by John Wilson
For an age, Wellington strokes and talks to the horse. Occasionally he looks over at me and I hear my name, but mostly I have no idea what Wellington is saying.
Eventually he looks up and says, “Come over here, Busca.”
Slowly I step forward. The horse watches me suspiciously but stays where it is. It even lets me stroke its head.
“What did you say?” I ask.
“I told him your story. I told him that his previous owner was partly responsible for your horse’s death and that you had killed his owner. These are things he knew already, but I explained that they meant that he is now yours. He agreed that this is the case, and he hopes that you will treat him better than his previous owner.”
“I will,” I say, trying hard not to think about how Wellington knows what the horse is thinking.
“Then you must tell him so. And also explain where you will go and what you will ask him to do.”
“I have come down here to look for my father,” I say, feeling awkward talking to the horse as if he was another person, “and I would like your help with that.”
The horse nuzzles my cheek as if he understands and agrees.
“I was angry after your old owner and the others killed my horse,” I continue. “Her name was Alita. That is why I lay in wait for your owner and killed him, but now my anger is gone. We won’t go and search for the others, but go down to Casas Grandes, which is the only clue I have about my father.”
The more I talk the more comfortable I feel. The horse continues to nuzzle my cheek.
“That is good,” Wellington says when I finish. “Horses need good stories as much as people do. They have their own stories and many are about the men who brought them to this land in their search for cities of gold. Perhaps, if you listen well, this horse will tell you his story.
“Now there is one other thing you must do. Give your new friend a name.”
I think for a minute. “I will call him Coronado after the man who led the army that brought the horses to this land.” The horse pushes against me and Wellington nods. “Coronado,” he says. “It is a good strong name. Now you must go.”
I feel upset that Wellington is dismissing me so abruptly. I have enjoyed my short time here, but I know I must move on. And now that I have a horse, there is no point in delaying. I tether Coronado to a branch and follow Wellington back up to his cave to collect my pistol and blanket. I crawl in to say goodbye to Perdido. When I come out Wellington hands me the battered copy of Moby Dick.
“You must take this story,” he says. “Lord Alfred George Cambrey Sommerville, Earl of Canterbury, gave it to me, but I cannot read the words. He began to teach me but he died before I could learn much. I am too old now for such tricks, so you should have Ishmael’s story of the sea monster.”
“Thank you,” I say, touched by the gesture. “I shall treasure it.”
Wellington nods and we return to Coronado.
The Kid’s saddle is old and worn but serviceable. I take down his bedroll and saddlebags. I don’t intend to sleep in a dead man’s bedroll, but it is heavy so I unroll it. Inside is a double-barreled scatter gun like the ones I have seen the guards on stagecoaches carrying. This one has both the stock and the barrel cut down severely so that the weapon is not much more than two feet long. It wouldn’t be much good at any distance, but at close range, filled with buckshot, it would be devastating.
I go through the pockets of the saddlebags. There’s not much in them—a flint, some tobacco, some dried beans, a bag with a mix of a few silver dollars and some pesos, some bullets for the Kid’s Colt revolver and a few scatter-gun shells, and a half-empty whiskey bottle. I give Wellington the Colt ammunition, the beans and the tobacco, and smash the whiskey bottle against a rock.
I’m about to pack my meager belongings, when I notice something else. At the bottom of one pocket lies a silver locket. It’s oval, almost the length of my thumb and covered in intricate engraving. There is a silver chain looped through a ring at one end.
I undo the clasp and am suddenly staring at the faces of two fair-haired women. They are both dressed formally and are obviously related, although one is about my age and the other significantly older. I guess mother and daughter. Despite the formality of having their pictures taken, both are smiling gently at the camera.
The thought of this happy pair being the Kid’s mother and sister shocks me. I barely imagined him as human, let alone having a family that would miss and mourn him. I guiltily snap the locket closed and stuff it back in the saddlebag.
