell that second time, he went full
on his face, unable to get his hands in front of him. In a fit of
anger he tore the remains of the jacket off. The third time he managed
to remain upright. As he stood there, the first thought of the horse
came to him. He felt that pain begin in his loins. Just the thought of
it!
With a sobbing curse he broke into a stumbling run at the first thicket
of brush. He halted himself before he had reached the _mogote_. He
was breathing heavily and his lips were pinched. He held out his
hand before him. It shook visibly. He closed his eyes a moment, face
twisted. Then he took a deep breath and opened them again, staring
about the clearing. There was a great torn place in one thicket on the
other side. He moved over there at a deliberate walk. The hole in the
brush was big enough to walk through; beyond that was another open
patch and then a second small thicket torn asunder by the passage of a
heavy body. It was full night by the time he found the sorrel that way,
following the trail it had made bursting through the brush. The animal
stood in a clearing, head hanging wearily, dried lather forming dirty
yellow patterns on its freshly scarred hide.
Crawford was about to step into the open when he caught himself. There
was a dim rustling in the brush to his left. His face turned that way
sharply. The noise ceased after a moment. He shook his head and went
out to get the horse.
"Stand still, you crazy fool," he said, "stand still now, I'm not going
to hurt you, just stand still, that's it, hold it."
The animal had started to shift away, but his soothing voice quieted
it. He moved in close and ran his hand reassuringly along its rump
and down its side. Then, as he stood with his face toward it that
way, close enough so that the heat of its body reached his belly, it
began to come again. That insidious, stirring, prickling sensation
deep in his loins. That hollow sickness growing in his stomach till it
approached nausea; the sweat breaking out on his face and beneath his
armpits.
The curse had a strangled sound in his throat, as he bent to get the
trailing reins. He wouldn't walk back to the spread. No matter what
else, he wouldn't give them that satisfaction. He stopped, with his
hand not yet touching the end of the reins. Even in the dark, bending
over like that, he could see the footprints. The sorrel's hoofs had
made their dim impression all over the decaying vegetation covering
the gound. But here and there, where the horse had not blotted it out,
was a smaller, deeper imprint, like that of a boot heel. He remained
stooped over it for a moment that way. Then, slowly, he started to lift
the reins. They were caught on something. He reached down and found
the ends tied about a long stake of wood embedded deeply beneath the
rotting brush.
Crawford slipped the reins off the stick and rose beside the horse.
Slowly he put his weight against its neck. His breath had a small,
swift sound. The horse gradually shifted around under that pressure
until it stood broadside between Crawford and the direction that small
rustling had come from when he first entered the thicket.
"Now." He spoke to the horse softly, sliding his hands up the reins
till they were directly beneath the bit, and pulling gently forward.
"Let's go. Let's go. Take it easy. Let's go."
The animal moved toward the fringe of brush surrounding the clearing.
Crawford walked close in by its side, tugging incessantly forward on
the reins, talking in that soft low tone. The animal's hoofs crackled
in the brush underfoot. It snorted once, pulling peevishly at his tight
grip on the shanks of the bit. He twisted them upward slightly and the
horse responded to the bit against its roof, quieting. They had almost
reached the edge of the _mogote_ when the shot crashed.
The horse was jerked over against Crawford by the force of the bullet
going through its body. Then it reared into the air, screaming.
Desperately Crawford tried to retain his hold on the reins, yanking
the horse on ahead, throwing the whole weight of his body into it.
He managed to fight the plunging, rearing animal a couple more steps
toward the brush. Then the beast's violent spasms tore his grip loose
of the reins. With the animal still forming a shield in that last
instant, he threw himself in a headlong dive for the thicket. Another
shot roared behind him, and the horse screamed again, and then Crawford
was rolling into the crackling, tearing mesquite thicket. He came to
his feet, pawing a cluster of berries out of his face, and plunged
blindly on into the _mogote_.
For a long, blind run, the only sound was that incessant deafening
crash of brush all about him. He burst through that first thicket
and crossed a game trail and clattered into another _mogote_. Black
chaparral this time, and stabbing junco and maddening prickly pear.
Then an open patch. And another _ramadero_. White brush and golden
huisache that filled the air with a vague, viscid odor of honey. Then
that was gone and the spines of the agarita tore at his face. He broke
through the agarita into a game trail that wound its secretive way
through the _mogotes_, and he stumbled down that till it petered out
into more mesquite. Halfway through, the spread of mesquite became
entwined with chaparro _prieto_ and Spanish dagger that met his
every movement with a vicious stab of its dirklike growth. He found
himself fighting a frantic, useless battle to penetrate this thicket
farther; it had brought him to a complete stop and, standing there,
chest heaving, face dripping sweat, he could see that the impenetrable
_mogote_ was on the rim of a draw, and that it grew on down into the
bottom of the draw, choking it full. Even if he could manage to fight
his way through the thicket, he would be exposed, crossing that draw.
The realization came to him in a dim, spasmodic way, with no true
reasoning behind it, for he was still filled with that animal panic.
He whirled back and fought his way out of the mesquite. And then,
crossing the comparatively open space of the game trail, it came to
him. He stopped there. Tears squeezed from his eyes with the effort
it caused him to control his breath so he could hear more clearly. It
came again, small, distant, yet distinct enough. The faint rattle of
mesquite berries, brushed by a passing body. The soft snap of decaying
vegetation beneath a careless foot. Again it was no reasoning process.
Just a wave of instinctive, animal realization of how he was trapped.
Face twisting with frustrated rage, Crawford backed slowly, almost
involuntarily, across the game trail into the mesquite thicket again.
He moved as far back as he could, upright, and then he got down on his
belly and crawled in until the roots and trunks and foliage became too
thick even for that, and then he stopped.
His shirt was drenched with sweat and the perspiration dripped into
his eyes, blinding and stinging. Gnats began to float in, attracted
by the sweat and the blood of his scratches. At first he fought them.
He rubbed his palms viciously against his face, mashing the maddening
insects. He slapped wildly, gasping virulent curses. It only seemed to
draw more. With a myriad of the gnats mashed wetly against the cut,
bleeding, stinging, itching flesh of his face, and with a veritable
cloud of them buzzing about his upper body, he put his head at last
into his arms, and a bitter, hoarse sobbing arose mutedly from him.
At last he stopped even that. He lay there in utter, hopeless defeat.
His crashing passage through the brush had frightened all the small
animals into silence, but now the sounds of them began again. A hooty
owl started to call, somewhere far out in the brush. Then, a coyote
mourning in some distant draw. The singing of a mockingbird that had
stayed awake to welcome the rising moon. The rustle of lizards through
the decay. And that other sound. That desultory, intermittent sound of
someone moving out there.
A thin scream rang out with terrifying abruptness, jerking Crawford's
head up. He lay that way a moment, up on his hands, rigid, trembling
with strain. Then he lowered himself again. Only an ocelot, somewhere,
out there, a big cat down from the mountains across the Rio maybe. And
now, lying there, with the first awful sense of defeat losing its edge,
the other began to come. They thought they had him? Damn them. Whoever
it was, damn them. The anger grew in him till it struggled with the
defeat. It thickened the blood in his throat till he almost choked.
Had him trapped? The hell. Kill him like that? Without a gun, without
anything. Think he'd just wait? _Try it. Come on, try it. I'm here. Try
it._
It was going through his head while he squirmed about beneath the low
overhanging branches of chaparral, scratching his face and hands anew
on barbed nopal and the harsh mesquite. Finally he found a maguey
plant, close to the trail. He had no knife, and he had to tear at it
with his fingers. They were ripped and bleeding by the time he had torn
the first strip of the leathery plant.
The Mexicans cured the strips in brine and in the sun to supple
it for their ropes. Crawford could do nothing but braid the stiff
lengths together. And all the time, out there, approaching with the
deliberateness of a man knowing the confidence of complete advantage,
those sounds, rising with deadly intermittence over the other sounds.
The soft crunch of a boot heel driving through the layer of rotting
vegetation that covered the ground. The sibilant harshness of mesquite
scraping leather. Crawford worked with swift desperation till he had
a line long enough; then he knotted a hondo into one end and formed
a loop. It took him half a dozen throws across the game trail to snag
one of the low chaparral branches in a _mogote_ over there. Then he
hooked the line beneath a root on the opposite side of the trail so
that it crossed the trail itself on the ground. He moved back into his
own thicket as far as the line would permit. Then it was the waiting.
Working with the rope that way, there had been no time to think. But
now it had begun to come.
_En la cárcel y en la cama se conocen los amigos._
Crawford felt his whole body grow rigid with a palpable jerk. He almost
turned his head to see who had spoken. A muffled sound escaped him as
he realized it had only been in his mind. The _brasada_ could do that
to a man, this way. In bed and in jail we know our friends? Sure. Maybe
it was Aforismo. What did it matter.
The hooty owl stopped for a while, and there were only small rustlings
in the underbrush. Then the sound again, returning. A sibilant,
crushed, snapping sound.
_I am a very dangerous man, Crawford._
This time he did not stiffen. It jumped through his brain so vividly he
could have sworn it was spoken. Yet he did not stiffen. All right. So
maybe it was Whitehead. All right.
Moonlight spilled through his thicket suddenly, and he realized how
long he had lain there. The rising moon made skeletal monsters of the
chaparral bushes across the yellow river of the game trail, only adding
to the haunted tension filling Crawford. Thoughts moved uncontrollably
through his head now.
_Please, no violence. I was born for laughter and wassail and song--_
No. Not Jacinto. Anybody else. Even Wallace Tarant. But not big, fat,
grumbling Hyacinth of the River. The gnats had found Crawford again.
He dared not move as they buzzed fitfully about his face, stinging,
maddening. He closed his eyes, gritting his teeth. Then he opened them
again. That would not do.
He thought he would go crazy. His hands twitched with the impulse to
slap at them. His body cried out for movement to escape their insane
buzzing. Each sting made him jerk spasmodically.
_Bueno--_
Sure, Bailey. Sure. Crawford could imagine Bailey doing that sort of
thing. All right, Bailey. Come on, Bailey. Let's get it over with,
Bailey.
He tried to stop thinking like that. There were so many possibilities.
He tried to stop considering them. A man could go loco that way. He
could go loco and jump right up out of the thicket and run screaming
down the game trail right into the arms of that bushwhacker, whoever it
was. A man could go loco anyway. The ocelot screamed out there again,
filling the night with a thin feral madness. It was all madness. The
gnats and the screaming cat and the howling coyote and the crackling
mesquite and the thoughts Crawford couldn't stop whirling faster and
faster through his head till he wanted to beat it against the ground.
_You'll excuse me. An old complaint._
Huerta? Sure, why not? It could be him. It could be any of them.
_I knew a Ranger once that pinned it to his undershirt._
Yeah. Even Quartel. The ocelot or Quartel or the hooty owl or any of
them.
He lay there, wanting to cry, his fists clenched around the rope till
they hurt, his eyes squeezed tight with the terrible effort he made to
control himself. Finally he opened them again, staring down the trail.
It would be getting him, too, out there. If it was getting Crawford
it would get the other man just as much. The _brasada_. That's what
it was. The _brasada_. Enough to drive any man loco like this. And it
would be getting him, too, out there.
The ocelot screamed. Crawford's lips pulled off his teeth in a wolfish
grin. That get you, Bailey? That get you, Whitehead? Like it got me?
The hooty owl began to talk. Crawford's grin spread. That get you?
Huerta? Sort of scary, isn't it? Jacinto? Stop maybe, and look around.
Sweat maybe. Like me. Aforismo? Sure. Sure it got them. They were as
nervous as hell. Whoever it was, he was as nervous as hell. Crawford
wanted to laugh suddenly. He was bathed suddenly in a cold sweat. Then
heat flooded up from his loins. It was like a fever.
Or was it the waiting? Or the _brasada_. Sure, the _brasada_. He'd felt
this way before out in it. At night. Not so much, maybe. But then he
hadn't been waiting for a man with a gun to come and kill him either.
The decay was damp from his sweat beneath his belly and legs. His
eyes ached from peering into the brush all about him. The gnats kept
clouding his vision. But now the man was closer. Each minute sibilance
crashed through Crawford's head like thunder. He could tell when the
man's clothing brushed a clump of mesquite berries and knocked some to
the ground. There was a peculiar rattling quality to that. He could
tell when the man stepped on a prickly pear. It had a squashing sound.
And when he shoved aside some chaparral. That held a hollow thump. And
pulled aside some huisache. Sighing, like the wind.
_I'm a very dangerous man, Crawford._ Sure. Sure you are, Whitehead.
Come on. I'll show you who's dangerous. I knew a man once who pinned
it to his undershirt. All right. One more time, Quartel. One more
time around and I'll show you who's dangerous. Made for laughter and
wassail and song? Come on. I'm waiting. An old complaint? You'll have a
complaint, Huerta. In bed and in jail--
Then it was the shadowy figure moving out of the darkness down the
trail, and Crawford yanked on the maguey and it slipped off the branch
and the branch snapped up with a soft crackle and caused the figure to
whirl that way, his gun crashing, his back toward the thicket in which
Crawford lay.
"Maybe you're a dangerous man," screamed Crawford in a terrible
release, leaping to his feet and throwing himself bodily at the man,
who was still firing wildly into the opposite thicket, "but this is one
bronc you'll wish to hell you never climbed on."
_Chapter Five_
HUERTA MAKES A PROPOSITION
At dawn, it was the birds, mostly, during the spring months, like
this. They filled the dim undulations of brush with a constant, shrill
twittering. Bobwhites shrieked from a draw full of white brush, and
blue quail cooed beneath the _cejas_ of green brazil, and turkeys
gobbled down in a dry creek bed where they were fattening on elm mast.
Through all this treble cacophony, Glenn Crawford walked heavily up
the road leading the shaggy black cow pony. It was Jacinto who saw him
first. Though the sun had not yet risen, smoke curled from the kitchen,
and the gross Mexican was just outside the door filling the coffeepot
from the water butt. It cost him some effort to straighten up when he
caught sight of Crawford. He stared blankly. Then he dropped the big
coffeepot with a clang and began running his way, grunting as each
foot struck the ground, his short, bandy legs looking as if they would
collapse every time the prodigious weight of his torso descended on
them in a step.
"_Dios_, Crawford," he shouted. "_Válgame Dios._ What happened? _Que
hace?_ Who is it? Are you all right? What happened?"
He was halfway to Crawford by the time Aforismo stumbled into view at
the bunkhouse door, pulling bare brown legs into his stiff, greasy
_chivarras_ and blinking sleepily. Someone must have asked him what
it was, for he grunted something over his shoulder and came on out.
Jacinto had reached Crawford by the time he got to the front of the
house, and it was there Crawford halted the horse. The tremendous
Mexican stood with his great belly heaving from the run, staring
blankly at Whitehead. He started to reach out and touch the man, then
dropped his hand.
"Is--is he--"
"Yes," said Crawford, watching Aforismo come from the bunkhouse and
Quartel step out the door now, yawning and cursing. The shutter on an
upstairs window clattered against the dilapidated weatherboarding, and
Huerta leaned out to look down a moment. Then he withdrew his head, and
Crawford could hear movement from within his room. Quartel came across
the compound after Aforismo, slipping a dirty cotton shirt over his
head.
"What happened?" he said. He looked at the body slung across the horse
without much expression in his face. What lay in his eyes was not
apparent till he got closer. They were narrowed, and the pupils held a
strange oblong felinity.
"_Es muerto_," said Jacinto stupidly.
"I know he's dead," said Quartel. "What happened?"
"Out in the brush," said Crawford, watching Quartel.
The Mexican looked at him, then glanced at the horse. He reached out to
pull the Winchester from beneath the stirrup leather, opening the front
end of the magazine and tilting the gun down. Two copper rim-fires
clinked into his calloused palm.
"Looks like he did a lot of shooting," said Quartel.
"He always carried that gun in one hand when he rode," said Jacinto. "I
told him he'd fall and break his neck sometime."
"Did you?" said Quartel. He was studying Crawford, shaking the two .44
shells up and down in his closed hand. "You still haven't told us what
happened."
"His neck's broken," said Jacinto hopefully.
Quartel allowed his narrowed eyes to observe the odd way Cabezablanca's
head hung, twisted around from the line of his shoulders. "That's what
it looks like. Where did you find him?"
"Yes," said Doctor Huerta, from the door. "Where did you find him,
Crawford?"
He had on a gaudy black-and-gold dressing-gown with satin lapels and
slippers of red leather. His face had never looked more dissolute. The
dim light seemed to draw out the singular, jaundiced corruption of his
sallow flesh. His heavy lids were almost closed over his eyes, veined
and pouched, and one of them twitched visibly. He had both hands in
the pockets of his bathrobe, and they were visibly closed into fists.
Merida stood behind him. She had on a house gown of blue cashmere,
evidently donned hurriedly. There was something Indian about her dark,
aquiline face; her black hair hanging long and straight about her
shoulders.
"I told you," said Crawford. "Out in the brush."
"You didn't tell me," said Huerta.
"I told Quartel," said Crawford.
"He didn't tell me what happened," said Quartel.
"To Crawford," said Merida, "or Whitehead?"
"Yes," said Doctor Huerta, moving tiredly across the porch. "What did
happen to you, Crawford?"
"We ain't interested in that now," said Quartel. "I'd like to know what
happened to Whitehead first."
"You seemed interested yesterday," said Merida. "You were quite upset
that you had lost Crawford in the brush."
"What have you got in your hand?" said Huerta.
"A gun," Quartel told him.
"Don't be obtuse," said Huerta. "I mean the other hand."
Quartel opened his fingers. The two shells glinted dully in the growing
light. Somewhere out back of the bunkhouse a rooster crowed. Both
Huerta and Merida looked for a long moment at the two cartridges.
Slowly, Huerta's jaded eyes moved to Crawford, and the heavy, blue
lids were lifted farther open.
"You say his neck is broken?" Huerta asked nobody in particular.
"Jacinto said his neck was broken," said Quartel.
"Well," said the woman impatiently, "is it?"
Huerta drew a weary breath and came slowly down the sagging steps and
around the horse. "Yes," he nodded, without taking his hands from his
pockets. "Broken."
"Like in a fall?" That pathetic hope was in Jacinto's voice again.
Huerta took one of his hands out. His long, pale fingers moved slightly
across Cabezablanca's head and face, sifting the dense white hair and
testing the skull with a professional casualness. "No contusions about
the head or face."
Huerta was running his forefinger delicately across the back of
Cabezablanca's shirt now, flattening it over the resilient planes of
the man's back. Then he moved around to the other side of the shaggy
horse, tugging at the man's pants legs. "No other wounds either," he
said at last. His head turned slowly till he was looking at Crawford.
Something had begun to dissipate the jaded glaze from those eyes,
something that grew in them as he watched Crawford. He spoke, however,
to Quartel. "How many shots does that Winchester hold?"
"It's an 1866 with King's improvements," said Quartel. "Thirteen."
"Oh." It was a soft, hissing intonation. Then Huerta motioned toward
the bunkhouse with the hand he had out. "Better take him down and bury
him out back of the bunkhouse."
Quartel jerked the Winchester at Crawford. "Let's go."
"No," said Huerta, putting that hand back in his pocket and walking up
the steps to the porch. "I think Crawford had better stay here at the
house for breakfast. You did such a poor job of keeping tabs on him
yesterday."
Quartel's face darkened and he took a quick breath before he spoke the
word. "Huerta--"
"Yes?" said Huerta, turning around at the top of the steps to face
Quartel. He leaned forward slightly, his satanic brows arched upward,
those heavy lids slipping down across his eyes. There was a faint,
inquiring smile on his thin, bloodless lips. For a moment Quartel stood
there staring at him, mouth still open a little. The rooster crowed
again. A chachalaca started scolding his mate out in the thicket. With
an abrupt jerk, Quartel turned to catch up the trailing reins of the
pony and started off toward the bunkhouse in that stiff-legged walk of
his, wooden boot heels thumping in a swift, hard tattoo against the
ground. Aforismo watched him go a moment, scratching his bare stomach
absently.
"You can't tell a man's been picking tunas just because he has nopal
thorns all over his coat," he said.
* * * * *
Crawford's boots made a soft muffled sound across the Aubusson rug of
the living-room. He lowered himself heavily into the Turkish toweling
which upholstered the movable cushions of the willow chairs by the
front windows. For the first time he felt fully the toll the preceding
night had exacted from him. His black beard failed to hide the gaunt,
driven hollows beneath his cheeks, and there was something feverish
in the glow of his eyes. He stared absently about the spacious, cool
room. Rockland had refurnished this chamber not two years ago, and as
many times as Crawford had been in it, he could never get used to such
luxury in this harsh, barren land. Huerta had followed him into the
house, halting in the entrance hall for a word with Merida, and now the
doctor stepped into the living-room, closing the door behind him. He
stood there a moment, studying Crawford.
"Merida will dress and be down for breakfast," he said, absently. He
moved to the pier table of rich, figured British oak at one side of
the room, opening one of the doors to lift out a cut-glass decanter.
"Perhaps you would like a drink--after what happened, no?" His face
managed to convey the effort the slightest physical exertion seemed to
cause him, as he poured the liquor. Then his red Chinese slippers slid
over the Aubusson's thick nap to Crawford. As he bent forward to hand
Crawford the drink, their glances met. Perhaps it was a trick of the
illumination from the window. The pupils of Huerta's eyes seemed to
dilate and contract and dilate again, small pin points of glittering
light flaring and dying and flaring once more beneath the jet-black
surface. It filled Crawford with a vague dizziness. "Why did you bring
Whitehead back, Crawford?" murmured the doctor. "It seems to me you
were rather in a position to escape, out there." He waited a moment,
but Crawford did not answer. "When you first came, I considered it
necessary to guard you," said Huerta, finally. "Perhaps I was taking
undue precautions. It seems you would have stayed anyway. Why,
Crawford? Do you still maintain you didn't murder Rockland?"
"That's right." It came from Crawford in a flat defiance.
"Then the only way you could prove your innocence would be to find who
really did murder Rockland," said Huerta. "Do you think the murderer is
here?"
"I have no doubt of it," said Crawford.
"Just what did happen out there?" Huerta said softly, bending toward
Crawford with the liquor.
Crawford took the drink, downed it neat before answering. "What do you
think?"
"I think you surprised a lot of people," said Huerta. "And gave them a
different estimation of you than they had possessed before." He leaned
backward slightly. "Why should Whitehead want to kill you?"
"Who said he did?"
"I never knew such a secretive man," said Huerta. "You refuse to give
one inch, don't you? Very well. Let us assume that Whitehead wanted to
kill you. Why should he?"
"Whitehead was Quartel's man?" said Crawford.
"Quartel is the foreman here," Huerta's agile mind had connected
that even while he spoke, and his head tilted forward in a faint
acquiescence. "All right. Why should Quartel want you killed?"
"He seemed to think I was a lawman," Crawford muttered.
"Is that sufficient reason?"
"You haven't been in the _brasada_ long, have you?" said Crawford.
"It's a good form of suicide for a lawman to show up in here."
Huerta nodded that way again, studying Crawford. "It is interesting,"
he murmured, "to watch it."
That took Crawford off guard. "What?"
"The way it works in you," said Huerta. "You're conscious of it all the
time, Crawford, whether in the proximity of horses or not."
"I don't know what you're talking about," said Crawford, getting up
from the chair with such violence that he pulled one of the rich blue
pillows off with him. He paced across the room in swift, inhibited
strides. Huerta watched him a moment, putting the jade holder languidly
to his lips. He did not smile, but the heavy blue lids, narrowing
across his eyes with a feline torpidity, managed to convey a certain
condescending amusement. His pale, pinched nostrils fluttered, emitting
twin streamers of smoke.
"Did it ever occur to you," he said, "that the legs might not really be
completely healed?"
Crawford turned to look at him a moment. "Sure," he said, finally.
"Sure it occurred to me. I went to more than one doctor. They all said
I was okay."
"It's not like an ordinary fracture, you realize," said Huerta. "Not
like you'd take a stick and snap it, or a leg. Mashed. Not a clean
severance. Crushed, Crawford, like you'd take a handful of meal and
grind it beneath--"
"All right. Mashed. Crushed. All right."
Huerta allowed him to finish, then inclined his head apologetically.
"It does things to the nerves. Physically, I mean. They get crushed
too. Displaced. Pinched. All manner of derangement. Your bones may
knit--the flesh, the skin. But the nerves. That's different. It would,
ah, take a man skilled in that type of work, now, a man with experience
in such things--"
"You've had a vast experience, I suppose."
Huerta shrugged. "Why don't you let me look at them. Maybe we do you an
injustice. Perhaps you have sound reason for feeling the pain."
Crawford studied the man's dissolute face, trying to read what lay
in the ironic twist of the lips, the narrow occultation of the eyes,
wondering if this was just another variation in the game. Yet, the
possibility of sincerity--
"Shall we go into the kitchen?" said Huerta. "The parlor is not exactly
the place for such an examination."
Crawford knew a hesitation. Then, with a decisive abruptness he
turned out into the entrance way and down the hall past the stairs.
The fireplace was of stone rather than the adobe found in the Mexican
dwellings; it ran almost the length of one wall. Jacinto had left a
pot of soup simmering over one of the smaller pot fires to one side of
the main spit. There was a plain Gothic dining-set, and Huerta pulled
one of the butternut chairs from beneath the bare table, indicating
that Crawford should remove his pants. That wary inhibition was in
Crawford's movements.
"You might sit on the table," said Huerta. When Crawford was seated,
the doctor moved closer and bent slightly, reaching out one pale
hand. It was like a woman's hand, satiny, boneless. "Can't you relax,
Crawford? What's the matter? Feel any pain?"
Crawford stared in a strange fascination at the slender, spatulated
fingers spidering his hairy calves. "No. No pain."
