by John Wilson
I only have time to register all this before the stranger grabs me by the shoulders and shoves me violently into the darkened barroom. I stumble painfully against a table. Four figures standing at the crude bar turn and stare at the commotion. As my eyes adjust to the gloom, I see that the figure nearest me is Ed.
“Well, look who it is,” he says. “Maybe Red and the Kid were right and we should have killed you back outside Tucson.”
“He come in riding the Kid’s horse,” the thin man says.
“Is that so?” Ed steps forward and stares at me with interest. “Now, we know what happened to Red— he got careless and his hair’s hanging off some savage’s war lance—but the Kid, he’d be a mystery. Last I seen of him, he was getting drunk on your money in Tucson, telling me that he’d catch us up the next day. Ain’t seen him since. I don’t suppose you could shed any light on what might’ve happened to him?”
I stay silent and Ed steps forward and punches me hard on the cheek. I stagger back, but the thin man grabs me and pushes me back toward Ed.
“I saved your life once,” Ed says. “Don’t think it’s gonna happen again. The Kid’s missing and you come riding in here on his horse. You’d better start talking if you want to leave this room alive, and I don’t want any fanciful tales of finding the horse wandering in the desert.”
“An old Apache gave him to me.”
Ed hits me again. “I thought I was clear about not wanting to hear any fanciful tales. Slim,” Ed addresses the thin man behind me, “take him outside and shoot him.”
“Sure,” Slim says, grabbing me by the arm.
“Wait!” I yell. “I’ll tell you what happened.”
“That’s better,” Ed says with a smile, “but make it snappy and convincing. Slim ain’t known for his patience.”
“I saw the Kid in Tucson the day after you robbed me. I went out on the trail to ambush him. I didn’t plan to kill him, just force him to give me my stuff back, but he was drunk. He shot at me—that’s where I got these cuts on my cheek—and I shot back. I don’t know if my bullet killed him, but he fell off his horse and smashed his head on a rock.”
“And you took his horse?”
“No. The horse ran off. I buried the Kid as best I could. I was found by an old Apache who lives in a cave in the hills. He found the Kid’s horse and gave him to me.”
Ed tilts his head and regards me with interest. “That sounds more like the truth. The Kid never could hold his liquor worth a damn.”
“Can I kill him now?” Slim asks over my shoulder.
“Not just yet,” Ed says to my great relief. “Me and young Jim Doolen have got ourselves some history, and there’s a place we need to go and something I need to tell him before you can have your fun. Tie him up, put him on the Kid’s horse and let’s move out.”
We ride out of town with Ed holding Coronado’s reins and me desperately trying to stay on the horse’s back. My hands are tied, and Coronado seems extremely skittish, dancing from one side to the other and tossing his head up and down. I talk to him to try and calm him down, but it does no good. He simply doesn’t like being in the company of Ed and the others. I know how he feels.
Fortunately the ride is short, and we soon arrive at a crumbling adobe arch. A single ornate rusted gate hangs at a crazy angle off a bent hinge. I look up and wonder if the rusted hook on the peak of the arch is where Santiago’s father’s head hung.
“You boys wait here,” Ed orders. “We won’t be long.”
“Don’t forget your promise,” Slim says, sending a shiver down my spine.
Ed leads the way through the gateway and along a curving path toward a long low building. The main part, I assume the house itself, is fronted by a wide verandah, the roof of which is supported by a series of elegant adobe pillars and arches. In the center there is a broader arch that leads to a wide doorway. To each side are less elegant buildings that were once probably bunkhouses, storerooms and stables. The whole impressive complex is bathed in a soft orange glow as the sun lowers toward the western horizon.
Ed rides straight at the building, up the two stone steps onto the verandah and through the doors into the main hallway. Coronado is forced to follow but is restless, and his hooves clatter on the dark stone floor.
Once in the room, Ed wheels his horse and drops Coronado’s reins. I briefly consider making a run for it, but even if I manage to stay on Coronado’s back with my hands tied, I would be caught in minutes.
