The Valiant Women

by Jeanne Williams

  “It does make for a quiet life.” Nōnó filled another tortilla.

  “Aren’t you afraid?” Talitha burst out.

  He smiled quizzically. “Child, a shaman has his power from the light of his heart. Tata Dios Himself gives this. A shaman moves through air with the brightness of the sun, talks with Tata Dios and even sees him. Why should I fear Apache ghosts?”

  When no one answered and the vaqueros fidgeted uneasily, Nōnó’s eyes slitted. His tone grew sibilant. “And if I am a sorcerer as my enemies claim? Then who would dare to trouble me? For even after I am dead, I can take the shape of a bear or mountain lion and kill that one who offended me. Or I can be a shooting star and kill that man and take his heart.”

  “God pardon you, that is wicked talk,” said Socorro. Her lips were pallid but she looked at the Indian with unwavering eyes.

  “I don’t believe it anyway,” said Talitha. “Except that you might have a light in your heart that lets you talk to God and heal people.”

  Nōnó’s jaw dropped. He stared at her a long moment. “You believe that?”

  She glanced at Shea, under the ramada now to shield him from the sun. “Yes. I believe that.”

  The shaman chuckled. “You believe it because you want to.” He filled another tortilla. “But that has power, too.”

  During the afternoon, he got out a knucklebone, and first with Belen, then with Santiago, played la taba. As with dice, the sides had different values, and the players kept score with grains of corn. When they tired of that, all three played quinze with four marked sticks.

  Toward evening, Shea was able to sip some gruel. Socorro held the gourd, speaking softly, and when it was clear he’d do her no violence, the others withdrew to leave them alone for a while.

  Santiago and Belen decided to go hunting but Talitha declined their invitation. She didn’t like to see wild things killed, nor did she want to be very far from Shea. She took refuge from the sun under a big mesquite, was startled and a bit uneasy when the shaman followed her. He crouched down, as was his habit instead of sitting.

  “You are not their child,” he said after a time.

  “No. But they have been very good to me.” Her voice trembled. “He’s going to get well?”

  “I think yes.”

  A long sigh escaped Talitha. Having her hopes confirmed swept away her vague fear of the Indian and she beamed at him joyously. “I know Doña Socorro will pay you. But if I can ever do anything for you—”

  “Will you give me a piece of your hair?”

  Talitha gaped, instinctively raised her hand to touch the single long braid she had plaited to save trouble during the journey. She didn’t like the idea of a reputed witch having a lock of her hair but could scarcely go back on her offer.

  “Why—why, yes, but I don’t have any scissors.”

  “I have a knife. Fine, sharp one.”

  That didn’t cheer Talitha, but she waited resignedly while he ducked into his house and returned with a keenly honed blade. “Will you take it where it won’t show too much?” she asked.

  His fingers, dry as a snake’s skin, brushed the back of her neck. Her flesh prickled in spite of the heat of the afternoon. There was a slight tug and then he was holding a long strand of bright hair, smiling at it in great satisfaction before he twisted some fiber around one end and tucked it carefully into a leather pouch.

  “What will you do with it?” she asked, unable to keep a nervous tremor from her voice.

  “Nothing to harm you.” He touched the hummingbird hanging from his neck. “I do not carry this for magic but because the feathers are beautiful and the bird’s heart so swift. It is good to be reminded of such things.”

  “What will my hair remind you of?”

  “Why, who but Yerúgami, Mother Moon?” Nōnó pointed to one of the smaller crosses in front of his house. “That is she. The big one is Father Sun who guards through the day. But Mother Moon watches at night.”

  “Who’s the third cross?”

  “Morning Star, son of Yerúgami. He helps her protect Tarahumare in the darkness.” He smiled shrewdly at her questioning look. “I know of the three Gods of you Christians and Christian Tarahumares, like the ones I worked with in the mines where I learned Spanish, would say the crosses are Father, Son and Holy Spirit. But it is not so. My people used the cross long before padres came among us.” In the dirt, he scratched two intersecting equal lines. “These are the four directions, the ends of the earth. It is older than any other cross, even the one of Tata Dios.”

