Gabriel's Story

by David Anthony Durham

  When the wolf moved, it did so suddenly, as if all reserve had been cast away. It shoved its head into the crack of the door and tried to squirm through. The boy forgot the rifle and fell back against the wall and stared at it. The wood bucked and shimmied against the rope latch, then gave with a crack. The wolf stepped forward. The boy couldn’t believe the size of its head. It was a monster of a head, a disembodied thing with enormous eyes. Its snout was longer than his forearm, with flaps of skin that pulled back from its teeth in exertion and hunger and anger. Behind this came a body somehow small by comparison, bony and barely capable of bearing the weight of its skull and all the more grotesque for it. The creature paused in the door and surveyed the barn with quick jerks of its head, taking in the frantic horse and mule and the crazed pig, which was trying to burrow through the wall of the barn. Then it looked at the boy.

  The boy saw the hairs on the creature’s back rise up. He saw its teeth standing like so many ivory phantoms in the dim light. And he saw into its skull through the sockets of its eyes. That’s when he remembered the gun. As the beast leapt toward him, he brought the rifle up to his chin and pulled, aiming into the blur of motion before him. He fell back with the kick of the gun and bounced off the wall and landed on his knees. He came up lashing out with the butt of the rifle, pulling the trigger again and again, although there was nothing left to fire. Only slowly did he realize that he was still alive and that the wolf was not upon him. He spun around, searching out the corners of the barn. But there was nothing, only Raleigh and the mule and the pig and the nervous clucking of the one remaining hen.

  He could never truly believe that the kick of the gun had been so great. In his dreams for many nights to follow, the kick was actually the force of the wolf’s chest butting against the rifle and ac cepting his bullet. But in real life there was no sign that the wolf had been shot. No body, no blood, nothing except the tracks that proved it had actually been there. How he could have missed it he would never understand. The wolf didn’t come back again, but the victory left the boy with a deep sense of something unfulfilled.

  ON A MORNING TWO DAYS OUT OF SANTA FE, the group came to the top of a sandstone ridge and looked down upon a farm. It was a complex of three structures, a main house and two barns, which sat next to a shallow river. Behind the house and lining the river ran well-tended rows of corn, among which a man and a woman worked, heads down and moving slowly up the lanes, oblivious of the watchers above. At the back of the house, two teenage girls washed clothes, occasionally laughing and flicking soapy water at each other. The whole valley was lightly dotted with firs, which shimmered in the morning breeze and sent their green smell wafting up the ridge. A goat munched on the sparse grass at the far edge of the field, and a single mule grazed from a long tether on the spit of land within the river’s fork. The place conveyed a sense of idyllic tranquillity. Gabriel couldn’t help but think of his own family, the green grass, the sod house, the people and the quiet warmth therein.

  Marshall led them forward. He hailed the family from a hundred yards. The two heads in the field snapped up. They exchanged some words. The woman circled quickly around the house, gathered the two girls, and disappeared inside. The man walked forward to welcome them. He looked to be a mestizo, mostly of Spanish descent but with features that also betrayed Indian ancestry. His legs were slightly bowed, his arms somehow short for his body, but his face had a strength to it, a quiet, polite calm, which instantly seemed both a greeting and a warning. His nose was prominent and sharply hooked, and his beard was carefully kept. He stood before the horsemen, wiping his hands with a handkerchief, and greeted them in Spanish.

  Marshall looked at Rollins as if something in the greeting would amuse him, then back at the man. “Howdy,” he said. “This here’s a beautiful spread you got. I never would’ve thought it, all this desert around the place. Little Eden. Hope you don’t mind us passing through.”

  The man watched Marshall, looked over the other men, and answered, switching into English without comment, “Thank you. You’re welcome to pass.”

  Marshall nodded. An awkward moment followed, a tense silence as the man waited for a response or movement from the travelers. Marshall seemed too enraptured by the tranquillity of the place to notice. He inhaled deeply and tilted his head to the side. “Listen to that creek. Ain’t that nice? Just gurgling like that.” Dallas affirmed that it was nice—right pretty-sounding, he thought. Marshall wondered out loud how far it was to the next creek, wondered if they’d find as nice a place as this to take some lunch and water the horses. He let the question hang in the air until the man made his offer, the offer he must make in that land of few homes and unwritten hospitality. Marshall accepted.

