Texas

by James A. Michener

  ‘I know well the torment you feel. I’ve seen it before, and I respect you for your integrity. I can tell you only two things. My religion is one of the sweetest, gentlest in the world, a consolation and a redemption. I’ve loved it for nearly seventy years, and when I die within its embrace I shall know no fear, for God has been with me always.

  ‘The Mexican government, in its wisdom, has said that you cannot have land unless you convert to the religion it sponsors. This is a clear law, not unreasonable, and not unfairly administered. So if you want land, you Macnabs, you must convert this day, for tomorrow I may be gone.

  ‘Let me tell you this, my sons, to own land is a good thing, and if you find it in your hearts to join my church, you may discover, like many before you, that it’s a worthy home, one which assures you much benevolence.’

  The old man did not go on to finish his statement, the implied part about what would happen if the Macnabs did not find their new religion congenial, and he certainly did not say that so far as he was concerned, once they got their land they were free to revert to Presbyterianism, but his entire manner implied that such was his belief.

  So Finlay and Otto became Catholics, trembling with fear lest they be struck dead for the blasphemy they were committing, but Father Clooney blessed them just the same and smiled at the heavy perspiration on Finlay’s forehead.

  That night Father Clooney slept on the porch as usual, but he was uneasy, and long after midnight he roused Finlay and sat with him by the flickering fire: ‘My son, we must do something about getting you land.’

  ‘I’ve converted.’

  ‘That may not be enough. Authorities have grown suspicious of Austin. They’re inspecting every grant he makes.’

  ‘What should I do?’

  ‘Forget Austin. Go back to Victoria and ask the De Leóns for an assignment in their grant.’

  ‘Will they give it?’

  ‘I know that family well. One of the best. I’ll write them a letter recommending you.’

  ‘I’d appreciate that. I’ll get it in the morning.’

  To Macnab’s surprise, Father Clooney reached and grasped his hand as if he were responsible for his new convert’s welfare: ‘No, we’d better do it now.’ And taking paper from the same old Bible with which he had converted the Quimpers years before, he drafted a warm note to the De Leóns, beseeching them to award land to his trusted friend Macnab. Handing Finlay the paper, he returned unsteadily to the porch.

  Sometime after dawn, as was her custom, Mattie went to him with a cup of broth, but when she tried to waken him he did not respond. For several terrifying moments she kept prodding him with her foot, refusing to believe that he was dead. Then his left arm fell lifeless onto the boards of the porch and she could no longer ignore the evidence.

  She did not cry out, nor did she call for help. She merely looked down at the body of a man she had first suspected, then grown to love, a faithful shepherd whose flock had been so widely scattered that he had worn himself out tending it. As if his death had also terminated a portion of her life, she gave no further thought to the proposed marriage with Reverend Harrison. After the funeral, which the Methodist conducted with a glowing tribute to his onetime adversary, she sent him north, where he married a much younger widow, who helped him fan the fires of rebellion.

  Otto observed this tangled behavior of his elders—Isaac Yarrow’s bitter dismissal of Texas, Reverend Harrison’s erratic courtship, the willful return of Father Clooney to a parish in turmoil, the curious behavior of Yancey, ten years older than himself and therefore an adult in his eyes, and the almost inhuman drive of Mattie—without understanding many of the actions or any of their motivations. But as the Macnabs were preparing to quit the inn and move south with their letter to the De Leóns in Victoria, an event occurred which he comprehended perfectly.

  From the opposite side of the Brazos, at eleven one bright morning, a loud halloo came ringing through the air, and Otto ran to see what traveler was coming south. To his delight, it was Benito Garza, the muleteer he had known in New Orleans, so without alerting Mattie he dashed to the beached ferry, jumped in and started poling across the river, shouting as he did: ‘Benito! It’s me! Otto Macnab!’ And as he neared the far shore Garza, standing with his two helpers, recognized the boy and shouted back: ‘The little horseman! Hooray!’ and the two assistants added their ‘Olés!’

  The three traders piled into the ferry, and Otto proudly escorted them across the river and up to the inn, where he called loudly: ‘Mattie! Strangers!’ but when she came to the porch she deflated the boy: ‘Garza! We’ve been friends for years.’

