by Jory Sherman
“He is close,” he said to Juanito.
“I know.” Juanito’s heart was thundering in his temples.
Then they saw the blood trail, so fresh it glistened in the sun like barn paint. Juanito took in a quick breath and gripped his rifle until his knuckles drained of blood. He could almost smell the Apache now, almost scent his sweat, the gushing wound in his side leaking his life’s blood. Large splatters of blood doused the bare rocks and stained the grasses where the wounded man had passed.
Chato reined up. He stared straight ahead at something Juanito could not see. Juanito stood up in his stirrups and that’s when he saw the Apache. He was sitting against a tree, partially shaded by the leafy branches. And he was chanting something in low tones. Spiders bristled on the back of Juanito’s neck and his stomach knotted.
“That is Ojo,” Chato said. “He has but one eye.”
“You know him?”
“I have seen him before, riding with Cuchillo.”
“What is he doing?” Juanito asked.
“He is dying.”
Chato rode closer. Juanito followed warily, his spurs cocked to jab into Scheherazade’s flanks and send her flying away from danger.
The air bristled with a strange tension as Chato and Juanito rode closer to the dying Apache. It was then that Juanito realized Ojo had turned his back on them.
“Watch but,” Chato murmured.
Ojo whirled around, a rifle in his hands. Before Juanito could move, Chato fired his rifle point-blank at the Apache. Juanito saw the Indian’s bare chest twitch slightly and then blood ooze from it as he went slowly to his knees. His finger ticked the trigger of his rifle. A puff of smoke spumed from the pan as the powder flashed hot silver and then the ball whistled overhead like some wasp on a path to an unknown destination.
Ojo knelt there for a moment, staring at the two men with sightless eyes frosting over with the final glaze of death. Blood was still flowing from his previous wound: a bullet had apparently gone straight through his abdomen. It was a hideous wound, with a large, tattered hole at the exit wound. Ragged pieces of flesh hung down and the meat inside had ruptured, forming a bloody doughnut. Sanguineous rags lay at the Apache’s feet. Then he pitched forward, still clutching his rifle, falling on it with a dull thud.
“He is dead,” Chato said.
“If that is what you say.”
“Should I take his scalp to show Senor Baron?”
“No, he would not like that.”
“I will cut off his head.”
“No,” Juanito said. “That is not necessary.”
“It is what one does with a snake.”
“Just leave him, Chato. Let us ride away from here and return to the ranch.”
“Cuchillo will find Ojo.”
“I know,” Juanito said. “This is far from over, this thing with the Mescaleros.”
“Maybe it will never be over.”
Juanito said nothing. He looked at the dead Apache, so pathetic now, so lifeless. Yet so brave. So merciless. How did one defeat such a people? How did one even begin to fight an enemy who was such a part of the earth that he was seldom seen and disappeared like smoke when he finished fighting?
“Go with God,” Juanito said in Spanish as he and Chato rode away. “Vaya con Dios.”
7
BENITO AGUILAR WATCHED as his wife, Pilar, bathed the blind child, Lázaro. She dipped a cloth in an iron pan that stood heated on the stove. Lázaro was naked and Benito thought how perfect he was in every respect, except for his sightless eyes. Lázaro was not his child, but fathered by his brother, Augustino. Truly, he thought, this family was cursed. He had killed both Augustino and his sister-in-law, Victoria, the widow of his older brother Jaime, who had been killed by Apaches. Victoria later married Benito’s younger brother, Augustino. Victoria was barren, but wanted a child by Augustino, so she had forced Pilar to bed Augustino and carry his child.
Benito wanted to hate Lázaro, but he could not bring himself to loathe the poor blind boy. And Pilar loved Lázaro, so Benito tried hard to show affection toward him.
