by J P S Brown
"So?"
"So he squeaked and gave me a dollar a head commission and instead of handing me my commission he said he would credit me against what he said I owed him." The Lion lowered his voice. "On top of that I owe Teresita a month's phone bill of long distance and room and board for myself and Lolita."
"Why didn't you get Squeaky to pay that before he left?"
"Me dio pena," the Lion said. "It embarrassed me."
"I didn't know a lion could be embarrassed?
"Sometimes we are embarrassed by our appetites," the Lion said mournfully, like an old lion with a stomach ache.
29
The Tailing
Colas means tails. Most animals have them. Indians say that a coyote gets his tail wet he can't run. He becomes, as it were, rudderless. That's how much his tail is necessary to his well-being because gf a coyote can't run he's as good as dead. Certainly the bovine is controllable by that handle so handy to the cowpuncher or the vaquero. A tail fits so easily into a man's hand and the tuft on the end of it will keep it from slipping a man's grasp. The tail is used by men to help the weak bovine to his feet, to wake up the sleepy bovine, to urge on a stubborn bovine who is ignoring what is best for him, to keep the mean and angry bovine from the balance he needs to drive a big horn into some poor unfortunate.
The undisciplined bovine might break and run and refuse to be turned by a horseman. He might never before have had occasion to respect a horseman. He might be running head up and bent on escape with a number 9 curled in his tail and be headed for the tall tules. The rider might not have time to tangle himself to a bovine with his rope. He also might not want to strangle the bovine. Strangulation often makes a whole relationship strained. The rider may have other business just as pressing at the moment as turning one bovine who sufers from the green eye. So he might grasp the bovine's most proximate hand hold. It then becomes only a simple matter to take all the wind out of the bovine by busting him down because a bovine on the dead run can be handled so easily by the tail a four-year-old on a fast horse can do it. When the steer gets his wind back and gets up you can be sure he'll hunt a friend, and the next time a horsemen comes coasting up to turn him he'll turn.
The Brahma steer kicked dirt into the adobe wall behind him as he sprinted through a small gate into the open. Mariano Piedras was waiting outside the gate for him. Mariano saluted the steer with hand to hatbrim and spurred his black mare broadside to him. The mare crowded the steer against the wall of a 60-meter track. She pressed the running steer so close to the wall that he lost balance and momentum for an instant.
This was not the first time this Brahma had been driven out of the barrier by the horsemen. He knew if he gained the lower end of the track he would escape. He was a strong 750 pounder. His Brahma blood gave him fleetness and grace and now he threw up his head and ran with all his might. The black mare coasted along close to his side until she was rating him, keeping pace with him. When her shoulder was even with the hip bone of the steer she neither gained more on the steer nor slowed down, but held her ground.
Mariano Piedras, smiling, reached down and patted the steer twice on the root of his tail. This gesture, called the pachoneo, like the salute to the hatbrim, was another formal preliminary to the event called the colas, the tailing of the steer. To Jim Kane, who was watching with great interest, the pachoneo resembled a caress, an indication that the steer now belonged to Mariano and Mariano was relishing putting an end to the flight of the steer. Mariano took the tail in his hand, leaned back in his saddle, and kicked his foot in its stirrup over the tail. He straightened in the saddle and wrapped the tail around his shin. He reined the mare away from the steer, opening a gap between mare and steer. The black mare backed her ears, thrust her muzzle forward, and, with nerve and muscle bunched in pulling the tail, passed the steer.
The Brahma's hind end was pulled around until it was almost directly behind the black mare before Mariano Piedras released the tail. The Brahma kept turning, doing. a little hopping dance to keep his feet, until he was looking directly back the way he had come. But now there were two different momentums working on him besides the force of gravity; the momentum of the pull of the black mare, and the momentum the steer had built up of lean, running steer. The hind end kept turning until the front end took over. The front end was still going the way it had been going before the tail had been jerked. The hind end could not catch up to the front end and the front end could not stop and wait for it. The steer fell smoothly on his side. He spun along the ground. He stopped spinning and rolled over on his back and got a good look at all four of his feet in the air. Finally he lay still, his hind end, his front end, and all his momentums back together again and Mariano Piedras had cinched the tailing competition of the day for his team.
