The Mule Tamer II, Chica's Ride

by John Horst

“Jesus, Billy.” Will Panks looked at Arvel then at the child. “He’s not thinkin’ of taking the boy.”

  “No, boys, I’m not.” He threw the dregs of his coffee on the fire, and kicked the flame dead with his good foot. “Come on, we’re wasting time gabbin’ about it.”

  They rode fast. Arvel put the child between himself and the saddle horn. Tammy moved out ahead of the others. The mule was moving at a good pace, as if she’d understood the importance of the task. The boy was too small and too weak to ride Alanza and Arvel feared he’d fall off. He felt the boy shaking as they rode.

  Off in a distance, Arvel spotted a rabbit feeding on some grass under a little washout. He pointed it out to the boy. “That rabbit there reminds me of a story, an old Yaqui legend. You want to hear it?” The child nodded his head. His back pressed into the chest of the man and every now and again, Arvel would put his hand gently on the boy’s shoulder. He forgot himself, thought for a moment he was holding his little girl and kissed the boy on the top of his head. It made the boy feel good and happy and calm.

  “Well, one day there was this rabbit and this bear, and they were squattin’ in the desert, takin’ a crap.” The boy suddenly sat up, straight in the saddle and looked back at the man, not certain of what he heard. “True, true story. They were squattin’ down, takin’ a crap, and guess what?”

  “Que?”

  “The bear says to the rabbit, “Mister rabbit, do you ever have trouble with shit stickin’ to your fur?” The child giggled. “And the rabbit says, well, no, I don’t, mister bear. So, the bear reaches over and picks that little rabbit up and wipes his ass with him.” The child sat silently for a while. He suddenly laughed out loud.

  “Now, you tell me when we get close, but not too close to your home, okay?”

  “Sí, Señor.” He tensed up and once again began to shake.

  They hit a rocky patch and slowed. The little boy told him it would be another mile. Arvel felt good. For the first time since Gold Hat’s attack on his family, he felt good. “You know, I’m very popular with animals, and old people, and children.” He waited to see if the boy was comprehending. He was listening to Arvel, and he was calming down. He did not shake so.

  “Everybody else thinks I’m a pendejo.” The little fellow turned to look up at the strange gringo again.

  “That is a very bad thing to say, Señor. And, you are not a pendejo.”

  They hid in an arroyo while Billy and Will completed their reconnaissance. They were back in short order.

  “He’s there, and I think the woman’s still alive. Looks like he’s settin’ up house, just sitting outside the house, smoking a cigar. Don’t see the burro. She probably thinks the boy’s okay.”

  “So, he’s a bad hombre, Will?” Arvel looked on, as if he were a judge at the bar.

  “Bad as they come, Arvel.”

  Arvel limped over to Donny and pulled out his Greener. He tucked the barrels under his right arm and opened the gun with his left hand. He reached into his pocket and loaded it as he’d been practicing. He was ready. He looked down at the child. “Muchacho, you need to take care of our horses and mules. Can you do that for me?” The child nodded energetically. “We’ll be back in no time, and your Mamma will be good.”

  The Dutchman had sensed an impending change, like the smell of a rainstorm coming in the late afternoon and decided to have a little fun while the opportunity was upon him. He’d suddenly turned severe and the young woman sensed it. He was an ugly gringo, but initially seemed fit and pleasant enough. She thought that he would stay and help her and her son. She would welcome company, and an able-bodied man would be good for a change. She had heard nothing from her husband for nearly two years, and she feared the worst. She and her boy were just surviving, and now their luck perhaps was going to change for the better with this new man to help them.

  He was upon her before she could react, and as he was twice her size, there was little she could do. He worked quickly and it was over and done before she could really comprehend the malice and cruelty of the act. For good measure, he belted her soundly across the face two or three times. She lost consciousness and lay in her bed while he ambled out to the little broken down porch at the front of the hovel. He found a bottle of mescal and had a proper celebratory drink.

  This is how Billy and Will found him. They were not aware that they’d missed foiling the heinous crime by mere minutes.

