Dead Man's Walk

by Larry McMurtry

  "No soldiers ever come here," he said.

  "Once when our jefe was alive he went to El Paso to see the soldiers and asked them to come, but they only laughed at him. They said they could not bother to come so far for such a poor village. They said we should learn to shoot guns so we could fight the Apache ourselves." "If the soldiers won't help you, then I think you had better do what they suggested," Captain Salazar said. "But we can talk of this later. We are tired and hungry. Have your women make us food." "We have many goats--we will make you food," the old man said. "And you can stay in my house, if you like. It is small, but I have a warm fire." "Call the priest," Salazar said. "These men are Texans--they are prisoners. I want the priest to lock them in the church tonight. They look tired, but they fight like savages when they fight." "Are we to give them food?" the old man asked.

  "Yes, feed them," Salazar said. "Do you have men who can shoot?" "I can shoot," the old man said. "Tomas can shoot. Who do you want us to shoot, Captain?" "Anyone who tries to leave the village," Salazar said.

  Then he turned, and went into the little house the old man had offered him.

  Despite Salazar's warning, the people of Las Palomas had little fear of the Texans. They looked too tired and hungry to be the savage fighters the Captain claimed they were. Even as they were walking to the church, the women of the village began to press food on them--tortillas, mostly. The little church was cold, but not as cold as the great plain they had crossed. Several old men with muskets stood outside, as guards. When the night grew chill, they built a fire and stood around it, talking. Long Bill walked out to warm his hands, and the old men made way for him.

  Bigfoot joined him, and then a few others.

  Gus went out a few times, but Call did not.

  The women brought food--posole and goat meat, and a little corn. Call ate with the rest, but he didn't mix with the crowd around the fire.

  He sat with Matilda, looking out of one of the small windows at the high stars.

  "Why won't you go get warm?" Matilda asked. He was a tense boy, Woodrow Call.

  All that was easy for Gus McCrae was hard for him. He didn't mix well with people--any people.

  Though he had come to depend on her help, he was wary, even with her.

  "I'm warm enough," Call said.

  "You ain't, Woodrow--you're shivering," Matilda said. "What's the harm in sitting by a fire on a cold night?" "You ain't sitting by it," Call pointed out.

  "Well, but I'm fleshy," Matilda said.

  "I can warm myself. You're just a skinny stick.

  Answer my question." "I don't like being a prisoner," Call said, finally. "I might have to fight those old men. I might have to kill some of them. I'd just as soon not get friendly." "Woodrow, those men ain't bad," Matilda said. "They sent their women to feed us--we ain't been fed as well since we left the last village. Why would you want to kill them?" "I might have to escape," Call said. "I ain't going to be a prisoner much longer. If I can't be free I don't mind being dead." "What about Salazar?" Matilda said.

  "He's the one keeping you prisoner. We walked all this way with him. He ain't so bad, if you ask me. I've met plenty of worse Mexicans--and worse whites, too." Call didn't answer. He didn't welcome the kind of questions Matilda asked.

  Thinking about such things was foolish. He could think about them all through the night, and be no less a prisoner when the sun came up. It was true that the old men of Las Palomas had been kindly, and that the women were generous with food. He didn't wish them ill--but he didn't intend to remain a prisoner much longer, either. If he saw a chance to escape, he meant to take it, and he didn't mean to fail. Anyone who stood in his way would have to take the consequences; he didn't want to feel friendly toward people he might have to fight.

  Later, when the chill deepened, the women brought blankets to the church. Call wrapped up in his as tightly as he could. But he didn't sleep.

  Out the church door he could see Gus McCrae, yarning with Long Bill Coleman and Bigfoot Wallace. No doubt, now that he was warm and full, Gus had gone back to telling lies about his adventures on the riverboat; or else he was telling them how he was going to marry the Forsythe girl, as soon as he got back to Austin. Matilda had gone to sleep, with her head bent forward on her chest.

  Call felt that he had been rude, a little, in not being able to answer her questions any better than he had. He didn't understand why women had such a need to question. He himself preferred just to let life happen, and act when opportunity arose.

  Finally, though, as Matilda slept, he did get up and go out of the church, not so much to warm himself --the old men kept the fire blazing--as to hear what lies Gus McCrae was telling. Long Bill was pretending his hands were a harmonica again; he was whistling through them. Bigfoot Wallace had gone to sleep, his back against the wall of the church. Several of the old men were watching Gus, as if he were a new kind of human, a kind their experience had not prepared them for. A few of the village women, wrapped in heavy shawls, stood back a little from the fire.

  "Hello, Woodrow--did you freeze out, or did you want to listen to Long Bill whistle on his fingers?" Gus asked.

  "I came out to whip you, if you don't shut up," Call said. "You're talking so loud it's keeping this whole town awake." "Why, stop your ears, if you think I'm loud," Gus said. But he made way for his friend, and Call sat down. The blaze felt good on his sore feet. Soon he bent forward, and napped a little. Gus McCrae was still talking, and the yarn had something to do with a riverboat.