“Do you know where we are?” Ed asks me.
“Alfonso Ramirez’s hacienda?” I guess.
“Right. Look around.”
The room has obviously been abandoned for a long time. There is a large hole in the roof at one end and a pile of broken wooden beams, adobe bricks and tiles beneath it. The mud nests of swallows are everywhere and several of the birds swoop and dive in annoyance at being disturbed. The walls are bare and the plaster, which shows the remnants of red and blue painted patterns on it, is peeling and chipped. The floor, made of some polished black stone, is covered in a layer of dust and tiny sand dunes that have blown in through the open door.
“The kitchens are through that doorway.” Ed points to a gap in the wall beside the large empty fireplace at one end of the room. “Alfonso took great pride in his ability to entertain. There was an oak table that ran the entire length of the room and, on feast days, a continuous line of servants coming through from the kitchens, bringing food and drink for the guests. Often there would be a guitarist or two at the opposite end, playing traditional Spanish songs.”
I’ve stopped looking around the room and am staring at Ed.
“You can’t imagine what it was like, the sound of the crackling fire, the clinking glasses and cutlery, the music, the chatter. It was magical.”
“How do you know all this?” I ask, my brow furrowing.
Ed tears himself back from his reminiscences and looks at me. He speaks slowly. “I know all this because I grew up here. When we met before, I told you that Ed was short for Eduardo, but I never told you my surname. It is Ramirez. Alfonso was my father, and I was born in 1834 in a room through that door.” He waves an arm at a doorway at the opposite end of the room from the fireplace.
My mind flashes back to the story Santiago told me. Alfonso married twice and had a second son a couple of years younger than Roberto.
“Roberto Ramirez is your brother,” I say.
“Half brother,” Ed acknowledges, “and was. He died near ten years ago, quite close to where I met you, as it happens.”
My mind reels with questions, but before I can get any out, Ed continues.
“But that ain’t the beginning of the story. It starts when I was sixteen years old and I discovered that my brother was still alive.”
14
“ Roberto ran off when I was no more’n seven or eight. Alfonso flew into a wild rage when he heard and beat the servant who told him the news to death before my eyes. After that, Roberto’s name was never mentioned. He was dead to all of us. It was fine by me. Roberto had always been my father’s favorite and I hated him. I was happy he was dead and looked forward to Alfonso now treating me as he had Roberto.”
As he speaks, I realize that Ed has changed. Gone is the coarse language of the cowboy that he used with his gang. Replacing it are the cultured tones of a Mexican landowner that he let me glimpse outside Tucson. He reminds me of those lizards in Africa that can change color to fit in with their background. As a bushwhacker on the trail or a scalp hunter with his gang, he is as rough as needs be. In the ruined hall of his father’s hacienda, he reverts to an older persona. I wonder how many other masks he has worn in his complex and violent life.
“Didn’t work out that way. Even dead, Roberto was still my father’s favorite son.” The bitterness in Ed’s voice sends shivers through me. “I lived every moment of my life trying to please Alfonso. Trying to be Roberto. It was no use; never once did my father show me the slightest affection. Oh, he spent time with me,
taught me how to shoot and use a knife, but it was like he was training a horse; there was no passion or reward in it, no sugar cube when I got things right, just beatings when I got something wrong.”
Ed smiles ruefully. “Alfonso was always telling me, ‘Life’s hard. There’s always someone out to get you; if it’s not Apaches after your scalp, it’s a neighbor wants to steal your land or some revolutionary wants your power. The only way to survive is to be faster and harder than them. Hit them before they can hit you and don’t ever let them close to you. Once you start to care about someone, you have a weakness and they’ll exploit it.’
“I grew up believing that, but I reckon I’m getting soft in my old age. I stopped the Kid from killing you and now the Kid’s dead and here you are causing me difficulties again. I won’t make the same mistake twice.”
I shudder at that last statement, but there’s nothing I can do but listen to the rest of his tale. This is where my quest has led me and, for all my fear, I must listen to this final story.