  Arvel worked his way slowly forward and peered through an opening between the rough boards of the shack’s north wall. He could see the woman lying in her bed, unnaturally, not in the way a woman would normally lay. Something was not right. She was nude from the waist down, too exhausted and sore from the rough handling to even cover her body, more in shock than in pain. This would not do.

  Arvel had an intense dislike for all bad men, but he particularly hated rapists. Murderers generally just took a life, which was bad enough, but a rapist was the lowest of the low to his mind. They took something from a woman and then left her to think about it, be tortured about it and have to live with the horror of it for the rest of her life. In a way, it was worse than death.

  He naturally loved women, women of every shape and size and age; ladies, whores, Mexicans, Whites, Orientals, Negroes, all women. He honestly felt that women were the best of humankind. They were better than men, smarter and kinder and the most splendid creatures. They made men civilized, made lands civilized, made everything that was good about the human race. He loved women and he knew they were, physically, only physically, the weaker sex, and the fact that a man would force himself on a woman was loathsome to him. He often killed bad men on the spot, he pretty much always did rapists.

  Billy and Will approached from the back of the shack. Arvel insisted and, as it was his idea, he refused to let the men lead the assault on the bad man. Arvel shuffled slowly to the front of the hovel. The Dutchman was relaxing with a cigar. He did not know he was under attack and did not much care to do anything but savor the moment, think on what fun he would have with this little Mexicana over the next several days. She was good. She was appealing to him and she served his appetite and depravity well. He’d have to be careful. He wanted to stretch this out and the last time he’d gotten overzealous and killed the last one way too soon.

  Arvel was upon him, just inches away when the man understood what was happening. He turned his head slowly and stared into the Greener’s barrels. His harelip quivered and he slowly lowered the cigar. He looked up at Arvel and smiled.

  “Howdy,” the man spoke with a thick accent. He looked at Arvel, looked him in the eye and kept smiling. He adjusted himself a little in his chair but dared not move quickly.

  “Howdy.” Arvel smiled his crooked smile.

  “What do we do now?” The man was bold. Arvel grinned again.

  “I shoot you, and you die.” Both barrels rocked the afternoon’s silence and the harelip disintegrated into a soup of blood and flesh and brain and bone. The body sat upright for a moment, the hand grasped the cigar, casually, as if nothing had changed. Then the massive frame toppled over onto the dusty floor. Chickens flew and ran about for fear of being trapped under its gore.

  Will and Billy were upon them at once, guns drawn. Will surprised, Billy not. Arvel broke the Greener open and replaced the spent shells.

  “Jesus Christ, mate!” Billy looked up at Arvel, terror in his eyes. “You’ve shot the gardener!”

  Will ran to the corpse, looking on in a panic.

  “Nice try, Billy.” Arvel grinned. “I saw the harelip.” He looked down at what was left of the man’s head. “Think you can patch him up, doctor?”

  Billy grunted, lit a smoke and handed one to Will who took it from him with shaky hands, “I’m a healer, mate, not a bleedin’ magician.”

  Will eventually found his voice, “My God, Arvel, I didn’t think you’d just execute him!” He stared at Arvel, as if he’d been looking at a new man, as if he’d seen Arvel for the first time in his life. “I’ve
heard stories, Arvel, but, my God, man.”

  Arvel felt a little foolish. “I’m sorry, Will. Didn’t mean to get you rattled. I say, good riddance of bad rubbish. You told me the fellow was bad, and,” he pointed with his head, in the direction of the poor señora in the shack, “I saw what he did to her.” He took one of Billy’s cigarettes and lit it, then limped through the doorway, just far enough to address the lady. “Señora, it is okay. The bad man es acabado. He will not harm you again.”

  She slowly emerged from the darkened room, a blanket wrapped around her body. Her face had ballooned up on the one side, eye swollen shut where the Dutchman had beaten her. She looked bad, but would survive. They’d already dragged the Dutchman’s corpse away from the hovel. She looked each man in the eye through the one that could still see, and then down at the ground. “Gracias, caballeros, muchas gracias.”