  All this sounded heathenish but intriguing. Rather than try to correct Nōnó’s errors about the Trinity, which she herself understood none too well, let alone where Mary and the saints fitted in, Talitha decided to learn more about Nōnó’s faith.

  “You have Tata Dios. Do you also have a devil?”

  “Why would we want him? He’s for Christians. But the Tarahumares who have become Christians have a devil and are more scared of him than of sorcerers.” Nōnó chuckled contemptuously. “This devil has a long beard like a Mexican and only one eye. Since the strings and bow of the violin make a cross, he cannot play it but he is a great one with the guitar. The first Mexicans were born of him and his ugly wife, but the Tarahumares, of course, are children of Tata Dios and brothers of the stars.”

  His tone was ironic. Talitha doubted that he truly believed the Tarahumare traditions any more than the Christianized ones, but she probed further. “Is there a heaven?”

  Again that slight smile. “Everyone needs a heaven. In ours are many large ranches stocked with the sacrifices made to Tata Dios. There are foot races every day, and games, and Tata Dios himself runs and plays with us.”

  Heaven, to Talitha, seemed tolerable only in comparison to a hell of eternal agony. She could only dimly remember the Mormon Terrestrial Paradise. But a heaven of ranches! That sounded highly desirable.

  Between ministrations to Shea, Nōnó told Talitha many other things that day as they sat under the big mesquite. How the gray fox and owl foretell death; how some bears are not bears at all but dead shamans who cannot be killed; and about healing plants, which he showed her, taking her to one of the storehouses.

  Palo amarillo for sore eyes and colds, chilicote for stomachache and toothache though Nōnó cautioned that the red beans must be used with care for they were poisonous. A number of plants reduced fever, yerba de la víbora, copal and mató. Verbena roots could be crushed into a poultice and the flowers steeped for washing wounds or boils. Yerba buena or wild mint was good for intestinal upsets, toothache and sore gums.

  “Is there anything that would ease Doña Socorro when she has the baby?” Talitha asked.

  He hunted around till he located the roots he wanted and put some into a small fiber bag. “Lantana helps at childbirth. Pound up the roots, boil them and have her drink the tea. Tea of cottonwood bark is good, too.”

  She thanked him gratefully and then asked what he’d used to cure Shea. “That is a secret, Shining Girl. But I can tell you that one part of his cure was jículi.” He led her to another smaller storehouse, opened the door enough to let her see a basket filled with small dried roundish things. Nōnó inclined his head, spoke respectfully to the basket and closed the door again.

  “This is the cactus Mexicans call peyote. It brings visions and keeps one from hunger and thirst. Only shamans can handle it and it is kept by itself so it won’t see or hear anything offensive. If I want to use some of it, I must offer teswino and meat. It is the younger brother of Tata Dios and he left it to comfort his people when he went to heaven.”

  Talitha blinked at all this. Nōnó had sounded skeptical, almost teasing, about many other things, but he seemed completely serious about this. He told her that jículi eased menstrual pain and, dampened or chewed, and placed directly on the afflicted part, had wonderful effects on fractures, swellings, wounds, burns and even rattlesnake bites.

  It sounded useful if rather frightening. “Could we buy some?” ask
ed Talitha.

  Nōnó gave her a shocked look. “It would be very angry and might eat both of us!”

  As if to make up for refusing, he gave her packets of roots and herbs, reminding her again of their properties, and then showed her his sucking stick. Examining her arm with sudden interest, he said, “You have some worms! Let me suck them out before they make you sick.”

  Before she could protest he put the tube, a piece of hollow reed about three inches long, on her arm, and sucked mightily. After a few minutes he unpuckered his cheeks, spat into his hand, and showed her some little whitish-yellow things that might indeed have been worms or parts of them.

  Fascinated, Talitha rubbed her reddened arm and stared. “How did you do that?”

  He grinned, tossed away the horrid little bits and produced something from a fold of his loincloth held in place by the broad girdle. Gingerly, Talitha examined them, rolled them in her fingers. “Why, they’re little pieces of hide!”

