by J P S Brown
He rose. "I'm going to the arroyo to bathe," he said to the girl's back. "Have you a towel and some soap to loan me?"
"Towel?"
"A cloth to dry myself with?"
The girl measured Chombe steadily with clear, feral eyes. "The sun will dry you. Try the sun for a change." Chombe had always reminded her of the salamanders she saw when the rains made them move from under their rocks.
Chombe carried himself away as straight as he knew how while he swung his rifle with as much style as he could imagine. He went to a deep, clear pool out of sight of the camp, though he hoped secretly that the girl would watch him while he was naked. He thought his muscles were fine from hefting provisions in the store. He disrobed to his shorts, laid his rifle on top of his clothes and waded into the water, his back to the camp, expecting to feel the girl's eyes on his body. He went into the water and liked it on his genitals. He removed his shorts under water, flopped into an imitation of a dive, and made his best motions of swimming as he had seen swimming done. He splashed twice and was engulfed. He splashed with all his might and sank deeper, swallowing water before he could find the ground with his feet. He stood up and spat water in a long, strong, expert stream for a great distance to the bank just as though he had wanted to fill his mouth with water. The girl might have better regard for him if she thought he could swim and could see how well he could spit water.
He paddled and soaked and rubbed sand on himself and climbed out onto a sunny rock. His genitals were stimulated by the sun more than ever and part of them grew and filled and began to bother him. He went back into the water to calm them, but he touched them and the water moved him more in his desire for the girl. He got back onto the rock and could not dry himself fast enough. He saw an old track of Luz del Carmen's on the bank and he wanted to hold her foot. He wanted her foot, her hands, her eyes, her hair and her thighs for his own to use today. He splashed across the stream and put his dirty clothes on. He took his rifle and went to the camp, feeling cleaner, but smelling the same.
The girl was not in camp. He waited and she did not return. He walked around the house, ignoring his horse standing in the sun with a tight cinch, nothing to eat and no water to drink, drying and shrinking in the sun. The girl was not at the house. He went back to the deserted shade of the portal. He was so hungry for food and the girl that he was getting wild. He saw that a large batea, a wooden bowl used to wash placer gold, was gone. The batea had been full of dirty clothes on a chair by the table. Perhaps the girl had gone upstream to wash the clothes. He hoped she had not passed downstream by him. His face and especially his forehead became hot with shame. Maybe she had seen him fondling himself on the rock. He left the portal and walked carefully upstream. He saw her barefoot track on the deep trail. Then he heard her singing over the rush of the water. Hah! Knowing he was naked, she had watched him and then gone to the stream knowing she had aroused him.
In truth, Luz del Carmen bathed and washed clothes every day in the same place at this time, and she had gone this day too with no thought of him or his passions. Her only precaution against him had been to cross the stream where she was surrounded by boulders away from the brush and she could face the trail instead of having it at her back. She was in the sun instead of in the shade. She had bathed and put on a half slip that covered her up to her waist. She wore an old, floppy straw hat and she was bare to the waist. She was kneeling at the stream, singing and scrubbing her cloth on a rock. Her small, full breasts fit tightly between her working arms and she was singing in a high clear voice a song only known to her.
Chombe walked to the stream in full view of her and smiled for her. She did not look up. She rinsed and wrung out the cloth she was washing and stood and folded it over her breasts. She crossed the stream gracefully and walked past him toward the camp. He followed her closely and gorged on the sight of her shiny legs and shoulders, the movement of her tight hips and bottom under the thin slip. She walked through the shade of the portal and into the house. He could not make himself follow her, though the house had no door. He took his chair again and smiled, waiting. When she came out to the portal she was dressed. Her wet hair was combed straight to her shoulders and she smelled as clean as the sunny rock in the stream.
"Ready?" he said.
She did not answer him but went to a green tree in front of the house and hung her wash on its branches. When she came back to put wood on the fire he smiled at her again.
"Ready, now?"
