Love, Let Me Not Hunger

by Paul Gallico

  Rose and Mr. Albert came into the area striding side by side, and oddly in step as though making an entrance into the arena. Rose had wrapped herself in her dressing gown, but Mr. Albert was still in his undershirt and needed only a red nose and a funny hat to make him look the perfect clown.

  They stared transfixed at the dead horse upon its side and the grotesque figure still perched upon it, almost like a burlesque of the high school riding act where the mount goes to its knees and then lies down and plays dead beneath the feet of its rider.

  For a moment Rose’s mind was steeped in the horror of the scene. Rose, who never had known beauty before, now turned to beauty as an anodyne to abomination. She raised the poor horse from the dead and recreated it in her mind as it had been in life in gleaming brass and leather harness, muscles moving exquisitely beneath the dark gloss of its hide, and the proud, tossing head topped by the gay feathers in red, white, and blue, nodding and waving as the handsome, vital animal went through its evolutions, turning and wheeling, circling, always finding its numbered place. She had been a part of this act and its beauty, clad in a blue spangled evening gown; she had learned the rhythm of the horses and how to move in and out of their patterns, and bring applause to the tall, thin man in immaculate riding clothes who guided their performance.

  Now he was a naked, ridiculous figure in cowboy boots, sobbing upon the neck of his palomino. The Liberty horse lay dead at her feet. And the dwarf, at whose antics and tumbles she had so often laughed, was now a hideous, maggoty little figure perched upon the cadaver.

  She stole a glance at Mr. Albert and saw, to her surprise, a curiously avid expression upon his features, and was astonished to find that she read his mind as though what he were thinking were printed in large letters upon a bill-board.

  Indeed, the next moment her guess was verified when Mr. Albert, reaching far back into the time of his childhood when he was a schoolboy before the first war, said, “Bags I for the cats.”

  It seemed, then, to Rose that this simple phrase dispelled some of the horror and the terror and the foulness, and that what had been done needed to be done. She thought of the great tiger, his fur now matted and mangy from malnutrition, his incandescent eyes dulled, and the gusto with which he would devour flesh and crunch bone, and of how the fire would return to his glance, the gloss to his coat, and the deep, contented purr to his throat. Pity was something Rose had only recently learned. It had never been in the curriculum of the hard school in which she had been brought up. She put it aside now. First things, like surviving, came first, and she dearly loved the tiger.

  She said, “We can feed Rajah, King, and Bagheera now.”

  Mr. Albert’s eyes gleamed in the lantern light, and he said, “Yes, yes, yes!”

  The heavy features of the dwarf composed themselves into a smirk of satisfaction, and he pounded the neck of the dead animal with a little fist as though claiming possession. “Hokay,” he said, “I not afraid to do it, any time. I give you but first I give my doks. Hokay?”

  From without the wall came the noisy grinding of a vehicle coming to a stop, heavy breathing, footsteps, the creak of leather and the clash of arms and equipment. Two of the Spanish guardias civiles who had been patrolling nearby burst into the finca, carbines at the ready. One of them shouted in Spanish, “Stand still! Nobody move! Qué pasa aqui?”

  There seemed to be blood all over now, red in the rays of the augmented light produced by the lamps of the police. There were the mother-naked figures of Janos and Toby, and Deeter except for his boots, the long-barrelled black gun still clutched in Toby’s hand and the knife in that of the dwarf, and the old man and the girl looking down seemingly unmoved.

  One of the policemen asked again sharply, “What is this?” and waved the carbine at all of them, as though he wished only a move to be made so that he, too, could shoot and bring about blood and death.

  And now a strange thing happened. It was the unstrung Deeter who brought about the closing of their ranks against the aliens, as though he had never gone to pieces and wept over the escape of his horse like a frightened girl. For he took his arms from about the neck of the palomino as if he had been only adjusting her bridle and, with his countenance quite changed, stern and sardonically set, moved into the circle of light.

  “Why,” he asked in his border Spanish, “what does it look like?”