It was early morning and Benito sat on the edge of his chair pulling on his boots made in Matagorda. The room was dark, since Pilar had not lit any of the lamps in the kitchen. She had stopped doing that weeks before. He supposed it was because she felt guilty about seeing when Lázaro could not see at all. She spoiled the boy, seemed to want to enter his world of darkness. He had noticed that she had become frugal with lamplight. But it was a minor irritation. If she wanted to be blind like the boy, that was a small thing, not worth mention.
He had dressed earlier, eaten a breakfast of tortillas, biftec and red beans soaked in salsa casera his wife had made from the tomatoes, chilies and herbs she grew in their garden. He wiggled his toes and stood up, satisfied that the boots would not pinch, for they were new, traded for in horns and hides, for he, like many of the other ranchers, had little money for such necessities.
“What will you do this day?” Pilar asked him.
“Pray,” Benito said.
Pilar, who had aged so much over the years, looked up at him, her face framed by black hair streaked with ribbons of gray. It broke Benito’s heart to look at her. In a way, now that she had the syphilis, she was as afflicted as Lázaro. Matteo hadn’t understood and Benito knew the boy hated him. Someday he was sure to return to the Rocking A and demand retribution. If only he could explain to the boy how it had been, how Victoria had treated Pilar like a slave, a surrogate for her own mad desires to mother a child. Jaime, his older brother, had been the one with luck. The Apaches had killed him and he died a merciful death.
“What will you pray for?” Pilar asked.
“For our souls, my precious.”
“I have prayed enough for both of us.”
“It was just a joke, Pilar. My soul has long been consecrated to hell.”
“Do not talk that way, my husband. It is not something to joke about.”
“I know. I am just tired, nada más. Tired of fighting the land, of raising the cattle, of fighting the Apache and the Comanche, the bandits who ride up from Mexico across the Río Bravo.”
“This land is paid for en sangre, Benito. Blood! You must see that it produces wealth for you and me, for our son, Lázaro.”
Benito winced. Of course the blind boy would inherit the Aguilar lands—if they had not all been sold off before Lázaro grew to manhood.
“Some of the cattle have the pinkeye,” he said. “I want to keep the rest of the herd from becoming infected.”
“Be careful you do not get the disease yourself,” she said.
“Why? Because it would make me blind?” He hated himself for that little cruelty, but he could not pass up an opportunity to open Pilar’s mouth, let her speak what was in her heart. She talked mostly to the boy of late, seldom to him, her husband.
“There are worse things than being blind,” Pilar said.
“And what would these things be? Having the syphilis?”
“Benito, you do not need to be cruel. And you should not speak of such things in front of Lázaro.”
“What should I speak of? The black leg. It is a disease of cattle, like the pinkeye. Syphilis is a disease of the human being.”
“Cállate,” Pilar said. “Be quiet.”
“Should the boy not hear of these things? How will he be a man? Have you told him that he has a little worm inside him that will eat his flesh until he becomes like a leper, and after that, the little worm will eat into his brain until he goes mad?”
“Benito, must you be so cruel?”
“I do not mean to be, Pilar. But you hide the truth from the boy. Even if he had eyes, he would never see through the darkness you throw over him like a cloak.”
“It is not necessary that he know about ugly things.”
“Y porque no? Is blindness a gift, then? As long as one can not see a thing it does not exist.”
“I do not mean to say that,” Pilar said.
&
nbsp; “You make Lázaro feel that he is special, that God has given him blindness so that he may become a curandero, missionary, a messiah, perhaps.”
“El es muy especial.” Pilar never raised her voice as she laved her blind son with the hot cloth. She began to dry him, crooning to him beneath her breath as if he were a small child. Lázaro seldom spoke when Benito was in the room. As if he understood that there was some barrier between him and his father.
“Yes, he is special,” Benito said wryly. “Like the cattle with the pinkeye. They cannot see and they become very dangerous, attacking every sound with their long horns.”
“Ten cuidado, my husband.”
“I will be home after dark, Pilar. Will you light a lamp for me so I do not have to stumble to my bed in the darkness?”