“You go to Casas Grandes?” Wellington asks when I have finished packing and am ready to mount.
“It’s the only clue to where my father might be,” I say.
Wellington nods. “That is good. Follow the arroyo out into the valley. Keep the rising sun over your left shoulder for five days until you reach the village of Esqueda. There you must turn to face the rising sun for five more days as you cross the mountains. Then you will be at Casas Grandes.”
“Thank you, Wellington,” I say, feeling sad at leaving the old man. “For everything.”
Wellington shrugs. “No es nada. What are a few tortillas and beans. I thank you for your story.”
There seems nothing more to say, yet I have trouble leaving. Eventually Wellington speaks again.
“You asked if I knew the scalp hunter named Roberto Ramirez.”
“I did,” I say.
“I knew of him,” Wellington says.
“Was he as evil as some say?” I ask.
Wellington shrugs.
“People say many things, but one must think of who is doing the saying. Is the word of an evil person to be taken the same as that of one who is good?
“Be careful of names. Some men do not understand their importance. They think a name is like a gun: it can be stolen and used for good or evil by whoever possesses it. They are wrong. You may steal a name, but you can never own it. I am not so clever that I can judge this Roberto Ramirez, whoever he may be.”
Wellington pauses and I am about to ask for more detail when he says, “You must go. Perdido and I wish you well on your journey, Busca, and hope your search is fruitful.”
Wellington turns on his heel and strides back up the gully toward his cave and his long-dead companion. Reluctantly I turn Coronado’s head and we walk down the arroyo and out onto the next wide, dry valley.
9
I sit on Coronado, watching the column of dust move slowly toward me over the wide, empty valley bottom. I don’t think it’s a threat, and there’s nowhere to hide out here even if it is. It’s the second day since I said farewell to Wellington, and I am traveling more or less southeast down a dry valley with rugged hills in the distance on both sides. I can’t be far from the Mexican border. Eventually the shapes at the base of the dust resolve themselves into a column of soldiers. I encourage Coronado and we trot forward to meet them.
“Good day,” the young officer at the head of the column greets me as he raises his hand to bring his men to a halt. He is white, but the twenty or so men behind him are black, although it’s hard to tell them apart through the thick layer of dust covering them and their mounts.
“I’m Lieutenant Fowler of B Company, Tenth US Cavalry, on patrol chasing savages out of Fort Bowie. Who might you be and where you headed?”
“My name’s James Doolen, and I’m headed down to Mexico.”
Lieutenant Fowler stares hard at me for a long moment.
“Can’t imagine why you’d want to go down there,” he says eventually, “but I reckon that’d be your business. What I will do is give you a bit of advice.
“Sergeant Rawlins,” the Lieutenant shouts back over his shoulder. “Show this young man what we’re carrying on them mules.”
After some commotion farther down the column, a large man with sergeant’s stripes just visible through the dirt on his sleeves rides up leading two mules, each of which has a long military-cape-covered bundle draped over it. The sergeant nods at me an
d lifts the corner of the cape on the nearest mule.
The man’s shirt and neck are covered in dried blood. There are a few strands of straggling brown hair still attached to the scalp, but the top of the head is a raw mass of bloody flesh.
I tense at the sight, which causes Coronado to skitter a few steps to the side. The sergeant moves to the second bundle and repeats the procedure. I know what’s coming this time so I am somewhat prepared, but I still gasp in shock.
The second body is just as bloody as the first, but it has a wide band of blood-stiffened hair still attached above the right ear. The hair is a striking red.
“The red-haired man,” I say before I have a chance to think.
“You know this fellow?” the Lieutenant asks.
“I don’t know,” I reply. “Maybe. I was robbed a few days back by someone with hair that color.”
“Could be him right enough. I ain’t never seen hair that color on any other soul round here, living or dead. Perhaps the savages did us a favor this time.”
I look back at the other body, but the cape has fallen back. Is that Ed? The hair was right, what there was of it, but I don’t want to get down and examine the body any closer.
