the Lonesome Gods (1983)

by L'amour, Louis

  While still in his early years, and living in the Indian village, he had learned about Telmekesh, the place where the spirits of the dead lived, which was reached through a gate between two moving mountains; the good were permitted to pass, but the evil were crushed as the mountains slammed together, closing the gate.

  He had become a skillful hunter, but knowing the sound of a rifle could be heard for some distance, he preferred more silent means. He used a bow and arrow occasionally but had come to prefer the sling. Due to his length of arm and extraordinary muscular power, it had become a formidable weapon in his hands, and one with which he could kill at a considerable distance.

  "Come, boy. Set up an' eat. Cookie' for you is like cookie' for an army. Takes time." They sat opposite each other across the flat top of a chunk cut from a great stump.

  "Meghan went to Francisco's woman? She will be all right, then."

  "And you, Peter? What will you do?"

  Peter looked into the fire; then he looked around at Alfredo. "I don't know, boy. Get me an outfit an' hit the trail, I guess, but I won't be far from you--"

  "Peter?" Alfredo placed a great rubbery hand on Peter's. "I mean, afterwards? After that?"

  There was a long silence. "Well, son, I hope there won't be no afterwards. You an' that woman"--his voice grew husky--"well, I never had nobody before. Not rightly, I didn't, although Zack Verne was always a friend. You been part o' my thinkin' for so long--"

  "Peter? Go to Johannes. Go and see him. I don't want you to be alone, if it comes to that. Johannes will do big things, I believe, and he will need a good man, and he likes you."

  The big voice rumbled off into silence, and the two men sat quietly, watching the fire.

  Before the day broke and while Peter Burkin slept, Alfredo slipped into his moccasins and a blanket coat and left the cave. He stood outside, stretching and looking carefully around. This cave was not unlike his temporary home in the San Bernardinos, except that the cave was larger and there were several inner rooms. It had two other entrances, both of them some distance away. One was natural; the other he had created himself when he discovered how close the cave came to the outer wall of the mountain. Both entrances were carefully hidden. Standing still, he looked around before moving. The chance that someone might have approached the place was always a possibility, although he had never seen a white man atop the mountain, and the Cahuilla avoided his area. Often there were deer feeding on a small meadow nearby, and once he had seen a bear.

  It was a grizzly, a huge beast that when standing on its hind legs towered even above him. The bear took a couple of steps toward him, and he stood his ground, unwor--vied. He knew the beast was nearsighted and curious. When it found out what he was, it stood staring at him and he at it; then it dropped to all fours, and apparently satisfied, walked away. Yet, when some fifty yards off, it raised up on its hind legs again to look back, shaking its big head as if mystified.

  Now, on this morning, he walked back into the pines and followed a vague trail, his own, to the edge of the mountain and to what he called his chair. Actually, it was a ledge of rock, a quarter-circle of it, that offered a convenient seat.

  It was a place to which he often came, some eight thousand feet above the valley below, looking down upon the canyons and the palms that gathered near the hot springs and wound in a green, lovely ribbon up a canyon to the southeast. The widest of the canyons was below him.

  Here he could watch the sunrise and sunset over the valley and look far up the pass through which Romero, Williamson, and Ben Wilson had traveled. He also could look eastward into the desert, a vast expanse of white and pink that was constantly changing color under the rising or setting sun. By day, cloud shadows paraded majestically across that vast emptiness.

  This was the place. When the end came, if he could make it, this was where he would come. He would sit here, as he sat now, and wait for the long silence.

  He started to rise, but his muscles seemed without strength. He tried again and half-fell back to his seat. For a long time he sat still, staring out over the desert. He tried again, but there was no strength left in him. His head ached.... The headaches had been worse lately. He sat still, his eyes closed. Slowly, then, he opened them and watched an eagle riding the hot air rising from the desert, soaring out there on magic wings, soaring, soaring.... For a moment he lost the eagle, his vision misting over.