"Then why so stiff?" Huerta pressed a spot just below his knee. The
strength of his grip was surprising. Then, still holding the kneecap
between thumb and forefinger, he looked up. It was the same thing,
again, those eyes. The pupils took on an oblique felinity, and the
odd little lights flaring beneath the surface. And he began to talk,
in that soft, bored, insinuating tone. "Nerve ends, you understand.
Pressures. As I said, deranged. Nucleus. So on. Hm? Pain?"
"No--no--"
Perhaps it was the gusty vehemence in Crawford's voice which caused
Huerta to look up. For a moment their glances met. Huerta's pupils
seemed to dilate slightly. _Sure_, thought Crawford, _go ahead, make
it good_, and he tried to feel the sarcasm, but somehow he couldn't,
because the effect of those eyes was real, distinct, eerie.
"No pain?
"No. No pain. No!"
Those eyes again. Contracting. Little lights flaring and dying. Just
for an instant. The probing fingers. That sibilant, insistent voice.
"Here, perhaps? The flesh looks rather badly healed. Feel that? Pain?"
"No!"
"Take it easy, Crawford. I'm trying to help. Here?"
"No. I told you. I don't feel pain, damn it, I told you--"
"Here then. Pain?"
"No--"
"Here?"
"No, damn you, no, I--"
"Pain?" Huerta's head raised abruptly. "What's the matter, Crawford?"
Crawford stood where he had stepped off the table, pulling on his faded
old levis with swift, tense jerks. "Nothing. Forget it."
Huerta leaned back against the table, studying Crawford through the
twin streamers of smoke he emitted. "Why does it disturb you so much,
Crawford, if you feel no pain?" he asked softly.
Crawford stood there facing him, breathing heavily. "What are you
trying to do, Huerta?"
"Give you, shall we say, an illustration," said Huerta. "Don't you
think I know what is the matter with you, Crawford? Ever since I first
saw you watching Africano out in the corral. Perhaps the others are
still groping. They sense something not quite right in you, Crawford.
But they don't know for sure, yet. I know, Crawford." He said the last
softly, positively, watching Crawford. He took a drag on the cigarette.
"It must be a terrible thing to live with constantly. It makes two
personalities out of you, really, Crawford. In these flashes of bitter
defiance, I see what you must have been before. The strength. The
courage. But the other is always there, isn't it, working beneath,
stirring in you, weakening you, tearing at you. The pain that comes
whenever you get near a horse. And the fear, Crawford. And more and
more, not just when you're near a horse. All the time. That lack of
confidence, that constant indecision. It won't lessen. It will grow,
Crawford, until you are that way completely, until these flashes
of your former self cease to come. I told you about that miner in
Monterrey--"
"You told me!" Crawford choked off the shout, staring sullenly at
Huerta. He spoke finally, again, controlling it with hoarse effort.
"Think I don't know."
"You _do_ know," said Huerta. "However, it is not hopeless. For most
diseases, there is a cure, even for those of the mind. Doctors are only
human beings. They can only cure what they have the knowledge to cure.
If the men you went to were not experienced in this type of thing, it
does not mean there is no hope."
"Are you suggesting--that you--"
"Why not?" shrugged Huerta. "I've had experience in such cases. Is it
inconceivable to you?"
"Why?" said Crawford.
Huerta studied his cigarette. "I don't quite understand."
"I mean why should you do it," said Crawford.
"I am no altruist," said Huerta. "A doctor usually gets paid."
"You know I haven't got any money," Crawford said. Huerta did not
answer, leaning against the table and studying Crawford through
narrowed eyes. "You're offering me some kind of proposition?" Crawford
asked him.
"You might call it that," said Huerta. "As I said before, we think your
quarrel with Rockland was over more than the way he acquired Delcazar's
land."
"Was it?"
"You know what I mean," said Huerta.
"Maybe I haven't got what you want."
"I think you have," said Huerta.
"Have you got a license?" said Crawford.
It was the first time he had ever seen Huerta taken off guard. There
was no change of expression in the doctor's face. Just that moment's
hesitation. It was enough to give Crawford a certain satisfaction.
"License?"
"M.D.," said Crawford. "Every doctor I've seen had it pinned on his
wall. Two or three, some of them. How about yours?"
Huerta drew a heavy breath. "I won't dignify that with an answer."
"I didn't think so," said Crawford. "That's one reason I won't take
your proposition. I don't think you could cure me of the stomach-ache.
I don't think you're a doctor. I don't think you ever were."
"My dear fellow, I spent fourteen years in the Mexican army--"
"So did a lot of butchers. If you operated on anybody, I'll bet a pink
cow to a blind hoot owl it was with a machete right up in the ranks."
"Crawford, my medical reputation has never been ques--" It had come out
of Huerta involuntarily, and he stopped himself with a distinct effort.
He stood there a moment, the anger flushing his sallow face dully as
he must have realized how far he had let himself go. Deliberately, he
allowed himself to settle back against the table. He closed his eyes
when he took a drag on the cigarette, did not open them as he exhaled,
and spoke. "Let us consider the negative side of my proposition, then.
Your condition can be used against you, Crawford. You could be driven
quite mad. Not obvious crudities. Not the type of thing Quartel would
use. Not making you ride a horse or letting you watch Africano. Not
anything as simple to get away from. Merely suggestion, Crawford. Your
mind will do the rest. Little things. Insidious things.
"Like the story of a miner who got crushed in a cave-in down at
Monterrey. Did that stay with you a long time, Crawford? At night,
perhaps, you'd wake up. Remembering. Wondering. Innuendoes, Crawford.
Insinuations. Things for the mind to retain and savor. Because it
_is_ your mind. I showed you that with the examination. It isn't your
legs. That doesn't give you the fear. It's what a man could work with,
Crawford, a doctor, who knew every stimulus, every reaction." He took
the butt of his cigarette from the jade holder, tossing it absently
into the fireplace. Then, still watching the holder, he spoke again,
sibilantly. "Do you doubt my ability to do it, Crawford, if necessary?"
Crawford had been watching the doctor with a taut, bleak expression on
his gaunt face, and he answered in a hollow, resigned way. "No."
"Then perhaps you will reconsider my proposition."
"No," said Crawford, in that same hollow tone.
Huerta reached beneath his coat for his silver cigarette case, taking a
smoke from this to fit it in the holder. He did not raise his eyes to
Crawford again as he moved across the room toward the door. He pulled
open the portal, and only then, turning toward Crawford, did his glance
rise. Again Crawford was swept with that strange, hypnotic dizziness,
as he stared into the man's eyes. It struck him as childishly
melodramatic, and he wanted to laugh, and could not.
"I think you will regret coming back this morning," said Huerta, in a
barely audible voice, before he turned to go out. "I think you will
regret it exceedingly."
_Chapter Six_
"TELL US WHAT HAPPENED."
An adobe banco ran down one side of the cookshack on the inside,
forming a bench, and it was upon this that Jacinto had deposited his
generous bulk. He was bent in childish concentration over a block of
wax from which he carefully peeled thin strips, depositing these with
much care into a clay bowl. Small, intimate mutters rumbled up from him
with each process.
"Ah, so," he mumbled, slicing off a piece, "ah _sí_," and sliced off
another, and then jumped erect in startled surprise, dropping the block
of wax. "Ah, Crawford!"
Crawford stepped on in through the door, sniffing. "Smells like
bayberry."
"How--how did you get out?" quavered Jacinto, grunting painfully with
the effort it cost him to stoop over and retrieve the wax.
"Nobody stopped me," said Crawford. "They gave me that upstairs
bedroom, but I couldn't sleep."
"You better not come in here, Crawford," said the gross cook. "Maybe
they're not watching you like they did, but you better get out of here.
Why do you think Huerta kept you up at the house this morning? Didn't
you see how Quartel looked at you? You're just lucky he didn't get you
down here."
There was a dish of cracklings on the table, and Crawford took one,
pulling a three-legged stool out to sit on it. "Quartel and the others
are out chousing cattle. Making candles?"
"_Sí_," mumbled Jacinto, lowering himself back on the bench. "Nobody
can make them like me. That was bayberry you smelled all right. I
didn't have enough sheep tallow. First I make it into blocks and then
cut it into small scraps so it melts quick without burning. I put the
wax in hot water and scoop the grease off as it comes to the top. Then
I strain it through a horsehair cloth to remove whatever dirt I missed
in skimming. I am now heating the wax to pour in the molds. Did you
ever see such fine molds? My father owned that brass one in El Paso. It
holds two dozen candles at one pouring. If you came here to find out
what's going on, I can't tell you."
The abrupt transition brought Crawford's head up in surprise. Jacinto
set the mold end up in a dishpan, chuckling.
"I am not as stupid as I am corpulent, Crawford. You didn't come here
just to eat my cracklings." His great bloodshot eyes slid upward in
their pouches till they met Crawford's. "But I can't tell you anything,
Crawford. I know something is going on. Huerta and that woman.
Something not quite right. Tarant too, somehow. Maybe you can tell me."
"Hyacinth, what did you think of that story about Santa Anna's chests?"
"I--Santa Maria, that wax is hot." Jacinto sat shaking his finger a
moment. Then he put it into his mouth. "If Santa Anna lost some chests
up here, I guess he lost them, that's all. Mm, you ought to taste that
bayberry. I think I'll season my _chiles rollenos_ with it some time."
"You heard the one about the map?" said Crawford.
"The _derrotero_? _Sí_, I guess there was supposed to be a map. Isn't
there always, with something like that?"
"Ever stop to think of Santa Anna's full name?"
"_Ciertamente._ Everybody knows it. Antonio Lopez de San--" Jacinto
stopped, staring at Crawford. Wax dripped from the tin ladle onto the
floor. Crawford popped a last crackling into his mouth.
"Would that give her a connection?" he said.
"Lopez is a common name," said Jacinto, almost defensively.
"A woman like that don't trail through this kind of country just for
the scenery," said Crawford. He closed his eyes, rolling the name
meditatively off his tongue. "Merida Lopez."
It must have been about then the first sound floated in from outside,
the creak of saddle leather, a man's hoarse cough. Jacinto jumped
across the room, jerking Crawford up out of the chair. "They're back,
Crawford, you got to go, you got to get out of here, if Quartel ever
gets you alone after Whitehead, he'll--"
He stopped shoving Crawford toward the doorway, and his voice faded
into a series of small, choked sounds. Aforismo stood there, sweat
streaking the dust in his smooth brown face, holding a belduque in his
hands.
"_El amante fiel_," he said, running his finger down the keen edge,
"the Loyal Lover. Did you ever see my knife, Crawford? Truly a
remarkable weapon. Handed down in my family for generations. The hilt
was once studded with precious stones, but they have long since been
picked out by various members of my illustrious house who were in
temporary financial destitution." He took a shuffling step toward them.
"Look at the _bravos_ on the blade. See this one. _Nothing compares
with my kiss._ Isn't that a delectable motto?"
Jacinto shrank back, staring in fascinated horror at the words cut into
that side of the gleaming blade. Through the dog-run, Crawford could
hear the thump of a chair in the bunkhouse, the clatter of spoons on
the table.
"Please, Aforismo, please," quavered Jacinto. "Let him go. _Madre de
Dios!_ let him go out the door before they find him in here. You know
what will happen. Quartel would--"
"And this one," Aforismo said, turning the blade over and pointing
to another motto cut into that side. "This is my favorite _bravo_ I
think. _Tripe is sweet but bowels are better._ Don't you like that
one, Jacinto?" He took another shuffling step toward them with the
point almost touching Crawford's belly. "Don't you like that _bravo_,
Crawford? Tell me you like it. It is my favorite, I think."
"Please, please." Jacinto was cringing behind Crawford, wringing his
hands, sweat dribbling down his coarse face. "_En el nombre de Dios_,
Aforismo, let him go, he never did anything to you, he never harmed one
little hair of your head, I hate violence so, oh, I do hate violence
so, my father he always tell me there are two sins in the world, work
and fighting, and--oh, _por Dios_, Aforismo, _Santa Maria, nombre de mi
madre_, let him go, let him go--"
"They say down in Durango a coyote always howls loudest in the trap,"
said Aforismo, nudging Crawford gently back with that needle point.
"I think maybe we better all go in the bunkhouse, eh? The hands are
getting hungry. Tripe is sweet but bowels are better, eh?" Crawford
did not step back quickly enough, and that needle point went through
his shirt with a soft ripping sound. The stinging bite of steel in the
hard muscle of his belly caused his move back to be involuntary. His
breath left him in a hoarse gust and he bent forward with the impulse
driving through him. That was as far as it went. Aforismo's boots made
that bland shuffle on the hard-packed earth, moving forward. His face
twisted with frustrated anger, Crawford shifted back into the dog-run,
shoving the cringing cook behind him.
"_Dios_, Aforismo, _por Dios_, no violence, please, I could not stand
the sight of blood, it would make me regurgitate, please--"
Jacinto knocked over a chair backing from the dog-run into the
bunkhouse. It made a loud clatter. Then Crawford was in the bunkhouse,
still bent forward that way, his breath coming out harsh and swift,
and he could see them. Bueno Bailey was seated at the table.
"I was just showing Crawford the _bravos_ on my belduque," said
Aforismo. "In Durango they say it is an ignorant man who cannot tell
his sons at least one _bravo_."
"_Bueno._" Bailey trailed the word out in a pleased, nasal twang,
shoving the bench back from the table. "Siddown, Crawford. We was just
about to eat."
"I guess you never met Ford Innes, did you, Crawford," said Quartel.
"This is Crawford, Ford. He is the one who brought your _amigo_ back
this morning."
The redheaded man in the doorway emitted a flat, harsh grunt. He must
have just stepped in, for he held his saddle under one arm. The short,
square lines of his body held all the lethal threat of a snub-nosed
derringer. He had a flat-topped hat set squarely on his head. The
bottom of his red beard was dirty from rubbing against the grease daubs
on the chest of a buckskin ducking jacket with square tails that hung
outside his _chivarras_ and which were caught up on one side by the
wooden handle of his Remington.
"Ford just got back from taking Wallace Tarant into San Antonio," said
Quartel. "As many times as that shyster's been back and forth between
here and town, he still can't find his way through the brush himself."
The leather rigging clattered against the hard earthen floor when Innes
dropped his pack. His bushy bleached brows formed a reddish dominance
above shrewd little eyes that had not left Crawford's face since he
entered. He moved over and sat down across from Bailey.
"So you brought Whitehead back." His voice held the same lack of
intonation as his grunt.
"Ford had been Whitehead's saddle mate for a long time," said Quartel.
"I guess he'd like to know how it happened to Whitehead."
"Get us some grub, Jacinto," said Aforismo. With his belduque he
indicated a place beside Bailey. "An empty seat there, Crawford. Sit
down."
Crawford looked at the knife. He sat down.
The table groaned as Aforismo lowered himself onto it and put his
feet on the bench, running a finger up and down his belduque. Ford
Innes began playing with his spoon on the table. Jacinto came from the
dog-run with a dish of beans. He fumbled the plate at the last moment
and almost tipped it onto the table. His fat jowls were trembling with
his chin.
"Please, please, let's not have any--"
"So Whitehead broke his neck out in the thicket," said Innes.
"Have some beans, Glenn," said Bailey, ladling them onto a plate he had
shoved before Crawford.
"They call them _nacionales_ down in Durango, because so many Mexicans
eat them," said Aforismo. "It is said of one who is weak that he lacks
_nacionales_."
"How did it happen to Whitehead?" said Innes.
"We don't know," said Bailey, helping the man to beans. "Crawford just
brought him back over his horse with his neck broke and said he found
him out in the brush that way."
"How did it happen?" Innes asked Crawford.
"There was eleven shots gone from Whitehead's carbine," said Quartel.
Innes began eating in a slow, mechanical way, his jaws working steadily
beneath his red beard, looking at Crawford. "Where's your iron?"
"Whitehead took away Crawford's rifle when he first came," said
Aforismo.
Innes's bleached eyebrows raised, and he ceased chewing for a moment.
Quartel was standing behind Crawford to one side, and Crawford caught
the sly grin spreading the man's pawky lips.
"There was no other marks on Whitehead's body," Quartel said.
"Well," said Innes, still looking at Crawford that way. Finally he went
back to spooning up the beans, his eyes never leaving Crawford's face.
"What happened?" he said again, around a mouthful.
"Yeah." Bailey nudged Crawford on the shoulder with his spoon. "What
happened?"
Crawford could hear his own breathing now. It held a harsh, driven
sound. He looked from Innes to Bailey, from Bailey to Quartel, from
Quartel to Aforismo. There was a patent brutal intent in all their
faces. He was hunched over so far now the heat of the beans in his
plate penetrated his shirt and warmed his chest.
"Where's the sorrel?" said Bailey.
"What sorrel?" said Innes.
"The horse he took out," said Quartel. "He never brought him back."
"Coffee?" It was Jacinto again, waddling in with a big pot. He set it
down, looking around at the men. He wrung his great fat hands together,
speaking in a small, strained voice. "Please, _señores_, please.
Violence. I cannot stand it. You won't do this. Tell me you won't do
this. My father, he say--"
Aforismo turned toward him, lifting the belduque. "Would you like my
Loyal Lover to see inside the sack?"
"No." Jacinto backed out, lugubrious tears forming at the corners of
his eyes. "No, _lástima de Dios_, tears of God, no--"
"You ain't told us what happened yet," said Innes, still eating.
"Yeah." Quartel shoved Crawford from behind. "How did you lose the
sorrel? You could ride any horse I could, remember?"
Crawford's hands were clasped desperately between his knees. There was
a taut, set expression to his features. Sweat had begun trickling down
his cheeks into his beard. His whole body was trembling.
"So you brought Whitehead in with a broken neck," said Innes.
"Yeah." Bueno poked Crawford with the spoon again. "How did it get
broke?"
"Yeah." Aforismo pricked him from the other side with the knife. "What
happened?"
"How did it get broke?"
"How did you lose the sorrel?"
"What happened?"
Crawford jerked away as Aforismo bent forward with that belduque again.
It carried him against Bueno, sitting on his other side. Bueno pushed
him back roughly. Quartel shoved him from behind so hard his chest
struck the table. A small, strangled sound escaped him.
"Tell us what happened."
"_Sí_, tell us, Crawford."
"What happened, Crawford?"
"Talk, damn you." Bueno's shove was harder.
"Tell us, Crawford." The knife prick was deeper. He jerked away from
it. Bailey caught him and shoved him back brutally. He made a spasmodic
effort to rise. Quartel put both hands on his shoulders and forced him
back down. He tried to twist around. Aforismo's belduque was in his
face. He jerked back the other way into Bailey. His hands knotted and
writhed between his knees underneath the table. His whole body was
shuddering now.
"Where's the sorrel?"
"How'd he break his neck?"
"Talk, damn you!"
"Tell us, Crawford."
"What happened?"
"Gentlemen!" It came from the doorway, and it stopped them abruptly.
Huerta stood there, bent forward slightly, and those bluish lids were
almost closed over his eyes.
"I think we all know what happened to Whitehead," he said, "don't you?"
He stood there a moment, but no one answered. He dropped his eyes to
the jade cigarette holder he held in one hand, tapping it to knock the
ash from the cigarette, and still looking down that way, spoke again.
"I think it would be wise, now, Crawford, for you to come with me, up
to the house, don't you?"
_Chapter Seven_
SUNDAY CELEBRATION
It was the odor at first. Crawford lay there, staring up at the
ceiling, groping up through the remnants of a sleep so heavy it left
him filled with an oppressive nausea. The hangings had been removed
from the bed and the four reeded mahogany posts reached up through the
semi-gloom to support the bare tester frame above him. He realized
where he was, then. Huerta had stopped them? Yes, Huerta had stopped
them last night, and brought him to the big house to sleep. Strange,
the influence Huerta had over them. Without actually doing anything.
Those eyes? Maybe that was it.
Crawford sat up abruptly, the heavy chintz coverlet falling away from
him. He held out his hand, staring at the fingers. They were trembling.
He sniffed the air. He pulled the coverlet completely off, swinging his
bare feet out of the bed. His levis were on the russet wing chair and
he grabbed them up and stepped into the legs. It was that sensation
again, stirring within him. It was hard for him to breathe. He sat on
the bed a moment, hands clutching the covers, staring at the wall. Why?
Here. Why?
He turned his head from side to side, searching the room. It was day,
but the overdrapes had been pulled across the window, and he could make
out the furniture only dimly in the semi-gloom. And still, down inside
him, rising, growing. He bent down to pull on his boots with swift,
desperate tugs, then rose. He looked like a hounded animal, the forward
thrust of his rigid body imparting that narrowness to his shoulders,
his eyes shifting furtively in a gaunt face. Then, on one of those
shallow, indrawn breaths, it came to him, unmistakable.
Slowly, his whole body so tense it was trembling now, he turned about,
sniffing. He stepped away from the bed, toward the windows, and it
faded. He moved back toward the bed, and he could smell it again. With
a muttered curse he bent down and tore the coverlet off. The dirty,
fetid horse blanket had been laid out flat beneath the chintz spread.
"Huerta!"
It came out of him in a strangled, guttural rage, and he bent to clutch
the horse blanket. He had it lifted off the bed before he released
it, throwing it back down and whirling to the door. His boots made a
hard thump down the stairway and into the entrance hall. He had almost
passed the living-room when, through the open door, he caught sight of
Huerta, seated in one of the willow chairs by the window. The doctor
had been reading, and he lowered the book, leaning forward in the chair.
"You must have slept well, Crawford," he said. "It's nearly noon."
Crawford started to take a step forward, opening his mouth to speak.
Then he closed it again, his fists clenched tight. There was a faint,
waiting mockery on Huerta's face. Crawford whirled and stamped on out
the front door. As he went down the front steps, he saw the crowd out
by the corrals, and was drawn toward it. He made out Bueno Bailey and
Innes among the men, but the others were new faces to him. There were
half a dozen riders cavorting their horses around in the open flats,
and a big Chihuahua cart was creaking out of the brush, piled high
with onions and apricots and baskets of blue corn meal and squealing
Mexican children and a fat Mexican peon driving. Crawford was part way
across the compound when he saw the woman coming toward him. He had a
momentary impulse to turn away, and stifled that. She held her heavy
green satin skirt up out of the dust with one hand, and the wind
ruffled the throat of her white Antoinette fichu. Her eyes, big and
dark and searching, were held to his face until she reached him, and it
did something to Crawford.
"They said it was a bull-tailing," she told him, coming to a stop. "I
don't exactly understand."
"About the only celebration the _brasaderos_ get," he said, watching
her warily. "A bunch of them gather almost every Sunday somewhere to
eat and drink and tail the bull. I think they're celebrating Cinco de
Mayo today. Commemorating some battle at Puebla--"
He trailed off, because he could see it in her face, and he didn't
particularly want to talk about the bull-tailing either. When she spoke
again, her voice was husky and strained, and it must have been what was
really on her mind, from the first.
"They were trying to kill you," she said. "Jacinto told me. They got
you in there, and started in on you, and they meant to drive you till
you cracked and fought back, and then they were going to kill you. How
did you stand it so long, Crawford? Jacinto said no other man could
have. Pushing you and shoving you and beating you like that. How did
you stand it?"
"I'm still here, ain't I?" he said.
She drew in a breath, staring up at him. "Why did you come back with
Whitehead?" she said finally. "You could have escaped."
"Maybe a man gets tired running," he said.
She caught his arm, coming in close enough for him to catch a hint of
her perfume. "Crawford, I want to help you."
His whole body was rigid now, with that wariness. "I never saw a cow
yet that wanted to get back inside a corral when it was outside."
"You're so suspicious," she flamed. Then she leaned toward him farther,
looking up into his face. "I guess you have a right to be. You've been
fighting all of them, haven't you, ever since this started. I don't
blame you, Crawford. I know how you feel. I'm in the same position. I
need your help as much as you need mine."
It had been a long time since a woman stood this close to him, with her
hair shining like that, and her eyes. He felt a weakness seep through
him. He stared at the soft red curve of her lip, and his voice was
hardly audible.
"What are you talking about?"
"Have you ever heard of Mogotes Serpientes?" she said.
"Snake Thickets? I guess so. It's supposed to be somewhere west of Rio
Diablo in that stretch of bad brush."
"You've never actually been there?" Her voice was tense.
"I don't know who has," he said. "There's a lot of the _brasada_
nobody's ever seen, white man _or_ Indian. There's a stretch due south
from here just above the Rio Grande called Resaca Espantosa. Nobody's
ever been through it. I don't know why they call it Haunted Swamp."
"But there is a good reason for the name Mogotes Serpientes?"
"So they say. It's supposed to be so full of snakes no man could stay
alive in there more than a few--" He trailed off as he realized how far
he had let her allure carry him, and pulled roughly away from her, his
mouth twisting down at one corner.
"Crawford," she said, trying to get in close again. "Please. Don't. I
mean it. You've got to believe me. If you believe in anything, you've
got to--"
"Huerta made me a proposition too," said Crawford. "It didn't pack such
a wallop, but it was along the same lines."
She flushed, stepping back from him violently. "You fool," she said, in
a bitter, intense whisper. "You fool."
They were still standing that way, staring at each other, when Huerta
came out on the porch. The woman saw him and turned away, moving back
toward the corrals.
"Hola, Quartel," someone over by the pens shouted. "When are you
letting the _toros_ out? I got a twenty-dollar pot for the first man to
tail a bull."
"It's mine." Quartel's bellow came from somewhere in the crowd, and
then he appeared, running in that stiff, saddle-bound stride of his
toward the horses. "Aforismo, let that blue out. He ought to give us a
good run."