“I think Alfonso went mad after my mother died of the fever. He would walk around the hacienda at night, calling Roberto’s name and weeping. He let the ranch fall away and would beat the servants at the least excuse. They began to call him loco, and more and more of them would disappear in the night. Apache attacks drove the rest away. Eventually it was just him and me. I thought about leaving too, but surely, if I was all he had left, he would begin to treat me with the respect I craved.
“When I was sixteen, Roberto came home. I was outside skinning a jackrabbit I had just shot when I heard shouting from the house. I ran in and saw Alfonso standing over there.” Ed waves his hand toward the fireplace. “There was a stranger standing facing him, holding a small pistol in his right hand. He wore his hair long in the Apache fashion, but he was dressed in cowboy clothes. They stood about a foot apart and were too engrossed in their argument to notice me.
“‘I should kill you now,’ the stranger said. ‘I returned to resolve things between us, but I talked to the townspeople and they told me what happened the night of my birth. You let her die.’
“‘She would have died anyway,’ Alfonso said in a voice that was so cold it scared me. ‘Anyway, you were what was important, the next generation, a son to take over the ranch, to give me immortality. You had responsibilities. Instead, what do you do? You shame me by running off to live like a savage. Now, all these years later, you crawl back whining about resolving things. I’m glad your mother died. She was weak, and you’ve inherited that weakness. All you are worth is the money I could get for your scalp.’
“I was confused,” Ed went on, “but I was gradually realizing who this must be. The stranger cocked his pistol and raised it to point into Alfonso’s face. His hand was shaking.
“‘Go on,’ Alfonso sneered. ‘Shoot me. It would be the one real thing you have ever done.’
“For a moment I was frozen in terror, thinking that this man was going to kill my father. Strangely, even in my confusion, all I could think of was saving my father’s life. Perhaps then he would care for me. The stranger let out a long sigh and lowered his weapon. I made a run at him just as Alfonso made a grab for the pistol. The three of us twisted around. Then the pistol went off.
“The stranger jumped back, pulling me with him. My father stood alone with a frown on his face. He was staring down at the left side of his stomach and his hands were held out in front of him in an almost pleading gesture. A wisp of smoke was rising slowly from a burned circle on his shirt and dark blood was already beginning to well out of a black hole at the center of the circle.
“‘You killed me,’ Alfonso said and took an unsteady step forward. He looked up at the stranger and spat full in his face. ‘Damn you to hell,’ he said and fell heavily forward against the corner of the oak table.
“The stranger said, ‘Oh my god,’ and stepped back, Alfonso’s spit sliding down his cheek. He stared at my father, slumped in a crouch by the table, blood dripping into a growing puddle on the floor, and then he looked at me. For a moment, I thought he was going to shoot me too, but his expression was one of terrible sadness. Then he turned and fled.”
Ed sits in silence on his horse, staring at the floor as if Alfonso’s blood were still there. I don’t think now that I could flee, even if I was’t bound. I am beginning to suspect some of the places Ed’s tale is taking me, and I feel as if I am standing on the edge of a precipice, my past yawning before me.
Eventually Ed continues. “I carried Alfonso to bed and tended him as best I could, but there was little I could do; the wound was fatal. It took my father five full days to die, most of it screaming in agony. I sat by his bed because I didn’t know what else to do.
“The night he died, I was sleeping in a chair by his bedside. Something woke me and I looked up to see Alfonso sitting up. His face was thin and drawn and his sunken eyes gleamed with a feverish unnatural light. ‘The man who shot me,’ he said. ‘His name was Roberto Ramirez. He is your half brother.’
“I had already worked out who the stranger was, but hearing that he was my half brother surprised me. My father had never told me he had been married before and I had assumed that Roberto and I had the same mother. I tried to talk, but Alfonso silenced me. ‘I don’t have much time. You must listen. I was married before, when I was a young man, to a foreign girl. Her name was Maeve Doolen. It was a mistake. She was weaker than me and life in this land requires strength.