  He lifted a huge hand and stared at it, slowly closing the fingers. It fell back to his lap. He looked again, trying to find the eagle. It was there, tilting its marvelous wings against the sky.

  He tried again to rise, but this time there was no response whatever. He relaxed slowly, sitting very still, his big hands resting on his massive knees.

  "Now?" he whispered. "Is it now?" And then, more softly still, "Why not now?"

  Chapter 59

  Francisco sat on the sandbank watching me. "It was spoken that you had come. Your house is gone, so I knew you would be here, in our old place." He glanced around. "Nothing has changed."

  "Not here," I agreed. Then I looked at him, smiling a little. "You eat well, Francisco. There is more behind your belt than when we met."

  He shrugged. "I have a woman. She is a good woman and she fears that I shall eat too little. Yet I can still run, and wrestle."

  "You were always good. Sometimes you beat me."

  He studied the breadth of my shoulders and shook his head. "No more, I think. You have grown strong."

  "I have enemies," I agreed.

  "You have a woman?" he asked mildly, flicking a stick at the sand.

  "No," I said, "but there is one of whom I think."

  He got to his feet and stretched, whipping the sand from his hat, which he had lying beside him. "She waits for you," he said, "and talks to my woman."

  Surprised, I got to my feet and went for the black stallion. "Meghan? Here?"

  "She looks for you. She fears you will not come back to her." Then he added as we walked along, "She has had much trouble, amigo. She speaks of this to my woman, and she to me." He glanced at me. "She killed one man. Shot him."

  "Meghan? I can't believe it."

  Francisco shrugged. "Who knows what iron is in the heart of a woman? She escaped and they followed." He paused, looking across at the clustering palms. "The big one, He Who Walks the Night ... he found her and left her close to us. She rode on in alone."

  "The big one? Tahquitz?"

  He shrugged. "It is a name. No doubt he has another. Your women says he is Alfredo."

  So ... Alfredo. It all was falling together at last.

  Meghan came quickly to her feet as I came up to the fire. For a moment she simply stared; then she ran to me, and it was natural that I should take her in my arms. "I think we should go home, honey," I said. It was the first time I had called anyone such a name, and I was astonished at myself, but she accepted the term without question. Who knows about women?

  We talked, and we ate the food Francisco's woman brought to us, but when I went to my horse again, it was saddled and Francisco was there. He told me then what had happened with Meghan, and when he had finished he said, "So she killed one, and the Big One, he killed another. One is left, and he is the worst. He is Iglesias." "So?"

  "He has come far, amigo, to ride back for nothing. Do you ride carefully, then."

  Meghan emerged, her clothing brushed and her hair rearranged. She was the girl I'd dreamed of, and more. Francisco went for her horse. "You go too soon," he said. "It is long since we have talked."

  "Remember the wild plums we used to find at that place on Snow Creek Trail?" I said. "It would be good to go there again."

  He nodded, putting his hands on his hips. "You come back. You and your woman. We build a kish for you. You stay."

  Meghan, when we were riding away, asked what a kish was. "A shelter ... a house. Often around here it is built of palm fronds."

  We rode on, talking only a little, happy to be together.

  Yet I remembered what F
rancisco had said about Iglesias and turned often to look back.

  "There is an Indian village ahead," I said. "We will stop there. I know them. It is a place where Peter Burkin often stopped when he rode through."

  "He will be an old man now?" she asked.

  "I suppose so. I do not think much of ages. People are people. What does it matter how old or young they are? It is a category, and I do not like categories. It is a sort of pigeonhole or a label. But it would be good to see Peter."

  Iglesias was a frightened man. It was not only his horse that had been scared. He had seen the huge man loom up before him and he had seen the casual whip of the great hand that flipped Biscal off into the gorge. When he finally got his horse stopped, he was far up Burns Canyon, so he kept going, camping that night in Round Valley under the looming peak of Tip Top Mountain.

  When morning came, he fixed a small breakfast and considered. Maybe he had been dreaming. It was fantastic. There could be no such creature as he believed he had seen.