"For what?" she asked, looking at him as though she did not know he was there unless he spoke.
"I'm going. Let's go."
"Go on, then. Good-bye. I hope it goes well with you."
"You're going with me, aren't you?"
The girl laughed. She was unacquainted with cynicism. She was only a small Indian girl, but she knew she was beautiful and she was no fool."¡Si, Chuy! Yes, Little Jesus, my great lord!" she said. She smiled until she had him fooled into smiling and then she sobered into her feral stare to watch his answering smile fade.
"You don't seem to have any feeling at all for me," he accused. "I'm serious."
"Yes, I have no feeling for you," she said, looking him in the eyes and staring him down. This was a special affront to him on this day, the day he had become confident of his killer's gaze. This was worse than her keeping her back to him. He reached for her, feinting, and he scared her. So, she was only another little mud hen of an Indian after all. He set the rifle down and his intent showed truly in his eyes this time. He was no longer feigning or acting a part to himself. His gaze was not the one he had been practicing.
The girl began to shake, but only she noticed it. She was mesmerized. This badness was suddenly happening to her. Her father had warned her to be careful when she was alone in this camp. She did not want to run. She would have to run all day and her father would miss her. She had work to do. This camp had always been a safe place for her.
"My father is coming. He wouldn't leave me here alone."
"Your father is working the roundup at Gilaremos. He isn't coming." Chombe sighed contentedly. The full intention of what he was about to do settled him. "Now come over here to me."
"No."
Chombe caught her hair as she whirled to run. He jerked her to him and grabbed her breast through popping buttons. She kicked her heel up and missed his swelling groin. She bit his arm, not hurting him. He laughed and turned her loose. He did not want to hurt her. He knew she must want him too.
"Little Indian," he laughed, when she faced him. She was tiny and within his easy reach.
"Ah, yes, and you are so blond," she said, because he was not blond. He was darker than she. "Salamander!" she hissed.
"All right, then. What do you want?"
"Leave me alone. That's all."
"No. Understand me. You are going with me. I have money. How much money do you want? What is your price?"
The girl, believing she had intimidated him by biting him, said, "How much did your fornicating mother charge?"
Chombe caught her again and controlled her by jerking and shaking her while he wrenched at her clothes and his own, and the moment he had hoped would be sweet and beautiful turned into a bumping, groveling, grunting struggle that demeaned him. He found himself on the ground with his head grinding against the table leg. The girl had become twisted and dirtied beneath his knees and he was barely able to hold her. Enraged because she had spoiled the goodness of his want for her, he knelt and looked at her, holding her tightly by a handful of hair. She turned away from him and became motionless, relaxed. He poked at her with the thrusts of copulation against her hip and she made no response of any kind. He stripped off the shreds of her clothes and dragged her into the house where bedding had been folded on a chair. He left her in the middle of the floor, unfolded a thin camp mattress and laid it beside her. He lifted her and laid her on the mattress. He looked for her face. It was hidden by her hair. Her eyes were closed. He looked at her body. It looked small and childish. He had
never seen a naked female body. The closest he had ever been to one had been a room and an embarrassed jerk of his head away, leaving only a flash of flesh to remember. He had little idea of what to do to satisfy himself with one.
He stripped and knelt beside her. He brushed dirt and mud and ground corn from her body. He nestled against her, tried to tickle her, aroused himself, and mounted her. He lay his head by hers as he searched for her. She howled in his ear, bit it, and ground a mouthful of it as she howled in it and kicked to twist her entire weight over her jaws on his ear. He tried to scramble away and she rode him to the floor, twisting his head away, and chewing and shaking his head by the ear. "No," pleaded Chombe once, shaming himself. He rolled on her and got a hand on her throat. He choked her off the ear and beat her face, crying because of the badness he was doing, until she was unconscious. He found rope and tied her hands to her sides so that she lay across the rope. He tied her feet outside the legs of the table. He tied a choke loop on a long rope to her throat. He raped her continually throughout the day.