“‘She bore me Roberto; however, she did not have the will to survive and died the same night. From his earliest days, I saw that Roberto had inherited her weakness, so I worked to build his strength. As soon as he could walk, I forced him to ride, shoot, rope calves and work hard from dawn to dusk. He hated the life and wanted nothing more than to waste his time in books and daydreams, but I kept at it. To crush the weakness in Roberto, I beat him for the least infraction. To make him hard, I had to be hard.’
“Alfonso suddenly clenched his fists and grimaced as a wave of agony swept over him. Beads of sweat formed on his face and he gasped, but he fought the pain back and went on. ‘I failed. Roberto would rather flee than face up to his responsibilities. I disowned him, tried to forget him. Of course, I had you, but you were not the first born and, for all his weaknesses, I never felt for you the way I did for Roberto.’”
I have the strongest feeling that Ed is about to cry, and I almost feel real sympathy for the tortured, unloved boy he had been. But he takes a deep breath and continues.
“I should have hated Alfonso then, but I couldn’t. I still craved his blessing, so I sat and listened to the rest of his tale. ‘I lived in hope that Roberto would come back and that we could be reconciled. As you saw, he returned, but only to torment me, to blame me for everything and tell me of some mad plan to go off looking for gold in California. You saw what happened.’
“I was weeping by now. It was obvious even to me that Alfonso was dying and the mad look in his eyes frightened me. He raised his hand to try and hit me, but he didn’t have the strength. ‘Don’t be a weakling like your brother. You are the head of the family now. I do not care what you do with what is left of the ranch or your life. I have only one request of you. Roberto disgraced me, the family and you. That cannot be allowed. I want you to find him and kill him.’
“I suppose I must have gasped or looked shocked, because Alfonso suddenly reached forward and grabbed my shirt in his clawed hand. His dying face was inches away from mine. I could feel the spittle on my cheek as he spoke and see the empty depth in his eyes.
“‘You must do this,’ he said. ‘It is an order, my dying wish. My honor and yours depend upon it. Swear an oath that you will do it or, by all that is holy, I will return from the grave and my ghost will haunt you into madness and death. Swear an oath!’
“I was utterly terrified. I didn’t know what I was saying, I just did what he wanted. I swore an oath that I would search out and kill my brother.”
For a moment, Ed looks like a helpless
child. How could he have possibly grown into a normal person after an upbringing like that? But his face hardens. He takes his disgusting good-luck charm off his saddle horn and holds it up before me.
“D’you know what this is?”
“It’s a scalp,” I say, confused. “You told me.”
“But whose?” There’s a madness in Ed’s eyes now. I shrug and he laughs crazily. “This,” he says in a terrifyingly soft voice as he waves the hair slowly in front of my nose, “this is Alfonso Ramirez’s scalp.”
“Your father?” I gasp.
Ed laughs again. “For several weeks I lived alone in the ruins of the ranch as Alfonso’s body slowly decayed and dried. I was haunted by nightmares in which he returned and reminded me of my promise. Eventually I decided I would have to keep my oath. I took his scalp with me so that he would know I had done it and not haunt me.
“I buried what was left of him and went searching for Roberto. I scoured all northern Mexico, but I was too late; he had done as he had told my father and gone to the California goldfields. I tried to convince myself that I had done my duty, so I didn’t follow him, but the dreams didn’t stop. I tried to kill Roberto in a different way. I got a band together, and for a couple of years in the early fifties when no one was too picky about where a scalp came from, we made good money.”
“I thought Roberto rode as a scalp hunter in those years,” I say in confusion.
“No,” Ed says with a smile. “He was in California living under a false name. I figured if I couldn’t kill his body, I could at least kill his name. For those years, I was Roberto Ramirez.”
I stare at Ed in shock. “You used your brother’s name?”
“I did and it made me free. I could do whatever I wanted, and everyone thought it was Roberto. While I was scalping women and children, it wasn’t really me doing it, it was my damned brother. Finally, I was showing my father that I was better than Roberto.”
