Paradise Valley

by Dale Cramer

  Rachel went with her father to the hay wagon, as the surreys were overcrowded. Dat was about to climb up to the driver’s seat when he looked over his shoulder at Schulman, nodded in the direction of Pelao and whispered in German, “Is he mute?”

  Schulman spat, glanced at the Mexican. “No, he can talk when he wants to, but like most Chichimecas he’s a bit stubborn. They’re like mules – they’ll work, but you have to get their attention.”

  Schulman took his hat off then, and looked purposefully at the western sky where the sun was beginning to dip toward the mountaintops. “We won’t make it all the way home tonight,” he said, “but we should put some distance between us and this town. It’s not safe here.”

  The ragged caravan trundled slowly up a dirt road for two hours, climbing gradually to the northeast along the face of a ridge. Pelao’s oxcart took the lead, being the slowest of all the wagons. The others paced themselves behind him, Rachel’s father constantly fretting and muttering to her about the top-heavy hay wagon with its load of farm equipment on these rutted, rocky, uneven mountain roads. But the pace suited the cows, plodding along, tied behind the wagons. Several miles up the ridge, when they were out of sight of Agua Nueva, they came to a crossroads. Pelao’s oxcart led them to the right.

  As they were making the turn Schulman looked over his shoulder from his position in front of Dat’s recalcitrant hay wagon. Pointing to the mountain pass in the east he shouted, “This is the last turn, Herr Bender! From here, the road takes us straight to your property!”

  On the other side of the pass, a long curving valley opened out in front of them, and in the gathering dusk Rachel could see a ribbon of road winding ever upward and out of sight at the top of the southern ridge. She wondered how much farther they could go before dark, but ten minutes later her question was answered. As they neared the base of the ridge Schulman shouted something up ahead to Pelao, who threw up a casual hand to acknowledge that he’d heard and then slowly pulled his oxcart off the road, heading for a level spot up the hill a little ways in a stand of oak trees.

  Schulman called back to Dat, “We camp here for the night!”

  The campsite had been used many times before, evidenced by a shallow depression full of ashes and blackened earth in front of a log worn smooth by so many having sat on it. While the women built a fire and put together a makeshift supper, the men took care of the livestock, seeing that the horses and chickens and cows and pigs were secure for the night, with plenty of food and water. Harvey and Rachel saw to the milking. Even here, the cows needed milking. Schulman had picked the spot because he knew of a small spring a stone’s throw up the hill where the water was always fit to drink. Aaron fetched water, and the women made a big pot of soup with potatoes and canned vegetables. Levi and Ezra untied one of the wagons and brought down hickory rockers for the women, and when the chores were done everyone gathered around the campfire for dinner.

  While they ate, Dat and the others began peppering Schulman with questions about their new home.

  “It’s a fine piece of land,” he assured them. “This road runs right through the middle of it. There are hills on three sides to keep the worst of the winds out, and the topsoil is black and rich. Best of all, you have me for a neighbor!” He laughed heartily at his own joke, as did everyone else.

  Except Pelao. Turning his bowl up, he drained the last of his soup without so much as a smile. Mamm noticed, and asked him – through Schulman, because she had barely begun to learn Spanish – if the soup was to his liking.

  Pelao nodded once, uttered a low grunt, then put his bowl down beside him on the log. Schulman said one clipped word to him in some strange language. The Mexican nodded curtly, rose and walked out of the circle of firelight. Pulling a ratty gray blanket and a Winchester rifle from under the seat of Schulman’s wagon, he propped the rifle on his shoulder and disappeared into the darkness.

  “What was that about?” Dat asked.

  “I told him to keep watch,” Schulman said. “He has the eyes of a hawk and the ears of a wolf, that one. And the good thing about a Chichimeca is he can go for days without sleep.”

  “But what was it you said to him? I didn’t know the word. Was it Spanish?”

  “Oh, that.” Schulman shrugged. “I know a few words of his native tongue. He’s easier to get along with if I make the effort once in a while. A little less . . . insolent.”