* * * * *
Used to working the wild, savage cattle of the brushland, the Mexicans
trained their horses to spin away from the side on which a man mounted
as soon as he lifted a foot to the stirrup. Though this saved many a
_vaquero_ from being gored by a ringy bull which he had just released
after throwing and branding the beast, it took a good man to get on
one of these horses. Each rider had a string of animals, and from his
bunch Quartel had saddled a brown horse they called a _trigueño_. He
knocked the reins loose of the corral post and snapped them over the
_trigueño's_ head. Then he checked the animal, pulling the nigh rein in
till it twisted the _trigueño's_ head down toward its shoulder so that
the horse's action would be inhibited long enough for him to mount. As
soon as Quartel raised his left foot, the _trigueño_ tried to whirl,
but that checking action held him long enough for Quartel to jam his
foot in the stirrup and swing aboard in one violent movement. Then he
released the tight rein and allowed the animal to spin toward the right.
From outside the cedar-post corral, Aforismo and several other
_vaqueros_ had goaded and prodded a blue bull until it was separated
from the other bulls within the enclosure. As it neared the gate,
Aforismo let down the drop bar.
In their natural state, running the brush, these cows were among the
wildest animals of the world, and the several days this cut of bulls
had spent penned up had put them in a frenzied rage. The blue stood
there a moment, glaring suspiciously at the opening, pawing the ground.
His great long curving horns had been scored and ripped and punched
by the brush until it looked as if someone had hacked them over with
a knife, and a pattern of scars formed a network across the gleaming
lathered hide of his forequarters. From the side, he looked deceptively
heavy, his length so extended that his back swayed, but as he lashed
his tail and shifted around to display a rear view, his narrow hips
and cat hams and ridgepole back became apparent. Abruptly, with a
hoarse bellow, he lowered his head, and swinging it from side to side,
galloped out of the gate.
Quartel yelled something, dug in with his Chihuahuas and whacked his
quirt against the _trigueño's_ rump at the same time. The brown horse
burst into a headlong run, followed by most of the other _vaqueros_,
shouting and yelling and snapping their quirts against leather
_chivarras_ and fancy _charro_ pants. The blue bull had spotted an
opening in the brush across the compound, and he shook the ground
tearing for it. But the horsemen swiftly closed up on the animal.
Quartel and another _vaquero_ were bunched together in the lead.
Quartel raked his _trigueño_ with those huge Chihuahua guthooks, and
the horse spurted ahead, drawing up beside the bull. Quartel leaned out
of the saddle and made a grab for that lashing tail. But the blue bull
jammed its forefeet into the ground and came to a jarring halt, plowing
twin furrows in the earth. Quartel was several lengths on by before he
could swing back in the saddle and pull his horse around; by that time
the bull had turned in a half circle and cut for the brush.
The other _vaquero_ had pulled up shorter than Quartel, and was in a
position to run down the bull on its quarter. He was a tall, supple
youth on a short-coupled horse they called a _bayo coyote_, its coat
a buckskin color with a black line running down the spine, with a
black mane and tail. Quartel spurred and quirted his _trigueño_ in a
last desperate effort to reach the bull first, but just at the edge of
brush, the other _vaquero_ pulled up beside the blue and leaned out to
grab for that tail.
He caught its hairy end, and dallied it around his saddle horn,
clapping the guthooks to his _bayo coyote_ at the same time. The
buckskin gave a spurt that pulled it ahead of the blue bull, and just
as the horse smashed into the first thicket, the tail of the bull
snapped taut, yanking its hind feet from beneath it. The _vaquero_ tore
the tail off his horn and hunched forward with his arm before his face
all at the same time, and as he disappeared into the thicket the ground
shook with the bull's falling. Huerta had come down from the house, and
he moved in behind Crawford.
"I understand a good man can break the bull's neck every time," he
said. "Why don't you try it, Crawford?"
Crawford's hands closed tightly, and he did not look at Huerta. The
inside of his mouth was dry and cottony as he watched the _vaquero_
come back through the mesquite into the open, prancing his _bayo
coyote_ proudly.
"You better go back to herding dogies, Quartel," the _vaquero_ grinned,
"and leave the grown ones to men."
"If you're a man, let's see your _reata_," roared Quartel, wheeling
his _trigueño_ toward the man and unlashing his 40-foot rope from his
saddle.
The rider fought his excited buckskin around in a circle as he tore his
own rope from the saddle, and when he had completed the circle, the
rope was free and the two riders were facing each other about a hundred
yards apart.
"_Vamanos, Indita_," shouted Quartel, his huge cart-wheel spurs
gouging the brown into a headlong run toward the other man.
"Are they crazy?" said Huerta.
"Stay around the border much and you'll get used to it," Merida told
him. "The _vaqueros_ used to do the same thing on the rancho where I
was born. They'd rather rope than eat."
"Duello," said Crawford.
"With ropes?" It caused Huerta distinct effort to evince even the dim
incredulity.
"Lot of 'em would rather fight with ropes than guns," Crawford told
him. "More than one lawman has been dragged to death here in the brush."
It had taken that long for the two riders to meet, passing one another
not 10 feet apart. At the last moment Quartel made a pass with his rope
arm. Indita's own throw caused him a hoarse exhalation that turned into
a shout of triumph as he saw his loop settling over Quartel's head.
Then it happened. As much as he had handled horses, Crawford did not
think he had ever seen one turn so fast. One instant the _trigueño_ was
racing past the _bayo coyote_, the next it was facing in the opposite
direction, Quartel's own involuntary grunt still hanging in the air to
tell what a vicious effort he had put into the reining. The motion had
carried Quartel from beneath Indita's loop in that last moment, and now
he sat the _trigueño_ perfectly still, facing after Indita's retreating
buckskin.
Quartel's first pass had been a feint, and he still retained his rope.
It was so slight a flirt of his hand that Crawford barely caught it.
He did not spin the loop above his head. He tossed it underhand, the
way he had thrown it with Africano in the corral. It was a hooley-ann,
spinning flatly out above Indita, seeming to hover above him an
instant, no bigger than the brim of his sombrero; then it was taut
about his shoulders, and he was pulled over the back of his horse with
a resounding thump.
"I ought to drag you for your presumption," said Quartel, shifting his
horse forward so he could get enough slack in his rope to flirt it
off Indita as the man rose. Then, pulling the rawhide clothesline in
with a series of quick, skillful snaps, he turned the _trigueño_ to
prance it over toward them, grinning at Merida. "How do you like that,
_señorita_?"
"I have seen it done before," said Merida.
Quartel's face darkened. "You don't think I am any good?"
"I didn't say that."
"Listen," he shouted, thumping his chest, "I am the best goddam roper
in the world. I am the best goddam rider in the world. I am--"
"Don't be a boor," said Huerta, in faint disgust.
"A what?" Quartel wheeled the horse around in a growing rage, the sweat
greasing his coarse face. "I'll show you." He started pounding his
chest again. "I'll show you who's good. I'll make you a bet. I'll bet
you a _talega_ full of gold pesos that I can, blindfolded, with one end
of the _reata_ tied to my own neck and not to be touched by my hands,
riding a bareback horse of your own choosing, forefoot each of any ten
bulls we got in a pen, and break their necks."
Huerta shrugged, smiling in a faint, vague dismissal. Quartel reined
the _trigueño_ in closer. "I mean it," he bellowed. "Are you afraid to
make the bet? Could anybody where you come from do it?"
"Frankly, I don't think anyone can do it," said Huerta, disinterestedly.
"I can," yelled Quartel. "I'm the best--"
"Don't be a fool, Quartel," the woman told him.
"You'll kill yourself. One mistake with that rope around your neck and
you'll be dead."
That was the final impetus. "_Hijo de la chingada_," shouted Quartel,
whirling his _trigueño_ away from them. "How many bulls you got in that
corral, Aforismo? Seven? Get me three more. Get me three more from that
holding pen across the arroyo. I'll show you what roping really is,
Merida. You're going to see a performance tonight you'll never forget!"
_Chapter Eight_
BEST ROPER IN THE WORLD
The throng about the large cedar-post corral was oddly subdued. Some
of the _vaqueros_ had dragged the blue bull over to the cooking fire
for Jacinto to spit, but the gross cook had left the carcass lying
on the ground. He stood with the middle bar of the fence making a
deep indentation in the incredible protuberance of his stomach as the
crowding _vaqueros_ pressed in from behind.
"_Madre de Dios_, Crawford, why do you let him do this thing?" wailed
the cook, running his fat hands nervously up and down the rail. "I
don't want to see a man die."
"Then why watch?" said Crawford.
"Please, Crawford, you take such a brutal attitude. Don't you know this
is the way Oro Peso died down in Mexico? He was the greatest roper in
the world, Quartel's boasting to the contrary. Oro Peso used to go
around making this same bet. Then somebody took him up on it. The third
bull pulled him from his horse. His neck was broken like you'd snap a
switch of mesquite. Please--"
"Hola, _compadres_!" shouted Quartel, from outside the corral, and
they saw that he had stripped his _trigueño_ of its saddle. Indita
dropped the bar and Quartel trotted the animal in, laughing as the
bulls bunched up on the other side, bawling. "You see, already they are
afraid of me. Who is going to put the blindfold on? Merida, will you
honor me?"
"Why not?" The woman's voice held a savage undertone that surprised
Crawford. She caught his eyes on her and turned toward Crawford. When
she saw the look on his face, she threw her head back that way, to
laugh. It held a rich, wild mockery. "What's the matter, Crawford?
Don't you like that in a woman? Maybe you haven't known the right
women."
Still laughing, she reached through the bars to tie the bandanna behind
Quartet's head as the man slipped off the _trigueño_ and turned his
back to her. Then he swung aboard again, and tied one end of the rope
he was carrying about his thick neck in a noose, too small to slip over
his head. Merida's face was flushed excitedly as she watched him prance
the _trigueño_ away, and her eyes flashed in frank anticipation. Huerta
pulled out his cigarette case and put a smoke into his jade holder.
His motions were as languid as ever, but Crawford thought his fingers
pinched the holder more tightly than was necessary.
"Hola!" shouted Quartel, wheeling his _trigueño_ in the middle of the
corral and kicking its flanks with his heels. The horse charged toward
the bulls, and the animals strung out along the fence. Quartel was an
uncanny judge of distance; when his horse was but half a length from
the fence, he made a quarter turn and raced along the bars after the
last bull in the running bunch.
"_Andale!_" yelled the man, and made his toss.
The loop snaked about the forefeet of that last bull as it turned at
the corner of the corral, and as Quartel felt the rope snap taut, he
let go completely with his hands, pulling his thick neck down into
his shoulders to set it and jerking back with his torso at the last
moment. The bull turned a flip, its shoulder striking the rump of the
running animal in front, and as the falling bull struck, Quartel shoved
his reins hard against the _trigueño's_ neck to wheel inward and give
himself slack on the rope. He clutched for the slackening rawhide
and sent a flirt down the rope that lifted the loop off the bull's
forelegs, and when he turned away, he was pulling the line in.
"_Viva Quartel, viva!_" shouted the _vaqueros_, shoving Crawford up
against the fence with their shifting press and deafening him with
their cheers. Grinning, Quartel kicked the _trigueño_ after the bulls
again. It started them off once more, bawling and running. Quartel's
hearing was as uncanny as his judgment of distance; he rode with his
head lifted, and when a scarred brindle bull broke from the others,
running along the fence and cutting across the middle of the corral,
Crawford could see Quartel's head turn after the animal. The Mexican
reined his _trigueño_ over that way, kicking it into a dead run that
closed the space between himself and the bull in a swift instant.
"_Ahora_," he shouted, "now," and tossed. His rope caught the bull's
hind feet instead of its forefeet, and as a strange sighing sound rose
from the crowd, Quartel must have sensed something was wrong, for he
spurred the _trigueño_ brutally, and its frenzied leap into a headlong
run gave him slack enough in the rope for that last moment to send a
flirt down its length that carried the loop off the bull's hind feet
before it could draw closed. The bull stumbled into the other animals
as they turned the corner and milled down this side of the corral. By
that time Quartel had his rope coiled, and he maneuvered the bawling,
excited animals so that they strung out down the fence once more,
and then ran his horse up behind the last one. This time it was the
forefeet, and he dropped the animal, breaking its neck as before. The
end of the rope about Quartel's neck was not a slip noose, but Crawford
could see the rawhide dig into the thick brown flesh of Quartel's neck
as he jerked back, till the skin showed a white ridge above and below
the lasso. He watched in undeniable fascination as the Mexican flirted
in the rope and turned his horse after them once more. Shouting,
Quartel closed the gap between himself and another bull and made his
toss. He released the lasso with his hand as soon as it was in the
air. The instant that loop caught on the running bull's forefeet,
Quartel reined his _trigueño_ in a quarter turn that wheeled it away
from the running bull. The bull's own forward motion would draw the
noose tight about its legs, and the turning maneuver of the horse would
stretch the rope taut between them as soon as that noose was completely
closed. In that instant, with the bull hitting the end of the rope and
flipping, Quartel had to wheel his horse back or be pulled off. He had
already turned the _trigueño_ away from the bull, and the noose was
making its singing sound closing on those churning forefeet, when a big
_hosco golondrino_ cut away from the other animals running along the
fence and turned out into the corral, directly across the head of the
_trigueño_. Quartel's huge neck sank into his shoulders, and he put the
reins against the _trigueño's_ neck to swerve it back as he felt the
rope snapping taut. But the turn would have run the horse head-on into
the _hosco golondrino_. It was the first time Crawford had seen that
_trigueño_ fight the bit; its head turned in and its neck arched, it
lurched in the opposite direction from Quartel's reining.
"Crawford," screamed Merida, and then the full weight of the falling
bull hit the end of that rope with Quartel going in the wrong direction
to take the shock. He made a small, choked sound as he was snapped off
the _trigueño's_ rump. Crawford was not conscious of going through
the bars. He found himself on the inside of the corral, with someone
climbing through the rails on his left. He did not realize who it was
till he had started running toward Quartel where he was rolling across
the ground. Then from the corner of his eye, Crawford caught the white
flutter of Merida's fichu.
"Get back, you crazy fool," he screamed at her, diving headlong at her
as a couple of crazed bulls charged by. He struck her with his arms
around her waist and carried her back against the bars as a third
animal crashed past where she had been standing. He rolled to his feet,
leaving her there huddled up against the fence, and dodged through
another pair of the bawling, frenzied animals, coughing in the dust.
The bull Quartel had thrown was scrambling to its feet, the _reata_
still caught around one foreleg. Crawford saw the slack rope hiss
taut as the animal broke into a stumbling gallop, and knew he could
never reach it in time. If Quartel's neck were not already broken, his
head would be pulled from his body now. Another bull went past behind
Crawford, its shoulder sending him spinning, and he threw himself
bodily toward the rope where it lay tautening across the ground, in a
last desperate effort to try and get it before the bull had stretched
it completely.
But even as he did so, he saw Quartel had risen to his hands and
knees. Still blindfolded, the man must have heard the sing of the rope
and known what was occurring. He gave his head one dazed shake and
jumped to his feet, sinking his neck in that way and throwing himself
backward. His body was at a three-quarter angle when the rope snapped
taut; he would have fallen completely if the line had not caught him.
The impetus of his jerking back that way and the weight of his body
combined to upset the bull once more. The ground shuddered to the
falling animal. Crawford heard the crack of its broken neck.
"How's that, Huerta?" laughed Quartel, running forward to slacken the
rope so he could flirt the loop free. "I told you I wouldn't pull on
it by hand. Did you see that? I didn't touch it with my hands, did I?
I'll bet you never saw a roper could do that down around Mexico City.
Even Oro Peso. Did you think I was finished? Not with a neck like that.
I could throw ten bulls all at once. Where's my horse? Bring me that
_trigueño_. I'm not through yet. Not with a neck like that."
In a daze, Crawford picked himself off the ground, seeing Indita run
out to corner the _trigueño_ and lead him over to the sweating, roaring
Quartel. Stumbling back to the fence, Crawford watched the whole crazy
performance begin once more. It was a nightmare of shouting _vaqueros_
and bawling bulls and singing ropes and clouds of acrid russet dust
obscuring the whole pattern every time the animals broke into a run.
Quartel took three casts to nail the seventh bull, and it was obvious
he was tiring.
"Three more," Crawford heard Jacinto mumbling beside him. "Three more.
Oh, _madre de Dios_, let him get over with this, will you, and I'll
never forget to say my rosary again. Three more, three more--"
Two more. One more. "Hola!" shouted the Mexican, "_ahora_," and
the rope spun, and caught, and tautened, and the ground shook as
the last bull broke its neck. Coiling in the rope, Quartel spurred
the _trigueño_ to the gate, ripping off his blindfold. They were
all running that way, Aforismo catching the man as he slid off the
lathered, quivering horse, pounding him on the back. Even Merida had
lifted her skirts to run that way, drawn by the excitement. Quartel
came through the crowd, sweating and grinning and pounding himself
on the chest with his hairy fist. "I told you. The best roper in the
world. What do you think of it, Huerta? Have you ever seen better? Was
Oro Peso better?" Then a thought seemed to strike him, and he sobered,
looking around at the _vaqueros_. "When I was pulled off the horse.
Someone was in the corral. I heard them."
The hubbub sank until there was only the muffled sound of stirring
bodies, and Quartel saw the direction their glances had taken, one
after another. He stared at Crawford in disbelief.
"You--"
Crawford shrugged, sullenly. "It was automatic, I guess. I didn't
think."
"Yes." Huerta allowed twin streamers of gray smoke to escape his
nostrils. "I wonder what would have happened if you had stopped to
think."
Crawford flushed, turning toward him, but Quartel came forward,
clapping his hand on Crawford's shoulder. "Huerta, I'm surprised at
you. After all, he saved my life. And how about you. A _talega_ of
pesos."
"I made no wager," said Huerta, tapping ash from his cigarette.
The blood swept into Quartel's face, and he stepped forward to grab the
lapels of Huerta's coat with one huge hand, jerking the man toward him.
"Huerta, I bet you a _talega_ of pesos--"
"I made no wager." Huerta had not moved his hands. One of them still
held the cigarette holder at his side; the other rested in the pocket
of his coat. But he was looking into Quartel's eyes, and his own eyes
had opened wider. The veined dissolution of his heavy bluish lids had
lifted until the whole pupil was visible.
"That's right, that's right," said Jacinto nervously. "Huerta didn't
take up your bet, Quartel. You was so busy shouting and all you didn't
wait to see if he'd made the bet with you."
"If he had, he'd pay me," said Quartel, still looking into Huerta's
eyes, an indefinable puzzlement drawing a faint furrow through his
brow, and something else. Abruptly he turned around, raising his voice.
"_Caramba_, if I ain't going to get a _talega_ of pesos, I should get
some kind of reward. You don't see a rodeo like that every day. How
about it, Merida? I want a reward--"
He had shoved through the crowd toward her, catching her around the
waist. Apparently not divining his intent at first, she had been
smiling, her face still flushed with that excitement. But as he caught
her and bent his face to hers, the smile twisted into a grimace. She
threw her forearm across his neck and tried to lever him away.
"_Vayase con la música a otra parte_," she cried, anger causing her to
break into Spanish. "_Tu barrachon, largo de aqui, tu chile, no puedo
sufrir su insolencia--_"
"My insolence?" laughed Quartel, grasping her wrist and tearing it from
between them. The force of it drew a gasp of pain from Merida; she
began writhing more violently in his embrace, and tried to scratch his
face with the other hand. But he caught that too, and forced both her
hands behind her until he had her wrists crossed with his arms about
her waist. In that last moment, he quit grinning. Crawford had seen the
same expression in the man's face before, when he looked at Merida, but
never so palpable, never so clearly recognizable. His voice came from
deep in his throat, husky and sensual and demanding.
"_Besame, querida_," he said, and lowered his sweating face to hers.
"Let her go, Quartel!"
The Mexican stopped, with his lips not quite touching Merida. The
woman's body ceased to writhe; she stood there in his arms, bent
backward like a bow, looking up at him. Without releasing her, Quartel
raised his head and turned it over his shoulder till he could see
Crawford. It had taken Crawford that long to get through the laughing,
shouting crowd; they were no longer making any noise, and they had
spread away from him. He stood there with his boots spread a little on
the hard-packed dirt and the weight of his shoulders thrown forward,
the bitter intensity of his face only accentuating its gauntness.
"Oh." The word came out softly, slyly on Quartel's breath. "Maybe you'd
rather be the one to kiss her. First he saves my life, then he wants to
take my woman away."
"Your woman?" gasped Merida.
"Take your hands off, damn you--"
"Don't swear at me, Crawford." The hurt tone of Quartel's voice held
that pawky mockery. "I thought we were _amigos_. I thought you saved my
life in the corrals."
"Quartel--"
"_Sí?_" The man had released Merida and wheeled to face Crawford. For
a moment he stood there, his heavy chest rising and falling gently
with his breathing. The mockery faded from his face, leaving a heavy,
deliberate intent. His shift to the side was unhurried, but Crawford's
effort to keep facing the man came in a swift, spasmodic reaction. Then
Quartel stood there again. "Nobody swears at me, Crawford," he said,
and then, moving with incredible speed for such a bulky man, he leaped
forward. Crawford had been waiting for something, but it came so fast
his move to block it was aborted. Quartel had him by the shoulders,
knocking him off balance, and Crawford had to stumble backward to keep
from falling. "Do you understand that?" Quartel was shouting it now,
hoarsely, allowing his ebullience to escape finally. "I'm _amansador_,
here, I'm foreman, and nobody swears at me or tries to stop me whatever
I'm doing. I rod this outfit and I can do anything I want and nobody
can stop me, do you hear?"
It was then Crawford realized what he had brought up against. Stumbling
backward, he had lurched into the _trigueño_ and it had kept him from
falling. He was held against it now by Quartel's hands gripping his
shoulders. The animal heat of it penetrated through his shirt, and
something else clawed at him, somewhere way down in his vitals.
In a new spasm, Crawford tried to lurch free of Quartel's grip; but
the man had still managed to keep him off balance, and he was held
there, with his knees bent and his body pushed off to one side so that
he had no leverage. He was shoved back hard against the horse again,
and the hot, living, hairy, animal resilience of it against his back
intensified that vague alarm inside him.
"Do you hear me, Crawford, do you hear me--"
Quartel's voice came through to him as if the man were far away.
Crawford was writhing from side to side, trying to escape, but he was
still held at that disadvantage. He had his hands on the man's arms,
tearing at them. The effort rocked Quartel from side to side, but
failed to loosen his grip. Crawford's face was twisted, and he was
gasping hoarsely, because it was growing in him now, raking at him
insistently with its subtle, insidious nails. His legs were beginning
to tremble and the muscles across his belly were twisting up into
little involuntary knots.
"Let go, let go--"
The violent movement and their shouting had excited the horse, and
it began to shift around behind Crawford. It had been standing there
against the fence where Quartel left it when he slid off. Crawford
had it pinned up against the bars, and the animal whinnied nervously,
trying to get from between him and the fence. Aforismo moved from the
crowd to grab the _trigueño's_ reins and pull its head down.
"What's the matter, Juarez?" he said. "Crawford, don't do that, you're
spooking this horse."
"Yeah, quit shouting!" roared Quartel. "Can't you see what you're doing
to my _trigueño_? Hasn't he been through enough today? Quit jumping
around like that."
He realized what they were doing. That had been the intent in Quartel's
face. It didn't help him now to understand. Nothing helped him now. It
had its grip on him. His struggles had become a blind, frenetic effort
to escape. Not from Quartel, now. It was the horse. The shrill sound
of the _trigueño's_ whinny and the rising turbulence of the beast's
nervous movement against him drove Crawford to a new violence in his
attempts at escape. It was no longer small or vague in him. It filled
his whole consciousness. It spread through his legs and lower body in a
clutching, stabbing pain that caused his knees to tremble and jerk. It
filled his chest with a terrible constriction. And as before, the pain
was rapidly turning to something else.
"Let go, damn you, let go--"
He was screaming it now, in animal panic, his face contorted, his
whole body writhing and struggling in a blind frenzy that only excited
the horse further. He felt it rear up, and would have fallen backward
beneath it had not Aforismo yanked it down hard with his grip on the
reins. The hot hide was wet with nervous sweat against Crawford's back,
and he could feel the ripple of its muscle with every movement it made,
and every ripple sent a new wave of panic through him. All reason
was gone from his mind and he was sinking into a dark vortex of that
terrible panic like a cow sinking into a black bog.
"What's the matter, Crawford? Are you afraid of the horse?"
"Let go, please, for God's sake, let go."
"What's the matter, Crawford?"
"Leggo, leggo, leggo--"
He stopped screaming. It took him a long time to comprehend he was no
longer being held against the horse. He crouched there on his knees
where he had fallen when Quartel had stepped back, releasing him. The
movement of the animal behind him raised a flurry of dirty brown dust.
Coughing in it, Crawford stared up at Quartel. The rage had disappeared
from Quartel's face. His lips were spread in that pawky smile.
"Sure," he said, "I'll let you go. What will you do if I let you go?"
Aforismo had pulled the _trigueño_ out from behind him now, and
Crawford crouched there on his hands and knees, black hair falling
dankly over his feverish eyes. He looked like a trapped animal, his
breath escaping him in hoarse gasps, his head turning in quick jerks as
his wild glance leaped from one person to another. First it was Merida.
There was a desperate plea in the way she bent toward him, her bosom
rising and falling, her red lower lip dropped away from the shadowed
white line of her teeth, glistening damply. Then Huerta, managing to
convey a bored amusement without actually expressing anything in his
face, as he studied Crawford distantly. And Jacinto, great, lugubrious
globules of sweat sliding down his brown face, wringing his fat hands,
making small, unintelligible sounds of pain.
A vagrant anger swept Crawford and he tried to collect it and hold it
in him, bitter and acrid and violent. But it held no strength, and a
shift of the wind swept the fetor of the _trigueño_ to him once more,
and the anger disappeared. There was none of the spasm of panic now.