  It was a lively reunion but also an emotional one, for after the noise and the embraces Garza almost shyly handed Mattie a present, and when she opened it to the applause of all, she found a bolt of English cloth and a simple dress made in France. They were the first such gifts she had ever received, and for a long time she was silent, then she said in a flat tone: ‘You carried them a long way, Benito.’

  Now everyone spoke at once, and Garza learned of Yarrow’s exile, Father Clooney’s death and the Macnabs’ conversion. He wanted to know where Zave Campbell had located his land, and Finlay explained: ‘He hasn’t exactly chosen it yet, but he favors a stretch along the Guadalupe,’ and Garza approved: ‘Any land washed by a river is good.’

  It was Otto who spoke the words that mattered: ‘Fact is, he’s not looking for land. He’s looking for a wife.’

  As Otto was talking, Benito was holding Mattie’s French dress against her spare form, but the boy’s words so startled him that he dropped the dress, left Mattie, and took Otto by the arm: ‘What did you say?’

  ‘He’s not really looking for his land.’

  ‘The other part. Is he looking for a wife?’

  ‘Yes. He gets four times as much land if he finds one.’

  It was then that Benito Garza’s maneuvering began. Sitting at the rough table and addressing all those in the kitchen, including two travelers who were eating, he said: ‘We were nine children and the family had only one ranch along the Rio Grande. No chance, for me to inherit the land, so I brought my two youngest sisters with me to Victoria. I’m head of the family. With some difficulty I found the oldest one, María, a husband, José Mardones, but he didn’t last long.’

  ‘Did he run away?’ Mattie asked, and he replied: ‘No. He was shot. Stealing horses … from a norteamericano.’

  Otto interrupted: ‘You told me in New Orleans that horses ran free.’

  ‘Trained horses are different,’ Garza said. Then he addressed Finlay: ‘So this wonderful woman, only thirty-one, still has no husband, and if Señor Campbell …’

  ‘How about your younger sister?’ Mattie asked, and he replied: ‘Josefina? She’s only twenty-six. She can wait. Always get your oldest sister married first.’

  This perplexed Otto: ‘But if they’re older than you, why don’t they find their own husbands?’ and Garza replied with dignity: ‘In a Mexican family it’s the father’s obligation. And I am their father, so to speak.’

  Now Garza became zealous for an immediate return to Victoria: ‘We’ve got to reach Campbell before he makes a serious mistake,’ so before the Macnabs were really ready to depart, Garza applied constant pressure for them to hurry: ‘Everything is better for a norteamericano in Texas if he has a reliable Mexican wife. Suppose he wants land? Suppose he gets into trouble with the alcalde? Or if the priests act up?’

  ‘He may already have found a wife.’

  ‘I hope not! He would be throwing himself away if he didn’t take María. I promise you, Señor Macnab, this woman is exceptional. A man finds a wife like her once in a hundred years.’

  In the morning the Macnabs looked in surprise as Garza bent low over Mattie’s hands, kissing each in turn, and even Otto could see that the Mexican herdsman loved this rough woman who ran the ferry, and they treated him with more respect as they moved south toward Victoria. There Garza hurried ahead, shouting as he
entered the town: ‘Señor Campbell!’ He located the big Kaintuck some distance to the north, tenting under a big oak on the banks of the Guadalupe, and his greeting was fervid: ‘What fine land you’ve chosen! Have you found a wife?’

  When Zave said ‘No,’ Garza gave an immense sigh, slumped to the earth beside Campbell, and said softly: ‘Señor, I liked you from the minute I saw you in New Orleans. I could see then that you had character. Now let us all go back to Victoria so that Señor Finlay can present the papers given him by Father Clooney and claim his land.’ He did not mention his sisters.

  The De Leóns accepted the recommendation of the revered priest, and after lamenting his death, they said: ‘We welcome you to Victoria. Choose your land wisely.’ And it was then that Garza said almost casually: ‘Since we’re all here, why don’t we go see my sisters?’ but he could not help adding: ‘Señor Campbell, I give you my word, you’re going to like María.’