“What happened to them?” I ask.
“Damned Apaches got them,” the lieutenant says. “In the hills down by the border. We found them by an old campfire with more holes in them than a pincushion.
“First I reckoned they were prospectors. Plenty of hopefuls down that way following the stories of gold and silver in the hills.” The officer sweeps his arm to the south and spits in the dust. “If you ask me, the only worthwhile rock they’ll find’ll be a tombstone.
“Anyways, these fellows had no rock samples, claim stakes or prospecting kit with them, so now I ain’t so sure. Could be as you say, that they were road agents on the run or just trying to hide out. Whoever they were, we’ll take them up to Bowie and get them buried afore they get to smelling too bad.”
“Did you see the Apaches?” I ask. “Are they still in the hills?”
“No sign of them.” The officer shakes his head. “But that don’t mean nothing. You can ride ten feet away from a savage and never know he’s there. Could be that they’ve moved on though. I reckon they were some young bucks broke out of the San Carlos reservation after Victorio flew the coop. Probably heading down to Mexico, looking to meet up with him or Geronimo. That’s just fine by me. If they murder a few folk down that way, then it’s the Federales’ problem, not mine.”
I feel uncomfortable with the lieutenant’s dismissal of the Apaches as savages. Wellington was one of the most civilized people I have ever met, and the red-haired corpse, if he was the man who shot poor old Alita, and the Kid were immeasurably more savage than him.
“Sergeant”—the lieutenant turns to the black man beside him—“take them mules back to the rear of the column and get the men ready to move on.”
“Yes, sir.” The sergeant hauls the mules around and heads back down the line of soldiers.
“You’re more than welcome to accompany us to Bowie,” the lieutenant says.
“Thank you,” I reply, “but I think I’ll keep heading on.”
“Suit yourself,” he says, “but travel fast and keep your eyes open. Nights’d be the best time to move. Where you headed in Mexico?”
“Casas Grandes. I was told to head south for Esqueda and then turn east.”
“That’ll work. The end of this valley, couple of hours’ ride, that’s the border. The valley splits round some hills, take the left fork. You’ll come to a river. Follow it until you come out into a wide north-south valley and head south. That’ll take you to Esqueda. Rest up good there because it’s rough country from Esqueda over to Casas Grandes. Good luck and keep a weather eye out for the savages.”
“Thank you.”
Lieutenant Fowler nods, wheels his horse and resumes his position at the head of the column. He raises his hand and orders, “Move out.”
Amidst the clanking of bits and the slow drumming of hooves, the column moves past me. Several of the soldiers turn to look at me, and Sergeant Rawlins nods as he passes.
As the dust settles around me, I wonder why I didn’t take the lieutenant up on his offer of an escort north to Fort Bowie. It would have been the safe and sensible thing to do. I suppose that my search for my father is such a strange and uncertain thing, and is turning out to be so much harder and more complex than I had imagined, that my resolve is hanging by a thread. I have to force myself to keep going. If I turn back to the relative comforts of Fort Bowie, I may never pluck up the courage to set out again. The goal of finding my father, or at least discovering what happened to him, has to drive me forward relentlessly or I will fail and spend the rest of my life wondering.
On top of that, I didn’t like the way the lieutenant talked about the Apaches. Of course, I might think differently if I run into a band of them determined to take my scalp. I sigh and encourage Coronado into a trot away from the soldiers.
I take the left-forking valley as the sun lowers toward the horizon behind my right shoulder. I suppose I am in Mexico now, although I have seen nothing to suggest it. By the time dusk falls, I am crossing rougher ground and have reached the headwaters of a small river flowing in the direction I am traveling.
I move slowly in the dark, even after an almost-full moon rises to cast a ghostly silver light over everything. I imagine every shadow conceals a warrior ready to fire an arrow into my chest or leap up and cave in my skull with an ax. My scalp itches as I try not to imagine a knife blade scraping round my skull.