It was heavy and oppressive in him, holding him down like a physical
weight, robbing him of all resolve, dominating all other emotion. He
was still shaking violently, and the salty tears blinded him. He felt a
dim impulse to move twitch at his legs, and he knew a moment there when
he thought he could rise. Then he heard the guttural, frustrated sound
he made, and knew he was still on the ground, and felt an overpowering
impulse to give way and cry.
"I thought so," said Quartel, and turned to take the reins from
Aforismo. He checked the animal to prevent its whirling away from him,
and jumped onto its back. He released the rein, and the _trigueño's_
head came around with a snap as it spun to trot off toward the fires.
The other _vaqueros_ followed one by one, in an uncomfortable silence.
Huerta patted a yawn.
"They've got some cane chairs over under those coma trees," he said. "I
think I'll watch the proceedings from there. Coming, Merida?"
She did not answer. She was looking at Crawford, her face pale. Huerta
shrugged, moved languidly across the dusty compound. Then it was just
the two of them, with Crawford finally gaining his feet, unable to meet
her eyes. Merida's weight had settled back onto her high heels slowly.
That ripe lower lip had contracted against her teeth till her mouth was
twisted across them faintly. Her husky voice was barely audible.
"I had hoped Huerta was wrong."
He stared at her, wanting to turn and run, unable to, somehow, and
finally it came from him, guttural, hardly recognizable. "Whadda you
mean?"
"About that fellow in the mine," she said.
"Whaddaya mean?" Had that been him? Shrill, and cracked, like that?
"You know what I mean," she said. "Not only pain. Fear. And not only
fear of what originally caused the pain."
"No--"
"Yes!" she said thinly. "Yes! It's not just the horses any more. It's
everything. You're a coward, Crawford. You're a coward!"
_Chapter Nine_
STILL IN THE THROES OF FEAR
The girandole candelabra on the mantel looked like a brooding ghoul in
the evening gloom which shrouded the living-room of Otis Rockland's
house. The French windows at the front extended completely to the
floor, double-hung sashes forming the upper half, paneled gates of
unpolished oak being the lower section. The damask hangings had been
pulled across during the afternoon to shut out the sun, but the windows
themselves were partly ajar, allowing the sounds from the corrals to
enter the room. Someone was playing a guitar over there where they were
still roasting the bulls that had been killed. A woman's laugh came
dimly.
Crawford raised his head a moment where he sat in a willow chair by the
window; then he lowered it once more into his hands. His face was bleak
and empty. He did not know how long it was since he had come here,
unable to face them out there.
When the creak of the porch came mutedly to him, he gave no sign. Then
there was more sound, louder, more recognizable. His head lifted as the
noise terminated with a muffled crash.
"Crawford!"
Just once like that, shrill and cracked. He got to his feet and ran to
the door, tearing it open. It was the side table in the entrance hall
which had made the crash. Merida must have pulled it over, falling. The
marble top had smashed, and a piece of it lay on the floor beside her.
The front door stood open wide.
"Merida?" he said, dropping to one knee. "You fell?"
"No." She stirred feebly, rising to one elbow with his help, hanging
her head over against his knee a moment. The kitchen door opened, and
her maid padded down the hall in bare feet, a small, wizened Indian, so
dark she looked negroid, dressed in nothing more than a white cotton
shift.
"It's all right, Nexpa," Merida told her. "A little accident. Crawford
will help me to my room."
She allowed him to help her up the stairs, leaning heavily on his arm.
The warmth of her body flowed through Crawford, and when they reached
the second floor he was breathing heavily. Beyond the last step, Merida
pulled away from him, her eyes meeting his in a swift, unreadable way.
She turned and moved toward her room, halting a moment outside Huerta's
closed door, as if listening. Then she opened the door of her bedroom.
He had kept from asking by an effort, but now he followed her in
hesitantly, speaking.
"Huerta came up?"
She closed her door softly. "He wasn't at the corrals when I left."
"Maybe he got hungry for his red beans." Her face lifted to him, eyes
widening, and he shrugged. "Jacinto said something about dope."
She pursed her lips, moving around him toward the table. "Couldn't you
see it? Opium when we were in Mexico City. Peyote now."
"Those beans."
"Yes. You've heard it. The Indians call it _raíz diabólica_. Devil
weed. They've been using it for centuries in Mexico. Even the Aztecs
knew of it. They called it peyotl. It's effect isn't as marked as
opium. He seems capable of eating those beans all day. They make a
drink of it that's more potent."
"He said something about a complaint," Crawford told her.
Her mouth twisted somewhat. "Maybe he has an old wound. He's been
around. He'd take dope anyway. That's just the kind he is. You saw the
kind. Dissolute? I don't know. Whatever you want." She had got a punk
off the table and was lighting the candles in the porcelain candelabra
supported by oak wall brackets. Then she saw how he was looking at her,
and turned part way. "What is it?"
He looked away. "Nothing."
She caught his arm, turning him back.
"No," she said. "It is something. Huerta?"
Crawford pulled away from her hand, uncomfortable, somehow. "I just
can't see you with him. You're not the type."
"What type do you think I am?"
He started to answer. Then he moved his shoulders again, letting out a
muted, rueful sound. "I guess I don't know, really, do I?"
"Don't you?" She was meeting his glance with a wide, candid demand in
her eyes.
"Santa Anna's chests?" he said.
She drew in a long, slow breath, and nodded, finally. "You do know,
then," she murmured, almost inaudibly. "You have known, all along." She
hesitated, studying him. When she spoke again, her voice was stronger.
"That's inconceivable to you, isn't it?"
"No--"
"Yes!" She blew out the punk with the word. "You've lived in the
_brasada_ most of your life. Money to you represents no more than a
barren, lonely ranch like this and a herd of cattle to support it. You
have no conception of what riches can really mean. Not just the horses,
the servants, the jewels. The grace, Crawford, the ease, the beauty,
the way of life." An intensity had gripped her voice, and her face was
flushed. "Do you know what it is to be a peon in Mexico? No. You've
never seen it, have you? You've seen the women in the brush here,
living like animals in a one-room mud house with nothing but a cotton
sheet for a dress. That's nothing. They're rich. They're hidalgos
compared with a real peon. I should know. I was one, Crawford. I won't
be one again. I'd rather steal and lie and cheat. I'd rather murder.
Can you understand that? I will, if it's necessary. I--"
She broke off, breathing deeply, looking wide-eyed up at him. Then
a short bitter laugh escaped her, and she turned away, the line of
her shoulders bowing faintly. Light drew a soft glow from the rich
black hair drawn tightly across the back of her head. With a new
understanding of the woman, he stepped in behind her.
"All right," he said.
The simple acceptance of that drew her around. They were standing so
close her breast touched his when it stirred faintly to her breathing.
"You were going to tell me what happened downstairs," he murmured.
"_Derrotero?_" she said, watching his face narrowly.
It was an effort to keep it expressionless. "The map?"
"It's why Huerta wanted to keep you here in the first place," she said.
"Quartel and Tarant were against it, but Huerta thought you had some
reason for coming here. He was right, Crawford. Nothing else could make
you take what they've been doing. You've got part of the _derrotero_,
and you think one of us has the rest. Well, one of us has!"
She turned around and did something with the waist of her dress,
beneath the fichu. When she turned back, she held a piece of torn,
yellowed paper in her hand.
"There are three pieces to the map," she said. "This is one of them."
"Lopez?" he asked.
"Yes," she muttered. "Santa Anna had many wives. My mother was one.
You will recall that the captain of the mule train sent one third of
the map to Santa Anna himself. It was about all my mother got out of
Santa Anna's estate when he died."
"Who was it downstairs?" he asked.
"He came from behind. It was dark. I did not see."
He stared at the section of paper a long time, scratching his dirty
beard with a thumbnail. "Huerta's been trying to find out all along if
I have the _derrotero_. The fact that he doesn't know for sure has kept
him from making any definite move, one way or another. What would he do
if he found out, for sure, one way or another?"
"Why should he find out?" she said.
"You're with Huerta."
"Am I?" she said, moving in close again. "Maybe I _was_."
"You tried that before," he said.
"No," she said hotly. "Will you never trust me, Crawford? I want to
help you. Not just the map. That doesn't matter, now. Out there, with
the _trigueño_. I'm sorry for what I called you."
"Maybe you were right," he said, bitterly.
"No! You're not a coward, intrinsically. Can't you see what they were
doing? Maybe Huerta was the first to see how it was--about your legs.
Now they all know. They're using it, Crawford. Quartel used it today.
He shoved you up against the horse and held you there till you were
half-crazy with panic. He knew you wouldn't fight him in that state.
It wasn't fear of him that demoralized you. It was horrible to watch."
She reached up to grasp his elbows with her hands, lifting her weight
toward him. "But I've seen what you used to be, too. When you brought
Whitehead back. No coward could have done that. Come back, with
Whitehead that way, knowing what you would have to face, here. Do you
realize what it did to me? To come out on the porch that morning and
see you standing there beside Whitehead's body, knowing what it meant.
It doesn't happen to a person often in her life, Crawford. That sort
of feeling. Let me help you, Crawford. I want to. I can't if you don't
trust me."
She was up against him now, almost sobbing it, and his hands had slid
around her waist, the flesh hot and silken against his palm through
her gown. For one last moment he tried to fight it. But he had fought
so long, so alone, without anyone, and the warm resilience of her body
against him filled Crawford with a giddy weakness.
"Merida," he muttered thickly, bending her back, "Merida--"
She pulled away, her face flushed. "I can't--if you don't trust me--"
He held her that way, breathing heavily, her back arched away from him
by the pressure of her hands against his chest. He searched her wide,
dark eyes, and found no guile there. Still filled with that desire
and driven by it, he made a guttural, inarticulate sound, releasing
her, and took one step to the bed, lowering himself on the embroidered
muslin coverlet. He bent to take off his right Justin. The fancy
stitching across the top of the boot unknotted, and he pulled it away
from half a dozen eyelets in the leather, revealing a double thickness
which formed a pocket.
"Used to keep my money here," he said, pulling out the piece of
parchment Rockland had given him. The woman's hand trembled as she
took it from him, laying it on the bed beside her piece, fitting them
together. Then her pale finger crossed the map until it reached a word
printed on his section. Her voice was no more than a whisper.
"Mogotes Serpientes."
"Yeah," he said, watching her. "Yeah. I never got around to using the
map. Kenmare was on my tail a lot since I left San Antonio. I didn't
take too much stock in the story anyway. Del never told me anything
about it, and it was his uncle supposed to have been captain of that
mule train. How did Rockland get hold of this portion?"
"Delcazar's uncle escaped to Mexico City, where he died, his effects
being turned over to the family lawyer down there," she said. "Rockland
originally wanted the Delcazar land up here for the water. He sent
Tarant down to Mexico City to make sure there was nothing in the
Delcazar papers which would prevent having clear title to the land when
he got hold of it. Tarant found this part of the chart when he was
going through those papers." She straightened slowly, allowing her gaze
to reach his face. "Do you know who has the other piece, Crawford?"
"No," he said.
Her eyes grew blank; and he stood swiftly, grasping her hand. "I've
trusted you, Merida. Now you've got to trust me. I don't know."
"It's got to be more than trust now," she said. "We're in it together,
Crawford. If I'm to help you, you've got to help me. Will you?"
"Haven't I proved that?" he said, trying to pull her toward him with
that hand. "Anything, Merida--"
She held back, calculation hardening the planes of her face. "Perhaps I
should have said, _can_ you?"
Just the feel of her wrist in his fingers that way, soft and satiny,
started it up again in him, and he quit trying to pull her in, and took
a step in toward her. "What horse you on now?"
"I mean, maybe you can't. Maybe you're incapable of it. You can't do
much the way you are now, Crawford. You're only half a man. It's not
just the horses any more. It's your whole life. Everything you do is
affected by it. I've thought of trying to get you a gun. A dozen times.
It would be hard, but I might be able to do it. To stay unarmed here,
like this--" She put her free hand against his chest to stop him. "What
good would it do, Crawford? If you'd had a gun, would you have used it
today? Quartel carries one. Would you have pulled yours on him?"
No woman had ever affected him so violently before. Hardly aware of
what she was saying, the blood pounding through his head, he sought to
force her hand aside and bend his face to hers, wanting only to feel
her against him again.
"Merida," he said, the blood so thick in his throat it made him sound
strangled, "I told you--anything--"
She took a deep, ragged breath, and he could not tell whether she
was fighting him or herself, now. "No, Crawford. It wouldn't be any
different with a gun. Not the way you are now. A gun wouldn't do you
any more good than your bare hands. Quartel wanted you to fight him
with your hands. You wouldn't even do that. Nothing will do you any
good until you can step on a horse again without feeling that pain in
your legs--that fear." She forced herself away, saying it in a cold
tone, "Africano?"
It was like throwing ice water on a fire. All his ardor disappeared
before the abrupt clutch of fear that word engendered in him. He
stiffened for a moment, still holding that one hand. Then he dropped it
and stepped back, his mouth twisted. Just the word, like that. Just the
name.
"Yes." The heavy rise and fall of Merida's breast abated as she studied
him, the candor gone from her face now, a cold, critical speculation
filling her eyes as she studied him. "Perhaps I was wrong, Crawford.
Perhaps you can't help me. Perhaps I can't help you."
"No? Let me show you," he said desperately.
_Chapter Ten_
FLIGHT FROM SNAKE THICKETS
This time of night did strange things to the brush. The moon had not
yet risen enough to light fully the trails winding their secretive
way through the jealous chaparral, and what vague dim light did seep
through the gloom held a reflected, synthetic quality. Most of the
_vaqueros_ were in a drunken stupor when Crawford and the woman left
the house, getting one of Rockland's prized copperbottoms and a pinto
mare from the corrals without being detected. They rode north from the
spread, following one of the ancient game traces which the _vaqueros_
used when working the cattle. In the eerie illumination, the berries
ripening on the granjeno bushes formed yellow shadow patches against
the velvet backdrop of darkness farther back, and the white filament
of the horse-maimer was turned to a sick erubescence where it crouched
on a stony ridge. Crawford caught the dim glow of the cactus's silky
blossoms, and pulled his reins in a hard jerk against the pinto's neck.
The animal shied to the right, away from the horse-maimer.
"Crawford!"
The woman said it softly from behind him, a controlled anger in her
voice. She moved the copperbottom up beside him, peering at his face.
"It's all right," he said impatiently.
"Crawford," she said again, in that low, insistent tone.
He tried to relax his legs against the pinto. Just a walk, and they
were like that. He felt his shirt sticking to his armpits and knew the
sweat was showing on his face. That terrible frustration was biting at
him.
"I told you it was all right," he said harshly.
A savagery entered her voice, struggling with that restraint. "Will you
quit trying to hide it, Crawford. From me. From yourself. I know all
about it now. I've seen it. There's no use being ashamed of it with
me. It's there. We both recognize it. Admit it. That's the first thing
you've got to do."
"All right. I'm afraid. Every time it moves. Every time it bats an
eyelash. Every time it--"
He stopped, realizing how violent the release had been, and it seemed
the mocking echoes of his voice were dying down the sombrous lanes of
the brush. He turned away from her, feeling a new wave of shame.
"That's better than nothing," she said. The tone of Merida's voice made
him turn back to her. She must have been waiting for that, because
the movement brought his eyes around to hers. "When you wouldn't meet
Quartel back at the bull-tailing," she said, "I condemned you for being
a coward. I'll never do it again. You may be afraid, but I'll never
condemn you for it. The only thing I'll condemn you for is refusing to
face your fear."
He felt his legs relaxing slightly, and for a moment the beat of his
heart diminished. He had never talked with anyone about it like this
before. He had kept it locked within himself, refusing to look at it,
refusing to admit it even to himself.
"Do your legs hurt now?" she said.
"A little." His voice was tight.
"Crawford--"
"All right. A lot. They hurt like hell. I hurt all over. Does that
satisfy you?"
"This the river?" she said.
He pulled the pinto to a stop and stepped off stiffly. He stood there
a moment with his face into the horse, trembling faintly. When he
moved away from the animal, the nebulous pain subsided somewhat in his
loins. Yet the animal's very proximity kept the irritation in his
consciousness. When he pulled the map from his shirt, his hand twitched
spasmodically, and he almost tore the paper. She took the paper from
his uncertain hands, moving into the best of the bizarre light. They
had ridden north in order to strike the Nueces River where the route
on his portion of the _derrotero_ started. The woman hunkered down on
the ground, spreading the paper out. There was something wild about
her figure, crouching there like that, her dark head brooding over
the chart. She looked up abruptly. It caused him to make a small,
involuntary movement, realizing how he had been watching her. He
squatted down beside her, seeing the scarlet tip of her finger descend
to the words printed in Spanish at one end of the chart.
"Montezuma Embrujada?"
"Yeah," he said. "You can see them right across the river. I don't know
why they're called the Haunted Ruins. It's just an old Spanish fort
they had here to guard the gold trains coming from the San Saba Mines."
Her finger moved down the line on the paper to the next spot. "Chapotes
Platas."
"Silver Persimmons. A bunch of persimmon trees growing about five
miles south of here that look silver in the moonlight. I been by there
sometimes chousing cattle with Delcazar."
"Tinaja de la Tortuga." Her finger had passed on to the third spot
marked on the upper portion of the map.
"Turtle Sink, we call it," he said. "There's the biggest old granddaddy
turtle you ever saw living there, but I never saw any water."
"Veredas Coloradas--"
"You got me now," he said. "I told you nobody's seen all of the
_brasada_. Delcazar knows more about it than anybody else I ever knew,
but he can't tell me where Snake Thickets are, or what's in Lost
Swamp."
"This is still on the portion of the map you had," she said.
He nodded. "It's new brush to me and thicker'n heel flies in spring. It
takes a machete to get through."
Her finger was trailing on down the line, crossing the jagged tear
in the paper, marking the spots noted on the second portion of the
_derrotero_. "Llano Sacaguista, Puenta Piedra, Resaca Perdida--you
don't know any of these?"
He shook his head. "I told you. I've never been down that way. I've
heard of some. Puenta Piedra, for instance. There's supposed to be a
natural stone bridge somewhere along the Rio Diablo. And most everybody
in the brush has heard the tales about Lost Swamp."
"Puenta Piedra is beyond that thick brush," she said. "Why not skirt
that section of the _brasada_ until we strike Rio Diablo? If Puenta
Piedra is somewhere along Rio Diablo, we should find it by following
the river's course. Then maybe we can follow the chart from Puenta
Piedra on down to the Snake Thickets."
"We won't get back before daylight," he said.
"I don't care." She rose with a toss of her head. "Let them know we've
been hunting the chest. I told you there wasn't any time left to beat
about the bush."
"And what have we got when we do reach Snake Thickets?" he said.
"Don't ask me!" She seemed to allow herself full release for the first
time. Her face was flushed and she swung aboard the copperbottom
viciously. "All I know is I can't sit around that house and wait for
something to happen. The only way to find something is to go out and
hunt for it--"
She stopped, as she saw him standing there staring at the pinto. It
had a little roan in its black coloring which caused the dark spots to
run over into the white patches, giving a sloppy, splotched effect. It
stirred faintly, snorting. Merida saw what that did to him.
"Crawford--"
There was a plea in her voice. She sat quiescent, waiting. His lips
flattened against his teeth. He moved slowly to the pinto, standing
there, staring at the sweaty saddle. The smell of it grew in his
nostrils. He was filled with the impulse to turn and run. His body
twitched with it.
"Crawford--"
He put his foot in the stirrup and stepped aboard.
Silver Persimmons, Turtle Sink, Rio Diablo. They were names on the
chart. They were spots in the brasada. They were names in his head and
their reality blended with black letters on faded parchment. He lost
all sense of time. His only consciousness was of movement. No telling
how long it took them from Haunted Ruins to Silver Persimmons. The
weird brush floated past in a sea of mingled pain and trembling and
sweating. The stark arms of chaparral supplicated the night on every
side. The _cenizo's_ ashen hue had turned a sick lavender from recent
rain, and it reeled biliously into vision and out again. Then Chapotes
Platas were gleaming like newly minted coin beneath the risen moon. The
woman talked sometimes, watching Crawford, in a low, insistent way.
"My mother was the _curandera_ of the village. You have no idea how
many plants those herb-women can make medicine from. On Saturday we
would go to the river a mile away and gather herbs. I used to enjoy
that. It was as far away from home as I got. The rest was mostly work.
Nothing very nice to remember. Choking to death in the fumes of the
herbs my mother had cooking constantly in the big brass kettle in our
jacal. Rubbing my eyes all day in the smoke. She was stone blind from
that. Grinding corn on the metate. I must have spent half my waking
hours with that metate. Do you blame me for marrying Capitán Mendoza
when he asked? I didn't love him. He was brutal and ugly. But he was
stationed in Mexico City. I was fourteen at the time--"
Turtle Sink ceased to be inked words on yellowed paper and rose
abruptly from the shadowed depths of the brush--a stony water hole
with sand white as bleached bones covering its bottom and the scarred,
mottled shell of a huge turtle barely visible in the black shadow
beneath one end. They were beyond that when the sound of his breathing
slid momentarily across the uppermost reaches of his consciousness. It
was not as labored, or as harsh. Then it was her voice, floating in
again.
"After Mendoza died, riding with Diaz, I got a job entertaining in a
cafe near Collegio Militar. It was there I first met Huerta. He taught
me to speak English, gave me my first taste of what money can do.
Tarant had known Huerta before, and when Rockland sent him down to
look into the Delcazar papers, Tarant contacted Huerta to help him.
Huerta was there when Tarant came across the portion of the _derrotero_
Delcazar's uncle had possessed. That's how Huerta knew Rockland would
have it. When Huerta told me about it, I showed him the portion of the
map I had--"
Now it was his legs. First it had been his breath, now it was his legs.
He realized they were hanging free against the stirrup leathers. He was
sitting a horse without tension for the first time since Africano had
rolled him. He turned toward Merida. Maybe it was in his face.
"Your legs don't hurt now, do they?"
He was almost afraid to speak. "No," he said, with a strange, husky
wonder in his voice. "No."
He had never seen her smile with such rich sincerity, and her voice
trembled with a strange, joyful excitation. "Then we can, Crawford, we
can!"
He stared at her, unable to answer. Then he averted his head, lips thin
against his teeth. Could they? He was afraid to answer it. Yet the pain
was gone. He could sit there with the movement of the horse beneath him
and its sweaty fetor reaching his nostrils in vagrant waves and feel no
pain. And with the cessation of his pain, the other things became more
vivid in his consciousness.
He caught the faint honeyed odor of white brush from a draw to his
right, and drank in its full sweetness for the first time in months.
The woman saw that, and her lips lifted faintly. They reached Rio
Diablo and turned northward on its banks. It was the best water between
the Nueces and the Rio Grande, yet it was no more than a stream, its
mucky course following a sandy bottom that wandered in lazy loops
through the _brasada_.
"We're crossing Delcazar's old spread now," Crawford told her. "You
can see how much better watering you'd get here than where Rio Diablo
turns into Rockland's holdings. That's why Rockland wanted to get hold
of this stretch. When Rockland's dad first got the Big O, they say the
river was bank full from one end of his pastures to the other. Couple
more years and it will be completely dry there."
They passed the borders of what had once belonged to Pio Delcazar and
came across a grass-grown pile of stones on a clay bank while it was
still dark, a broken, hand-hewn timber thrusting its jagged end skyward
from the rubble. Crawford dismounted and moved about the area, bending
now and then to squint at certain spots. Then he stared across the
river to where another heap of stones stood on the far bank.
"Puenta Piedra," he mused, tugging idly at his scraggly black beard. "I
wonder if those stories about a natural stone bridge could have started
from one the Spaniards built on the route south from San Antonio."
"How does this line up with Tinaja de la Tortuga?"
He looked upward, turning his head till he found Lucero, and raised his
hand to it. "There's the Shepherd's Star. And the one the Mexicans call
La Guía. They're always fixed in relation to each other. That leaves us
almost due south of Turtle Sink."
"That tallies with the map," she said, spreading the parchment out
against her horse's neck. "Red Trails must be right in the middle of
that thicket we skirted. And this is the Puenta Piedra they mean. We
have to turn east a little now to strike Llano Sacaguista."
He got onto the pinto without hesitation this time, and led down
into the brown muck of the shallow water and up the other bank.
Llano Sacaguista proved to be a vast open flat covered with greening
sacaguista grass. He had never traversed these particular flats, and
beyond this was a stretch of brush entirely foreign to him. They left
Rio Diablo for a mile or so and then struck it again. A block in the
river caused by some ancient upheaval rendered the land boggy here. The
hollow boom of bullfrogs mingled with the other night sounds. A 'gator
bellowed somewhere from the depths of the exotic brush.
"Looks more like East Texas," Crawford muttered. "I wonder if this
could be Lost Swamp."
He could see the glow of excitement in the woman's eyes now. They
pushed on southward with the false dawn dropping an eerie light through
the brush. The boggy section fell behind, and the natural aridity of
the _brasada_ returned. They were still following the river, though it
was nothing but a dry bed now, the trickle of water having ceased where
it ran into Lost Swamp. A true dawn was bringing light to the sky in
the east when they heard the first sound. It was a thin sibilation,
reminiscent of the mesquite sighing in a light breeze. Crawford moved
his pinto over beside Merida's copperbottom, halting both horses, to
sit there, listening. Then he touched a heel to the pinto's flank,
moving it carefully down into the very center of the river bed. The
brush on either bank grew more dense as they moved on up the dry bed,
and began to gather here in the bottoms now. The sound increased, too.
The faint hissing was veritably ceaseless now, rising and falling in
a sibilant tide. Finally the brush was so thick in the river bed they
were having to force their way through. The pinto was beginning to
fiddle nervously. It shied, finally, and Crawford jerked it to a stop,
a vagrant wave of the old panic gripping him. He sat there a moment,
trying to control his breathing.
