by David Xavier
In the following years, Salomon and Arturo outgrew the fence slats at the presidio. They outgrew the rope swing they had tied to dangle from a tree on the cliffs of Monterey Bay. They passed much of their time running off the cliff with the rope seat across their chest and under their arms. Juana did not participate, but she watched the tree flex and creak from branch to roots as the boys swung over the bright water, and she held her breath until they returned. Salomon and Juana had gone from pushing each other in a wheelbarrow in plain sight as children, to timing their walks to spend flashes of unchaperoned time with each other, stealing moments together, smiling side by side.
Nights were spent in anticipation of the lights going out, so they could sneak around in the moondark like thieves and lay in the whispers of the tall grass to name new constellations. To wonder about their place among the stars. The day’s dust had settled and died and the only sounds were those of restless animals and the breeze in the grass blades, and the hush of their own breathing. They lost themselves among the orbits of faraway light and cosmic stones, until they lay together, breathing as one in the predawn light, awakening with the first rise of the insects and the revived smells of an earth given back to prediscovery, if only for a night.
Young though they were, now reaching the prime of lovers, they realized their lasting and mature need for each other. They held each other there in that awakening world unseen and secret. It was not the forbidden act Juana’s mother had warned vaguely against, meant only to be shared under God’s blessings, but there they lay upon the parted grass in clandestine embrace, unable to speak what they felt, but confident in each other’s arms that it was reciprocated.
New mornings rose with a renewed promise between them. Salomon worked at the presidio stables, raising ropes against the horses. Juana stitched and tanned cueros daily for the mercado. Each night she washed the smell of skins from her body, and each week she put away as much of her pay as she could in a box in a hole in her family’s mud hut. She and Salomon both shared dreams of each other as they worked, and when shadows lengthened and overtook the day, they found each other again in silence beneath the flickering sky.
Maria Ysabel had matured further in her beauty, her eyes still smiling about like those of a child, but around those eyes she was gray and tired. The table in the corner had fewer flowers upon it, although a fresh bouquet lay atop the old roses, wilted and stiff. She spent her days washing jackets and polishing boots for the soldiers. In the evenings she sat on a stool in the darkness, massaging her feet, or she knelt and prayed to Our Lady of Guadalupe.
It was mid-afternoon and clear when Salomon watched Arturo Leyva ride out of Monterey, shouting and laughing, his face a horrible twist of madness. His eyes were white. His hands were red and gleaming. His soaked shirt stuck to his chest. Behind him two uniformed men gave chase, pistolas drawn.
Arturo had busied himself these years in metalwork. He swung a heavy hammer and made unusual blades. He made shoes for horses. He swung a small hammer and made medallions for boots and saddles, for pistola grips. He held his face close to his work. A one-legged customer had him mold a prosthetic. Another man requested metal teeth, a piece he could slip in and out. Arturo made these for them.
An American came to his shop that morning and asked him how small he could make a spring.
“I cannot make a spring.”
“I think a spring is just what I need. But it has to be small.” The American held his fingers up.
“I have never made a spring before. Get out of my place.”
The American looked at him. “I will pay you first if that is your concern.”
“Look at me. Look how much that concerns me. I don’t care. Get out of my place, I cannot help you.”
The American stepped out into the street and looked around. He looked up and squinted about. The metal tapping resumed in Arturo’s shop. A moment later the tapping stopped and Arturo answered a knocking at the back. He opened the door to see the American with his pistol drawn. Arturo grabbed at the outstretched weapon and stepped forward. In one motion he swung the American around and they had reversed places. He pulled a handmade dagger from his waistband, the blade was as long and thick as a forearm, and stuck the American to the wall. The first scream made people hold still in the street, the second made them run for safety. Arturo stuck him again and again so quickly the man did not have time to fall. He sank against the wall between stabs with horrible eyes, leaving a red smear. By the time he sat he had been stuck so many times his shirt was cut to rags and pulsed with heavy amounts of blood, and visceral bulged from behind the fabric shreds at his belly. He made a weak attempt to raise his pistol, and Arturo chopped down with his blade. The pistol fell in the dust, grasped still by the man’s hand.
When the policia turned the corner behind the shop, Arturo ran from the front with what he needed and mounted the first horse he saw. One officer turned immediately and vomited, the other fumbled for his pistola. Hours later, six officers made a search for the stolen horse. A reward was posted for the horse-thief, no mention made of the murder.
Salomon was questioned about the whereabouts of his friend. He told the truth, that he did not know. He was questioned about the horse. Did he know where the horse-thief would hide it? He did not know. He was told if the horse-thief returned, that he would report it immediately. Salomon lied and said he would.