I’m cold and scared riding through the dark, but I’m more frightened of stopping and going to sleep. The trail by the river is narrow, and in places I can almost reach out and touch the trees beside it, but it is fairly flat and the valley bottom often widens out so that I feel a little less hemmed in. I wrap my blanket around my shoulders, and Coronado and I trudge on.
My head jerks upright and I almost fall out of the saddle. I’ve been asleep. Not for long, but the last thing I want to do is fall and injure myself. I rein in Coronado, uncork my canteen and splash water on my face. The shock of the water helps, but a few minutes after we start moving again, I find myself nodding off.
“Stay awake,” I tell myself out loud. “You’d feel a fool if you travel at night to avoid an Apache attack, only to break your arm falling off your horse.”
Talking out loud feels good.
“Well, Coronado, I hope Wellington…” I stop and think. “Too-ah-yay-say,” I say. Somehow it seems right to use his Apache name after what Lieutenant Fowler said about savages. “I hope Too-ah-yay-say was right and that one day you’ll tell me your story. I would like to hear more about your namesake and his explorations. Come to think of it, you could probably tell me a lot about the Apaches as well.”
I think back over all the old man told me.
“You know, Coronado, Too-ah-yay-say is Cochise’s cousin and he knew Mangas Coloradas. I read dime novels about them. Cochise was a great warrior and so was Mangas Coloradas. One story I read said that Mangas Coloradas went to talk peace under a flag of truce and was captured by the soldiers. While he was sleeping that night, the soldiers stabbed him with red-hot bayonets. When the warrior jumped up, they shot him and said he was trying to escape.
“What do you think of that, Coronado? And it’s even worse. After they killed him, they boiled the flesh off his head and sent his skull back to a museum in Washington. That’s more savage than scalping.
“I can hardly believe that Too-ah-yay-say knew these famous people and did all the things he said, fought in the war and led that Englishman on hunting trips. Too-ah-yay-say must be…”
I don’t notice the tall figure until it steps out into the full moonlight and speaks. “What do you know of Too-ah-yay-say, K’uu-ch’ish and Dasoda-hae, whom you call Mangas Coloradas?”
Coronado skitters sideways and I almost fall off. The idea of turning and galloping off into the dar
kness crosses my mind, but it’s insanity. There’s no way I can stay on Coronado moving at high speed in the dark, even if he doesn’t break a leg, and besides, other figures are detaching themselves from the shadows all around.
“I met Too-ah-yay-say in the mountains. He gave me tortillas and beans and cleaned my wounds and gave me directions to here. I’m on my way to Casas Grandes.” I’m speaking very fast, almost babbling as my fear mounts.
The man in front of me is a frightening sight. He’s big, at least six feet tall and broad across the shoulders. His trousers disappear into soft leather boots that reach almost to his knees, and he wears a long loose shirt, belted at the waist with a broad red sash in which is tucked a long knife. His black hair hangs over his shoulders and is held off his face by another red sash wrapped around his head. He wears a full cartridge belt slung diagonally across his chest and a rifle over his left shoulder. In is right hand he holds a long lance from which hang an assortment of feathers and, I am appalled to see, a fresh red-haired scalp. He’s smiling, but it could be at the pleasure of adding my scalp to his collection.
“Too-ah-yay-say told me he was a cousin of K’uu-ch’ish.” I try to pronounce the name the way the warrior had. “He told me stories of Mangas Coloradas, Dosada-hay.”
“Dasoda-hae,” the stranger corrects me. “Too-ah-yay-say told you his story?”
“Yes, he did,” I say hurriedly.
“Hmmmm. And you told him your story?”
“I did. I told him how I had come down here from the north to look for my father and how—”
“Do not be so eager to tell strangers your story. What other story did Too-ah-yay-say tell you?”
I struggle to work out what this man means. Too-ah-yay-say only told me one story, his. Then I realize. “He told me Perdido’s story.”
“And you met Perdido?”
“I did.”