"You wanted to know where Snake Thickets was," he said. "It looks like
we're sitting right on the edge of it."
There was a vague awe in her voice. "It sounds as if all the snakes in
Texas had gathered here. Crawford--"
"Don't be loco," he said, seeing it in her eyes. "We wouldn't last two
minutes beyond this spot. If those Mexicans cached anything, it sure
couldn't have been inside here."
"If?" Her tone was sharp; the excited glow fled her eyes, leaving them
narrow and speculative as she looked at him. "You still don't believe
there is any money."
"I told you I was skeptical to begin with," said Crawford.
"But the part of the _derrotero_ you had--" she moved her hand in a
vague, defensive way--"coming all this way, putting up with all that
back there--Quartel, Huerta, Whitehead--surely--" She stopped as it
must have struck her. A reserve crossed her face, tightening the planes
of her cheek, and that speculation deepened in her eyes, accentuating,
somehow, the oblique tilt of her brow. "Maybe I was right the first
time," she said finally. She leaned toward him slightly. "I guess I
should have seen it before this. You're hardly the type, are you? Money
wouldn't mean enough to you to put up with that." She stopped again,
studying him, and then a faint smile stirred her lips. "Which one of
us do you think murdered Otis Rockland?"
He met her eyes for a moment, almost sullenly. Then a vague unrest
seeped through him. His saddle creaked as he shifted on the pinto,
and he turned his head upward, sniffing. She must have taken it for a
discomfort arising from her scrutiny, for that smile on her lips spread
perceptibly.
"I didn't think you were that righteous," she said.
He brought his eyes back to hers with an effort, staring a moment
before he comprehended. "Look," he said, then, with a careful
deliberateness. "I don't give a damn about Rockland being killed. It's
me, see. It's purely a selfish motive. I told you. A man gets tired
after a while. He gets tired jumping like a jack rabbit every time a
tree toad chirps. He gets tired running the brush all day and all night
to keep one jump ahead of those badge-packers. He gets tired living on
raw meat because he's afraid to build a fire, and sleeping in a bunch
of mesquite because he can't get near enough a house to get a blanket,
and scratching his face off because he hasn't even got so much as a
knife to shave with."
"Then why didn't you leave?"
He opened his mouth to say it. Then he closed it again, staring at her.
Finally he shrugged sullenly. "It's my country, that's all."
"Is it?" she said. "Or maybe I'm wrong again. Maybe Quartel was closer
to the truth than any of us. Where do you pin the badge? On your
undershirt?"
"I didn't think you'd understand," he said.
"It would be the most logical reason for your staying, through all
that," she said, studying him. "If you really are hoping to find
Rockland's murderer, that would be the most logical reason."
"Let's close the poke," he said.
"And maybe that about your legs is wrong, too," her voice probed
relentlessly. "That would be a pretty good blind. Who would suspect
them of sending in a lawman who couldn't even sit a horse?"
She must have meant it to sting him. He saw some strange satisfaction
in her face as he stiffened perceptibly.
"No--Merida--" He held out his hand, losing for a moment all sense of
the heavy antipathy which had fallen between them. Then it was that
restlessness, coming again, through the consciousness of her mocking
eyes on him. The pinto began to fiddle around in the sand, and the
woman's copperbottom raised its head, delicate nostrils fluttering.
Merida looked at the animals, frowning.
"What is it?" she said.
A puff of wind ruffled Crawford's ducking jacket against his ribs. He
turned in the saddle, staring northward. It was light enough with dawn
now for him to discern the blackening clouds on the horizon, above the
pattern of brush. The breeze whipped through the _brasada_ anew, strong
enough now to drown out the incessant hissing which emanated from
Mogotes Serpientes. Mesquite rattled mournfully to the wind. A mule
deer broke from chaparral with a clatter behind the horses, bounding
across the river bed in frightened leaps. The pinto snorted and began
fighting the bit, whirling in the sand.
The woman shivered with the sudden chill, calling again, a vague fear
tinging her voice. "What is it?"
He could hardly answer. The plunging, rearing pinto had filled him
again with that panic, and he was gripping frantically with his legs,
blood thickening in his throat, choking him up, sweat breaking out on
his face.
"Norther." He finally got it out. "Hits like this sometimes in the
spring. Better get to shelter quick as we can. It looks like hell is
going to pop its shutters. Delcazar used to have an old jacal on the
Diablo. It's south of us somewhere along the bottoms. He and I used to
hole up there when we were hunting--"
He was fighting the pinto all the time he shouted, and he could hold
it no longer. Frothing at the mouth from battling the bit, the horse
wheeled wildly, tossing its head, and bolted up the bank of the river.
The wind had risen to a veritable gale already, and the ducking jacket
whipped about his torso with a dull slapping sound as the pinto burst
through the first growth of chaparral. A hackberry rose ahead. Crawford
reined the horse aside desperately, sliding off on one flank to get
beneath the branches. He was shaking with panic now, and the pain was
in his tense, quivering legs.
"Crawford, Crawford--"
It was Merida's voice behind him. Her animal made a hellish clatter
going through a _mogote_. Then that was drowned in the howl of the
rising gale. Crawford was dimly aware of his own choked sobbing as
he fought to stay on the frenzied pinto and turn it southward toward
Delcazar's jacal. His consciousness of the norther was only secondary
to the terrible animal panic in him. The black clouds had risen like a
pyre of smoke over the northern horizon and were descending on the near
brush like an awesome, clutching hand. Already rain was beginning to
pelt the thickets. The howling wind tore a pendent bunch of mesquite
berries off its bush as Crawford raced by, carrying it into his face.
He shouted aloud at it, clawing wildly at the blinding mass. But
mostly it was the horse beneath him. The writhing heat of its frenetic
movement beating against his legs. The dank smell of its wet body
sweeping him. The coarse black hair of its mane whipping into his face.
The awful demoralizing consciousness of its uncontrollable run carrying
him along.
He could hear his own choked, incoherent cries. The fear held him in a
shaking, writhing vise now. Nopal clawed his face. A post-oak branch
struck his head with stunning force. He clung to the horse, bawling
insanely, no longer trying to rein it, torn off one side by raking
chaparral, beaten at by the trunk of a hackberry, scratched and ripped
by mesquite.
"Let go, Crawford." It was Merida, calling shrilly from behind him
somewhere. "Jump, Crawford, please, let go, oh please--"
"No! no!"
Had he screamed it? Someone was screaming. His head rocked backward
to a blow. Sensations spun in a kaleidoscope about him. The towering
dominance of a cottonwood reeled around its orbit above him. Mesquite
swept into his vision and out again. Sound and sight and feel became a
confused pattern. Red-topped nopal swam past. The crash of chaparral
dinned in his ears. The gnarled curve of a post oak reeled up and
blotted out his vision with a stunning blow in the face. His own hoarse
scream of agony. The drum of hoofs somewhere beneath him. The shrieking
wind. White brush. Green toboso grass. Brown hackberries. Agony in his
legs. The horse whinnying. White brush. Pain. Grass. Screaming. Trees.
Shouting. Blood. Nopal--
"Crawford!"
He did not know he had left the horse till he found himself crouched
there in a thicket of mesquite, his face against the wet, earthy smell
of dampened grama grass, making small, incoherent sounds. He seemed
in a void, only dimly aware of sound sweeping around him, his awesome
fear the only real thing to him. It clutched his loins and knotted the
muscles across his belly. His legs were still rigid and trembling with
that pain. He was sobbing in a hoarse, choked way. He heard the creak
behind him but didn't know what it was till the woman's voice came
through the haze of primal panic.
"Crawford--"
"There. That's it. You've seen it now. All of it. Can we? Hell. How do
you like it? Isn't it pretty?"
"You should have jumped." She had dropped to her knees before him and
pulled his face up off the ground. The rain had soaked her clothes and
when she drew his head into her arms he felt the soft, wet contour of
her breast through the damp silk shirt. He was still shaken with that
animal fright, and he had no control over his choked, guttural sobbing,
or his words.
"I couldn't jump. It's always like that. I'm so scared I want to puke
and the only thing I want to do is leave the horse and I can't." His
voice sounded muffled against the supple heat of her body. He had never
let it out like this before, and with the panic and pain and fear
robbing him of all control, he heard all the agony and anguish and
frustration of the last months flooding from him in a wild release. He
was still crouched on the ground, bent into her lap, his face against
her breast, his fingers clutching spasmodically at the grass on either
side of her.
She soothed him like a child, stroking his head. Finally, the pain
began to die in his legs. The knotted muscles across his belly began to
twitch spasmodically, and then relaxed. It was no longer his hoarse,
sobbing words against her body. It was only his labored breathing. The
full realization of what had happened struck him, and he forced his
head back in her arms till he was far enough away to see her face. The
flush of a sudden shame swept darkly into his cheeks. She saw it, and
her eyes widened with a tortured compassion.
"No, Crawford, no, please," she said, in a husky voice, and put her
palms against his cheeks and pulled his head to one side. Her position
gave weight to the leverage of her hands, and he found himself lying
with his back on the ground, with his knees twisted beneath him and
Merida bending over from her sitting position.
He had thought about it, before, enough times. A man did, with such a
woman. But none of it had equaled this. All the shame was swept away.
The sounds of the storm were blotted out. His whole consciousness
was of the straining tension of her body against him and the moist
resilience of her lips meeting his. Finally she lifted her head, and he
could see that her eyes were closed. She sat that way a moment, without
opening them, her blouse caught wetly across the curving rise and fall
of her breast. He lay staring up at her, and it was not the fear or
the pain or the shame any longer in him, or even the passion which had
swept him in that brief, violent moment. Opening her eyes, she must
have seen it in his twisted, wet face.
"Crawford," she said in a strained voice. "Crawford, what is it? What
do you want?"
_Chapter Eleven_
OLD FRIENDS REUNITED
The Mexicans constructed the roofs of their jacals by laying willow
shoots in a herringbone pattern across the bare vigas which formed the
rafters, and then piling a foot or so of earth atop the shoots. It was
this pattern Crawford saw when he first opened his eyes. Then it was
the estufa, built of adobe, in one corner of the room, with a raised
hearth and a cone-shaped opening in front, the hood rounding from the
center to each wall with two mantels terraced back toward the chimney.
It was over this oven that the old man stood.
"Delcazar!"
Crawford's voice turned the aged Mexican, a rusty black frying pan
still held in one gnarled fist. His face was seamed like an ancient
satchel, and he squinted with the effort of focusing his rheumy eyes
on Crawford. His soiled white cotton shirt hung slack from stooped,
bony shoulders, and the inevitable _chivarras_ were on his skinny
legs, glistening with daubs of grease. They gazed at each other in an
uncomfortable silence, and finally Delcazar made a vague movement with
the frying pan.
"Hard to know what to say," he mumbled. "After such a long time, and
all that's happened."
"Yeah." Crawford put the rotting bayeta blanket off him, moving his
arms and legs tentatively, grimacing with the pain it caused him. Hail
had come after that first downpour of rain, and the white skin of his
shoulders was marked with small purple bruises. He sat up, swinging
his legs off, watching the Mexican. "I remember we had a terrible time
in that storm. Last I recollect is trying to build a fire beneath some
coma trees."
"That must have been a long time before I find you," said Delcazar.
"I was in my jacal here when I hear somebody yelling my name. You was
carrying Merida across your shoulder. Both near froze to death. I put
you to bed like that time in Austin when the red-eye got you." He saw
how Crawford was looking around the dim room, and Delcazar grinned
hesitantly. "She's out getting water for the coffee."
They were still watching one another that way, waiting, and Crawford
waved his hand around the room. "I didn't think you'd hide out here."
Delcazar bent toward him, squinting. "Hide out? How do you mean?"
"A lot of people know about it," said Crawford. "I should think it
would be the first place they'd look."
"They?" Then Delcazar seemed to understand. He pointed at himself with
a thumb. "You think--that I--I--" He halted with a confused grunt,
staring at Crawford. "Then--you didn't?"
"Don't you know?" said Crawford.
"_Dios_, no," said Delcazar. "How could I know? Bueno told me how you
threaten Rockland after Africano rolled you. I thought--" he gave a
short, rueful laugh--"I guess I even hoped--"
He trailed off, shrugging hopelessly again, and Crawford bent toward
him. "Del, are you trying to tell me you didn't kill Rockland?"
"Trying!" The old man bristled. "Trying to tell you? You doubt my--"
He broke off, staring at Crawford. When he spoke again, it was simply,
without vehemence. "No, Crawford. I didn't. I thought you did. You're
on Bible Two. There was a couple of Rangers in the brush. Torbirio
spoke with them. He tell me they had you on the fugitive list."
His face darkened, and he turned away from Crawford, setting the frying
pan down. From one of the terraced shelves he took a grease-soaked
paper, unwrapping it from about the piece of bacon, rubbing the meat
sparingly across the frying pan.
"Isn't that the same piece of side meat you had when we were here
last?" said Crawford.
Delcazar tried to smile. "Almost, I guess. Some day I have a hog of my
own and we grease the pan with a fresh piece every morning."
"You said you hoped I had killed Rockland," Crawford murmured, watching
Delcazar's back. "Why?"
"_Nada_," said Delcazar. "_Nada._"
Crawford's levis had been drying over the fire, and he rose to get
them. "Because if I had done it, the whole thing could have been
nothing more than the quarrel between me and Rockland?"
The old man pulled a pot of boiled beans out and dumped them into the
frying pan. "Frijoles _fritos_, Crawford. You always like them."
"But if it wasn't me who did it," said Crawford, pulling on his damp
levis, "there would have to be some other reason for Rockland being
murdered. Santa Anna's chests, for instance." He saw Delcazar's whole
body stiffen. The beans started to hiss as the flames licked at the
bottom of the frying pan. "What do you know, Del?" said Crawford.
"_Nada, nada._" The old man turned around, rising with effort. "I don't
know nothing."
"Your uncle was the _capitán_ of that mule train," said Crawford.
"My mother tell me that," said Delcazar. "I never seen him. He died in
Mexico City when I was a little _niño_."
"Then why are you so het-up if you don't know anything about it?"
"It's dangerous, Crawford," said Delcazar, catching at his arm. "It's
the most dangerous thing ever hit this brush. You better get out of it
while you're still alive. It's got the whole _brasada_ going now. No
telling how many are mixed up in it now. The Mexican government has an
agent up here somewhere."
"Huerta?"
"The man at Rockland's?" said Delcazar. "I don't think so."
"Huerta was the one who told me about your uncle," said Crawford.
"Funny nobody has come hunting you. You're a logical link."
"They have," said Delcazar. "I wasn't here to greet them."
"Who?"
"That ramrod Tarant hired to clean out the brush," said Delcazar. "Him
and his whole _corrida_."
"Quartel?" Crawford's eyes narrowed, staring past Delcazar. "I hadn't
thought of him."
"You better think of him. You better think about everybody, Glenn. No
telling who's in it, now, and who ain't. No telling who's going to
come up behind you next. I hear they take your Henry away--" He turned
and squatted by the mess of saddle rigging and blankets in the corner,
rummaging around till he came up with a wooden-handled bowie--"Here,
it's all I have. I know it seems silly, but you got to have something.
I wish I had a gun. That old Remington I owned blew up." He stopped
again, clutching Crawford's arm. "Glenn, you ain't going back?"
"Why else did you give me the knife?"
The old man let his hand slide off.
"I guess so. I know you." He sniffled, rubbing peevishly at his
coffee-colored nose with a calloused index finger. "I guess there ain't
any use trying to keep you from it. They couldn't keep you from it with
Whitehead. What are you after there, Glenn?"
_Puntales_ of peeled cedar formed the doorframe. Crawford hefted the
bowie in his hand, flipped it into the cedar post with a deft twist of
his hand. He walked across the room and pulled it free.
"We found Snake Thickets before the norther hit, Del," he said.
The old man grunted. "You're doing it wrong for a short throw like
that. Let me show you."
Crawford had been holding the bowie by the tip of its blade and
throwing it from back over his shoulder, allowing it to flip over once
in the air before it struck. Delcazar palmed the heavy knife with the
hilt against his wrist and the blade on his fingers. He threw it from
his hip, point foremost. It struck with a dull thud. Crawford went over
to the post. The blade was embedded half an inch deeper than his throws
had sent it in. Standing there in the doorway, he turned back to the
old man, squinting at him. Delcazar sniffled that way again, rubbing
his nose, not meeting Crawford's eyes.
"I told you, Glenn, I never even seen Mogotes Serpientes. If you find
it, okay. But I never even seen it. I thought it was just a story, like
Resaca Perdida."
"We saw Lost Swamp too," said Crawford. "Snake Thickets was the most
interesting, though. You should have heard it. Sounded like those
beans, only ten times as much. Must be a million snakes in those
_mogotes_." He paced back to Delcazar, palming the knife as the old man
had this time, throwing it with a grunt. With the blade quivering in
the cedar post, he turned part way to the Mexican. "I guess you know
what the woman came from Mexico for. She thinks it's somewhere in Snake
Thickets."
Delcazar was shorter than Crawford, and he had to turn his head up to
meet the younger man's eyes. "Listen, Glenn," he said soberly, "I don't
know what you're in this for. I've heard a lot of reasons. Quartel
thinks you got a badge tacked on you somewhere. That might be. A man
can get a new job in the time you been away from the brush. Bueno
Bailey said something about trying to clear yourself of Rockland's
murder. That may be, too. If you didn't kill Rockland, maybe the man
who did is at the Big O spread. Personally, I no care whether you
killed Rockland or not or why you're here. I just no want to see you
messed up in it, that's all. I know you before, and I no want to see
you messed up in it. Take my advice as an _amigo_. Forget Mogotes
Serpientes. Forget the whole thing. Get out of it. Get out of it right
now."
Crawford scratched his beard, squinting into the old man's eyes
thoughtfully. "You know, Del, it just strikes me. Two men can be
friends for a long time, and not really know each other very well."
"Ah, _carajo_," growled Delcazar, shuffling back to hunker over the
fire.
Crawford watched him stir the steaming beans. "Is there a way into
Snake Thickets, Del?"
"_Nada_," grumbled the old man. "I don't know. I don't know nothing."
There was a muffled sound from outside, and then Merida was standing
silhouetted in the doorway, staring at Crawford. All his weight lay
in his chest and shoulders, and below the line of dark sunburn that
covered his face and neck, the skin was pale and white and so thin
as to gleam almost translucently over the musculature lying quilted
across his upper back. He became aware of how long Merida had gazed at
him like that, without speaking, and turned farther toward her. The
myriad striations that formed the heavy roll of muscle capping his
shoulders were clearly defined, and the abrupt movement caused a faint
ripple beneath the skin, like the stir of a sleepy snake. Merida smiled
strangely as she entered with a big clay jug of water.
"_Cimarrón_," she said.
"What?" he asked.
"_Cimarrón_," she said. "_Ladino._ I never could quite think of what
you reminded me of. Now I know. One of those wild outlaw cattle Quartel
brings in from the brush. Sullen, like them. Bitter. Even built like
them. Their weight all up in their shoulders, running the brush so
constantly they melt the beef off till--"
She stopped short, a strange, indulgent smile catching at her mouth as
she saw the puzzled expression in his face. He turned to pull his shirt
off the estufa. Merida moved after him, till she stood close behind.
Delcazar was across the room, pulling a twist of chili from where he
had hung it on a viga. Merida spoke in a low tone that the old man
would not hear.
"What was it out there, Glenn?"
"When do you mean?" he said, without turning around.
"You know when I mean," she said. "After I'd kissed you. The way you
looked. That expression on your face."
"Nothing," he said stiffly. He couldn't tell her, somehow, if she
didn't know. It just wasn't in him to express his own terrible
incapacity again, to her. For that was what it had been, out there,
after the kiss. The bitter, unutterable realization that no matter how
much he wanted her, he was completely unworthy of such a woman, and
could never have her.
"It was something," said Merida, tensely, trying to turn him around,
"tell me, Crawford, tell me--"
"Hola, Delcazar!" shouted someone, from outside, halting Merida. The
old man whirled about, dropping the chili. Quartel had come into view,
outside, across the clearing from the doorway, moving into the open
from the brush in stiff, tentative steps, his Chihuahuas tinkling
softly. He was leading his own _trigueño_ and the copperbottom Merida
had ridden. Crawford made an abortive move toward the door, but
Delcazar caught him.
"_Buenos días_," said Delcazar, stepping then into view.
"I found Merida's horse down in the bottoms," Quartel told him. "I
thought they might--ah, the flash rider himself."
He must have seen them behind Delcazar. Crawford pushed past the old
man into the open, and saw the morning sunlight catch Quartel's white
teeth in that pawky grin. The brush held a torn, rended look after the
norther, great holes ripped in the mesquite thicket behind Quartel,
mesquite berries littering the ground. The copperbottom shifted
wearily, rattling its bridle.
"How did you find us?" said Crawford.
"I trailed you," said Quartel.
"That's some trailing."
Quartel shrugged. "Believe it or not. I don't care. There was someone
at the Big O looking for you."
"Yeah?"
"_Sí._ I misjudged you, Crawford. Let me apologize for thinking
you were a lawman." Merida made a small strained sound from behind
Crawford, and Quartel grinned at her. "_Sí_, Merida. This man looking
for Crawford don't pin it on his undershirt, either. He has it right
out where everybody can see. He's hunting Crawford all right. He says
he's got orders to shoot him on sight."
_Chapter Twelve_
CONQUEROR AND CONQUERED
It was twilight of the same day that Quartel had found them at
Delcazar's jacal. Crawford and Merida had ridden double on the
copperbottom back to the Big O, where Merida had gone up to her room
to change, while Crawford washed up in the kitchen. No one was in
evidence when Crawford returned to the living-room for a drink, feeling
exhausted and battered from that night in the storm and the long ride
back. He was no connoisseur, his experience with good liquor limited
to the few times he had drunk Rockland's potables here, and he was at
a loss to choose from the array of glittering bottles and decanters in
the sideboard. He sampled one labeled _curaçao_ and found it too sweet
for his taste. Finally he settled on some armagnac, pouring himself
a stiff jolt and moving toward the French windows. He had meant to
sit down in one of the willow chairs, but the strange silence outside
caught his attention.
It was unnatural for this time of day. There was no wind, and the
mesquite berries hung in motionless clusters from drooping trees. Dusk
clouded farther thickets, and only the nearest growths took form. The
low mats of chaparral crouched like waiting cats in the gloom. The
warped dead hackberry by the wagon road thrust skeleton arms skyward.
It seemed to be waiting for something too. That oppressive sense of
expectancy bore in on Crawford, and he emptied half the glass at one
gulp, squinting his eyes as the brandy burned his throat. It did not
help. Waiting. The sickish sweet scent of the _lluvia de oro_ twining
itself through the lattice of the front porch was so oppressive in the
hot, still air that it nauseated him. Waiting--
The sound of someone rushing down the stairs caused him to turn toward
the door. It was Merida, and he was surprised to see she had not
changed from the torn, dirty leggings she had ridden in. Then he saw
the expression on her face.
"Where's Quartel?" she cried.
"He went down to the bunkhouse I guess," Crawford told her, frowning.
"What is it?"
"He was right."
"Who was right?"
"Quartel," she said, coming across the room in still, tense steps, her
eyes fixed to his face. "Nexpa saw him."
"Quartel?"
"No," she said. "Crawford, don't you understand? Nexpa saw him from an
upstairs bedroom. He's out in the brush and he's coming back."
It struck him, then, whom she meant, and his fingers tightened
involuntarily around the glass. "The lawman?" She stared at him
without answering, her mouth working faintly. He realized his fingers
ached, and he eased his grip on the glass. "That's crazy, Merida. No
badge-packer would come in here like that. Even Sheriff Kenmare was
afraid to follow me this far. Nexpa must be mistaken." She shook her
head, the planes of her face taut and strained-looking, her eyes glued
in that wide, frightened way to his. He made a small, frustrated motion
with the glass, his voice growing hoarse. "She must be, Merida. No
lawman. Not even a Texas Ranger." She shook her head again, emitting
a small, sobbing sound. He bent toward her tensely, his chest moving
perceptibly with the breath passing through it. He was remembering
what Delcazar had said. Bible Two? "It _is_ a Ranger?" Crawford almost
whispered.
She caught his arm, the words torn from her. "You've got to get out,
Crawford. Before he reaches here."
"Ranger," he muttered, almost to himself, turning to get past her
toward the door. "It can't be--"
"Too much time, Crawford," she said swiftly, blocking him from that
direction. "Can't you understand? He's coming back. You won't even be
able to cross the compound before he's here. You won't even be able to
reach the brush. You'll never make it on foot, Crawford."
He stared down at her twisted face. "What are you saying?"
"There's one in the small corral," she said. "Nexpa told me. It's one
of Jacinto's, so it won't be spooky."
It took him a moment to comprehend what she meant, and then it escaped
him in a strangled way. "Think I can do it that way?"
"You've got to." She was close to crying now, the tears glistening in
her eyes. "There isn't any other way, Crawford. Can't you understand?
You've got to. Right now. You'll never make it to the brush. It's twice
as far as the corral. You'd be out there in the open, and you'd be a
clay pigeon. Your only chance is the corral."
"No!" He tried to break free of her grip on his arm. "I can't. You know
I can't. You saw, out there in the storm, with that pinto."
"You can!" she cried. "You've got to, Crawford, you've got to."
He stared down into her twisted, pale face. Then, with a guttural,
inarticulate sound, he whirled to the French windows, opening one
farther, and stepped out onto the porch. He stood a moment behind the
screen of yellow _lluvia de oro_ covering the lattice. The silence
lay across the compound so thick it almost gagged him. Waiting. There
it was again. His shoulders hunched forward, and his whole tense body
had taken on the look of a hunted animal. He stared furtively down the
length of the porch. His shirt was wringing wet with sweat now.