  “Buckskin,” Nōnó nodded, delighted with his joke. “I put them in my mouth and while I’m sucking, they swell with saliva and look like maggots!”

  “Ugh!”

  “Don’t make rude sounds. It is a very useful treatment.”

  “I don’t see how!”

  Patiently, he said, “Many people who come to me think they’re sick, that the wind or sorcery has put some bad thing in them. If I suck out a stone, or much blood, or little worms like this, they go away happy. And cured.”

  She gazed at him between accusation, amusement and wonder. “I don’t understand you, Don Nōnó. You believe some things and others you laugh at.”

  “Only a fool believes everything,” he shrugged. “Only a worse fool believes nothing. Now you will excuse me while I make offering to the jículi. It is time the señor had more of it.”

  Next day, Shea was rational and could sit up, move around shakily, and the next day they left.

  “Tata Dios protect you,” the shaman said to Talitha.

  “May He be with you,” she answered, genuinely sorry to part with the old man. What a mixture he was, of knowledge and rascality, wisdom and superstition! She would have liked to adopt him for a grandfatherly teacher, visit him often. And she wondered what he would do with that strand of yellow hair.

  They rested often for Shea tired and Socorro drooped in the saddle though her eyes, when she watched her husband, were full of joy. The kind woman at Imuris fed them again, exclaimed at Socorro’s extreme heaviness and tried to persuade her to stay there till her baby came.

  “It will not be long, señora! And this jolting on horseback can’t be good for you.”

  Santiago nodded slow agreement. “It wouldn’t hurt you to rest a week or so, Don Patrick. Belen and I could go on to the ranch. Perhaps you can get an escort from here, but if you’re not back in two weeks, we could come for you.”

  “Sounds sensible,” Shea said reluctantly, eyes on his wife’s thin face.

  But Socorro shook her head. “It may be several more weeks before the baby. Patrick and Miguel have been without me too long as it is! I want them to see the baby when it’s new.” She turned to the soldier’s wife. “You are very kind, señora, and I thank you a thousand times. But you will understand that I long to see my children and have the baby in my own house?”

  “I understand. But oh, madama, I have fear for you!”

  Socorro smiled and lightly kissed the woman’s brown cheek. “Do not. If my husband can be cured of hydrophobia, shall I not be delivered of a child?”

  The woman waved them out of sight. They rested twice that afternoon and camped well before sundown. Shea dropped off to sleep at once and Talitha coaxed Socorro into resting beside him while the rest of them took care of the horses and got out food. Talitha also decided she’d better pound up those lantana roots Nōnó had given her. If they could just get home first! Apart from Socorro’s comfort, James would be in torment till he saw that Shea was getting well, and in spite of her terrible first anger with him, Talitha did pity her brother.

  Next day Shea was stronger but Socorro rode with a set face. During the night, she went into labor. In spite of the danger, there had to be a fire for light and Talitha put the roots to boil in a kettle of water.

  Socorro drank meekly of the brew but though she gripped Shea’s hands tight and moved with the pains, by dawn she seemed no closer to relief and she was much weaker.

  “Sweetheart,” Shea whispered, face strained and gray in the first light. “Try hard! Push!”

  She obeyed but soon lay gasping. Helpless tears slid from her eyes. “Shea, I—I cannot!”

  He glanced desperately at Talitha. “Your hands are still small. Can you see if the baby’s placed wrong?”

  Talitha washed her hands in hot water boiled after the root brew had been poured into a gourd. Last time, when she helped with the twins, she’d been too young to realize all the dangers. Now, with her own body that of a woman, she was cold with fear.

  Carefully, she felt around the taut flesh as the tiny skull forced down and Socorro screamed. “I’m sure the head’s in place,” Talitha told Shea. “I can feel the fine hair on it.”

  “There’s just not enough strength in the contractions,” Shea groaned. “And she’s getting weaker!”

  “Perhaps if she sat up and we sort of held her—that’s how the Apaches do. Let her hang on to that paloverde branch?”

  “Let’s try it.”

  Between them, they supported her in a squatting position. It seemed to help. She gripped the branch till her fingernails were white, made animal sounds and sweated. Then her hands loosened, fell limp, and she collapsed.