  The man called to his wife. Almost instantly she appeared. She cracked the door open, paused, then slipped through and pulled the door closed behind her. The man asked her to prepare a lunch for the visitors. She went back into the house and returned with a cutting board at her waist, holding a large knife in the other hand. She set them down on a wooden table. A moment later the two girls emerged from the house, one carrying a plate of corn tortillas and the other a slab of bacon. They looked to be in their early teens, one slightly older than the other, both slim and tall, taller already than their father. Despite their demure manner, their down-turned faces, the short steps with which they walked, and the plain dresses they wore, or perhaps because of these, the girls betrayed a budding, youthful sensuality. Rollins let out a low whistle. The mother’s eyes cut him, but she made no comment.

  Marshall instructed the others to water the horses and stake them out. Once this was done, the men gathered under the firs and listened as Marshall and the man spoke.

  “This is a hell of a lonely country, ain’t it?” Marshall began.

  The man agreed that it was, but he said it suited them well. They were prospering here and enjoying the quiet toil of the earth and the solitude.

  “What about Indians, bandits and that? You feel safe, what with the womenfolk and all?”

  The man said that he enjoyed good relations with the nearby Indians. They traded often, and he’d found them to be nothing save peace-loving, curious folk, simple in the way of God’s first children and thus beautiful. He said also that he had a son, a strong young man who was away just now but who was a comfort to them all in their solitude. He was a soldier, a vaquero, a son and brother, all at once.

  “He’s talented, your son. Jack of all trades.”

  The man agreed. He stroked the dark hair of his mustache with his fingers. “He is good at many things.”

  Marshall smiled and turned to his companions. “These here are good folk, living a good life. You hear that, Dallas? You should learn something from this.”

  Dallas nodded, although his attention was on the girls.

  “Hey, Dallas, you hearing me?” The boy nodded. Marshall turned to the man. “Think Dallas there’s much impressed with your daughters. Fine family you’ve got. Makes me a little envious, tell you the truth.”

  Once the women had set out the food, the wife led the girls off a little distance to eat by themselves. Rollins stood and asked them back to the table. They would not come, and the man said that was the way it should be. Marshall told Rollins to sit down and act like he had some sense.

  As they ate, Marshall probed the man further with questions about his life. The man answered him politely, thoroughly, as if it were his duty, one that he didn’t take lightly. Yes, it was a joy to father a family and see the children grow. No, he wouldn’t give it up for anything. Yes, his family had come north from Mexico several generations ago, from the Guadalajara region. And yes, it was difficult to say where his heart and loyalties lay, being part of a conquered territory, beaten, but not truly accepted into this so-called union. While there were few in Nuevo Mexico who bore his familial name, there were many who did in Viejo Mexico. This he would never forget.

  Despite his cordial responses, the man watched the group with slight disdain,
which he did not give voice to but which he couldn’t help showing all the same. His eyes said that it was rude to ask such questions and that only his good manners prevented him from pointing this out. If Marshall noticed this, he gave not the slightest sign. He chatted on between mouthfuls of food, so completely engrossed by the man’s words and so unaware of what his body was saying that Gabriel felt a tingling low in his back. He didn’t know what was going to happen here, but he feared that the peace of the afternoon was too much like a blank page and these men were too anxious to write their history on all things pure.

  After lunch the men lounged around, showing no signs of haste. Their postures were relaxed enough, but their eyes moved with quick, nervous shifts, landing often on the man, the girls, the wife, and then sliding to Marshall. The woman went inside. Shortly after, Dallas sidled off to where the girls were back at the washing. He moved casually, as if taking in the air over there and enjoying the view of the river without a clear thought in his head. When he finally turned to face the two, he seemed almost surprised to discover that the girls were so near at hand. Gabriel heard the beginning of his conversation: “Hey, y’all girls speak American?” He moved a little closer and looked to be helping them with the laundering.