  The cool, drawling voice took the wind and bluster out of the policeman, who could only repeat, somewhat ineffectually, “What has happened? A shot was fired.”

  Deeter’s eyes were mocking now. “We’ve killed a horse,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “To feed our animals. What do you think?”

  “You had no right—”

  “Why not? It’s our horse.”

  The policeman said, “It was forbidden to touch anything. These are the property of the Court until released.”

  Deeter managed to laugh, lapsing into English. “You ain’t going to have any property at all pretty soon, you silly bastards. What’s worth more—a horse or them there wild animals? They’ll be starved to death in another week. Go back and tell that to the Court. We told you we didn’t have any more money for food. All they gave us was a run-around.”

  The two carabiñeros shrugged and relaxed their weapons. The spokesman said, “The judge will hear about this in the morning. In the meantime no one is to touch the carcass.”

  Deeter said, “Sure, sure, that’s all right. You tell your judge. We’ll see him in the morning.” And he smiled amiably at the police and then said, in English, “Okay, boys, beat it!”

  The two stood uncertainly for a moment, and then turned and went out. The engine of their jeep started up and they drove away.

  Deeter said, “I don’t suppose any of you punks can skin a horse?” He went over and took the knife from the hand of Janos. The dwarf cringed and for a moment a look of fear came over his heavy features.

  The smile was still on Deeter’s face as he said, “I’ll just keep this. I ain’t going to hurt you. It’s done, you bloody little bastard. Now get out of my way!” With the implement he made the first incision in the median of the horse’s belly, and with a single stroke opened the hide as though it had been fastened with a zipper.

  With Toby and Mr. Albert assisting, Deeter butchered the horse then and there. The smell of blood had been wafted to the menagerie, sending the starving carnivores into a frenzy. Terrible sounds burst from their throats as they attacked the bars of their cages. The place was a pandemonium of screams, yelps and ear-shattering roars.

  They fed them as the pearl-clear Spanish dawn broke over the horizon. There was no question about Mr. Albert’s distributing the food in the usual manner, opening the hatch to the cages and pushing in the pans. The portions had to be fastened to the ends of poles and thrust in between the bars where the maddened animals ripped and clawed at them, splintering the wood in their rush to get at the food.

  Rose forgot her own hunger in the satisfaction of seeing them eat. The horse that was had been forgotten; here was only meat as she was used to it hanging in butcher’s shops on the high street, and she herself took morsels of it to the smaller animals among the flesh eaters and tossed some entrails to the eagle.

  Toby and Deeter, their arms and legs splashed with blood, continued the quartering and the hacking, for it was agreed they would persuade the butcher with whom they had dealt in the market place to keep the meat in his cold room; otherwise in the summer heat it would spoil before it had been used up.

  After they had finished and the scene of the slaughter was covered over with fresh dirt, the men washed themselves. Deeter had gone grim and silent. He now wore the gun, which Toby had restored to him, hanging western style from the cartridge belt at his waist. He had removed Marlene Dietrich from the shed and tethered her to a wheel of his living wagon. He did not speak to Janos or issue threats against him. Strangely, the little man by his deed had grown very tall in their midst and his presence and hi
s action were felt by all of them. Toby, too, was aware of the fact that from then on he must be extra vigilant for the safety of the valuable rosin-backs and the fine Arabs that were the livelihood of this family and himself.

  All of the five were miserably oppressed; their dilemma was still with them, that problem which could only be solved by money; while the carnivores ate, the herbivores starved. When the hay they had bought with their last pesetas was gone, the last of the butchered horse devoured, what then?

  The full flush of morning, when the sun had climbed to its ten o’clock position, brought them a final irony and one wholly unexpected. For the old limousine taxi used upon official occasions drew up at the finca and disgorged Dr. Perrera. Following in a jeep were the guardias civiles who had been there the night before.

  The five were at their regular chores as the old gentleman, flanked by the two green-coated carabiñeros, marched slowly into the enclosure, and they emerged to meet them. Fred Deeter said out of the side of his mouth, “Ixnay, don’t crack. It’ll be about the goddamned horse. At least the old goat speaks English. Let me handle him.”