  “Socorro!” Shea cried. “Socorro!”

  She didn’t answer. The pulse fluttered in her throat. Her breath came in quick shallow gasps. “We’ve got to get that baby out!” Shea rasped. “Even if we kill it, it’s got to come!”

  “Let me give her another drink.” Talitha brought the root tea and coaxed some down Socorro’s throat, washed her hands again as she turned to the task she dreaded. “Talk to her,” she told Shea. “Hold her hands and get her to push.”

  He did this, talking of Patrick and Miguel, how excited they’d be with a new brother or sister. Socorro responded bravely, bearing down with the weakened contractions, trying to make them do their work. Talitha inserted her fingers on either side of the head, tugged as gently and firmly as she could with the next spasm. The head moved forward slightly, seemed to stick, and then with Socorro’s next desperate effort, Talitha pulled and the head came through.

  “One more big push!” she called. “One more!”

  It came, and with it the slippery little body. As Talitha cut the thick, pulsing cord that still connected baby and mother, dark blood and mucus came out. Putting the baby in Socorro’s arms, Talitha cleaned the afterbirth out of Socorro, leaned back to catch her breath.

  “A girl!” Shea was telling Socorro. “She’ll be beautiful, just like you!”

  Socorro touched the damp fuzz on the little head and smiled.

  But the bleeding wouldn’t stop. Santiago, summoned hastily from the slope where he and Belen had withdrawn, worked with Talitha to staunch the flow, propping up Socorro’s hips and legs, packing the cleanest garments they had between her thighs.

  Nothing worked. Her life drained away before their eyes as Shea held her. She knew she was dying, asked him to take good care of the baby and call it after her own mother, Caterina. This done, she was quiet a moment before she opened her eyes to caress Shea.

  “Querido,” she said to him in a tone so soft it was nearly inaudible. “We saved each other in the desert. We rode through the mountains. Now we have slept again beneath the stars—”

  Her voice trailed off. She was smiling when the great gush of blood poured from her.

  She was smiling when she died.

  His big body wrenched with sobs, Shea held her close, pleading with her to come back, begging her to live. But her dark eyes couldn’t see him though a ten
der smile lingered on her mouth.

  Talitha took the baby. This red scrap to cost Socorro’s life? It wasn’t fair! If Socorro had been at home instead of jolting horseback through the heat in an agony over her husband, this would probably not have happened.

  And Shea wouldn’t have been bitten if … In a flash, she saw James as he’d been when they left, saw Socorro bending to kiss and absolve him. But it was his fault! It was!

  Or was it hers, for insisting Juh’s son come with her instead of staying with the Apaches? I wish he had! she thought miserably, immediately knew that wasn’t so. She still loved James. And he was so little, only six, and how was he going to feel now, with Socorro dead?

  Staring down at the feebly squirming infant, Talitha wondered what to do with it. She had cared for James almost from birth, but at least for a while he had been grudgingly nursed by one of Juh’s wives. It was with vast relief that she remembered Anita whose Paulita was two months old.

  Plenty of milk there, and it would be lovingly given. The baby could exist on water till they got home, which they could do tonight if they started soon. Shea still held his wife but Santiago was standing a little way off, staring at nothing. His hands clenched and unclenched.

  Talitha washed the baby quickly and carried it to him. “Please hold her while I fix her a rag to suck on and make our pinole,” she said.

  To her astonishment, Santiago’s tawny eyes were filmed with tears and his face seemed as young as James’s. Talitha suddenly knew what her maturing senses had been detecting for a good while. Santiago had loved Socorro, too; as a man, not as a companion only.

  “Who can eat?” he said dully, though he took the baby obediently enough.

  “We all must,” Talitha replied shortly though her heart was wrung with pity for him, swelling with her own grief and loss. “Shea’s still far from strong and we need to get the baby home where Anita can feed her.”

  “Socorro, she’s—dead,” whispered Santiago.

  “Yes, she is!” Talitha almost snarled at him. “But her baby’s alive. We have to take care of it!”