“Cómo no?” she said.
“Be a good boy, Lázaro,” Benito said to the boy.
“Yes, Papa,” Lázaro said.
As he left, Benito strapped on his pistol and grabbed his pouch and powder flask, along with his rifle. Always the weapons, he thought, always the danger. Always the Apache.
8
PILAR DRESSED LÁZARO quickly after Benito had left. The light was just seeping through the kitchen windows, spreading over the counters and the table like a thin cream.
“There,” she said to her son, “you are immaculate and dressed in fine clothes.”
“Thank you, Mama,” he said. “Was Papa mad at you?”
“Not.”
“Was he mad at me?”
“No, my son. He loves you.”
“Not like you do.”
“Well, a mother’s love is different.”
“Special?”
“Special.” She smiled.
“What is the syphilis?” he asked.
“It is not something to concern you. Papa was just talking. He is worried about the cattle.”
Lázaro turned to his mother, smiled crookedly. She touched his face with her hand, caressing his cheek with the backs of her fingers. “You are very handsome,” she said.
“Someday I will make you and Papa proud of me.”
“I know you will, my son. Someday you will be a grandee. You will own much land and you will have a beautiful wife and be happy.”
“I do not want you to ever go away from me, Mama.”
“I will never leave you, Lázaro.”
But even as she said the words, she did not know if she believed them. She would grow old and die someday. Would Lázaro truly grow to be a man and be able to live in his world of darkness with so many evils to fight, to overcome?
“Good,” he said. “I love you, Mama.”
“And I love you, Lázaro.” She squeezed his hand and they walked out the back door to gather eggs even as the rooster was crowing at the rising of the dawn. And there were tears in her eyes as she thought of leaving the boy behind when she died. Leaving him all alone, at the mercy of the world. And behind her dread of Lázaro’s fate was an even larger fear, one she and Benito had never discussed. But she knew that one day this fear would become a reality that they all must face. And the memory of another son loomed large in her mind. Matteo Miguelito, from her own womb, but not Benito’s son. She had seen the hatred in his eyes before he had gone to Mexico. The hatred and loathing. Yes, Matteo Miguelito would be back someday, to claim what was rightfully his. What would happen to her beloved Lázaro on that day?
Pilar shuddered to think about it.
9
THEY EMERGED FROM the mists of morning by ones and twos and threes, like resurrected beings. They joined together in some mysterious way until they were a band once again, as if some secret signal had passed between them after the storm had scattered them and decimated their ranks. Mythical pieces of some slain giant come together after the storm had passed, melded into one magnificent fighting unit once again by the sun. The Apaches rode their ponies as one being, in perfect unison, back toward Frontera Creek. Not a word was spoken among them, but all away from the empty space where a pony and rider had once been, where a friend and fellow warrior was no more.
Cuchillo had been driven away by the storm and the flooding, but he was not one to leave his wounded or his dead behind him. He returned to Frontera Creek with his braves and saw that the vaqueros were back in their casitas, cleaning up. They were all armed, carrying rifles and machetes and some standing guard. They had not regrouped their horses in the corrals and the cattle were scattered through the brush like deer.
He wheeled his horse from his concealed vantage point above the line camp and his braves turned their horses as if they all were on a single wheel and followed him as he picked up the tracks of Juanito and Chato and Ojo. Cuchillo had been on such spoors before, and he rode with a heavy heart, for he could read a blood trail as well as any man raised with the earth and sky and all creatures brethren to him.
A day passed before Cuchillo read the signs in the sky and knew that they would find dead things on their journey.
There were many buzzards in the sky and on the ground where Ojo had slain his horse and eaten the animal’s heart and liver. And coyotes had been at the corpse during the night and early morning. He ordered his braves to pile stones on the remains of the horse. Then the Apaches rode on, staring at the circling buzzards riding the air currents.