"Crawford--"
It came from Merida, standing in the window behind him. Without turning
around, he moved down the steps, his boots making a clatter in the
silence. Then he was moving across the ground in an urgent, shuffling
gait, his narrow, dark head turning ceaselessly from side to side. He
realized he was still holding the glass, and threw it from him with
a muffled curse. With every step nearer the corral, something seemed
to be contracting about his heart. He was fighting for breath, and
sweat had turned his beard soggy when he reached the fence. In the
semi-gloom, he could barely make out the shape of the horse. This was
the corral they broke broncs in, built in three sections, the largest
section on this side, with a chute at the other end, and beyond that,
a small, tight holding corral not much bigger than a stall, where they
held the animals before putting them into the chute to be saddled. It
had been Otis Rockland's boast that this smaller section was built
so hog-tight and bull-tight it would hold the wildest bronc that
ever double-shuffled. The heavy, reinforced cedar bars were so close
together a man could not crawl between them but had to go through the
gate. This gate itself was built so that it would close automatically,
a rawhide rope run from its frame through a pulley on the overhead
structure with a bucket of sand hanging at its end. Whenever the gate
was open the weight of the sand bucket pulled it closed again, and the
drop bar fell automatically into its sockets on the outside.
Crawford stopped at this gate, glancing from one side to another at the
brush. There was a small crackle behind the bunkhouse. With a startled
abruptness, he pulled the rope that hoisted the drop bar from its
sockets and lifted it above the top of the gate, allowing the portal
to swing open. The bar would not drop back into position as long as
the gate was ajar. Holding the gate open, Crawford found a rock large
enough to wedge beneath the bottom bar and keep the sand bucket's
weight from pulling the gate closed when he let go. The horse inside
snorted softly. Crawford stiffened by the gate post. Then, his whole
body so tense the muscles ached, he took a forced, jerky step toward
the animal. The horse snorted again, louder. It had been hitched to
the corral and, as Crawford drew near, the animal began tugging at the
reins nervously.
"Easy, boy, easy." Crawford tried to make his voice soft and
reassuring, but it came out tight, harsh. "You're going to break your
headstall. Easy, you jughead."
But as he drew near, the horse's efforts to get free became wilder. It
whinnied shrilly and reared up. The sound halted Crawford in the middle
of the corral, his whole body a rigid line. The reins pulled free of
their half hitch on the cedar-post bar, and the animal wheeled away
from Crawford toward the far corner of the small corral. Crawford's
movements were forced, now, as he moved to catch the animal in that
corner. He bent forward slightly to peer at the lines of the beast. The
darkness revealed only a hazy impression of broad rump and viciously
churning hind legs and a roached mane. The stirrup leathers flapped
loosely as the animal moved down the fence, trapped in the corner now
by Crawford's advance. He was close to it when the horse wheeled with a
strangled, screaming sound and broke toward him in a rush.
"No!"
It escaped Crawford in a hoarse shout. He stood there a moment longer,
staring at the horse, his whole face contorted. Then he threw himself
to one side, and the animal galloped past. It saw the partly open
gate and was in a dead run by the time it reached that side. But in
its frantic rush, the beast struck the opening partly broadside, rump
crashing against the gate, head slamming into the fence post. The horse
reeled back, screaming in rage, and wheeled to go through headfirst.
But the blow of its body had jarred loose the rock Crawford had wedged
beneath the gate, and the heavy bucket of sand descended with a rush
to the ground, slamming the gate shut before the horse reached it. The
drop bar outside fell into its sockets with a thud, about the same
time the charging horse struck the gate once more. The whole corral
shuddered with the impact, but the gate held firm. The dazed horse
staggered away from the fence, making thwarted, guttural sounds of pain.
Crawford realized he was trembling now. Pain swept up his legs, and the
muscles across his belly began to jump and knot. Still dazed, the horse
wheeled about wildly. It caught sight of him again, and all its enraged
bestial instincts must have pinned the cause of its pain on Crawford,
for the animal screamed once more and rushed him.
"No," shouted Crawford, again, his voice choked with the terrible
reasonless fear that inundated him. He whirled and leaped to the high
fence, trying to climb it. But he heard the pound of the animal's
hoofs behind, and realized he would never make the top in time, and
threw himself off. As he rolled to the ground, the animal crashed into
the fence where he had been a moment before. Crawford stumbled to his
feet, starting in a wild run for the gate which led into the chute.
But he saw before he reached it that it was shut tight too. He turned
to the other gate, his whole consciousness filled with the sound of
the panting, whinnying, snorting animal behind him. At the portal, he
tried to reach through and lift the drop bar from its sockets, but the
cedar-post log was too heavy. He grabbed the gate, heaving at it madly.
The horse was trotting back and forth on the other side of the small
corral in a dazed way, shaking its head, snorting. Crouched weakly on
his knees by the gate, trembling and shuddering, Crawford tried to keep
his voice down, hoping he would not arouse the horse again.
"Jacinto," he called. "I'm in the corral. The bar's dropped on this
gate in the corral and I'm trapped inside with Africano. Jacinto, come
and get me out--"
There was no sound from outside. He sagged there, panting, the pain
clutching at him spasmodically, clenching his teeth in a desperate
battle against the fear.
"Merida! Can't you hear me? Somebody. Jacinto! Come and let me out.
The bar's dropped and Africano's in here. That killer's in here and
I can't get out. Merida." His voice rose and he began shaking at the
gate again. "Someone hear me! Merida! Jacinto! I'm locked in with that
black killer--" He was screaming now, throwing himself bodily at the
door like a frenzied animal--"Damn you, come and get me out, damn you,
Merida, you put that _puro negro_ in here, you knew I'd be trapped
in here with Africano, someone, come and let me out, for God's sake,
Jacinto, let me out, Aforismo, can't you hear me, you can hear me, damn
you, oh, God damn you--"
He stopped, huddled against the door, sobbing uncontrollably, realizing
his own screams had set the black off again. Crawford jumped away as
the horse came at him, stumbling and rolling in the dirt, bawling like
a baby, too far gone to realize clearly what he was doing. He tried to
claw up the fence again. But that pain in his legs and his terrible
fear robbed him of much control. His boots beat a futile tattoo on the
bars, seeking the openings in between. His bloody hands clawed blindly
for holds. And the fence was too high for him to reach the top before
the horse crossed the small corral. Over his shoulder he could see the
animal coming.
"No! no! no--"
His wild bellow was cut off as the animal spun broadside against
him. He heard his own crushed roar of pain, and he fell off into the
dirt, his arms instinctively going over his head to protect them from
flailing hoofs as he rolled away. The horse was as wild and frenzied
as Crawford now. Two beasts filled the narrow confines of the corral
with their crazed screams, forming shadowy, thundering, pounding,
running shapes back and forth between the fences, the whole structure
shuddering as one or the other smashed into the sides. Crawford did not
try again to climb the fence. Hands bloody, clothes covered with dirt,
shirt torn, all his wild concentration was on avoiding the mad, blind
rushes of the killer horse. He found himself backed up against the door
leading into the chute, facing the charging horse. He threw himself
bodily aside, and the animal crashed into the door. Panels cracked and
splintered, and corral posts groaned with the strain. The _puro negro_
stumbled back, blood streaming from its head, eyes showing their whites
in the gathering darkness, foam dripping from its jaw.
Crawford had rolled across the short space to the side fence. And
crouching there now, watching the horse wheeling and circling, seeking
him, a terrible blinding anger swept him, blotting out for a moment
the awful fear and pain. They thought they could do this to him? They
thought they could lock him in a stall with a killer? The hell--
He dove aside again as the horse rushed, feeling no pain in his legs as
he landed, feeling no panic, feeling only that utter rage, scalding,
vitriolic, cleansing.
"You think you can do this to me?" he found himself shouting. "Merida?
You think you can lock me in here like this? Damn you, Merida!" He
moved in front of the door to the chute, yelling crazily at the animal.
"Come on, Africano, here I am, you bastard, here I am, come on, see me,
damn you, come on--"
Dirt spurted beneath the churning hoofs as the horse charged and reared
above the man. Crawford waited till the last moment, jumped aside.
Panels cracked and split again as twelve hundred pounds of horseflesh
crashed against the gate. The horse staggered off, whirled back to
Crawford.
Gasping, Crawford pawed sweat from his eyes, dodged aside. The _puro
negro_ caught itself before plunging into the fence there, whirling on
one hind foot and changing its lead in mid-air to rush Crawford again
with a frenzied scream. He put himself in front of the chute door again.
Once more it was the horse's wild scream and the leap aside and the
maddened animal shaking the whole corral as it crashed into the door.
Another panel cracked, and hinges creaked, and the door sagged outward.
Blood covering its head, the black whirled and came at Crawford
sideways. It didn't give him enough room on either side, and the
black's shoulder caught him as he tried to jump away from the rear
fence. He went down, rolling up against the side with a force that
stunned him.
The horse had smashed into the rear fence, and it backed away, shaking
its head. Sensing Crawford at its side, the animal turned, shifting its
weight to kick.
Crawford saw the movement and knew what it meant, and not even hearing
his own shout, he clawed up the fence and threw himself directly at the
horse's rump. His weight struck the black hocks, and, without leverage,
all the kick did was throw him bodily back against the cedar logs.
With almost human cunning, Africano jumped forward to clear the space
between them so it could catch Crawford with the full force of its
kick. He rolled under the hoofs as they lashed out. One of them caught
his shoulder and he screamed in agony. Then he was up against the door
again.
He didn't know how many more times he drew the black into that door
before the portal collapsed. It was all a wild haze of choking dirt
and soggy sweat and salty blood and lashing hoofs. Time and time again
he waited there at the gate till the last moment, and then jumped
free, allowing the horse to batter on into it. And finally, with the
whole corral shuddering with the impact, the black crashed through
the portal, tearing its lower half clear out and carrying the upper
portion of the gate about its head and neck as it stumbled on into the
chute. The opposite door to the chute had been left open, and the horse
went on through into the larger corral.
Pawing blood and sweat off his face, drawing in a great gulp of air,
Crawford staggered out after the animal. It was logical that Merida
should have taken this long to hear the racket from the house, but
the men from the bunkhouse should have reached the corrals long ago.
Jacinto was at the fence with Merida, and Quartel was coming up in his
hard-heeled run, followed by Aforismo and the others.
"Crawford," cried Jacinto, "get out between the bars! You can do it
now. While Africano's still fighting the door. Are you loco? He's a
killer. He'll run you down. You can get away now."
"No," gasped Crawford, "no," and ran on toward the horse where it had
dragged the chute door clear out into the middle of the corral. He
wasn't finished yet. He knew he had to do it now or never, while the
anger still blotted out his fear. He worked the _puro negro_ into a
corner and got close enough to jerk the shattered door off its neck.
The horse tried to break away, but Crawford threw himself in front of
it, getting the frenzied, lathered animal back against the fence. One
of the hands was belatedly climbing the fence with a rope. Crawford did
not wait; he moved in toward the horse.
Screaming like a woman, Africano charged straight at him. There hadn't
been enough room between them for the beast to gain much momentum,
however. Crawford met it almost head-on, throwing himself partly aside
only at the last moment, grabbing the roached mane with one hand and
hooking his other arm around beneath the neck and letting the horse's
shoulder slam into his hip, throwing him up and over.
"Crawford," he heard Jacinto scream, "oh, you fool, Crawford."
He didn't hear any more, then, except the horse's wild, frenzied sounds
and the horse's drumming hoofs. He didn't see any more except the black
devil beneath him, doing everything within the scope of its vicious
cunning to get him off.
It bucked, and he took every jarring drop screaming triumphantly at the
agony it caused him. It rolled, and instead of stepping clear off and
waiting till the horse came up again, he rode its belly around, eyes
open wide, dodging the death in its flailing legs. There was an insane
frustration in the black's eyes as it came onto its feet again and
found the man had never left it. The horse rolled again, directing its
kicks this time. Still Crawford was on when it came up.
He rolled it from one side of the corral to the other, until it had
enough of that, and began going over backward. A man stepping off then
would have ultimately lost his touch with the horse too. But Crawford
rode its neck when it twisted onto its hips and rode its head when it
put its rump into the ground and rode its belly while it was upside
down.
The horse rose into a veritable orgasm of mad bucking, pin-wheeling,
sunfishing, humping up and coming down with all four feet planted, and
knocking most of the consciousness from Crawford every time it landed.
Crawford was bleeding at the nose and ears, face covered with blood and
sweat, clothes black with dirt. His whole world was one of shocking,
jarring pain and a grim, terrible concentration on finishing this.
The horse began rolling again, trying desperately to get the man under
its black body, and Crawford went with it, crying openly now, pawing
blindly for holds, head rocking as a hoof caught him, lying over the
animal's back with his nose streaming blood on its dirty hide.
Finally he felt the animal come to a stop beneath him, legs trembling,
barrel heaving, lather dripping off it white as snow. Crawford slumped
over, hearing his own sobbing, not knowing whether the wet on his face
was sweat or blood or both. He waited for the animal to gather itself
again. It didn't. Finally Crawford slid off and his legs collapsed
beneath him; he grabbed the horse's cannon bone and pulled himself to
his knees, then the mane and pulled himself erect. He bent over and was
sick. Choking weakly, he saw them coming from the corral.
"Get away, stay away. I'm taking this horse back in. You wanted him for
cow work? You got him." Merida swam into his vision, and he spat out
blood and teeth before he could speak again. "And maybe you don't know
it, Merida, but you did me a big favor. Yeah. A _big_ favor."
_Chapter Thirteen_
VIOLENCE IN THE BUNKHOUSE
The morning sun had not yet warmed the mud walls of the bunkshack
through, and the dank reek of adobe filled the dog-run as Crawford
passed down its narrow corridor toward the kitchen, still limping
with the pain of his ride on Africano the evening before. Coming from
the run, he almost knocked over Jacinto, who had been sitting propped
against the wall on a three-legged stool, his head bent forward on his
fat chest.
"What are you doing?" said Crawford.
The huge cook had barely caught himself from falling, and he blinked
sleepy eyes up at Crawford in surprise. "Sitting on a stool."
"You been sitting there all night," Crawford accused him.
Jacinto looked sheepishly at the prodigious butcher knife across his
lap. "No--I--I just--" He waved the blade suddenly at the room. "Well,
why not, you been sleeping up at the big house, and now you come
down here, and after all that about Whitehead, and everything else,
_sacramento_, how is a man to know what might happen--"
Crawford gazed at him soberly. "_Gracias, amigo_," he said.
Jacinto grinned in embarrassment, turning to shuffle toward the stove.
He put the knife down with a clatter and got the big coffeepot to fill
it with water at the butt. When he had it on to boil, he took three
clay bowls off a shelf and put them on the table. Seating himself at a
bench before the bowls, he spoke again.
"You feel all right this morning?"
Crawford was standing in the doorway, staring emptily toward the house.
"No," he said. "Beaten to a pulp."
"I'll fix you some Romero steak," said Jacinto. From the dull red clay
bowl he fumbled a grain of corn, carefully picking out the black base
with his teeth and spitting it into a second, a blue bowl, dropping the
remainder of the kernel into the third, a yellow container. He gave
Crawford a sidelong glance. "You told Merida she did you a favor last
night. How did you mean?"
"Never mind," said Crawford.
Jacinto plucked another grain from the red bowl, picking out the base
with his teeth. "You think she put Africano in there?"
"What else?" said Crawford. "Did you see any Rangers around?"
"No," said Jacinto, frowning at him.
"Neither did anybody else," said Crawford. "There weren't any."
Jacinto took out another grain of corn, waving it at Crawford. "You
mean you thought you was running from a Ranger?"
Crawford turned away impatiently, pacing toward the door. "That's what
she told me."
"_Por supuesto_," said Jacinto. "Why should Merida do such a thing?"
"Good way to get rid of me as any," said Crawford bitterly.
Jacinto studied him a moment, smiling in a hesitant, puzzled way. Then
he tipped the yellow bowl so Crawford could see it was full of pale
corn kernels. "Now I have _tortillas_ white as the sand in Arroyo
Blanco." Grunting, he bent forward to pull the metate nearer his bench,
a large oblong block of pumice stone, hollowed out in the upper surface
from countless grindings with the pumice rolling pin they called a
mano. He poured the hollowed portion full of the corn kernels. "Why
should she want to get rid of you?" he said, without looking up.
"I guess she had a good reason," said Crawford.
Jacinto took up the mano, began to grind the corn, the hulls working to
the edge of the metate like scum along the edge of a water hole. "That
day of the bull-tailing, when you and Merida went out into the brush.
You found what you wanted?"
"Let's not talk about it," said Crawford.
"And maybe you and her was the only ones who knew where it was, then,
no?" said Jacinto. With the edge of his fat hand, he shoved the
collection of hulls off into the blue bowl, which contained the black
bases he had spit out. "You think that's why she did it?"
Crawford's head jerked from side to side. When he spoke, the
frustration was evident in his voice. "How do I know? How do I know
anything? Sure we found what we were looking for. You know what it was.
Everybody knows. Why do you all keep beating around the thicket this
way? Mogotes Serpientes. You know that. Maybe she and I are the only
ones who know how to get there. And if I was out of the way, she would
be the only one to know. It's what she came up here in the first place
for, isn't it? She didn't even try to deny she put that killer horse in
there. It's the best reason I can think of."
Jacinto poured a little water into the corn left on the metate, began
grinding it again with the mano. "Is it?"
Crawford turned sharply from the door. "What do you mean?"
The paste of corn meal and water Jacinto now had was called masa. He
began to pat it into thin _tortillas_. The _comal_, heating over an
open fire, was a large plate upon which he cast the _tortillas_ to
bake, without salt, leavening, or grease.
"I am not too astute in affairs of the heart," said the cook, drawing
a heavy breath and wiping sweat off his fat face, "but I have had a
few, and have drawn some conclusions about women from them, which I
think are as accurate as any conclusions about women can be. They will
do strange things when they are in love, Crawford, often cruel things,
or brutal. Love to them, when they are enmeshed within it, is all of
life, is their whole existence. They will fight for it with their last
breath. They will go to any extreme for it. Merida is no ordinary
woman. You have seen her fire. You know her depths."
"You're riding a pretty muddy creek," said Crawford.
"I'll clear the water," said Jacinto. "Just give me time. Merida came
to you for help, didn't she?"
"You might call it that."
"All right. But she knew you could never be much help in the state you
were in. You told me she tried to aid you in conquering it that day you
left the bull-tailing."
"So what. Huerta acted like he wanted to help me once too. It was only
part of the game he was playing."
"_Lástima de Dios_," cried Jacinto, clapping fat hands to his brow.
"Pity of God. Now I know you must be as loco about Merida as she is
about you. Only a man in love could be that blind. Can't you see what
she did? That day you and she rode into the _brasada_ must have made
Merida realize, finally, that the only way you could conquer your fear
was to ride Africano again. And she wanted to see you conquer your
fear, Crawford. More than anything else. More, even, than finding what
she came up here for. More, even, than having you live. She didn't want
a half-man. She didn't want a coward. She wanted _you_, the way you
used to be, the way she knew you must have been whenever those little
flashes of your old self would show themselves."
Crawford had turned around, staring at Jacinto, now. It was beginning
to grow in him. The first dim realization of it. An understanding he
couldn't name, yet. It prickled the hair on the back of his neck.
"Yes." Jacinto could see the strange wonder in his eyes. "You are
beginning to see, no? It took you long enough. There are not many women
with that kind of gravel in their craw. Not many women could have done
it that way."
It was starting to blossom in Crawford now, a strange, dim exaltation.
"Do you realize what it did to me? To come out on the porch that
morning and see you standing there beside Whitehead's body, knowing
what it meant?" Suddenly he knew how she must have felt. "It doesn't
happen to a person often in her life." Suddenly he knew what she had
been talking about. "That sort of feeling."
That sort of feeling. He looked around at Jacinto, his eyes wide.
"_Sí_," said Jacinto. "You understand now. It would take a lot of man
to accept it, Crawford, even when he understood. It would take _her_
kind of man. Admittedly she took a big chance on killing you. Maybe
she'd rather have you dead than a coward. That's the kind she is. Not
many men could take her. Not many men could realize she sent them out
deliberately that way, and still take her."
"Hyacinth," Crawford said almost inaudibly, "Hyacinth--"
"_Sí, sí._" The gross cook began to chuckle excitedly, for he must have
seen what was in Crawford. "You better go to her now, Crawford, before
it's too late. She thinks you're through with her, after what you told
her last night. She thinks you're not enough of a man to take it that
way. But you just didn't understand. Now you do. Go on, Crawford. You
won't get a woman with that kind of guts twice in your life. It's
almost as good as owning a vinegar roan. I owned a vinegar roan once--"
But Crawford had stopped hearing the cook. It held him completely now.
It lifted him so high he didn't feel his feet hit the floor when he
started to walk. He moved past Jacinto with a dazed, twisted expression
on his face, not even seeing the fat Mexican. The only thing within his
awareness was that sweeping, tingling sense of exaltation, so strong
and poignant it approached a nausea. The kitchen door faced away from
the house, and it was more direct to go through the dog-run and out the
bunkhouse; he must have gone that way unconsciously, not remembering
his passage through the covered run.
"Where you going?" It penetrated only dully. He kept on walking. Then
somebody was in front of him. "I said where you going?"
Innes! The singular odor of sweaty leather reached Crawford from the
red-bearded man's buckskin ducking jacket.
"The house," he said, trying to get around the man. Ford Innes shifted
again, and this time Crawford was brought up against the man's body. It
was like walking into an oak tree.
"Not right now," said Innes.
It was the other things, then, brought in with a clarity almost
painful. Bueno Bailey. Sitting at the table. Filing the sear on the
trigger of his gun. Aforismo. Sitting on the upper bunk to Crawford's
right. His legs dangling over the sideboard.
"Did you ever see the _dichos_ on my belduque?" he asked, seriously. "I
like the one on this side best. _Tripe is sweet but bowels are better._
Don't you like that one best?"
The contraction of Crawford's muscles began with his calves. They
twitched faintly, stiffening up, and the tightening ran up the inside
of his legs and pervaded his belly and crossed his chest. His whole
body was taut as he took the step back away from contact with Innes.
"That's it," said the red-bearded man.
Bueno's gun was an old 1848 percussion Dragoon, converted to handle
cartridges. Rubbing his finger delicately across the sear, Bailey
nodded his head approvingly.
"_Bueno_," he said. "I'll bet the pull isn't more than half a pound on
that now."
"Where is Quartel?" asked Crawford.
"If you don't blow your foot off, you'll blow your head off," Innes
told Bailey. "I never heard of anybody filing a hair trigger down below
a pound."
"Where is Quartel?"
Tongue between his teeth, Bailey slipped the mainspring into the butt
of his Dragoon, tightening the strain screw against it carefully. "You
don't think that's too much of a hair trigger, do you? I knew a Mexican
up in San Antonio that used to carry an old Remington filed down to a
quarter-pound pull."
"All right," said Crawford, through his teeth. "I am going up to the
house, Innes. Will you get out of my way?"
"That Mex would still be alive if he didn't have the cussed habit of
jumping off his horse when it stopped," said Bueno Bailey, slipping the
trigger down through the frame and screwing the trigger stud into its
proper hole. "But I don't jump off my nag. I get off real easy all the
time."
"Please, Innes." It was Jacinto's voice, from behind Crawford. "Let him
through this time. It ain't the same as before. Please. It's different.
_He's_ different. Don't you know? _En el nombre de mi madre._ Can't you
see--"
"This _bravo's_ pretty good," said Aforismo, swinging his legs.
"_Nothing compares with my kiss._ But I guess I like the other _dicho_
better. Which do you like best, Crawford?"
"Oh, _Dios_." Jacinto's voice was quavering now. "Please, Innes. I hate
violence so. Let him go. I was not born for such as this. Wassail and
song, Innes. Can't we all have wassail and song--"
"_Bueno_," said Bailey, as he finished tightening the hammer stud and
started putting on the metal side plates.
"_Compañeros_, can't you hear me? Wassail and song. No violence. Oh,
_carajo_--"
"I'll ask you once more." Crawford's voice was flat. "Get out of my
way."
"You're not going any place," said Innes, pulling his buckskin jacket
up off the handle of his own gun. "Why don't you sit down?"
"Yeah." Bailey had the walnut grips screwed on. He reached for the
barrel, fitting it in place. "Why don't you sit down?"
Crawford stooped over to grab the hilt of Delcazar's bowie in his boot
and lunged forward at the same time. He struck Ford Innes doubled over.
The red-bearded man expelled his air in a gasp and went down. Crawford
let himself go with Innes, rolling off the man as they struck. He came
face up with the knife in his hand. It happened so fast that Aforismo
only had time to pull his belduque back for the throw. Crawford's
position prevented an over-the-shoulder throw such as Aforismo's.
"All right, Del," he grunted, and heaved the bowie from his hip, point
foremost, while he was still in the act of rolling off Innes.
"_Chingado!_" he heard Aforismo scream. Bailey's body blocked the view
in that same moment. Crawford did not see the blow coming. He shouted
hoarsely with the pain of Bueno's Dragoon barrel slashing across his
head. Stunned, the most he could do was let his knee fly up. It caught
Bailey in the crotch. The man's explosive grunt held a sick agony.
Crawford was still sprawled partly across Innes, the redheaded man
had been striving to free his gun without wasting time trying to get
from beneath Crawford. He had it out now and was twisting to bring it
in line. Blinded by Bailey's blow, Crawford squirmed around, launching
a wild kick at Innes. It caught the redhead's fist as he pulled the
trigger, knocking the gun up. The Remington's boom filled the room, and
the slug knocked a rain of the whitewash they called _yeso_ off the
ceiling.