  Will jogged back to retrieve the boy and the animals while Billy worked on the lady. There wasn’t much he could do for her. She’d just have to wait for the swelling to come down. He made her some coffee while Arvel rested. The little fight had exhausted him, but he felt good. He was certain he could move more of his right side.

  He watched the señora sit quietly, suffering. It made him so sad and he wanted to cry again. He swallowed hard and tried to comfort her.

  “You have a good boy, señora.”

  She managed a weak smile and a quiet gracias. He decided that she probably did not want to talk and sat silently as they waited.

  In short order, they were back. Will proudly riding and the boy in front of him, as he’d ridden with Arvel at the start of their little adventure. The lad hopped from the horse before Will had even slowed down. He ran to his mother, then stopped short when he saw her face. He did not want to hurt her further by hugging and kissing her.

  “Ay chingao, Mamma!” He walked up on her slowly. “You are hurt, Mamma.”

  She reached out and wiped the dirt from his face. She checked his bruises now. The nice gringos did not tell her that her boy had been abused. It would have only added to her anxiety.

  They watched the reunion. Will had not seen anything like this before. Arvel had, many times. In all his years Rangering. it was the best experience he’d ever known, bringing poor victims back together with their families. He looked on at Will, his eyes were wet, but he was smiling. “Worth the detour, boys?”

  Billy grinned . “Sure, Mate. It was worth it.”

  The señora insisted, despite her injury, on making them supper. Arvel was sorry to eat her meager offerings, but the men all dined heartily and graciously received her hospitality. She made good chicken and after a while was even beginning to get a little talkative, particularly to Will. Arvel smiled at the old prospector who was enjoying the attention of the plain, albeit, wholly feminine young woman.

  As they mounted up, they each shook the little lad’s, then the mother’s hand. The señora disappeared into the hovel and returned. She had a gift for each of them. She’d passed the many lonely nights weaving horse and goat hair trinkets. She gave each man a cross on a neatly woven hair chain. They were very plain, she did not have the means to dye the hair, but they were beautifully made. One could see the care and reverence and love that went into each of them.

  The three saviors bent their heads as she placed one on each of them, like a mythical princess, bestowing honors on her subjects, heroic warriors returning from a great battle. She absent-mindedly kissed Will, the last one in line, on the cheek. It was a strange gift for the threesome, a confirmed agnostic and two atheists, and they all wore them proudly.

  X The Mexican Cossack

  They arrived at San Sebastian with their numbers swelled to one hundred. They were a strange army. An army led by old people, counseled by an Indian. Dick Welles was at the front, followed by Del Toro, Uncle Bob, and Alice Walsh. With the addition of Del Toro’s vaqueros who’d joined the expedition, along with the volunteers from Arizona, they comprised a formidable little army.

  Dan George had found them in the night and reported on Chica and Rebecca. He was thoroughly dejected by his failure at buying the little girl’s freedom but heartened by Alice Walsh’s smile. She also had good news for him from her attorney in Baltimore. They now had easy access to a quarter of a million dollars. She gave Dan the particulars.

  “It doesn’t seem to be about money, Alice.” He walked with her to Kosterlitzky’s office. “Maria was amazing, of course.” He grinned and looked into Alice’s eyes. “She shot the bastard in the rump.”

  Colonel Emilio Kosterlitzky graciously welcomed them. He was particularly attentive to Alice Walsh as he recognized her as a lady and treated her accordingly. He very well knew Alejandro Del Toro and Dick Welles and greeted them as old friends. “And Captain Walsh?” He looked on enthusiastically to the group.

  Alice Walsh spoke up, “He’s ill at present, Colonel. He’s back at his ranch.”

  “Well, you will please tell him I asked about him and please tell him to get well soon.” He turned his attention to Dick Welles. “What do you propose, Captain Welles?”

  “Colonel, we know Gold Hat’s between here and his fort. Mrs. Walsh…,”

  “Miss Chica?” Kosterlitzky knew very well of Chica long before she had become Mrs. Arvel Walsh. He and his men even chased her once, after she’d stolen a wealthy American colonel’s fancy hunting rifle on the Mexican side of the Sonoran border. He’d only ever caught a glimpse of her then and didn’t actually meet her until she’d been married to Arvel for more than two years.