  But that girl! She was real, vital, beautiful. In all his life he had seen nothing like her hair of red-gold, her slim, lovely body. He wet his lips with his tongue and swore. To have such a one and let her get away? He had to be stupid.

  Yet ... her home was in Los Angeles, and she would be going back. To go back meant she had to go through San Gorgonio Pass. If he were to take the Cienaga Seca Trail to Big Meadows, he could go up South Fork and cross over to the Falls Creek Trail. He had done it once, with several others, to escape some ranchers who were pursuing them.

  He might get down into the pass and by discreet questioning discover whether the girl had gone past. It would not be easy, but he planned to ride into Los Angeles anyway.

  He allowed his horse to graze a bit longer while he thought out the way. He camped that night in Cienaga Seca. Once, on the following morning as he was riding into Big Meadows, he looked back and thought he caught some movement. Deer, probably. There were a lot of them around. Yet before turning up South Fork, he looked back again.

  Nothing....

  A mile up the canyon, he camped. The wind off the peak was cold. Perhaps he was a fool. What did one woman matter? But such a woman!

  He drew his serape around him and thought about her as he stared into the fire. Somebody would be with her. One man, no doubt. Wait for the right moment and shoot him down.

  Stopping for a drink near Dollar Lake, he was getting into the saddle again when his horse's head jerked up, ears pricked. Although Iglesias watched his back trail for the next few miles, he saw nothing.

  Tomorrow he would be in the pass. Tonight he would rest well. He checked his rifle. Tomorrow, one shot for him, one for the horse.

  Of course, there might be more than one man with her, and that would complicate matters. Yet ... he had done it before.

  Before his eyes opened he heard the fire crackle and was immediately alert. His fire should be down to mere coals, and a fire does not crackle unless with fresh fuel.... He opened his eyes.

  A man was squatting on his haunches beside the fire, roasting a strip of meat over the flames.

  He was not a tall man, but was enormously thick and strong. Iglesias could see the powerful muscles in his shoulders and arms, and the thick thighs that bulged the material of his pants.

  Slowly, warily, Iglesias turned over and sat up. The man smiled at him. "You sleep soundly," the man said. An accent, but not Spanish, not German ...

  "In your business it does not be good to sleep too soundly."

  Iglesias was wary, but his pistol was under his jacket on the ground near him. His knife was there also. "And what is my business?" Iglesias asked.

  "You are a thief," the stranger said. "Occasionally a murderer. And you attack women," he added.

  "I could kill you for that," Iglesias said.

  "You mean you would like to kill me for that." The man looked into Iglesias' eyes and smiled. "But you could not kill me, you could not kill me at all."

  The man took the piece of meat in his fingers, and Iglesias knew it was hot, but the man did not wince. If it burned, he showed no sign of pain.

  Casually Iglesias let his hand drop to the jacket, and the stranger smiled again, tearing off a small bit of the meat with his teeth. "Do not look for the pistol. It is gone. "So is the knife. I took it away while you slept." The man smiled again. "My rifle is on my horse, but I shall not need it, either."

  "What is all this talk? Who are you?., "If you had gone back where you came from, you might have lived," the stranger said, "but you decided to try to find the young lady again. That was when I knew you must die."

  "What are you talking about? Are you loco?"

  "You do not learn. She escaped from you, and you followed. You left one of your friends--"

  "I have no friends!"

  "Naturally not. One of your companions, then. You left him dead and unburied. Then you almost came up to her, when your other companion was killed."

  "Who are you?"

  "Who? It does not matter, really, but I am Yacub Khan. A friend of the young lady and her father. A friend, also, I believe, of the young man--Johannes Verne." He smiled again. "But no friend of yours."

  Iglesias was thinking. This man did not seem to be armed, yet he was obviously very strong. To fight him was out of the question. Yet, a stick, a stone ... What would the man do if he simply got up and walked to his horse?

  He got up, and the man continued to eat. Iglesias stared at him, uncertain what to expect. "You talk too much!" he said. "I shall leave."