  In the morning, with frost on the cornfields and on the needles of the chaparral, Salazar provisioned his few troops for the march south. There were no horses in the village, but there were two mules, one of which Salazar requisitioned to carry their provisions. The Texans emerged from the church blinking in the strong sunlight. They had been given coffee, and a little cheese made from goat's milk, and were ready to march.

  "I'm in a hurry to see El Paso," Bigfoot said. "We couldn't get to it coming the other way, but maybe we'll make it coming from the north." "Yes, you will make it," Salazar said.

  "Then, I expect, they will send you on to the City of Mexico. There is a lake with many islands, and all the fruit is sweet--that is what I have been told." The people of Las Palomas were anxious to see that none of the troop--Texans or Mexicans-- went hungry on the march south to El Paso.

  Though they knew that the party would be following the river, where there were several villages that could supply them, they piled so many provisions on the mule that the animal was scarcely visible, under the many sacks and bags. Several of the Texans even had blankets pressed on them, as protection against the chill nights.

  Captain Salazar was just turning to lead the party out of the village, when they heard the sound of horses--the sound came from the south.

  "Reckon it's Indians?" Gus asked.

  Even though he was feeling more confident of his survival, thanks to a good meal and a night beside a warm fire, he knew that they were not yet beyond the Apache country. What the villagers had had to say about their stolen children was fresh in his mind.

  Captain Salazar listened for a moment.

  "No, it is not Indians," he said. "It's cavalry." "Lots of cavalry," Bigfoot said.

  "Maybe it's the American army, coming to rescue us." "I'm afraid not, Se@nor," Salazar said. "It's the Mexican army, coming to march you to El Paso." All the villagers were apprehensive--they were not used to being visited by soldiers, twice in two days. Some of the women crept back inside their little houses. The men, most of them elderly, stood where they were.

  In a few minutes, the horses they had been hearing clipped into town, forty in all. The soldiers riding them were wearing clean uniforms; and all were armed with sabres, as well as rifles and pistols. At their head rode a small man in a smart uniform, with many ribbons on his breast.

  The sun glinted on the forty sabres in their sheaths.

  Beside the cavalry were several men on foot, so dark that Call couldn't tell whe
ther they were Mexican or Indian. They trotted beside the horses--none of them looked tired.

  The Mexican soldiers who stood with Salazar looked embarrassed. Their own uniforms were torn and dirty--some had no coats at all, only the blankets that had been given them by the people of Las Palomas. Some of them remembered that when they had started out from Santa Fe to catch the Texans they had been as smartly dressed as the approaching cavalry. Now, in comparison to the soldiers from the south, they looked like beggars, and they knew it.

  The small man with the ribbons rode right up to Captain Salazar and stopped. He had a thin mustache that curled at the ends to a fine point.

  "You are Captain Salazar?" he asked.

  "Yes, Major," the Captain said.

  "I am Major Laroche," the small man said. "Why are these men not tied?" The Major looked at the Texans with cold contempt--the tone of his voice alone made Call bristle.

  The thing that surprised Gus was that the Major was white. He did not look Mexican at all.

  Captain Salazar looked discouraged.

  "I have walked a long way with these men, Major," he said. "Together we walked the dead man's walk. The reason they are not tied is because they know I will shoot them if they try to escape." Major Laroche did not change expression.

  "Perhaps you would shoot at them, but would you hit them?" he asked. "I think it would be easier to hit them if they were tied--but that is not my point." Captain Salazar looked up, waiting for the Major's point. He did not have to wait very long.

  "They are prisoners," the Major said.

  "Prisoners should be tied. Then they should be put up against a wall and shot. That is what we would do with such men in France, if we caught them." The Major looked at the dark men who trotted beside the horses. He said something to them-- one of the dark men immediately went to the pack mule and came back with a handful of rawhide thongs.

  "Tie him first," the Major said, pointing at Bigfoot. "Then tie the one who turned over the General's buggy. Which is he?" Salazar gestured toward Call. In a moment, two of the dark men were beside him with the thongs.

  Bigfoot had already held out his hands so that the men could tie them, but Call had not. He tensed, ready to fight the dark men, but before his rage broke Bigfoot and Salazar both spoke to him.

  "Let it be, Woodrow," Bigfoot said.

  "The Major here's ready to shoot you, and it's too nice a morning to get shot." "He is right," Salazar said.

  Call mastered himself with difficulty. He held out his hands, and one of the dark men bound him tightly at the wrists with the rawhide thongs. In a few minutes, all the Texans were similarly bound.

  "Perhaps you should chain them, too," Salazar said, with a touch of sarcasm. "As you know, Texans are very wild." Major Laroche ignored the remark.

  "Where is the rest of your troop, Captain?" he asked.