  Dat’s eyebrows went up in surprise. “He doesn’t speak Spanish?”

  Schulman chuckled. “Of course he does. Everyone here speaks Spanish, but he prefers Nahuatl. You have to know a little of their history to understand how things work down here. There are three kinds of Mexicans – people of pure Spanish descent, mixed-blood mestizos, and Indians. The Indians are a difficult bunch – backwards, illiterate, and hopelessly superstitious. Completely incomprehensible. The Spanish, at least, are civilized. Some of the Spaniards have mixed and interbred with the Indians over the centuries, but a mestizo is never the equal of a Spaniard. Señor Hidalgo, the man whose land you are purchasing, is a gentleman of pure Spanish descent.”

  While the women washed up, the men dragged out one of the homemade cabin tents and erected it by lantern light without too much difficulty. The women would enjoy the privacy and comfort of a tent, at least, while the men slept under the stars.

  Chapter 16

  The next morning dawned bright and fair and cold. The Benders’ unwieldy caravan got under way at first light with the sullen Pelao once again leading the way in his oxcart. Twice that morning they passed little groups of Mexicans going the other way, peasants dressed in the same kind of loose cotton clothes Pelao wore, except that most of the men wore floppy straw sombreros. Nearly all of them wore multicolored ponchos or blankets draped over their shoulders. Each of the parties was towing a burro laden with burlap bags of what appeared to be beans of some kind.

  The washed-out dirt road led a winding course, climbing gradually along the face of the ridge until they reached the crest, a lofty place of barren rock where they could see for a hundred miles in every direction. Rows and layers of bald mountain peaks stretched into the blue distance on both sides. Below them at the tree line a coyote dashed from a patch of scrub brush to pounce on a small rodent, and Rachel pointed out a herd of mule deer flashing through the piñon pines.

  “It will be good hunting here,” Caleb said, pressing his hat down tighter on his head after a stiff gust of wind nearly tore it away.

  Rattling along the rocky crest, the air felt almost cold enough for snow, even at midmorning. Rachel buttoned the top button of her coat and tucked herself as well as she could into her father’s wind shadow.

  Around noon, when the sun hung directly overhead, Pelao halted his oxcart and sat looking out over the valley ahead as the others pulled to a stop behind him.

  “Come see!” Schulman shouted, jumping down from his wagon.

  Everyone swarmed out of the wagons and buggies to gather in front of Pelao, who remained seated on the oxcart. They had reached the end of the crest. In front of them the road turned and fell away precipitously. Below, beyond the foot of the ridge, lay a broad valley bracketed by two lower ridges like parentheses, their upper reaches half covered with pine and oak thickets. The road ran like a crack through the middle of the valley floor, where the earth, though uncultivated, shone as green as the pastures of heaven with wild grasses.

  “Your new home!” Schulman said with a flamboyant sweep of his arm.

  Caleb stood still, looking out over Paradise Valley, and it seemed that a great weight lifted from his shoulders in that moment. He stood a little straighter, a cold wind ruffling the hair covering his ears and the long wisp of beard hanging from his chin. The hope that had festered and burned within him for so long found instant vindication in what he now beheld with his own two eyes, and he felt ten years younger. The young couples – Levi and Emma, Ezra and Mary – hugged each other, laughing and chattering rapidly to the children in Dutch. Mamm snugged against
Caleb’s arm, a rare display for her, and, her eyes shining, whispered to him, “Vas danksht?” What do you think?

  A hush fell over them all as they looked to the patriarch, eager to hear his first impression.

  Caleb pursed his lips. “I think,” he said, nodding solemnly, “it is beautiful. I think we may have found the promised land. Let us hope it flows with milk and honey.”

  An hour later they reached the valley floor, and the Bender caravan clattered and clanked slowly through the heart of the wild pasture. Rabbits hurried across the dirt road in front of them and darted into the brush as a golden eagle wheeled overhead, hunting.