  "Look around you. Take a good, careful look. I want you to see this place. Really see it. Lovely, is it not? The sunshine on the water? The leaves rustling, the--" Iglesias stooped suddenly and picked up a thick stick. The man simply looked at him, finished what he was eating, and stood up.

  "Look around you," he said again. "Even one so evil as you can appreciate beauty. I want you to look, because it is the last thing you will ever see."

  "You're crazy!" Iglesias began to back toward his horse. He sensed rather than saw movement. He lifted his stick and felt the stranger's hand grasp his shirtfront. Iglesias struck down with the stick, but his hand was at an awkward angle and he could not use it with force. Yacub Khan was right against his body. A hand moved up; he felt the shock of the blow, and something within him burst.

  Yacub Khan held his grip, looking into the panic-stricken eyes. "If you had gone the other way, you might have lived," he said, and dropped him.

  Walking across to Iglesias' horse, he stripped off its gear and turned it loose. Then he went to his own horse and mounted.

  A valley opened to the westward, a widening valley with a creek in the bottom. Turning his horse, he followed it. No doubt it would emerge in the pass or just beyond it. Anyway, the direction was right.

  Iglesias lay on the grass, trying to catch his breath. It would not come, but blood did. It came up from his mouth and ran down the side of his face and neck and to the pine needles.

  Chapter 60

  It was quiet in the large room. Don Isidro sat in his cowhide chair, staring out across the patio. Elena, working with her needle, glanced at him. He rarely talked to her, but now he did not talk to anyone.

  "I shall return to Spain," he said suddenly.

  "Why not?"

  "And you?"

  "I shall stay. I have friends here. I like it."

  A woman appeared in the doorway and stood waiting. Elena looked up. "Yes?"

  "There is word. The Senorita Laurel is with Senor Verne. They are corning home."

  "That is good news indeed." Elena never asked how they knew, for the word came by devious means, one person to another, and often with such swiftness it was hard to believe.

  The woman still stood there, and Elena asked, "There is more?"

  "SI, senora. The Big One is dead."

  She disappeared from the door, and for a long time there was silence in the room. At last Don Isidro spoke. "Did she mean Alfredo?"

  "Yes."
/>
  "I wonder how they know? How could they know? I thought ... I believed him dead long ago."

  "The woman loved him." And then she added, raising her eyes to him, "They know everything, Isidro. They always know. There are no secrets in the great houses. We delude ourselves in believing otherwise."

  He stared blindly out across the patio. All so useless! So foolish! Back there in the desert, when the boy said so bravely, "Good-bye, Grandpa!" I should have gathered him in my arms and taken him home. The thought faded and he leaned his head back against the chair. After a few moments Elena arose, crossed the room, and covered him with a blanket.

  She most send word to Miss Nesselrode, for she would be worried.

  At the reading room Miss Nesselrode looked at the boxes of books newly arrived by ship. There were three, two from New York and one from London. Now was the time she needed Johannes. He had always enjoyed opening the boxes and putting the books on the shelves. So much was happening. Ben Wilson and some others were putting in a power plant to light the city with gas. It would stand, she believed, opposite the Pico House. New streets were being laid out and some of the roads leading into the town were being improved, and they needed it.

  The door opened and she looked up. It was Alexis Murchison. He hesitated just inside the door. He was, she thought absently, a remarkably handsome man.

  "May I come in?" He spoke hesitantly.

  "It seems you are already in. What can I do for you?" "I just wanted to tell you that I have decided to remain. I mean, I am going to stay in California."

  She put down her pen. "And what will you do here?" "I shall work for a firm of commission and forwarding merchants. In fact," he added, "I shall be managing the business...

  "You should do well. You speak Russian, and no doubt French as well. You will be dealing with a variety of shipmasters as well as local businessmen. Do you speak Spanish?"

  "A little."

  "You will find it an asset. Much of your business will always be done in Spanish." She took up her pen. "Well, this is news, indeed. Congratulations. I believe you have made a wise decision."