Cuchillo came to the place where Ojo had been slain. They scared the vultures away and saw that the little dogs had fed on their compadre during the night, tearing at his flesh and bones, leaving a hideous pile of human remains and scattered, half-gnawed bones. Like a man reading a map, he studied all the signs until he had absorbed all the terrible secrets of the earth. They had found the dead pony and Cuchillo had seen what happened there and now knew the whole story of Ojo’s last moments as a man before he became a spirit once again.
“We will bury this warrior with his brave horse and lay with him the sacred objects of our people and the tools of war,” Cuchillo told the others. “We will not mention his name again, but we will hear it in the wind and in the call of the owl. Ojo died bravely and his hair was not taken. We will tell his widow where he lies and that he faces the east. Go and do these things. Bring his pony to this place and pile the rock high so that the coyotes and the buzzards will feed no more on the flesh of our brave friend.”
And when this was done, and the smokes had been offered to the great spirit and tobacco to the four directions, the Apaches rode away.
Cuchillo’s son, Culebra, rode with his father and asked him about death.
“What happens when a man dies, my father?”
“There are many stories, my son. But I like one that I heard some moons ago, one that satisfies me like no others.”
“What is that, my father?”
“It is said that the Great Spirit lives inside each man, and when the man dies, the spirit returns to the Father of All. A little spirit joins a big one. We cannot see this spirit, but it is like the breath and it leaves on the wind of death.”
“I do not understand it.”
“That is why I am going to tell you what I heard from one who is not of our people, but it makes sense to me.”
“Who told you this thing?”
“It was one of those whining, begging Lipan Apaches.”
“You take this man’s word?”
“It was not his word. It was told to him by another. The other was one of the men who killed our brother two suns in the past.”
“I am very confused, Father.”
“The one they call Mickey Bone talked with me some moons ago. He wishes to go back to his people, the Lipan, the Querechos. He was once called Miguel Hueso.”
“I know the man,” Culebra said.
“We spoke of death and he told me what he thought it might be. If we cannot see spirit, he said, then we must speak of things we can see in the mind.”
“And what were these things?”
“Bone said that when a man dies, it is like the rattlesnake shedding its skin. It becomes new again. But,
he said, death was more than that, more mysterious, and so I listened to him.”
“And then what did this Bone say to you, Father?”
“He said that death was like a rattlesnake shedding its skin, only what emerges is not a snake, but a bird, and it flies off into the hidden world and all we see is smoke where it disappears. That is spirit, and maybe we hear the bird sing for a time, but once it has flown away it can never be heard or seen again in this world.”
“That is a good way to see death,” Culebra said.
“I hope you will tell your grandsons what I have told you.”
“But you heard it from a Lipan, the filth of the world.”
“Bone was only a messenger. He heard this thing from another as I have told you.”
“And who is this other, Father?”
“You know this man too, but you have not spoken to him, nor have I had words with him. He is the one from far away who knows the heart of the wild cattle and brought the cattle from far away to make new cattle for Martin Baron. Bone thinks he is a curandero, a kind of holy man who heals the spirit, not one who heals the body. He says that he knows many words and has read the talking signs in the paper skins they call Bibles.”
“He is the one who is not a Mexican, but looks like one and speaks the same tongue.”
“Yes. He is called Juanito Salazar and he is from a place where they grow silver in the mountains. It is called Argentina in the Spanish tongue.”
“Ah,” said Culebra. “And do you think this Juanito is a curandero?”
“I do not know. But he is very strange and he speaks of unknown things like a wise man speaks. Bone thinks he is a medicine man.”
“But if he killed our friend, then we will kill him.”
“Yes, Culebra. We will kilł him. Like Baron, like Aguilar, he is our enemy. We do not want him here, so we must take away his life.”
“I would like to cut out his heart,” said Culebra, who had not yet learned all there was to learn about war.
Cuchillo said nothing, but his lips pursed a little, as if he were smiling.