  When they came to what he judged to be the center of the valley, Caleb called ahead and brought the caravan to a halt. Climbing down from the hay wagon he walked out through hip-deep prairie grass dragging his fingertips across the seed heads, surveying the land with a farmer’s eye. It wasn’t perfectly level; there were long, shallow waves in it, noticeable only from ground level, which was good. The fields rose gently toward the ridges on either side, breaking into little grassy knolls as they neared the slopes, and Caleb noted that any of those knolls would be a perfect spot for a house.

  A hundred yards from the road Caleb stopped and stood for a long time with his hands on his hips, seeing a farm in his mind’s eye. There, on that knoll in the shadow of the ridge, he could see a good solid house with smoke coming from a stovepipe and a spread of colorful flowers off to the left, where Mamm’s kitchen garden would be. Behind, from a second little rise, grew a splendid barn with a silo and whitewashed horse fences all around. The fields to his right and left came alive with waves of wheat and forests of corn. As he turned full circle he saw with a clear eye the houses and silos and slender spires of windmills dotting a sea of fine, rich, cultivated land, and he knew in his heart that he would make the dream come true. Paradise Valley was real.

  He got down on his knees, yanked up a handful of grass and sniffed the roots. He stuck a hand down into the depression, scooped out a little topsoil, squeezed it in a callused fist to gauge its moisture and sand content, sniffed it, tasted it.

  A contented smile came to his eyes as he spat out the dirt and wiped his hand on his pant leg. He remained there, kneeling, while he removed his hat, lowered his head and closed his eyes.

  His kin had all followed him silently into the grass and gathered around him, waiting. When he lowered his head, they all knelt with him while Caleb voiced a brief but fervent prayer, thanking a benevolent Gott for His blessings and for bringing them all so far without calamity.

  When Caleb rose to his feet and snugged his hat back on his head, the others rose with him. Turning to face his family he waved his arm toward the knoll behind him and proclaimed, “We build here. Tonight we make camp at Hacienda El Prado. Tomorrow is the Sabbath and we will rest, but on Monday we will return to this place and begin digging our well.”

  Señor Hidalgo had offered to let them pitch camp at the hacienda for now. The hacienda lay two miles farther down the road beyond the end of the valley, but until they could get a well dug and build some kind of pen for the animals they would not be able to live on their land.

  Ezra, Levi, Aaron and Harvey all gravitated toward Caleb at that point, drawing into a huddle to talk about the land – what they each saw in it, the problems and possibilities. The women separated naturally into another group to talk about an entirely different set of problems and possibilities.

  While Ezra and Levi debated about the best place to find water, Caleb looked up to see someone coming on a horse. A big black Friesian loped straight toward them across the prairie grass, ignoring the road, and as it drew nearer they could see the rider was a middle-aged Mexican. Schulman, too, strode purposefully toward the group from the direction of the wagons.

  The horse slowed his pace and stopped next to them, stamping his large hooves nervously and tossing his long mane. Caleb had not seen such a fine animal since they entered Mexico. The rider, sitting atop a silver-studded western saddle, wore a narrow brimmed hat like city folk wore back home, a fine new hunting coat and fancy leather chaps. The toes of newly polished cowboy boots peeked through the stirrups. Raising his hat with his free hand, the Mexican smiled broadly.

  “Buenos días! Señor Bender?”

  Caleb stepped forward, removing his hat, and reached up to shake the hand of his benefactor.

  “I am Caleb Bender,” he said, in his uncertain Spanish. “Are you Señor Hidalgo?”

  “Me llamo Diego Fuentes,” the man said, reaching down from his perch on the tall horse to shake Caleb’s hand. To Caleb’s relief, he switched abruptly to English. “I am the administrator of Señor Hidalgo’s estate. The haciendado is away just now, but we have been expecting you. I watched your progress from the hacienda for the last hour and have come to greet you. So!” He swept an arm over the valley, a proud glint in his eye. “What do you think of our little valley?”

  Caleb smiled, nodded. His Spanish was precarious at best, and he was greatly relieved to hear that Fuentes’s English was quite good. “Muy bien,” he answered. “It’s a fine piece of land, and I think we will do well here.”