  He led the way to a two-room adobe shack he had built near the central plaza, and as he approached it he started shouting: ‘María! I bring new friends!’ and to the rough wooden doorway came an ample woman with a big warm face. When her dark eyes looked at the newcomers and her mouth broke into a smile of welcome, Otto knew immediately that he had found a replacement for his Baltimore mother, and as the days passed in her benign presence this feeling deepened, for María Garza Mardones was one of those women who embraced the world. Her laugh sounded like a deep-throated bell; she was patient with the follies of men; and she adored children, chickens, colts and hard work.

  The closing weeks of 1831 were memorable, because the Americans and the Garzas moved out to Campbell’s land and started building a dog-run. The three men chopped trees for the timbers while the two Garza women and Otto mixed mud and straw to make adobes. Since each person worked as if the resulting cabin was to be his or her own, the floor plan could be spacious, with the open runway full eighteen feet wide, and each of the two halves larger than the ones at Quimper’s Ferry.

  At the end of the first week the Macnabs were surprised to see that Campbell was driving stakes to outline a third room on the north. ‘What’s that for?’ Finlay asked, and Zave said: ‘You and Otto. Till you get your own land and your own house.’

  Otto, who had fallen in love with María, considered this an admirable decision, for he expected his friend Zave to marry the Mexican woman, and he was further pleased on Wednesday of the second week when Zave started driving even more stakes for a fourth room, also on the north but well separated from the one intended for the Macnabs.

  ‘What’s that one for?’ Otto asked, and Zave said: ‘Benito and his sister Josefina. They’re to be livin’ with us, too.’

  ‘Are you marrying María?’ Otto asked, and when Zave answered: ‘Yep, I cain’t pass over a woman who can really work,’ the boy rushed to the stalwart Mexican woman and began kissing her.

  So before the first room of the dog-run was even well started, Zave had planned what amounted to a frontier mansion, and that was the beginning of the good times at Zave Campbell’s. What gave this particular house a touch of extra charm was its position near a solitary live oak festooned with Spanish moss, which meant that the tree provided both decoration and some protection against the sun. Also, a traditional long, low porch joined the two halves on the south side, but in this instance it also swung around to enclose the western end; at close of day the occupants could rest there and watch the sun go down.

  María, once her marriage to Campbell was solemnized, showed great affection for Otto, and since she had reason to believe that she could have no children of her own, and the boy was so appreciative of anything she did for him, she considered him her son, and for his part he adopted Mexican ways, learning not only the language but also the handling of cattle. Under Benito’s skilled tutelage he improved the shooting skills Zave Campbell had taught him on the Trace.

  But it was in horseback riding that he appreciated Benito most, for Garza was both patient and firm in teaching him the basics, and soon he had Otto galloping at the head of the file when the Mexican hands rode forth to round up mustangs. With Benito’s help he broke one for himself, a high-spirited little beast with a tawny coat and an obstinate spirit. ‘What shall I call him?’ he asked Benito, and that excellent horseman said: ‘Chico. He’ll learn he’s Chico real fast.’

  For a boy of ten, there was a beautiful world to be explored. It was spring, and the fields along the Guadalupe were studded with fascinating trees: the wild persimmon, the thorned huisache, the delicate pecans. There were the taller trees, too, that he had missed in those desolate flats by the sea: the post oaks, the cottonwoods, the ash, and always that persistent half tree, half shrub which fascinated him with its gnarled branches and sharp thorns, the mesquite. Sometimes as he wandered among his trees he would come upon a wild boar tusking the earth, or fawns grazing, or the silent slither of a copperhead, the noisy warning of a rattler.

  Each evening, when he returned home, he found that María had prepared some new treat, for she was a most ingenious woman, capable of transforming the poorest materials into something delicious, and he grew to love the tortillas she made so patiently, kneeling before the stone metate as she beat the boiled corn into the gray-white mixture she later baked on the flat rocks.

  But he liked especially the peasant dish she made with whatever bits of meat her lodgers might provide: bear, buffalo, venison, possum, goat, beef, all were alike to her. Collecting a few onions from her garden and red chili peppers that grew wild, she followed an unbroken ritual, which she explained to Otto in her flowing Spanish: ‘You must have two pans. Brown the meat in this one so it looks good. In this one put a lot of bear grease, the chopped chilies, the onions and a bit of garlic if you can find it.’ She was generous in the amount of grease she used, because she wanted the final dish to be golden brown in color and with lots of nourishment for her hard-working men.