In the evening he roused her and made her prepare food for him while he held her naked by the choke loop. Fully dressed, he sat on the chair with its back under his chin and the rifle over his lap and watched her body move, pulling her to him for a better look when she tried to hide it from him. He enjoyed watching the movements of her round buttocks over the runner's thighs the best. He would make them fuller and softer with his use of them, he knew, but they were fine now. He made her eat and then he tied her to the mattress again. He went to the fire and sat with his rifle while he sipped coffee with all the sugar he wanted and rested with a satisfaction that made him smile softly to himself, a smile he had never shown before or would ever show to the world.
The dog began to bark and run toward the gate. Chombe was outside the light of the fire with the rifle and he had no reason to move. He waited, wondering where the dog had been all through the day. He knew he had been in camp. Chombe had seen the dog now and then, but the dog had never bothered him. This was all only a natural happening to the dog, and it was just as natural for people to do. The dogs, the horses, the cattle, all nature fought at this business of the conquest of females. Nature knew he was right to do as he was doing. He was only making himself happy while he had the opportunity. The girl would come to understand this and would learn to like him, follow him, love him as long as he wanted her to. This was only nature. After all, who else would have her now even if she wanted someone else? No one would. She was his now. His to use and keep, or his to use and throw away.
He watched Bonifacio, the Guarijía, come through his gate and walk to the portal. The dog played around Bonifacio's legs. The Indian called quietly for his daughter. He set his bule, machete, and morral down before he saw Chombe with the rifle pointing at him. He did not speak to Chombe. He called his daughter again and went into the house. Chombe stopped him when he tried to untie the girl. Bonifacio knelt with his head down beside his girl. The girl was unconscious or sleeping. Bonifacio finally looked up at Chombe.
"Come outside and we'll talk, Boni," Chombe said.
"Don't act smart or I'll kill you. I'm going to probably have to kill you anyway so be easy on yourself and don't bother me. I'm a sensitive man, I don't like scoldings, and this has been a big day for me. As you can see, your daughter and I are practically married." He could not keep his secret grin from showing now that he had someone to talk to and know his power. This grin was one of pride and happiness in success, a grin modest men try never to show. This grin is so hard to hide, however, in a true moment of fulfillment a man might burst into laughter trying to hide it if he only opens his mouth to speak a modest word. Now, he could not hold back the grin, so he began to chuckle in spite of himself and then to laugh aloud, controllably and carefully, savoring the deep, handsome tone of his laughter to ease the pain of modesty.
"You've disgraced my little daughter," Bonifacio said.
"How so? Did you think her little apparatus was going to go unused all her life? No. Apparatuses are for men to use when they need them. That girl has tempted me for a long time. Today she paid, that's all."
"Little daughters don't tempt men. They could only be a temptation to masturbators like you. No good man will have my girl now after you played with yourself in her."
Angered, Chombe shouted, "I did not play with myself. I had that girl until she began to like it."
"Why is she tied up like that if she likes you so much? Untie her and see how she likes you."
"I'm not ready. Luz del Carmen is the first girl I've ever used. I want to be sure she likes me and will go away willingly with me before I turn her loose. I don't want to force her to go with me. I'm not that kind of man. You know that wouldn't be right. You know me, Boni. I'm not bad. I'm a man. I'm claiming my rights as a man."
"You're crazy. No man rapes a little girl and tries to justify it to her father. If he does he is not a man. He is a criminal, or he is crazy. You'll never be able to call yourself a man now that you've disgraced my girl. You are a masturbating coward. That's the best I can say for you."
Bonifacio picked up his machete and stepped quickly across the fire toward Chombe. Surprised, Chombe did not have time to rise from his chair. He ducked and shut his eyes as he raised the rifle to block the blow Bonifacio aimed at his head. The rifle's trigger guard and lever protected his fingers. The machete sprang away from Bonifacio's hand off the steel of the rifle. Chombe, head and shoulders taller than Bonifacio, beat Bonifacio with the barrel of the rifle until Bonifacio fell unconscious with his feet burning in the fire. Chombe searched Bonifacio's morral and found a bottle of lechuguilla. He drank half the bottle before he smelled the rubber of Bonifacio's huaraches
burning.