  “I imagine you are all very tired and ready to end your long journey,” Señor Fuentes said. “We have a place prepared for you at the hacienda, and I will be happy to guide you the rest of the way.” The big Friesian shivered and reared a bit, anxious to get moving. Fuentes gripped the reins and calmed his horse with a few low words.

  Caleb gestured toward the wagons and asked, “Could we leave the hay wagon here? There’s only farm equipment and tools on it. We will need the tools here when we come back on Monday.”

  Fuentes shook his head. “No, Señor Bender, you must not leave the wagon out here. Not if you are going to stay at the hacienda.”

  “But why? This is our land, is it not?” He had, after all, made the down payment and signed the letter of intent.

  Fuentes shrugged apologetically. “Well . . . because it won’t be here when you come back.”

  Caleb stared blankly for a minute, trying to comprehend. “Are you saying someone might steal it?”

  “Yes, this is exactly what I am saying. You must not leave anything out here on the open plain, unguarded, or it will not be here when you return.”

  “They would steal our tools?” Caleb’s face twisted in confusion. “From our own land? What kind of people – ?”

  “There are bandits who pass through here,” Fuentes said. “Also, most of the people around you are very poor. Mestizos, Chichimecas. They live in squalor, and to them you are outsiders, people from another world. Yanquis. The rules are different here. If you leave something unattended, someone will assume you don’t want it anymore and they will take it. Señor Bender, you are not in Ohio anymore.”

  Despite her momentary joy at finally reaching Paradise Valley, Rachel couldn’t help feeling a little discouraged sitting on the front of the hay wagon with her father as they followed Señor Fuentes to Hacienda El Prado. It seemed to her they had entered a strange world where new and unanticipated threats loomed just beyond every turn.

  The road out of Paradise Valley bent southward once they cleared the end of the southern ridge, and on the open plain she could see Hacienda El Prado from a long way off. In the middle distance lay a few small farms, if they could be called that – they seemed very poor farms by Amish standards. There were a few adobe hovels like the ones they’d seen in Agua Nueva, some with crude stables and rickety barbed-wire fences to corral a milk cow, a handful of goats or a burro. The fields around them had been cultivated, but poorly – hand-sown in oats and winter wheat. Each of the houses had its own small vegetable patch at its feet, usually with a natural fence of prickly pear cactus planted around the perimeter. There were none of the tall, fork-shaped saguaro cactus here, and very few of the little round barrel cactus. Occasionally, she did see a tall, spiky thing that looked for the world like some kind of yucca. Some of them were higher than a man’s head.

&
nbsp; At the feet of the hacienda lay a fair-sized village. Everything Rachel had learned in her Spanish studies had led her to believe a hacienda was just a big house, but she was unprepared for what she saw when they approached the real thing. The house itself dominated the landscape by its sheer size and grandeur, sitting atop the largest hill this side of the ridges, but at its feet lay a small town. They drove right on into the middle of the town amid the stares of a hundred peasants who stopped what they were doing to watch the parade. Riding down the main street Rachel proudly demonstrated to her dat that she had learned enough Spanish words to read many of the signs over the shop doors.

  “Look! Mercado,” she said. “That’s a grocer, and next to it is the carniceria – the butcher shop. And there’s the oficina de correos – the post office.”

  Everything was here that a proper town should have. She identified the blacksmith shop, a tannery, and a small textile mill of some kind. At the far end of town, in the shadow of the hacienda itself, stood a beautiful little Catholic church with walls of stone and stained-glass windows. The grounds around the church were neat and clean, and beyond it lay a large fenced-in cemetery shaded by two huge old oak trees.

  A little ways beyond the church stood the entrance to the grounds of the hacienda, a pair of massive arched wrought-iron gates in a smoothly finished adobe wall with decorative vines growing across the top. Rachel expected their wagons to keep going right on through the gates, but she was wrong. Just short of the church, Fuentes’s big Friesian took a left turn and led them through a winding little dirt street to the outskirts of the town.