  "Dead," Salazar said. "The Apaches followed us into the Jornada del Muerto. They killed some. A bear killed two. Six starved to death." "But you had horses, when you left Santa Fe," the Major said. "Where are your horses?" "Some are dead and some were stolen," Salazar admitted. He spoke in a dull tone, not looking at the Major, who sat ramrod stiff on his horse.

  When all the prisoners were bound, the Major turned his horse. He looked down once more at Captain Salazar.

  "I suggest you go home, Captain," he said.

  "Your commanding officer will want to know why you lost half your men and all your horses. I am told that you were well provisioned. No one should have starved." "Gomez killed General Dimasio, Major," Salazar said. "He killed Colonel Cobb, the man who led these Texans. He is the reason I lost the men and the horses." Major Laroche curled the ends of his mustache once more.

  "No officer in the Mexican army should be beaten by a savage," he said. "One day perhaps they will let me go after this Gomez. When I catch him I will put a hook through his neck and hang him in the plaza in Santa Fe." "You won't catch him," Call said.

  Major Laroche looked briefly at Call.

  "Is there a blacksmith in this village?" he asked.

  No one spoke. The men of the village had all lowered their eyes.

  "Very well," the Major said. "If there were a blacksmith I would chain this man now. But we cannot wait. I assure you when we reach Las Cruces I will see that you are fitted with some very proper irons." Salazar had not moved.

  "Major, I have no horses," he said.

  "Am I to walk to Santa Fe? I am a captain in the army." "A disgraced captain," Major Laroche said. "You walked here. Walk back." "Alone?" Salazar asked.

  "No, you can take your soldiers," Major Laroche said. "I don't want them--they stink.

  If I were you I would take them to the river and bathe them before you leave." "We have little ammunition," Salazar said.

  "If we leave here without horses or bullets, Gomez will kill us all." The priest had come out of the little church. He stood with his hands folded into his habit, watching.

  "Ask that priest to say a prayer for you," Major Laroche said. "If he is a good priest his prayers might be better than bullets or horses." "Perhaps, but I would rather have bullets and horses," Salazar said.

  Major Laroche didn't answer. He had already turned his horse.

  The Texans were placed in the center of the column of cavalry--the cavalrymen behind them drew their sabres and held them ready, across their saddles. Captain Salazar and his ragged troop stood in the street and watched the party depart.

  "Good-bye, Captain--if I was you I'd travel at night," Bigfoot said. "If you stick to the river and travel at night you might make it." The Texans looked once more at the Captain who had captured them, and the few men they had traveled so far with. There was no time for farewells. The cavalrymen with drawn sabres pressed close behind them.

  Matilda Roberts had not been tied. She passed close to Captain Salazar as she walked out of the village of Las Palomas.

  "Adios, Captain," she said. "You ain't a bad fellow. I hope you get home alive." Salazar nodded, but didn't answer. He and his men stood watching as the Texans were marched south, out of the village of Las Palomas.

  Major Laroche made no allowance for weariness. By noon, the Texans were having a hard time keeping up with the pace he set. The pause for rest was only ten minutes; the meal just a handful of corn. The mule that the villagers had so carefully provisioned had become the property of the Major's cavalry. The Texans hardly had time to sit, before the march was resumed. While they ate their hard corn, they watched the Mexican cavalrymen eat the cheese the women of Las Palomas had provided for them.

  Gus was puzzled by the fact that a Frenchman was leading a company of Mexican cavalry.

  "Why would a Frenchie fight with the Mexicans?" he asked. "I know there's lots of Frenchies down in New Orleans, but I never knew they went as far as Mexico." "Money, I expect," Bigfoot said. "I never made much money fighting--I've mostly done it for the sport, but plenty do it for the pay." "I wouldn't," Call said. "I'd take the pay, but I've got other reasons for fighting." "What other reasons?" Gus asked.

  Call didn't answer. He had not meant to provoke a question from his companion, and was sorry he had spoken at all.

  "Can't you hear? I asked you what other reasons?" Gus said.

  "Woodrow don't know why he likes to fight," Matilda said. "He don't know why he turned that buggy over and got himself whipped raw. My Shad didn't know why he wandered--he was just a wandering man. Woodrow, he's a fighter." "It's all right to fight," Bigfoot said.

  "But there's a time to fight, and a time to let be.

  Right now we're hog-tied, and we ain't got no guns. This ain't the time to fight." They marched all afternoon and deep into the night, which was cold. Call kept up, though his foot was throbbing again. Major Laroche sent the dark men ahead to scout. He himself never looked back at the prisoners. From time to time they could see him raise his hand, to curl his mustache.

  In the morning, there was thin ice on the little puddles by the river. The men were given coffe
e; while they were drinking it Major Laroche lined his men up at rigid attention, and rode down their ranks, inspecting them. Now and then, he pointed at something that displeased him--a girth strap not correctly secured, or a uniform not fully buttoned, or a sabre sheath not shined. The men who had been careless were made to fall out immediately; the Major watched while they corrected the problem.

  When he was finished with his own troops, the Major rode over and inspected the Texans.