He picked the feet out of the fire. He went quickly to his horse and got his reata. He tied Bonifacio's hands against a mesquite horcón, pillar that supported the portal. He clapped dust from his hands, grinned happily, and raped Luz del Carmen again. He went back to the portal to see if Bonifacio had revived so he could be of service. Bonifacio was sitting up. Chombe slapped water into his face and untied the reata from the horcón. He put a choke loop on Bonifacio's throat. "Slide your machete to me with your feet, Boni," he commanded. Bonifacio shuffled on his burnt feet, pushing the machete until Chombe could pick it up without having to overextend himself. He sat Bonifacio down in front of the horcón, tied his feet, and raised them so that Bonifacio was on his back. He tied the reata high to the Y fork of the horcón under the eaves.
"Your machete is dull now, Bonifacio," Chombe said.
"I'll have to sharpen it." He began sliding the machete on Bonifacio's sharpening rock. He took a cup of water from the olla and handed it to Bonifacio. "Don't drink it, Boni. Hold it for me." He sharpened the long machete awhile and felt the edge, looking away from it. "Ah," he said and laid it across the rock easily. "Give me some water." Bonifacio examined the rock and the machete and twisted himself so he could pour the water onto the blade without wasting water, as was his habit.
"How did you use this tool today to get it so dull?"
Chombe accused cheerfully.
"Clearing the mauguechi," Bonifacio said. "I worked all day."
"I thought you were helping Juanito Vogel in the roundup. He's paying you to work his cattle, is he not? You did your day's work for him today, did you not?"
"Not today. Juan went to Avena. He had business there."
"And you took advantage of his absence to work for yourself, even though he is paying you to work for him?"
"Yes. Why should I say more than the truth? I had my own business to finish."
"So you didn't see the vaqueros today, and you skulked away to do your own little mierda of work."
"Yes."
"And you told the vaqueros you would not work today so they would know you were cheating Juanito and working for yourself."
"No. I didn't tell them. I told them I would be suffering the grippe at least for today and maybe for a day
or two more."
"Ah, you are a clever man, Boni. You know how to look after yourself. I admire that."
He caused the edge of the machete to ring off the stone. "And where is your clearing?"
"Close."
"You left your tools there?"
"Yes."
"Feel that," Chombe said, holding the blade close to Bonifacio. Bonifacio touched the edge.
"Nooooo. It's dull," Bonifacio said. "I told you, I worked it all day. Also, it struck the steel of the rifle."
"Dull?" Chombe felt the blade and gazed absently at Bonifacio to better sense the fineness of the cutting edge. "I would say it is sharp now. Buena, I don't know. You know your own blade. Give it water and I'll work on it and you tell me when it is sharp."
Bonifacio poured water carefully on the blade again, and Chombe slowly worked it on the stone. He rested and drank the rest of the water in Bonifacio's hand. He filled the cup again. He handed it back to Bonifacio. "Drink," he said. "But save some for the work."
He rubbed the blade softly against the rock, making it ring quietly. He honed the edge down until he was satisfied the blade was sharp enough for his business. He took the water from Bonifacio and washed off the white stone dust that had become a paste on the blade.
"Where did you say this mauguechi was?" he asked.
"C1ose," Bonifacio said without interest in his mauguechi.
"Boni, I'm going to untie your feet so you can walk."
We're going to your mauguechi. I want to look it over to see what we can farm there, you and I."
"My mauguechi will never be your business. Why go there?"
"I realize you are angry, Boni. Don't look for reasons. My rifle is reason enough. Let's be friends. You have my respect. I love you as much as I do my own father. You are my father-in-law now."