  Marshall told the Mexican that their destination was California. He asked him about the country to the west of here, and the man told him what he knew of it. He said it was high desert country, that they were at the edge of a plateau that stretched for two hundred miles, that beyond that there were more mountains. A bad country, he called it, many scorpions and few people. They should conserve their water, for there would be little this time of the year. Beyond that, he said, the land leveled again and was desert until you reached more mountains. Somewhere beyond that was the Colorado River, and beyond that California, but he could not speak with detail, for he had never been that far. He said it would be a long trip, but he wished them a good voyage.

  “Oh, it’ll be a good one,” Marshall said.

  “Why do you make this trip?” the man asked.

  “Well . . .” Marshall waved the question away. “Hey, here we’ve shared your table and all that and had this nice talk, but I don’t even know your name.”

  The man smiled. “I find travelers are often slow to speak of names. I am Diego Maria Fuentes.”

  Rollins guffawed. “Maria?”

  The man looked at him without apology. “Yes. It’s not as it sounds, though. My—”

  There was a shout. They all turned in time to see one of the girls shove Dallas with such force that he stumbled backward down the shallow slope and fell into the river. He stood up cursing, and the things that happened next followed each other so fast that Gabriel could hardly keep the string of events in order. The door to the house flew open and the woman emerged, brandishing a long slaughter knife. She flew toward her girls and beyond, toward Dallas. The boy drew his pistol in a flourish that sent a spray of water into the air and sighted on her. The father stood to move, but Rollins stopped his progress with one of his long, stiff arms.

  “What, you think I won’t shoot a woman?” Dallas yelled. “Goddamn, what the hell you thinking, pulling a knife on me? I’ll shoot you dead just as soon as look at ya.” His gun hand jerked with his words, impassioned and yet unsteady. The boy cast a quick look at Marshall. “I wasn’t even doing nothing. Just told the girl she smelled like strawberries.”

  The Mexican, still trapped behind Rollins’s arm, whispered God’s name quietly and spoke Marshall’s aloud. He pushed the arm away and began to move forward. His body seemed divided between two disparate inclinations. His hands gestured for appeasement, drew calming circles in the air, and tried to wave the tension away. But his eyes and lips betrayed him, respectively cutting the boy with all the venom they had and muttering a quick string of Spanish expletives.

  Whether Dallas would have understood the man’s words was doubtful, but Marshall seemed to grasp them clearly enough. He swung on the man, drew his pistol, and stopped him with the butt of it. The impact across his mouth knocked out four of his front teeth. He stumbled backward and fell flat on his back. He struggled to his feet, but Marshall hit him again with the pistol, across the forehead this time. As the man stood, dazed, Marshall swung the full force of his kick to the man’s groin. He went down.

  Marshall stared at him a moment. “I can’t stand to hear my men talked about that way, leastways not by yourself. Dallas may be the son of a whore and a mongrel dog, but it ain’t your place to say it.” He turned to the others. “Damn! Just when I was enjoying the afternoon, too. Dallas, you damn horny toad, what are you playing at? Now look what you’ve gotten us into. Look at this fella. Just a minute ago we were doing a little polite conversating. But you had to act a fool, and he had to go and get uppity.”

  Rollins, so excited that he sprayed moisture with his words, stood before the man with his fist swinging low before his face, waiting for the slightest provocation to lash out. “Damn right, he got uppity! Mexicans are the uppitiest sons of bitches next to niggers! But now look at him.”

  The man’s eyes rolled. He tried to stand, even reached out toward Marshall, for support or to do him injury. Marshall slipped away from his fingers and pushed Rollins back in the same motion. All his attention was focused on the man’s movements, on the gurgling sound his throat was making and the blood that poured freely from his forehead and the corners of his mouth. Dunlop walked toward the man with outstretched arms, but before he reached him, Marshall tossed his gun to his left hand and punched the man with his right. The blow snapped the man’s head around and sent flying a froth of blood and spit. The man fell on his face and groveled in the dirt.