Next, the announcer in the booth above the lienzo charm at the hacienda of Don Tomás Piedras requested Mariano to tail a steer a la Lola, Lola style. Mariano unsaddled the black mare and mounted her bareback with both his legs on the side," the steer would run. The announcers commentary sounded like this:
"¡Sale el novillo y sale el jinete! The steer is out and the rider is out!"
"¡El jinete saluda! The rider salutes!"
"¡Pachonea! He pats the steer!"
"¡Agarra la cola! He grabs the tail!"
"¡Levanta la pata! He raises his foot!"
"¡Arciona! He wraps the tail!"
"¡Y tumba! And throws the bull!"
The people watching the exhibition honked the horns of their cars and applauded. This was the finest exhibition of horsemanship Kane had ever seen. Mariano had been riding sidesaddle, no saddle, at full speed and had wrapped the tail on his leg. He had lain back over the mare to sustain the weight of the steer, had changed the momentum of the steer, and then had released the tail just before the weight would have snatched him off the back of the mare.
But near Kane was a cynic who was not impressed with what Mariano Piedras had accomplished. The cynic was a small boy, dirty, barefoot, shirtless, and wizened. He mimicked the announcers voice as he trotted about, intent on a game of his own;
"¡Sale el novilloooo, sale el jineteeee!" the boy sang.
"¡Saludaaa!"
"¡Pachoncaaa!"
"¡Agarra la cola!"
"¡Leoanta la pata! He lifts his leg!"
"¡Y mea! And pees!"
A horse race had been matched and Kane and the Lion drove to Don Tomás' airstrip to watch it. A crowd of men had formed at the finish line to drink and make bets. Cars and pickups lined the airstrip close to the finish line. The Lion left Kane at their car and joined the men to make his bets. He stood a foot taller than the rest of the crowd and his deep laugh sounded often.
Kane sat on the hood of his car and waited for the race to begin. The starter was nearly an hour shouting his "Santiago," his signal for the race to begin. A line had been drawn across the airstrip at the starting end. The Indian jockeys, their hair tied back with bandanna brow bands, their knees tied to their mounts by wide cloth straps, rode back and forth to the starting line. The starter required that they ride up and stand their horses' front feet on the line. He also required that all four feet of each horse to be on the ground before he would give the signal to start. A tall palomino horse was matched against a short, chunky, bay mare for four hundred meters. Four hundred varas, or stakes, one meter apart had been stuck in the ground in a straight line down the track to the finish. The horses would run on each side of the line of varas.
"¡Santiago!" the starter shouted and the race was on.
"¡El puro palomino!" the women shouted from the tops of the pickups. "The palomino is leading!
The men on the finish line crowded the sides of the track, barely leaving enough room on each side of the varas for the horses to pass. The closer the horses got to the finish line, the closer the men crowded into their path to see which one was leading. At the last instant before the palomino crossed the line, the crowd pushed back and the men tumbled and fell out o
f his way.
Kane went over to the crowd to see how the Lion had done on the race. The Lion was surrounded by arguing men and he was shaking his head and laughing. Chavarin was in a crowd of eight or ten men the Lion was collecting money from. The Lion collected from the last loser who owed him, saw Kane, and started walking toward him.
"Heh, heh, heh!" the Lion purred. Kane and the Lion had their backs to the men with Chavarin.
"¡Oye, gringo! I'll match my bay mare against that big sorrel cochinada, pig-slop, you ride," someone shouted. Kane turned and recognized Beto, the vaquero of Don Marcos Aguilera, who had taunted Kane drunkenly about Pajaro in the night at Tetamoa and whom Kane had seen riding the bronc mule in Chinipas. The boy must have flown in to Rio Alamos with the bush pilot who made regular flights to and from Chinipas. Chavarin was standing by him, laughing and hiding his rotten teeth behind his hand. Kane bet himself that Chavarin was encouraging Beto to brace Kane in the crowd. Kane turned away from them and walked on.