  As always, the Juez de Primera Instancia raised his hat and began with an exchange of politenesses and references to the glorious day. Finally, coming to the point, “—and it is particularly felicitous that under these circumstances I have good news for you. The very best, I am sure.”

  The five stood in a semi-circle, watching, waiting and listening breathlessly, the thought in the mind of each that Marvel had been heard from, that money had arrived perhaps, addressed to them through the judge, and their ordeal was over.

  “Yes,” continued the judge, “the very best of tidings. The Court has reached its decision, formulated upon the report of the pathologists in Madrid who have used the latest methods, something only recently discovered, I believe, having to do with carbon spectra.”

  Still they waited with only the smallest of cankers gnawing at the high hopes that had filled them, for after all the judge had said the news was good.

  “Based, then, upon these incontrovertible analyses, the Court has rendered the verdict of accidental death, an act of God, as it were. Poor Jorge Alvarez was killed instantaneously by either the first strike of lightning, the second, or both.”

  “And—?” It was Deeter who said it.

  “—and therefore you are now free to depart with your animals and your equipment.” The old man ceased speaking for a moment, regarded the panama hat he was still holding in his hand, and then looked up at them with a half-apologetic smile as he continued, “And we hope, without wishing to appear inhospitable, that you will take advantage of this decision. You are no doubt cognisant how welcome you have been in our midst, and how we have valued your exemplary behaviour. Yet, on the other hand, you will surely have been aware also that your presence has been something of a strain upon us. In fact, your liberation comes at a most opportune moment, for those charitable families who have been inviting you to their tables have just asked me how long this drain upon their resources is to continue. I was able to satisfy them with the news that since you would be departing at once there would be no further necessity for their generosity.”

  So violent was the implication of this irony that they did not fully grasp it at first, although Toby had managed to keep from getting lost in the labyrinth of the judge’s verbosity to the point where he translated it—“That means we don’t eat.”

  Deeter said harshly and bitterly, “So you want us to go—”

  Dr. Perrera said deprecatingly, “Would it not seem now that you are at liberty to do so—”

  The tall, lean ex-cowpoke put his hand upon his hips and drawled insolently, “Perhaps you’d like to tell us how?”

  The judge took no offence at the tone but gestured in the direction of the lorries and the wagons. “There,” he said, “all your property is intact. You have only to—”

  “—hitch up and pull out,” Deeter completed for him. “Well now, ain’t that nice. Now you listen to me. We’re broke! Flat! We haven’t got a centimo between us. We couldn’t buy enough gasoline to put into your eye. How do you think we’re gonna feed our animals? We’ve had to kill one of our horses to keep the cats alive. Where’s your goddamned S.P.C.A.? We’ve applied for help to your Señor Alcalde. The Señor passed the buck to the police. The cops passed it right back again.”

  For an instant Dr. Perrera looked both confused and distressed. “I had heard from the alcalde that you were in some difficulties. Unfortunately, it takes time for the proper authorities to act in these cases. However, when you notify your patron, Señor Marvel, that the Court has rendered a verdict in his favour, he will come at once to reclaim—”

  “Marvel’s taken a powder,” Deeter interrupted. “He’s disappeared. His old lady back home don’t even know where he is. We’ve telephoned.”

  “Look here,” Toby said suddenly, “when Marvel left you made him put up a bond of some kind. Anyway, I saw him give you a wadge of money. If he isn’t guilty like you say, give it back to us and we can get out of here.”

  The judge pondered this for a moment, and then a look of regret crossed his features. He replied, “Impossible, unfortunately. For the decision of the court only frees Señor Marvel from criminal responsibility. Since poor Alvarez was actually at the moment of death still in the employ of the circus, there remains civil liability, and the Court has turned the funds deposited by Señor Marvel over to the widow in compensation. And in view of what you have just told me about the extraordinary defection of your patron, it would seem—”

  “—that you had scored another bull’s-eye,” Deeter completed. “Heads you win, tails we lose. So what do we do now?”