  When the two pans were properly heated on the coals and a rich smell was pervading the kitchen, she took from a treasured hoard imported from Monterrey or Saltillo small samples of two valuable spices, oregano and comino, and after measuring out the proper portions in a pot, she mixed in all the other ingredients with a flourish, stirred well, then placed the pot back on the coals. She would never allow any beans to be added to her dish: ‘No true Mexican puts beans in chili.’ The result, after hours of careful cooking, was a rich, spicy, aromatic meat dish whose principal flavor was a marvelous mix of red-hot chili and oregano.

  But she never served it alone. In the evening before she made this chili con carne she threw into a pot a large helping of beans, any kind available, and these she soaked overnight. She refused ever to cook a bean until it had been soaked. ‘I think God would strike me dead if I just threw beans in cold water and cooked them,’ she told Otto. ‘They must be soaked.’ She also insisted upon sieving them three times through her fingers: ‘To sort out the little rocks. Many a person has lost a tooth biting into rocks, but not in my beans.’

  She rose early in the morning, simmered her soaked beans for two hours, then boiled them for two more. When they were well done, she mashed them, added a little oil and fried onions, then fried them lightly in a pan. ‘Now they’re ready to eat with chili,’ she told Otto, but she was most careful to see that the two dishes never mixed. Each was to be respected for its own uniqueness.

  With such food and affection Otto had never been happier, but one aspect of his life along the Guadalupe did cause him worry.

  He was a true Macnab, descendant of a clan that had stolen cattle for hundreds of years, and he had seen how his father and his dear friend Zave had gathered strays during their trip along the Natchez Trace, but his developing sense of right and wrong had warned him that such behavior was criminal, and he was pleased when his father dropped the habit. Now he watched as Campbell instructed Benito in the tricks of bringing into his care any cattle or horses that did not have a specific home, and some that did.

  Otto went to hi
s father, pointing out that in Texas men burned marks on the flanks of their animals to prove ownership, and he had seen in Zave’s fields animals with several different brands. Finlay dismissed his fears: ‘All Campbells are like that.’

  Worry of a more subtle kind was caused by Benito, now twenty-six, for slowly the boy of ten was beginning to realize that his Mexican friend had a violent and often vicious temper. Benito would pummel any Mexican workman who displeased him; often Otto saw that he wanted to punch Zave too, but was afraid; then his neck muscles would tremble and he would turn away and spit. In training mustangs he was needlessly cruel, and when Otto protested, he laughed: ‘Horses and women need to be beaten. Then they become the best.’ Otto, who had cringed when drunken men had thrashed their easy Under-the-Hill women, asked if María’s Mexican husband had ever beaten her, and Benito snapped: ‘Plenty, and she deserved it.’

  Statements like that bewildered the boy, for he had witnessed Benito’s ardor in furthering his sisters’ interests, and he remembered his thoughtfulness in bringing Mattie Quimper those presents: Sometimes I don’t understand him. It’s like he has a dark side.

  María had other concerns, for when she was satisfied that her home in the dog-run was secure, and that her norteamericano husband was a good man, she began her campaign to find equal stability for her sister Josefina. Whenever the men complimented her cooking, she told them: ‘Josefina did it,’ even though Otto knew she hadn’t. Any fine sewing was done by Josefina, and occasionally María would say to Finlay: ‘This one, she’s a good girl, believe me.’ When Josefina smiled, María would ask: ‘See that lovely, crooked smile she has? It came from our mother, Trinidad de Saldaña, a refined lady from San Antonio.’

  Despite this constant advocacy, Macnab showed no interest, until one noon, when the stew was extra good, thanks to Josefina, María said in Spanish: ‘Don Finlay, did it ever occur to you that if you married Josefina, you could get a whole league-and-a-labor next to ours?’ Macnab said nothing, but he did sit straighter. ‘And when Xavier and I die’—she pronounced the name Hah-vee-EHR—‘who would get our land but Otto?’ Now Macnab was all attention. ‘Don Finlay, can you imagine your son coming into possession of two leagues and more?’