"He is afraid!" someone else called.
"So rich and so afraid!" another shouted.
"A coward!" another shouted. "Let him go."
"Gringo!" Beto shouted. Kane turned to go back. The Lion grabbed him by the arm.
"Don't pay them any attention," the Lion told him. "They are nothing but a bunch of cow thieves and liars. Chavarin is probably trying to instigate trouble."
Kane pulled away from him and went on toward them.
"Maybe they can fist fight as well as they can cuss fight," he said. He walked up to the bunch of them and faced Beto. Beto was cocky with his beer and his new hat, his new snap-button Western shirt, and his crowd of friends at his back. Kane knew how Beto felt at that moment. Kane had been Beto's size once and he admired the boy. He knew how Beto had lost the old hat riding a wild mule bucking in a canyon, in the Sierra and scattering Don Marcos' coffee all over the canyon.
"You think you are muy gallo, much rooster?" Kane asked him quietly. "Are you someone I know? Only my friends call me 'gringo' and I would like to know who you are and what you are, as I don't know you."
Beto said, "Don't get angry, we are all friends here."
"You may all be friends but I don't know any of you and I don't love you, so kindly from now on keep your mouth off me.
"You don't need to get angry," Beto said. "If you don't want to play your horse, we won't have a horse race."
"My horse is not a plaything but I have one that I play with and will run at you but not for little boys' marbles, for twenty thousand pesos," Kane said, making the brag a bluff and wondering if Pajaro could win a horse race and also wondering where in the hell would get twenty thousand pesos.
"Bring your horse and if we like him for an opponent when we see him we'll run for ten thousand pesos next Sunday," a fat little man yelled belligerently at Kane.
"I can't run next Sunday, " Kane said.
"You are afraid," Fatty said.
"Are you the only one who can set conditions for a race?" Kane asked him. "It takes two horses to make a race. You want me to drop everything I am doing and bring a horse to show to you so you can decide whether or not you will race? You don't want a race, you only want to scream insults."
"No one, except perhaps you, a gringo, is afraid of a little horse race," Fatty said.
"You look like the kind of agent anyone would be afraid to deal with. But don't be mistaken about me. I will take you on anytime and if I can't run you a horse race I can fight you a fist fight and win it, " Kane said. Mariano Piedras had been standing his horse nearby listening to the argument. Now he rode his horse between Kane and the gang around Beto.
"Jim," Mariano said. "You are on the wrong track. The charros are waiting for you at the clubhouse." Kane did not want to push the matter and spite Mariano. He and the Lion got in the car and went to the clubhouse to have a drink. Mariano joined them there.
"Be careful of this pack of bullies," he told Kane. "'The little one you were arguing with, the little fat one, is Gordo Toledo, a killer, a cutthroat, and a thief. He told me he would cut out your guts tonight and I told him if he tried it I would get my pistol and shoot him."
"All this talk of pistols, knives, and gutting, and gringos, is getting old and makes me tired," Kane said. ''It is time to shut the mouths and forget it."
The gang with Chavarin came into the clubhouse and sat across the room at the long meeting table of the charros. Beto was not with them. Two of them detached themselves and came over to Kane's table. Mariano introduced them to Kane and the Lion as his cousins.
"Hombre, Jim," they said, and patted Kane familiarly on the back, reminding Kane of the pachoneo before the tailing. "Don't get angry. We like racehorses, that's all. We are not fighters? They excused themselves then and went back to their bunch and started the insults again.
Mariano was tired from the competition of the day. The few bottles of beer he drank slowed his thinking and relaxed him. He sat loosely in his chair, his wide hat on the back of his head, his legs stretched out in front of him. His brother charros came to the clubhouse to congratulate him on winning the tailing and stayed to have beer with him. Mariano was holding forth like a young prince who had won the joust. He was not aware that the bunch at the long meeting table with Gordo Toledo and Chavarin were laughing and making jokes about Mariano, Kane, and the Lion. The jokes were all being directed at the two cousins, who were enjoying them and were acting as sounding boards for the jokes. Mariano was paying no attention to the voices of the bunch until Gordo Toledo began raising his voice so that Mariano could hear him.