  The courtesy of Dr. Perrera remained undiminished in spite of his disappointment and dismay at the turn events had taken. He had thought to be rid of the problem which had been affecting their community; now it was still with them. He said merely, “It is difficult, is it not? For the time being, then, you may remain where you are while I consult with my colleagues. You will, of course, prosecute your patron.”

  Deeter drawled sarcastically, “Oh, sure!”

  “Until later, then,” the judge said, and, entering his taxi, departed, followed by the police.

  Toby said, “So what will happen now?”

  Deeter said bitterly, “Nothing. You can bet your ass on that. The old goat’s up a tree.”

  Mr. Albert put in, “And in the meantime we don’t eat any longer.”

  “That’s for sure,” Deeter said.

  The camp, which had been peaceful and co-operative during the trying days when they had been expecting Sam Marvel back became filled with tensions again. They themselves were subsisting on scraps of meat from the butchered horse. As Deeter had forecast, there was no word from the judge or the alcalde or anyone in the town. They were out of sight, and if not out of mind, their plight would only be subject to a round-robin of buck passing between Madrid and Zalano and various municipal functionaries. The added problem that assailed them now was sleep. Someone had to watch over the horses.

  It was the second day after the visit of the judge that Fred Deeter announced quite quietly in the morning, “I’m pulling out of here.”

  Toby cried, “You’re doing what?”

  “You heard me,” Deeter said. “You know as well as I do that little son-of-a-bitch there is trying to figure out a way to kill my horse, and when he does I’m going to shoot him, and next time I won’t miss. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life rotting in a Spanish jug.” His trap mouth, set in a cynical grin, directed at Toby, “Unless, of course, the next is one of your horses, and if you’re a man then you’ll kill him.”

  Janos laughed. “Ho, ho, ho! How you know that? Sure I kill another horse till they all gone. Then I start on you.”

  Toby laughed. “So you’re running out on us? I always thought you were kind of yellow.”

  Deeter did not seem offended. “Well, not exactly,” he said. “I suppose every man�
�s got a bit of coyote in him. But I’ve had an idea. What were doing here now is just senseless, sitting on our asses, doing nothing. We couldn’t help it before, but the situation has changed now in two ways. For one thing, we know Marvel ain’t coming back, or at least nobody knows where the bastard is. And for another, you heard the judge say we’re free to go and move out what we can.”

  Toby asked, “What’s the point? We can’t move the lorries. And like you found out before, we can’t sell ’em either on account of the customs.”

  “That’s right,” Deeter said, “but there’s no duty on horses. There’s eight of Marvel’s Liberty horses left. They’re all in fair shape now since they’ve had a feed. I’ll ride Marlene, herd the rest up to Madrid, and sell ’em; and we’ll use the dough to get us all out of here. Then we’ll find Marvel and push his stinking face in.”

  Toby said suspiciously, “Why not sell ’em here, then?”

  Deeter laughed unpleasantly. “You’ve got a beautiful body but the brains of an acrobat, kid,” he said. “These are trained horses here. You gonna sell ’em for ploughing? They’re an act. They’ll fetch four times as much in Madrid. We’ll have to take it easy on account of the paved roads, but I ought to be able to make it in three to four days. There’s an all-year circus in Madrid. We may have to let ’em go cheaper, but they’ll fetch more than they will here. What about yours? I can sell those too!”

  Toby was not unaware of his dilemma. He swallowed hard and said, “They’re not mine to sell. They belong to my old man.”

  Deeter merely nodded and said, “Okay, suit yourself.” Then he asked, “Will you be able to get along until I get back?”

  To their surprise it was Rose who replied to this question with a sudden lift of her head and the parting of her lips. “Yes, we’ll get along,” she said. “You can go.”

  Now a curious kind of exchange of glances passed between the ex-cowboy and the girl, and so sharp were these looks, vivid and expressive, that it was almost as though they have been conversing with one another with words, yet no one knew exactly the meaning of it all, except that Mr. Albert had the feeling that somehow Deeter had lost a battle, for it was he who first turned his head away.