  Dick smiled briefly. He was very serious these past days. “Yes, Miss Chica, she’s shadowing him and fifty of his men. They’ve got the Walsh’s eight year old daughter as captive. Mr. George here,” he nodded toward Dan who extended his hand to the Colonel. “Tried to pay a ransom to no avail. Miss Chica shot Gold Hat in the ass for his trouble, though.”

  “And killed one of his men.” Dan interjected then grinned sheepishly. “She told me she only had forty eight and a half to go.”

  “So,” continued Dick, “we know Gold Hat won’t negotiate, for what reason, we cannot fathom, and we know his propensity for killing hostages when under attack, so we don’t want to attack him, but rather destroy his fort, his base of operations. Miss Chica will get her girl back on her own,” he looked a little doubtfully.

  Dan George cleared his throat. “No disrespect intended, Colonel, but Gold Hat did not seem the cleverest fellow, intellectually speaking. How is it that he’s been free to roam for so long?”

  Kosterlitzky smiled. He waved his hand, as to assure that the comment wasn’t considered a threat. “Two reasons, Mr. George. One, tertiary syphilis has dulled his brain, and two, he’s been inactive for quite a number of years. We don’t know why, but he has not been a great threat until this raid into your country. We’ve just had more pressing issues here and he became unimportant to us.” He lit a cigarette and smiled, “and, frankly, we’ve never had the resources to attack his stronghold, which is,” he blew a plume of smoke into the air over his head, “substantial.”

  “Will you go with us to attack it, Colonel?” Alice Walsh looked the man in the eye.

  “I will, Mrs. Walsh, I certainly will.”

  Dick began to calculate. “How substantial, sir?”

  “Five hundred bandits. A fort that is three hundred years old, but still fairly secure, the walls not all together rotten, and some old Napoleons, but few men of his outfit capable of putting them to good use.”

  Dick Welles stroked his chin. “And we, a hundred good men with Winchesters and six shooters.”

  “And I with another hundred men, Rurales well trained with Mausers.”

  Alice Walsh sat up straighter in her chair. “Two hundred against five hundred.”

  “Ah, my lady,” the colonel smiled, but we have three French seventy-fives.”

  “And a mule full of dynamite.” Will Panks stepped into the colonel’s office, “and Arvel Walsh, and Billy Livingston,” he grinned as th
e two men followed him into the room, “so God help ‘em.”

   XI Subterfugio

  Gold Hat was deposited onto his cot in his marquee tent. He was bleeding badly. He was furious. He’d lost the money in the box the Indian presented to him, one of his bandits was dead, and he now had a gaping wound through his left buttock. He looked at Rebecca Walsh and sneered. “Come over here!” he shouted and pointed to the ground next to him.

  Rebecca stood, frozen, not knowing what to do until the old bandit screamed again. She reluctantly complied. He grabbed her by the hair and pulled her down to his level, “you little bitch.” He softened momentarily when he looked into the pretty blue eyes. “You offspring to a bitch whore.”

  Marta suddenly glided into the room, ubiquitous cigarette between her lips. She’d heard that the old man was shot, and hoped to find him dead. She spoke firmly to the old man and the clown man standing beside him. “It is not her fault.” She helped Rebecca up and sent her to her little room. “Leave her alone.” She began looking over the man’s wound. “It’s not so bad. The wound is clean, and the bullet came out. You now have two extra holes in your ass, that’s all.” The clown man chuckled. Marta looked on at him with disdain. “Counting him,” she pointed her cigarette at the clown man, “you now have four assholes.”

  Rebecca suppressed a laugh. Despite the rough handling, and the shaking inside, she could not help finding Marta’s remark very funny. She was glad that the girl had shown up when she had. She quickly obeyed when Marta ordered her back into her little room. She thought certain she was in for a beating and the little bandit had come to her rescue.

  Once Rebecca was safely out of reach, Marta inquired about the meeting with the American. The clown man spoke as he watched his maestro bleed.

  “You missed getting thirty thousand American dollars?” She blew smoke at her father’s fat face.