"Mariano will be going to the United States now, I suppose," Toledo said to the cousins.
"Naturally," one of the cousins said.
"He always goes where his sister Adelita goes and we hear Adelita is going to the United States with a gringo very soon," another cousin said.
"She had better go before the little gringo inside her grows big enough to embarrass her," Gordo Toledo said.
Mariano grabbed a bottle and went at Toledo. The two cousins intercepted him before he reached the table and held him, trying to hold back the arm that held the bottle. He dragged them with him to the table and threw the bottle at Toledo. The bottle smashed against the wall behind Toledo and sprayed beer on him.
"Everyone at this table is my friend except you, Toledo," Mariano shouted. "Cow thief! You have no shame, you"—he pointed at Toledo over the heads of the cousins holding him—"who have been caught in the act of stealing my father's cattle. And my father forgave you. How can you come here to my father's house and insult my sister? Cow thief! Son of a bad act."
The cousins led Mariano out of the clubhouse.
"Do you know what I have been thinking?" the Lion asked Kane.
"What have you been thinking?" Kane asked, feeling exceedingly good with the effects of the beer and the prospects of a fight which he could not possibly lose because his cause, the cause of Adelita Piedras, was a worthy and just cause. The odds were exceeding right, eight to two, and Kane felt his companion, the Lion, was a fine mace to fight beside.
"I have been thinking that Gordo Toledo would be the most likely person in Rio Alamos to tell us what happened to our black-and-white corriente bull."
"Exactly what I have been thinking, caballero," Kane said. Delight in the Lion's truth and profundity tickled Kane's nostrils. "Probably if we rattle the teeth in that fat head we might induce the Gordo Toledo to buy a black-and-white corriente from us sight unseen."
"Yes, this is true," the Lion said.
"Let's go rattle them," Kane said.
"First we must plan the battle," the Lion said. `'Notice how smoothly they removed Mariano from the field. Notice also that Beto the vaquero did not come in. I know him and know he would not pass up your challenge of this afternoon, especially after he had time to think about it. Beto must be nearby. He is probably outside and he is probably horseback. If he is outside, Gordo Toledo and Chavarin want you outside where Beto can handle you from on ho
rseback. If you go outside and I don't go outside with you we will have one advantage?
"What advantage? Who needs an advantage against these mierditas?"
"The advantage that I will come out behind them while you occupy the front of them," the Lion said, barely moving his lips.
"How cunning you are, Lion. Are all lions so cunning?"
"Only when they are old and toothless and have worn and broken their claws," the Lion said.
Adelita Piedras came to the door of the clubhouse, saw Kane, and walked to his table. Kane stood for her and gave her a chair. She calmly sat down.
"Lion, you must not stay here any longer," Adelita said.
"Take Senor Kane with you and go back to Rio Alamos. That Beto is horseback outside bragging he is going to rope Señor Kane and drag him into the monte for all of them to get a piece of him."
"Don't worry about Jim," the Lion said. "No one is going to hurt him. We have business with these men. They owe us for a bull. None of this concerns you."
"It does concern me. I invited you here. I am going to leave here and I want you to leave with me."
"Adelita, you should not have come here. We don't need you to shield us," Kane said.
"You do not know these men," the girl said intensely. "Why do you wish to fight with them? What could you win? They have been planning to get you all day. They planned and bragged all through the charreada this afternoon about dragging you to the brush and stripping you and beating you up and doing other things to you."
"Ah, the evil fellows," said Kane, laughing. "I know what they plan to do because I heard them talking as did everyone else around them. I told them to leave you alone," Adelita said.
"Ah, thank you so much, girl," Kane said. "You see, your protection was to no avail. Don't feel too badly. They wouldn't be getting a virgin."
Adelita stood up behind her chair then, looked Kane straight in the eye and said, "Do as you like." She strode out of the room, her horsewoman's legs swinging, the hips in rhythm, the hand with the bracelets brushing her thigh.
