The Mexican government agreed to pay a total of twenty-five thousand pesos to the Chirinato Apaches.
Captain Grant Drummond had to be permanently removed from serving on the American-Mexican border for the rest of his career in the United States Army or any other government position he might occupy at a later date.
The participants in the conference quickly signed the agreement and everyone went home to put the stipulations into effect.
Now Eruditus thought about it and became more despondent. “Give me some more of that tiswin.” He took the jug and drained it. “I wish this was mescal.”
“Me too,” Aguila said. “Then you would forget how bad you feel.”
“The Soldier Chief Grant feels bad too,” Eruditus said. “He was angry about his soldiers, was he not?” Aguila asked. “He did not like what happened to them.”
“Of course he was upset,” Eruditus answered. “That was another damned good reason for me to resign my position as an army scout. Clooney, Charlie Rush, Donegan and the rest were sent to Fort Leavenworth in Kansas Territory.”
“Maybe they will like it,” Aguila suggested. “Did you not tell me the weather is cooler there?”
“Since they were sent to a new regiment, Clooney and Rush lost their ranks,” Eruditus said angrily. “They became privates.”
“I do not understand what that means,” Aguila said.
“It is like they were denied war honors they had earned,” Eruditus explained.
“I see,” Aguila said. “That is not fair.”
“Then the Soldier Chief Grant was sent to the place where the Big Chief of the Americans lives,” Eruditus said. “It is a long way from here.”
Captain Grant Drummond had been given a severe dressing down for several reasons. Only the fear of public opinion saved him from formal charges and a court martial. Kidnapping De La Nobleza and Perez, however, was not considered his worst transgression.
The first and foremost sin he committed, as far as the bigwigs in the army were concerned, was his unapproved action of bringing the Chirinatos into the fighting with his dragoons. Even the commanding general of the army could not do such a thing without an authorization that had to come from an act of the U.S. Congress.
Aguila swallowed some more tiswin. “The Soldier Chief Grant will not like going to where the Big Chief of the Americans lives,” the Apache said. “You said it was not a place where he could fight.”
“Oh, he’ll fight again, don’t worry about that,” Eruditus said. “The way the northern states and southern states of this country are arguing and threatening, they will be in a war someday. Grant will be a general then, and can lead many more troops than he ever imagined. And to more glory!”
“Do you mean the White-Eyes will fight each other?” Aguila asked.
“Yes,” Eruditus answered. “I know it will be a long and bloody war between them.”
Aguila shrugged and reached for one of the jugs in the creek. “I don’t fully understand what you said, but I will believe you just the same.”
“But now I worry about the Chirinatos,” Eruditus said.
“Why?” Aguila asked. “We have avenged our dead have we not?”
“Oh, that you did!” Eruditus agreed.
After Antonio Eduardo San Andres de la Nobleza was kicked from the Mexican army, he settled in the town of Juntera where he took the paltry amount of money he could save from his treasury to open a small cantina. But a Chirinato raid on the town, led by Quintero and his friends, resulted in yet another kidnapping of the former general.
The Apaches carried him out onto the Vano Basin where they spent a day and a half killing him. Some say his shrieks still echo along the foothills of the Culebra Mountains.
“At least my tribe is at peace thanks to the soldier chief Grant Drummond,” Aguila said. “No matter what others think, he acted with courage and honor.”
“I am sure that consoles him,” Eruditus said.
“Yes,” Aguila agreed. “He knows we Chirinatos can go out on the desert and make our medicine for Spirit Woman without being murdered by Mexicans and scalphunters.”
“I am still filled with worry about your tribe,” Eruditus said.
“But why are you troubled for your Indian friends?” Aguila asked.
Eruditus pointed down at the Pool-Beneath-the-Cliff. “See the army fort there? That is just the first permanent intrusion of the White-Eyes. Soon there will be more and more of them. Many will want to live here. Especially in the Culebra Mountains. I realize that now.”
“What will happen to us?” Aguila asked.
“They will put you on a reservation or make you move to some other place,” Eruditus sadly explained. He took the jug and treated himself to several deep swallows.
“Let us not worry about things yet to happen,” Aguila suggested. “We are old men, Erudito. Let us spend our last years together up here in the comfort of the Culebra Mountains and get drunk every day until we die.”
“That is my intention, Aguila,” Eruditus said. “You will forgive me if I become sad sometimes, will you not?”
“Of course,” Aguila said.
The hawk rose back into the air. A small rodent was grasped in its cruel talons as it flew toward a nest high in the Culebra Mountains. The two old men watching it continued to get drunk.
The Vano Basin, as it always had, lay beneath the Arizona sun in patience and dignity, waiting for whatever fate the slow whirl of passing years would bring to it and those who lived there.
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