"_Lástima de Dios!_" Aforismo's voice came from somewhere after the
shot, "come and pull it out, you _chile_, come and get it out--"
Crawford struggled to his feet, striving to jerk free o£ Bailey. But
the man had him about the waist, head buried against Crawford's belly,
hair hanging in greasy yellow streamers, groaning with the pain of that
knee Crawford had given him in the groin.
Innes still had his Remington. He gripped it with his left hand too,
now, rolling back with the weapon in both fists to line it up on
Crawford. Struggling with Bailey, Crawford could do only one thing. He
threw the weight of his whole body toward Innes. Bailey tried to jerk
him back, but not soon enough. Before Innes got that Remington turned
in the right direction, Crawford was close enough to lift his leg above
the man's face. He saw Innes's eyes open wide with the realization.
Then he felt flesh and bone crunch beneath his stamping boot.
Lifting his leg robbed Crawford of his balance, and he fell backward
with Bailey's next lunging jerk. They struck the wall so hard the whole
building shook, and another rain of _yeso_ spattered down over them.
"_Cristo_, will somebody take it out? Oh, please, somebody come and
take it out--"
Bailey rose up, straddling Crawford. Before the man could strike,
Crawford doubled in beneath him and got his legs twisted around so he
could heave. Bailey went back with a cry, stumbling into the bench.
The plank splintered beneath his body, and the bench collapsed with
him. Innes was getting to his feet, hoarse, desperate sobs rending him.
He pawed blindly at his mutilated face with his free hand, blinking
his eyes as he tried to find Crawford. He must have caught Crawford's
movement against the wall. He whirled that way with the Remington
coming up.
Crawford jumped toward him, catching the gun in both hands. Still
unable to see, Innes clung desperately to the six-shooter. When
Crawford yanked the gun around, it pulled Innes too, swinging him
against the wall. Unable to tear the Remington free, Crawford let go
with one hand and lurched in close to sink his right fist deep into
Innes's square belly.
"That for your three-quarter-pound pull, you _pordiosero_," shouted
somebody from behind Crawford, "that for your bacon grease--"
Innes sagged against the wall with a pitiful sob, still trying to pull
the gun against Crawford. Crawford brought that fist in again.
"Oh, _madre, madre_, please come and get it out--"
"That for your hair trigger, you _lépero_, I hope it gives you
_corajes_, I hope it gives you worse than fits of the spleen--"
Innes was slumped halfway down the wall now, still making those
horrible sobbing sounds as he refused to give up. Crawford shoved the
gun clear back against the adobe, and hit him again. The redheaded man
slid completely to the floor, dropping the Remington. Crawford whirled
around, wondering why Bueno had not come back in. Then he saw who had
been yelling.
Bueno Bailey was huddled in a corner, and standing over him, beating at
him with the broken end of the bench, was the fat cook. "That for your
bacon grease, you _rumbero_," squealed Jacinto, and the bench made a
crunching sound striking Bueno, "that for your--"
Crawford leaped across the room and grabbed the bench before Jacinto
could strike again. The huge Mexican fought him crazily, trying to tear
loose and get back at Bueno. "Just one more, Crawford, please, just one
more. He deserves it. Did you see what they were trying to do with you?
_Barba del diablo_, just one more. Look at the scabby _pordiosero_--"
"Who was it didn't like violence?" shouted Crawford.
Jacinto stopped abruptly, looking at Bailey, crouching dazedly against
the wall. He stared around at the carnage of the room, the smashed
table, Innes sprawled out against the wall clutching his face.
"_A fe mía_," he said in a hollow voice. "Upon my word. It looks
like they turned a _toro_ loose." Then his popping eyes came back to
Bailey. "I did--that--" he waved an incredulous hand at the man. "No,
Crawford, tell me I didn't." Jacinto turned around to clutch at him.
"_Violencia._ _Caramba_, I couldn't, not me, not little Hyacinth of the
River. My father would be desecrated. Please, tell me I didn't do it--"
"_Dios_, somebody, come and pull it out, damn you, Crawford, somebody,
you _chingados_, come and help me, come and get this _cuchillo_, damn
you--"
It was Aforismo's voice, breaking in on Jacinto's plea. Jacinto turned
toward the man, where he still sat up in the bunk. Aforismo must still
have had his right hand held back over one shoulder to throw his
belduque when Crawford's knife struck him, for the bowie was up to its
hilt through his palm, pinning the hand to the adobe wall. With the
inconsistency of a child, the tortured look left Jacinto's sweating
face, and he began to chuckle.
"Look at him. Aphorisms? Hah! What good are they now? _Proverbios._ Why
don't you give us a saying now, Aforismo?" He had begun to drag the
table toward the bunk. "_Dichos?_ What right have you got to _dichos_?
Tripe is sweet? Hah! How does that belduque know?" With a great effort
he had managed to climb on the table and bend over the bunk to grab the
hilt of Crawford's bowie. "_Nothing compares with my kiss._ That makes
me laugh. That belduque never kissed anything but the inside of your
belt--"
"_Madre_," howled Aforismo, "take it easy, will you?"
Jacinto tugged more violently in his effort to pull the knife from
Aforismo's hand. "_Dios_, Crawford, how did you throw it so hard? No
wonder he couldn't get it out. I'll bet it goes clear through the wall
into--Crawford, where you going?"
He was almost out the door, and he threw it over his shoulder. "To the
house." Crawford ran all the way across the compound and up the steps
and through the close, suffocating heat of the entrance hall, glancing
through the door of the living-room.
"Merida?" The echo of his voice held a frightening ring, farther down
the hall. "Merida?" he called again, and whirled to take the stairway
up, knocking off a mahogany riser with his boot heel, leaping the
whole elliptical landing where the stairway turned, halfway up. It was
recognizable, now, a woman's sobbing, coming from Merida's bedroom.
This door was open, too, and he stumbled in. Nexpa was crouched at the
foot of the bed with her face in her hands. He grabbed her shoulders,
pulling her upward.
"_Dónde esta Merida?_" he shouted.
The maid turned a face up to him so dark it looked negroid, her eyes
wide and terrified. "_No sabe, no sabe_," she gasped.
"What have they done to her?" he cried hoarsely, shaking Nexpa. "You
know. Where is she? Did they take her? What happened?"
"_No sabe_," sobbed the maid again. "_Huerta, Huerta_--"
"Huerta took her," shouted Crawford. "What are you talking about?
Where? _Dónde, dónde?_"
"_En su cuarto. Merida eo puso alli, en su cuarto!_"
"My room?" he said, and dropped her roughly against the footboard and
wheeled to run down the hall to the chamber he had occupied, tearing
open the door. The reeded mahogany posts supporting the bare tester
frame formed a skeleton pattern in the gloom.
"Merida?" he called. He could not see enough in the semidarkness, and
he ran to the windows, yanking the heavy overdrapes of dark blue velure
away from the window. Noon sunlight flooded the room, turned the damask
covering on the wing chair to a gleaming china blue, caught brazenly on
the brass fixtures of the Franklin stove in the small fireplace. Then,
blinking his eyes, Crawford saw it, and realized what the maid had
meant. "In your room. Merida put it there."
On the chintz coverlet of the bed lay his rifle.
_Chapter Fourteen_
CHALLENGING SNAKE THICKETS
No longer did it wait. No longer did it crouch in passive,
latent malignance. Now the evil coma unsheathed its thorns, like
a knife-thrower drawing his dirks for the first time. Now the
adder-toothed retama struck from beneath the disguise of yellow flowers
which had caused the Mexicans to call it flower of gold. Now the deadly
Spanish dagger of the devil's head thrust and parried and lunged like a
savage fencer.
Ever since Crawford had returned to the Big O, the _brasada_ had
filled him with a strange, inexplicable sense of biding its time,
crouched out there, surrounding them with its sinister, purring,
waiting destruction. And now, as if this was what it had anticipated,
it seemed to leap forth in all its deadly, ruthless malevolence, like
a beast unleashed. Never before had it fought him so, blocking his
way impenetrably, cutting and stabbing and striking every foot of the
way. And Crawford met its challenge, taking a wild, savage delight
in pitting all his skill and strength and experience against the
_brasada's_ violent, cunning, malicious virulence.
And he had a horse! Knowing it would take something more than an
ordinary brush horse to catch Huerta, he had chosen Africano. It had
not been broken to the spade bit yet, but would work with a hackamore,
and the fact that they had first captured it in the _brasada_ indicated
a life of running the thickets, which would make it a good brush horse
even without training. Just how good, Crawford realized the first
thicket they traversed. The _puro negro_ met the brush with a fearless,
consummate skill, something uncanny about the way it could sense
whether the _mogotes_ were actually impenetrable or whether they held
a weak spot which could be run through. It found holes in thickets
Crawford would never have guessed were there, running headlong through
the most dense ramaderos without a moment's hesitation. The kind of
a horse a brush-popper dreamed about. It was a constant battle, and
Crawford fought it with the wild abandon peculiar to the _brasadero_
when he was riding the brush like this, shouting at the horse and
himself and anything else that wanted to listen, and cursing in two
languages at every stabbing, clawing thicket which tried to drag him
off.
And the names passed by, as they had before. Silver Persimmons. Turtle
Sink. Rio Diablo. Chapotes Platas. He had tried to follow Huerta's
trail for a while, but when he had seen the undeviating direction it
was taking he had quit tracking and had let the black out. Finally he
came crashing through the fringe of chaparral into the clearing above
Rio Diablo and swung down off the lathered, heaving horse, and ran
toward the jacal. A man was trying to crawl across the threshold of the
doorway.
"Crawford," he groaned. "I knew it was you. I heard you coming ten
miles off. There never was anybody could match you cussing the brush.
I guess that's 'cause there never was anybody loved it the way you
do." He tried to rise abruptly, his eyes opening in a glazed way as he
stared past Crawford. "_Dios_, Africano!"
Crawford had reached him by then. "What happened, Del? They did this to
you?"
Dried blood darkened the old man's face, and the soles of his bare feet
had a red, blistered look. "You got a hackamore on it," said Delcazar
vacantly, still staring at the black. "You can't ride that killer with
a hackamore. You're loco--"
"Who did it? Tell me who did it!" almost shouted Crawford.
"Merida--"
"She did this!"
"No, no," gasped Delcazar weakly. "Merida come first. She say she
needed help. Say you weren't with her any more for some reason. Had
an idea I knew about Snake Thickets. While she was still here, Huerta
came. Followed her, I guess. He thought I knew about Snake Thickets
too. Those cigarettes of Huerta's. I'm a _viejo_, an old man. I
couldn't stand much. The woman try to stop him. She couldn't do it."
"How do you get in, Delcazar?" Crawford's voice shook with its low
intensity.
Delcazar's eyes widened. "Crawford, you ain't going to try and follow
them. It's suicide. Even if you know how to get in. Those _serpientes_.
You been there. You heard them. Please, you and I been _amigos_ too
long. Let those fools kill themselves after a chest of pesos. Who wants
pesos--"
"How do you get in?"
Crawford's voice held a shrill, driven stridor that stiffened Delcazar.
The old man stared at him a moment, mouth open slightly. Maybe it was
the pale, set look to Crawford's face.
"Rio Diablo. You know how it goes underground about a mile above here.
Nobody's ever been able to find where it comes up again. It comes
from the Nueces past here and then drops out of sight and there ain't
nothing left but the dry bed going on south to Mogotes Serpientes. I'll
tell you where it does come up again. Right inside Snake Thickets.
That's why nobody ever found it. You know how water in a place like
Turtle Sink dries up during the day. Then, come night, it rises to the
surface again. That's what happens inside Mogotes Serpientes. During
the day, the part of Rio Diablo that surfaces inside the thickets is
all dried up. Then when evening sets in, it comes up again. That's how
you get in. You got to run a short stretch of the thicket before you
reach water. That's why you have to time it right. The snakes sleep
during the day, and start to stir around at sundown. That's about the
same time the water starts rising. If you start in just a few minutes
before the sun sets, you can run that stretch of thicket between the
outside and the water while the snakes are still asleep. Naturally
you'll wake them, but you got a bigger chance of reaching the water
than if they were already wide-awake and waiting for you. Once you're
in the bog, you're safe. The snakes will come down to drink, but
rattlers like dry land too much to go swimming in that muck. Time it
wrong by one minute either way and you're done. If you go in too early
and the water ain't risen yet, you're setting right in the middle of a
million rattlers. And if you go in too late and the snakes are stirring
around, they'll probably get you before you reach water. I found it out
from an old Comanche a long time ago, Crawford. I was afraid to tell.
I was afraid to go in myself and I was afraid somebody would make me
show them the way if I tell, and I couldn't do that, Crawford, nobody
could. It's suicide. Maybe those Mexicans do it once, with the chests.
It couldn't be done again in a million years."
"Still got those cavalry boots?"
"Crawford, please, you ain't going to--"
"I'll want your batwings too."
Delcazar began to cry without sound, and the words came between his
lips with a resigned audibility. "In the jacal. Under my bunk."
Crawford stepped past the man, the decision hard and crystallized in
him now, permitting no other considerations. He hauled out the old pair
of jack boots someone in Delcazar's family had worn with Diaz, and
unhooked a tattered pair of batwing chaps from the bunk post, a rarity
in this border section where most men preferred _chivarras_. He pulled
the ancient Chimayo from the bunk and began cutting it in strips with
the bowie. Then he wound the strips about his legs like puttees, up
to his crotch, till they formed three or four layers; he had trouble
pulling the jack boots on over this thickness.
"_Pechero?_" he said, swiftly buckling the bull-hide chaps on.
Delcazar was huddled against the doorframe, watching him hopelessly.
"Had one somewhere. Maybe under the bunk too."
The _pechero_ was a buckskin shield used by the _brasaderos_ for
popping the heaviest brush; it fitted around the front of the horse's
chest, tying over its withers and behind its front legs. The black was
too weary for any objection as Crawford lashed the _pechero_ on.
"Gloves," Delcazar was motioning vaguely toward the fireplace,
"gloves--"
They were on one of the shelves above the estufa, thick buckskin gloves
with flaps as long as the forearm. Crawford pulled them on his hands
and stepped past the old man. He stopped there a moment, staring down
at Delcazar. His mouth twisted open as if he would speak. No words
came. A torn look crossed his face momentarily. Then he turned and
swung aboard the black and jerked the hackamore against its neck and
the animal wheeled and broke into a gallop down toward the brush lining
the river--
The sun was low and he forced the flagging _puro negro_ down Rio Diablo
until the water ceased and they were running the dry bed. The mesquite
became thicker in the bottom lands, interspersed by cottonwoods turning
sear with the heat of oncoming summer. Finally the _pechero_ was
rattling and scraping constantly against the brush as Crawford forced
his way through. He was riding at a walk now, head cocked to listen,
eyes roving the terrain restlessly, whole body tense with waiting for
the first sign that he had reached Mogotes Serpientes. The sun was
almost down now, and he was filled with a growing, trembling sense of
urgency. Maybe it was the incessant clash of brush against the buckskin
shield which hid the other sound at first. Suddenly he pulled the black
to a halt. It came from ahead of him, a faint, barely perceptible
hissing sound. He sat there a moment, letting the thought of Merida in
there harden the resolve within himself till it was so sharp and clear
it hurt. The black had begun fretting at the sound, and Crawford pulled
in the _mecate_ on the hackamore, bending forward.
"All right," he said, "we're going through!"
Perhaps it was the tone of his voice. The horse ceased all movement
abruptly, stiffening beneath him. Then the man flapped his legs out
wide and brought his spurs in against the sweating black flanks with
a hoarse shout. The _puro negro_ leaped forward like a startled buck,
breaking into a headlong gallop straight into the brush thickening in
the river bottom ahead of them. Crawford rode as if he were bareback,
gripping the animal from his thighs down, heels turned in hard against
the horse. They crashed headlong through the first thicket of mesquite,
Crawford bent forward with his free arm thrown in front of his face,
the branches ripping at his cheeks and tearing his levi ducking jacket
half off his back. A post oak loomed before them as they tore free of
the mesquite. He reined the black viciously to one side and the animal
reacted with a violence that would have unseated Crawford but for that
grip of his legs, wheeling so sharply the man's torso was snapped to
one side like the flirt of a rope. Crawford jerked himself back in
time to bend down off one side as they passed beneath the branches.
Then they were racing at a thicket of chaparral and huisache entwined
together so thickly it formed a solid mat before them. Crawford felt
the confidence of the horse beneath him and gave the animal its head,
and they crashed headlong through the hole Africano had spotted with
his uncanny instinct. Filled with the wild excitement of it, Crawford
had begun shouting and swearing that way again, adding his own hoarse
obscenities to the roar of popping brush. But even all this sound
did not obliterate the noise. It came through his bellow and the
crash of brush with an insidious, sinister insistence, that constant
menacing hiss, like the threat of escaping steam. It filled him with
an excitation which did not come from the mad ride. And as he burst
through the chaparral into the open, the first snake struck.
It happened so fast his own reaction did not come till the snake had
gone again. He had a dim sense of a sudden writhing shape leaping
from the last of the chaparral they were coming out of, and the sharp
snapping thud somewhere in front of him, and the horse's leap sideways,
screaming. Again his terrible grip was the only thing that kept the man
in the saddle, and they were tearing forward once more with a vague
impression of that writhing shape slithering off into the brush. They
were crashing into the next _mogote_ before Crawford realized the snake
must have struck that _pechero_ on the horse's chest. Now more of them
were in sight. Fast as he was going, he could still see the sleepy
torpidity of the awakening snakes. He spotted what he thought was a
root lying in the thickness of a _mogote_, but as the black jumped it,
the root came alive, jerking in a surprised, sluggish way, and then
one end began to curl inward. But by the time the serpent had awakened
fully and snapped into its coil, Africano was by.
Another one ahead woke faster. Crawford did not see it till a flashing
motion filled the lower corner of his vision. Again he heard the sharp
thump of the snake striking that _pechero_, and saw the frustrated
serpent drop away from the shield in a stunned way. The horse was
in a veritable frenzy now, lather foaming its mouth, screaming and
whinnying and fighting the hackamore madly without actually trying to
change its direction. It was no longer only the hissing all about them.
It was the movement. On every side the thickets seemed to have come
alive. Writhing, slithering shapes undulating in dim spasms through the
pattern of brush. But the fact that they were still awakening and the
speed at which Crawford was going aborted the greater part of their
efforts. Time and again he saw a snake strike after he was already
by. Twice more one of them reached the horse, only to batter its head
against that stiff shield of cowhide. Then, beneath him, Crawford heard
a thick, slopping sound, and the black stumbled, and almost went down.
With his spurs he forced the animal farther on into the muck. It was
not very deep and there were patches of dry ground, but there was no
more of that nightmarish movement about him now. Only the incessant
sinister sibilation to his rear.
His body was drenched with perspiration, and for the first time he
realized he was panting in a choked, rasping way. The horse was heaving
beneath him, still fighting the hackamore and fiddling around wildly.
He suddenly felt as if he were going to collapse. He bent forward,
gripping the saddle horn, realizing it was only reaction. Then,
as strength returned in slow, undulating waves, the black stopped
abruptly, head raised, ears stiffened. Crawford automatically put his
heels into the animal. The _puro negro_ stood adamant. Then Crawford
heard it, and stopped trying to force Africano ahead. Suddenly the
horse threw up its head and let out a shrill, wild whinny.
"Damn you," snarled Crawford in a guttural voice. "I ought to--"
He stopped at the answering whinny from farther in the brush.
"Crawford?" asked someone from there.
Crawford felt his body straighten involuntarily in the saddle. "Yes,
Quartel," he said.
_Chapter Fifteen_
TREASURE HUNT CLIMAX
Perhaps it was the sound. The constant, incessant, unrelenting sound of
those snakes. Standing in this narrow strip of bog formed by the rising
muck of the underground river, the hissing was audible on both sides
now. There was something infinitely evil about it that clutched at a
man's vitals. It filled Crawford with a vague, primal panic, akin to
the fear he had known of Africano before, yet different, in a subtle,
insidious way.
"I knew it was you." Quartel's voice startled him, coming from an
entirely different direction than before. "I heard you coming. I wish
I could cuss the way you can, Crawford." It was getting on Crawford's
nerves. The black was becoming unmanageable beneath him. Under other
circumstances he would have been willing to play the game. But the
thought of Merida somewhere in there drove all the conditioned wariness
from him. Suddenly the black raised its head again; he pulled on
the hackamore to stifle the whinny in its throat, but he saw which
direction it was turned in. He flapped his legs out wide and brought
the heels in hard, bolting the black into the mesquite. They crashed
through the _mogote_. Crawford had the Henry in his right hand as they
burst into the open, keeping it free of brush with the lever down. A
vague, blurred impression of Quartel sitting that _trigueño_ leaped
into Crawford's vision. With one motion he was jerking the hackamore
against the left side of the black's neck to wheel it toward the man,
and then releasing the hackamore completely to have both hands for
his rifle, bringing the Henry up into line with his right hand and
slapping his left palm against the barrel at the same time. In that
last instant, as fast as he had moved, he had time to see why Quartel
had been doing it this way. The man had no gun in his hand. Even as
Crawford wheeled and brought his Henry up, Quartel was leaning forward
with a grunt, his arm snapping out.
Crawford tried to duck the rope and fire at the same time. He heard his
bullet clatter through brush, after the thunder of the shot, and knew
he had missed. Then the edge of the loop struck his hand and slid down
his arm and closed over the gun. It was either let go the Henry or be
jerked from his horse.
The rifle bounced along the ground, and for a moment it looked as if
Quartel were going to be able to pull it to him. Then it slipped from
the noose. The Mexican wheeled his _trigueño_ toward the rifle, and
his intent was patent. Crawford turned the black and quartered in on a
line that would bring him between Quartel and the Henry. Seeing how he
would be blocked off from reaching the gun, Quartel reared his horse
to a stop, flirting in his rope and catching it up in loops. Crawford,
realizing that if he turned to approach the Henry his back would be to
Quartel and the man would have him with that rope, halted his black
too. For a moment, the two men sat there facing each other across the
open ground. It must have struck Quartel how it had to be, now, about
the same time the realization came to Crawford. The Mexican let out a
hoarse, violent laugh.
"All right," he said. "I am the best roper in the world, Crawford."
He sat there, grinning, allowing Crawford to unlash the 40-foot rawhide
lasso from the black's rig. A picture formed in Crawford's mind that
filled him with a growing tension. A picture of Quartel blindfolded
on that _trigueño_ in the corral with one end of a rawhide dally tied
about his neck and ten snorting, stamping, vicious _ladinos_ tearing
up the turf and the strange sighing sound rising from the crowd of
sweating, stinking _vaqueros_ every time he threw the bull. It didn't
help a man. It didn't help a man while he unhitched the rawhide lashing
on the saddle skirt from about the dally and shook out the loops and
watched the braided hondo slide down the slick rope. His motions were
stiff, jerky. He hadn't roped in a long time.
"Hola!" bellowed Quartel, and those great Chihuahua spurs rolled down
the flanks of his brown animal like cart wheels digging ruts in a road.
Crawford jabbed his own guthooks into the black, and Africano jumped
into a dead run. The brown horse seemed to come at Crawford in a surge
that left no space for conscious thought. He knew what a mistake it
would be for him to make the first pass, and he bent forward in the
saddle, watching Quartel's hand.
But the Mexican was waiting too, and the _trigueño_ was completely past
Crawford, with Crawford still holding his rope and twisting around
so he could watch Quartel, when the man made his throw. The Mexican
passed the rope over his shoulder, without looking at Crawford. In that
position, the movement of Quartel's arms was blocked off by his body,
and Crawford did not know the Mexican had made his toss till he saw
the small, tight loop spinning directly over his head. The throw was
calculated to compensate for Crawford's forward speed. All he could do
to escape it was rein to one side or the other. He bent forward so far
on Africano his chest struck the saddle horn, putting the reins against
the black neck hard.
The violence of the quarter turn almost snapped Crawford from the
saddle. He shouted with the pain stabbing through his middle. He heard
the faint sound of the rope striking Africano's rump. Then he was
tearing into a _mogote_ of mesquite.
Instead of going on through, he wheeled Africano within the thicket.
The horse reared up, screaming with the pain of turning in that cruel
brush, and Crawford was charging out the way he had come.
Evidently expecting Crawford to go on through the mesquite, Quartel
was racing around the fringe to intercept him on the other side.
This caused the Mexican to be at Crawford's rear as he burst out the
same spot he had gone in. Crawford put his reins against Africano's
neck, and again the horse responded with that incredible turn, and
Crawford found himself directly behind the churning brown rump of the
_trigueño_. The Mexican was already in the act of wheeling his horse
around to meet Crawford. Then he must have seen how Crawford had turned
after him, and realized how his own maneuver would place him, for he
tried to turn back. It was too late.
Quartel's first turn had placed him broadside to Crawford's oncoming
black. Crawford had that one free pass at Quartel's flank, with the
Mexican in no position to defend himself by a throw of his own.
Crawford saw his loop settle over the man's head.
"All right," he shouted, and dallied his end of the rope around the
saddle horn, wheeling Africano away to pull Quartel off.
But there was no weight on the rope. It fell slackly from the horn, and
Crawford twisted back to see what had happened.
He had seen Indians do it. One instant Quartel had been sitting the
horse, the next he wasn't. The loop fell across the back of the
riderless _trigueño_, caught on the cantle, slipped off. Then the
Mexican appeared in the saddle again. He had jumped completely off,
hanging onto the horn with but one hand, to strike the ground and
bounce back up, the rope hitting while he was off on the far side that
way.