  Dunlop stooped over him as if he would help but feared to touch him. Marshall looked at the Scot with revelation in his face.

  “Look at him, Dunlop. The worm does turn, doesn’t it?”

  Shouts from Dallas redirected their attention. He had the woman on her knees, with his pistol aimed dead at her forehead. He was yelling at her, and she was trying to respond but could scarcely utter a word for his cursing. Caleb slipped behind the woman, took the knife from her, threw her down, and bound her hands and legs as he would bind a calf for branding. Dallas turned his gun on the two girls, who stood in such complete shock that they seemed to understand nothing, not even the function of the weapon aimed at them.

  A moment passed in stillness, each person frozen in a posture of crime or torture, each stunned at the prospect of what the next moment might bring. The tinkling of the river played in the silence; a crow called in the distance; the horses watched the human antics with apprehension. Gabriel felt he could scarcely breathe. He stood trapped by the stretched moment in time.

  It was Dallas who broke the stillness. He smiled. Whether the smile was enough to change the direction of the men’s actions or whether they had shared a plan from the outset, Gabriel couldn’t say. But he watched it unfold, an almost silent chain of actions that couldn’t have been smoother if choreographed. Caleb dragged the woman across the ground and set her beside her husband. Marshall waved his hand toward the girls, and Rollins and Dallas took them inside. The girls walked like numb creatures to be directed, with no fight, just eyes hungering for their parents, seeing their state and then following the men’s directions. Dallas broke the silence by asking if the other men figured the girls were virgins. Marshall said he figured they were. Yes, he figured they were. Then they were gone into the house.

  Gabriel looked at James, and he back. They both looked at Dunlop, who pulled his eyes slowly from the man at his feet. His gaze passed over the boys and fell on the house. He stared at it with an emotion that grew as the silent seconds passed. His cheeks trembled; his jaw worked up and down as if he would speak. He mumbled something, shook his head, and stumbled forward. He moved in a trancelike state, carried forward by something beneath his conscious mind. His steps were wild and clumsy and barely kept him upright. And they were short-lived.

  Caleb was up and ove
r the picnic table and to Dunlop in a few strides. He kicked the man’s feet from under him, drew his gun as he fell, and landed on top of him, his knee digging into Dunlop’s back, the muzzle of his pistol pressed into his neck. Dunlop cried out, sounds that were not words, that were not even protests of pain but howls of a torment that language couldn’t explain. His feet thrashed in the dirt and his fingertips gripped the earth, but Caleb held him down.

  Gabriel took a step toward them, but he was stopped before he could even form a clear thought. Caleb didn’t change his grip on Dunlop, but his eyes flashed a threat at the boy. Gabriel froze, and the man went to work binding Dunlop’s hands. He didn’t feel the need to check the power of his threat. And indeed, there was no need.

  Gabriel stood immobile, James at his side, watching. Caleb tied the parents together, back to back, with efficient, silent motions. He then sat biting his fingernails, listening to the stony silence that came from the house, watching the couple and the boys with his coal-black, narrow eyes. When the men emerged from the house, they did so triumphantly, throwing about jokes and laughter, pushing one of the girls before them, the one who had shoved Dallas. She was bound at the wrists and blindfolded. There followed an argument that Gabriel caught very little of, as he was staring at the girl. She stood as still as he, head straight, chin raised, and jaw set tight. Her blouse was ripped open down the front and her skirt was crumpled and soiled. She stood until Rollins grabbed her by the wrist and led her toward the horses. She walked with a limping, pained progress, but she did not fight.

  The argument, which Gabriel had missed, had been won for the moment by the baser demons of the men’s nature. The whole group mounted and rode, the girl on one of her father’s horses, a long-legged gelding that was strung by the halter behind Rollins. Dallas led a paint mare away in a similar fashion, loading her up with various objects that he took a fancy to. Only Caleb stayed behind. As Gabriel reached the rise on the far side of the house, he cast one last glance back. Caleb sat a few feet away from the couple, seeming from the distance like a friend sharing the afternoon. A form stepped from the house: the other girl. With that last glimpse, the land pushed its elbow in between them and the homestead was no more.