The first wild action had left no time for much thought, but now, as
he recovered his rope and maneuvered to meet Quartel's next move, the
sheer deadliness of this struck Crawford fully. Like trying to figure
out three or four plays ahead in a poker game, with your life in the
pot instead of a few dollars. Well, he had been figuring one play
ahead, ever since he had seen the cards Quartel put down back there at
the bull-tailing. It was the trick Quartel had used on Indita. Crawford
had spotted the weakness of it, even then. A man could take advantage
of that, if he had a horse which could turn quick enough.
Crawford remembered Quartel and Indita had been racing head-on at each
other, and he placed himself in the position to meet Quartel that way
as the Mexican trotted toward him from across the clearing now. The
_trigueño_ was picking up its feet in a high, excited action, lather
marbling its snout and chest.
"_Vamanos_," Quartel roared, and raked the animal's bloody flanks with
his Chihuahua can openers, and they were racing at each other again.
Quartel leaned forward and threw his arm out with a grunt as they went
by one another. Crawford's own arm stiffened with the impulse to make
his throw. Then he realized Quartel's clothesline was not coming.
The rest of it moved automatically, without any conscious volition
from Crawford. Holding his throw, he allowed the black to race on past
Quartel. Then, when he knew Quartel would be wheeling that _trigueño_
to make his true cast at Crawford's retreating back, Crawford yanked
the _mecate_ against Africano's neck. He felt the movement of the
horse's shoulders beneath him, changing leads as it spun in full gallop
on its hind foot. No quarter turn this time. A half turn, switching
ends completely in that instant, so that he was facing Quartel instead
of going away and, with the horse still in motion, was racing back
toward the Mexican.
It caused Quartel's rope to overshoot completely. Crawford saw the
man's face twist in surprise. Then Crawford made his cast. It was an
underhanded throw with a hooley-ann at the end. In wheeling, Quartel
had come to a full stop. He made one last abortive effort to turn
his animal away, but the small loop caught him before the _trigueño_
reacted. Then Crawford was on past the Mexican, with the rope dallied
on his horn and snapping taut. He heard Quartel make a strangled sound
of pain. Then there was the thump of him striking the ground.
Crawford tried to keep his black in full gallop and drag Quartel, but
something within him rebelled. He halted the animal and swung off,
running back to catch the man before he could rise. Quartel was on his
knees, that rope still about his thick neck, shaking his head dully.
The mesquite rattled behind Quartel, and Merida stepped out. She must
have passed the Henry where it had been dropped. She held it cocked
in both hands, and her bosom was heaving, her face torn and bleeding
from the brush she had run through. They stared at each other without
speaking. Her eyes were wide and shining, and her lips started twisting
across her teeth without any sound coming out.
Then, without any consciousness of having moved, he found her body in
his arms and her lips against his and the sound of her expelled breath
hot and hoarse in his ears. He didn't know how long he was lost in it.
Finally the other things began to come. The cold, hard feel of the
rifle barrel against his back where she held it in one hand with that
arm around him. The guttural sounds of pain Quartel was making trying
to get that noose off his neck. The crash of another passage through
the mesquite.
"Crawford, Crawford, I knew you'd come, I knew they couldn't stop you,
none of them--" It was Merida, whispering it in a husky, passionate,
barely coherent stream against his chest. "I was so afraid. Thinking
of you out there. All those snakes. I wanted you to come and I didn't
want you to. I didn't know what I wanted. I do now, I mean. I guess I
haven't known really what I wanted all my life, but I do now. I was so
afraid--"
"Merida--Where are you?"
It was Huerta's voice, accompanying the rattle of the thicket. Crawford
lifted his face from the woman's, staring at the doctor as he stumbled
from the mesquite. The man's fustian was ripped and torn, and he was
dabbing at a cut on his cheek with a silk monogrammed handkerchief. He
brought himself to an abrupt halt, breathing heavily, when he saw them.
Crawford disengaged himself from Merida, taking the rifle out of her
hand, still looking at the doctor. There was something about the man
that vaguely puzzled him.
"Did you find it?" Crawford asked Merida finally.
A dim, bitter expression entered Merida's face. "Yes," she said, "we
found it."
"What do you mean?" Crawford muttered.
She inclined her head through the mesquite, that strange expression
still on her features. Crawford frowned at her. Then he turned to jerk
the Henry at Quartel. The man had finally got that rope off his neck
and stood there rubbing the bruised flesh sullenly. He moved ahead of
Crawford through the brush.
"You too, Doctor," said Crawford.
They passed through the thicket and crossed a boggy section. With the
violence of the action over now, the hissing of the snakes began to
impinge on Crawford's consciousness again. Rising out of the bog to
the thick mat of greenish-brown toboso grass covering an island of
firm ground, they reached the first aparejo. It was one of the old
X-shaped packsaddles used by the original Mexican muleteers, with two
brass-bound chests lashed into it so that one would fall on each side
of the mule.
"The Mexicans carrying this stuff must have been following the dry
river bed and hit the fringe of Snake Thickets about dusk," said
Merida. "That's the only way they could have got this far in. Then,
when the snakes started waking up, and they realized what they had
wandered into, the men left the stuff here, knowing it would be as safe
as anywhere they could have hidden it, and shot their way out through
the snakes again."
"Did you just stumble onto it too?" Crawford asked.
"Quartel had the other third of the _derrotero_," said Merida.
"Quartel?" Crawford's head lifted sharply to the man. He emitted a
small, humorless laugh. "That explains a lot of things."
"Does it?" said Quartel.
"It showed Quartel how to find the aparejos once he was inside Mogotes
Serpientes," Merida said. "But not how to find Snake Thickets." Her
eyes were on Crawford, and that odd expression still filled her face.
She moved her head toward the chest. "Go ahead," she said.
He kept Quartel and Huerta in sight when he knelt. The wood was rotten
and someone had torn the lid of one chest away from its brass bindings.
He lifted it, and stared at the black gunpowder filling the oak box.
The woman's voice sounded far away.
"The Centralists must have done this. They would have done anything to
break Santa Anna's power at that time. They knew his men were ready to
desert because they hadn't been paid in three months. It was only by
the promise of this pay that Santa Anna held them together long enough
to fight the battle of San Jacinto. You can imagine their reaction
if the train had reached the army and they had found their pay to be
nothing more than this." She stared emptily at the case. "Twenty chests
of gunpowder. That's ironic, isn't it? All this trouble over twenty
chests of gunpowder."
Crawford rose slowly, drawing himself back to present necessities by a
distinct effort. "We'd better start thinking about getting out of here."
Huerta's feet made a small, quick shift against the toboso grass.
Crawford realized what it was in the man now. That air of infinite
ennui was beginning to dissipate before something else; an indefinable
tension tightened the little muscles about Huerta's mouth till the soft
flesh was furrowed like an old man's. The bluish, veined lower lid of
his right eye was twitching noticeably. "We can't go out now," he said,
and the strain was palpable in his voice. "Not through all those snakes
again. They're awake now."
"This place dries up come daylight," said Crawford. "It won't be any
safer than out there. We have to leave sometime before then, and it
might as well be now."
He began peeling off his gloves and handing them to Merida; then his
heavy denim ducking jacket and the bull-hide chaps. Huerta's breathing
became more audible as he watched it.
"No," he said, "no--listen--"
"What's wrong with your gun?" Crawford asked Quartel.
"Merida's horse got hit by a snake about halfway through," said the
Mexican. "She got pitched and Huerta wouldn't stop to pick her up. I
was following them pretty close and came across her before she'd been
caught by the snakes. But they were all waked up in that section and I
used my lead up shooting our way on into here. That's why I had to use
the rope on you."
"What caliber you got?"
Quartel looked surprised. "It's an old Bisley .44."
From the pocket of his levis, Crawford pulled a handful of his .44
flat-noses. He stood there with the copper cartridges in his hand,
meeting Quartet's eyes. He held out his hand.
Quartel stared at the handful of shells, then he threw back his head
and let out that Gargantuan laugh. "Crawford, you're the craziest
_barrachon_ I ever saw."
He took the cartridges and broke his Bisley and began thumbing them
into the cylinder. Huerta lowered the handkerchief from his scratched
face, and his effort at control was more obvious now.
"I haven't got a gun," he said.
"That's too bad," said Crawford.
"No, no, listen, you can't expect me to go out there without--"
He turned around and indicated Quartel should follow him through the
mesquite to their horses. Like the well-trained roper it was, the
_trigueño_ had stopped the instant Quartel left its back, and was
standing in the same spot they had left it. Africano must have run on
across the bog and been stopped by his fear of the snakes in the first
dry thickets over there, for he came trotting back through the mud,
whinnying nervously. Crawford blocked the animal off against a _mogote_
of chaparral and caught it.
"Get on first," he told the girl.
"Crawford," Huerta began again, "you can't--"
"Get your horse if you're coming with us," he told the man.
Huerta opened his mouth to say something more; then, with a strangled,
inarticulate sound, he turned and crashed back through the mesquite. In
a moment he returned on the copperbottom. It was a risky thing to do
with such a green horse, but there was no other way, and Crawford swung
onto the black behind the cantle. The animal kicked in a startled,
angry way and started to buck. Crawford swung his arms around in front
of Merida to grab the _mecate_ and yank back hard on it, spurring
Africano at the same time. The _puro negro_ quit bucking and broke
forward, slopping into a muddy stretch. Crawford turned the horse to
get Quartel in front of him. They rode toward the edge of the bog that
way.
"You go first, Quartel," Crawford said. "I'll follow you, Huerta. If
you can keep your head and stay in between us, we might be able to get
you out. Just keep your head. That's the whole thing. Get panicky and
you're through. You can even get bit a couple of times by snakes and
still live to tell about it if you don't let it throw you. It isn't the
venom that kills a man so quick; it's when he gets spooked and starts
running and yelling and pumping all that poison through him a hundred
times as fast as it would spread if he just stayed calm. Savvy?"
Huerta's copperbottom fiddled beneath him. "Crawford, I can't. Not
without a gun. You can't ask me to."
"Quartel?" said Crawford.
"_Sí_," grinned the Mexican, and flapped his feet out wide. The
_trigueño_ bolted before Quartel's feet came back in to kick his
flanks, and then crashed into the thickets. Crawford held the Henry in
one hand and he waved it at Huerta.
"Get going, damn you, I'm not going to wait for you to puke, get going!"
"No, I can't, not through there--" Huerta saw Crawford swing out his
feet, and whirled the copperbottom with a last desperate shout, and
crashed into the Snake Thickets after Quartel. Then Crawford's heels
struck the black, and they were going.
At first it was only the wild, crashing, pounding, yelling run through
the mesquite. With Quartel leading the way all they had to do was
follow the trail he made, running through holes he had burst in the
thickets ahead of them. Then the snakes began. First it was that
sharp, dry thump against Africano's _pechero_, and the woman's shrill,
startled cry. Quartel's gun crashed from ahead of them, but Crawford
was too taken up with reining the black to use his Henry. He had that
blurred impression of violent undulation around him. There was another
snapping thud against Africano's buckskin shield, and a big diamondback
fell to the ground beneath them as they went by.
Then it was the shrill scream from Huerta's copperbottom ahead.
Crawford saw the huge rattler dropping off the animal's rump, and the
copperbottom started to buck.
"There it is," screamed Huerta, "there it is!"
"Don't lose your head," shouted Crawford. "Get him to running again.
He'll last through, Huerta, get him to running--"
Another rattler flashed from the thickets. The copperbottom reared
up as the snake struck, pawing the air wildly. Crawford came up
from behind at a dead run and Huerta's panicky reining brought the
copperbottom down broadside to them. Crawford jerked his whole body to
the left with the desperation of his attempt to rein the black around,
but Africano smashed head-on into Huerta's animal.
Crawford had the sense of falling through a bedlam of Huerta's wild
yells and Merida's voice calling something and the animal's frenzied,
agonized screaming. Then he hit the ground with Merida coming down on
top of him. It knocked the breath from him and he struggled to get from
beneath her, making a horrible retching sound in his fight for breath.
He got to his knees, surprised that he still clutched the Henry. The
copperbottom was already crashing off through the brush, and Africano
was just scrambling to his feet. Crawford lurched at the black horse,
but Africano whirled and galloped at a _ramadero_ of _cejas_, smashing
through and disappearing. There was a whirring sound from behind and
Merida's shriek. He whirled, snapping the lever on his Henry down at
the same time, and fired from the hip at the serpent coiled just
beyond her. She had been in the act of throwing herself away, and the
slug driving into the snake aborted its strike. The head fell heavily
to the ground with only half its length uncoiled. Crawford leaped to
Merida, grabbing her roughly by the elbow and yanking her erect.
"Crawford, get me out, Crawford! Crawford!" It was Huerta, rising
from the patch of switch mesquite where he had been thrown. There
was a sallow, putty color to his face and that eye was twitching
uncontrollably now. He staggered toward them, his blasé, jaded
sophistication swept away before the terrible animal fear. A deadly
rattle rose from behind him and he tried to run, and stumbled, falling
against Crawford.
The woman's gasp made Crawford turn in the direction she was looking,
and he brought up the Henry, kicking free of Huerta, firing at the
snake which had writhed from the switch mesquite toward them, shouting
at Huerta. "Get up, then. I'll get you out. Get up!"
Panting, sobbing hoarsely, Huerta pulled himself up, staring about him
wildly, starting like a frightened deer at every new sound. Crawford
put the woman directly before him and started moving forward. Huerta
cringed at his side, clawing at him, and he had to keep shoving the man
away.
"Hurry, Crawford, hurry, please, what are you doing this for? We'll
never--"
"Let go," Crawford bawled at him. "It won't do to lose our heads and
start running. How can I--"
"No, Crawford, no--"
Shouting it, Huerta reeled back against him. Crawford had to fight the
man off and wheel that way and fire all at once. He couldn't have hit
the snake anyway. It had already been in the middle of its lunge.
"I'm hit," screamed Huerta. "Crawford, I'm hit. Save me. I'll do
anything. Help me!"
"Keep your head, Huerta. Quit fighting like that!"
"No, Crawford, for God's sake!" Huerta was floundering around blindly,
shouting and clutching at Crawford, who tried to kick him away so he
could keep the gun going. Another rattler slithered from the thickets,
and he fired wildly at it.
"Huerta!" cried Merida, tearing at the man, the panic gripping her
voice and twisting her face, "don't be a fool. Let him go, let him go--"
"No. Get me out! I'll do anything, Crawford, admit anything. You were
right. I'm no doctor. I had two years in France and they dismissed
me. The opium. There. Now. I've told you--" His babble broke off in a
wild shriek. Crawford had not seen the snake strike. It fell away from
Huerta's back, slithering off into the thicket. Huerta crawled toward
Crawford on his hands and knees, a faint, yellow froth forming at his
lips. He clutched at Crawford's legs, shouting up at him. "I'll tell
you anything, please, anything. I was the one who killed Otis Rockland.
Is that what you want? I knew Tarant had given him that piece of the
_derrotero_, and I knew Otis was in that hotel room. I'd just reached
him when you arrived, and I had to escape by the balcony without
getting the map--"
Again his hoarse bawling broke off in a scream. His struggles had
carried them both over to a thicket, and Crawford could see the same
snake Huerta did, coiled almost at their feet. He tore free of the
doctor's frantic hands, throwing himself back, and firing at the
serpent. He tripped and fell heavily onto his back, seeing the snake
jerk with the slug but reach Huerta anyway. Screaming, the doctor
fought to gain his feet.
"Get me out, Crawford, get me out," he howled, pawing the writhing,
thumping thing off in horror, whirling to run blindly away from it
across the small opening. "It wasn't Quartel who had Whitehead try to
bushwhack you that time, either. It was me. I wanted the third of the
_derrotero_ you had. And I was the one who tried to get Merida's third
in the house during the bull-tailing. Please, Crawford, what more can
you want? Get me out now!"
He looked like some frenzied beast, greasy black hair down over his
face, froth drooling off his chin. He stumbled blindly into a _mogote_
of chaparro _prieto_, and tried to turn and get out. But there must
have been a nest of them in the black chaparral, and they caught him
there.
"No, Crawford," he screamed, as the first one struck, with a fleshy
spissitude, knocking him to his knees in the thicket, "they're all
around me," and his voice broke as a second one caught him. "For
Christ's sake, Crawford, get me out. I told you, didn't I?" he sobbed,
trying to crawl on through. And then another one struck him. "Oh, for
God's sake, Crawford, please, for God's sake." And another, and he was
lying on his belly, still trying to crawl, and his voice had sunk to a
pitiful wailing, like a little child weakening, sinking until it was
barely audible. "Please, get me out, oh, please, Crawford, get me out,"
and then dying finally, beneath the crescendo hissing of the snakes,
"Get me out, I'll do anything, only please get me out--"
After it had ceased, Crawford felt himself twitch, and realized how
long he had been crouching there in a dazed shocked immobility at such
a bizarre, terrifying display. It was like awakening from a deep sleep.
There was a thick, sweet taste in his mouth, and he was sweating, and
movement came with a strange pain. He saw that Merida was standing
over him, staring at the brush with that same stunned horror in her
face. His movement caused her to turn in something akin to surprise.
She looked at him a moment before her eyes dropped to his hand; he
was rising, but the sound she made stopped him. It must have struck
him sometime during his struggles with Huerta. He did not remember
when. The twin red punctures on the back of his hand were oozing blood
thickly. With a curse, he started to rise again and get the rifle, but
Merida caught him.
"No, Crawford. The knife. Your bowie. You've got to get it now before
it spreads." She was on her knees beside him, pulling the bowie from
his boot where he had thrust it after winding those strips of blanket
on.
"The snakes," he said, "the snakes--"
"If we sit still they won't come for a minute. Now--I've got to." She
met his eyes, then bent over his hand with the blade. He felt himself
turn rigid, but it caused him less pain than he anticipated. She did
it in three quick, skillful strokes. "I told you my mother was a
_curandera_. I've seen her do this a dozen times. Find some Spanish
dagger and you can get a poison from it that makes as good an antidote
as any."
She bent to suck the wound, and now it was beginning to come. _Take
it easy._ The hissing bore in on him with a physical weight. _Take it
easy, damn you. That's why Huerta's through. He lost his head. All
right. Get up, then, damn you, get up._ He got up.
The motion drew his hand from Merida's fingers, and she rose too. He
had scooped up the Henry in rising, and he pulled the lever down. No
fired shell popped out, and he realized the magazine must be empty. He
reached in his right-hand pocket for fresh loads, and pulled out his
hand, empty. The woman's eyes followed the movements in a fascinated
way as he shifted the rifle so he could reach into his left-hand
pocket. Again his hand came out empty. Merida's gaze raised to his, and
they stared at each other blankly for a long moment. A small, hopeless
sob escaped her.
The first, faint, snapping crackle came from behind, turning him that
way. It was a big diamondback, slithering from the switch mesquite.
It stopped as it caught sight of them, and its long, shimmering
body coiled with oily facility. The ugly hammerhead raised, and the
glittering opacity of its cruel little eyes held Crawford's gaze in a
viscid mesmerization. Then it began to rattle.
"Crawford--"
The woman's agonized whisper brought his eyes around the other way.
Another serpent, as big around as his lower leg, had crawled from a
_mogote_ of huisache. Again it was the soft snap of decaying vegetation
that lay thickly over the ground, and the cessation of this as the
snake saw them and stopped, and that swift coiling movement, and that
sibilant rattle.
"Crawford," said Merida, in a hoarse, strained whisper. "We can't move.
They'll strike as soon as we move. They're all around us and we can't
move--"
"No," he said gutturally. "Remember they don't often strike above the
hip. You've got those batwings. Just keep your feet, that's all, just
keep your feet."
"There's another one," she said, and he saw the panic was gripping her
the way it had Huerta. "We can't move, Crawford. Not a step. They'll
have us."
"Merida," he said. "You've got to. Don't lose your head. Just start
walking."
"I can't," she said, in a strangled, pathetic way, "Crawford, I can't--"
He could feel that animal fear rising up in him, to blot out all his
terrible control. Sweat formed gleaming streaks through the grime of
his face. His right hand was clenched so hard around the useless gun
it ached. Gritting his teeth, he summoned the awful, supreme effort of
will it would take for him to make that first step. His whole body was
stiffened for it, when the first thunderous detonation came from out in
the brush. There was a second, and a third, before Crawford recognized
them as gunshots. This was followed by a long crashing of brush, and
Quartel burst into view. This movement caused the snake on Crawford's
right to strike. It hit his leg with a solid thump, knocking him over
against Merida, and though he knew the fangs had not penetrated the
triple thickness of Chimayo blanket around his calf, he could not hold
back his hoarse, fearful shout. Quartel had fired twice at the second
rattler, knocking it back before it could strike. The serpent tried to
recoil and strike again, in a weak, abortive way, and Quartel jumped at
it with a curse, stamping on its head. Then he whirled away to fire at
a third one beyond Merida.
"Hola!" bellowed Quartel. "Let's go. You only got a little stretch left
and we'll be out."
"You!" said Crawford blankly, gaping at him.
"Who else?" grinned the man. He caught Crawford by the shoulder,
shoving him forward. "Come on, I tell you. We ain't got time for
coffee."
The rest of it was Quartel's bellowing gun and the crash of mesquite
and Merida's hoarse, uncontrollable sobbing and a nightmarish sense of
movement within and without him as he staggered through the thickets.
At last he found himself face down on gritty sand, his breathing
settling down to the shallow exhalation of complete exhaustion. He
looked up to see Quartel squatting over him, that grin on his sweaty,
greasy face. The woman was sitting up on the bank beyond Quartel, the
batwings lying at her feet. Crawford realized he was barefooted and the
blanketing had been stripped off his legs.
"The chaps saved Merida," said Quartel. "And that Chimayo on you was a
good idea. The only thing you got is that hand. I don't think it will
cause you too much trouble, the way she fixed it."
"Why did you come back?" said Crawford.
Quartel shrugged. "For the same reason you gave me those shells back in
the bog when you didn't know for sure whether I'd use them on you or
the snakes, I guess." He sat there looking at Crawford a while. "I'm
sort of glad it was Huerta that killed Rockland," he said finally. He
laughed, at the look Crawford gave him. "_Sí._ You could have heard
that Huerta yelling up in San Antone. My horse went down just as I got
out, and I was lying here in the sand when Huerta cut loose. He really
cracked up good, didn't he? It sort of finishes my job out here."
Merida came over and lowered herself to her knees beside Crawford, and
he sat up, staring at Quartel. "Your job?"
That pawky grin was on the Mexican's face. "_Sí._ Like I said I knew
one who pinned it to his undershirt. Me, I couldn't even do that. Only
a damn fool would come into the _brasada_ with a badge. But I got a
commission back in San Antonio from the federal government."
Crawford continued to stare at the man a long time, and it all went
through his head, before he said it. "_Marshal_ Quartel?"
"That's right," said the Mexican. "Maybe I look like I should be a
_rurale_, but I'm a citizen of the States and my father was before
me. They sent me out to get you a couple of weeks after Rockland was
killed. Other lawmen had been given the job without meeting much
success. I guess you know about that. I figured you'd turn up at your
old corral sooner or later, so I had the Nueces Cattle Association
recommend me to Tarant as qualified to rod the roundup he was managing
for Rockland's estate. By the time you'd showed up at the Big O, I'd
been there long enough to find out that, whether you murdered Rockland
or not, there was more to the whole business than just the personal
trouble between you and him. That _derrotero_ for instance. I'd gotten
a third of it from Whitehead. He'd found it many years ago on the body
of one of the Mexican muleteers, who had been shot in the brush by
Houston's men but apparently had gotten away from them to die. It was
the section of the map which showed Snake Thickets, and how to find
the chests once you got inside the thickets, but not how to find the
thickets themselves. When you finally arrived, I had to choose between
nabbing you then, or staying on and trying to find out what was really
behind the murder."
"Then, those other lawmen--"
"The ones I told you about when I found you at Delcazar's?" Quartel
giggled slyly. "I'm the only lawman I seen in the _brasada_ since I
came. You were pretty jumpy, Crawford. I thought if I cinched the girth
up tight enough it might squeeze out some interesting things."
There was no apology in his voice for how he had used Crawford. The
elemental brutality of the man was in his greasy, thick-featured face,
and the courage, too. _And it would take that kind_, thought Crawford,
_to come into a place like this. I can cuss better and ride better and
rope better than any hombre in the world._
"Not rope better."
"What?" said Quartel.
"Nothing," said Crawford, sitting up to pull on his boots. "How about
Tarant?"
"He was involved all right," said Quartel. "He knew Rockland had
that section of the map, and allowed Huerta to stay at the Big O,
undoubtedly having made some deal with him to split the money when they
got it. Since it was Huerta that murdered Rockland, we might be able to
nab Tarant as an accessory."
With a weary breath, Crawford rose. "We can reach Del's from here in a
couple of hours. He needs tending to, and that old Chihuahua cart of
his will be better than walking back."
Quartel got up and turned to climb the bank toward the brush. Merida
started after him, but Crawford caught her arm.
"Out there in the thickets," he said. "I didn't quite get it. You were
all mixed up. Something about not knowing what you'd wanted all your
life, and knowing now."
"Maybe seeing those chests of gunpowder made me realize it fully," she
said. "It could be symbolical, in a way, of money. You seek it all your
life, and when you finally get it, you realize it isn't what you want,
after all."
"What _do_ you want?"
"Don't you know?"
He gazed at her without speaking for a moment. Her face had taken on
that feminine softness. Her eyes met his widely, shining a little. He
was suddenly swept with the desire to shout or cry or laugh or take
her in his arms, he didn't know which, the realization swelled so
swiftly within him. It had all been so broken and aborted and bitterly
frustrating between himself and Merida before, and now it was so
complete. Yet, somehow, it was too poignant to express here. He reached
out and took her hand.
"Let's go," he said.
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Treasure of the Brasada, by Les Savage
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