Chasing Pancho Villa

by R. L. Tecklenburg

  “Maria,” he forced himself to say. “Your message….”

  “Shhh…,” she mocked him, “…Señor James.”

  “Come. We eat, drink, and then we talk.” Maria took his hand and led him into the house. “I want to call you Harry. It is what your brother called you, yes?”

  “Yes, my brother called me Harry. How did you know?”

  “He spoke of his big brother often. I think he idolized you.” Holding his hand, she led him into a foyer with a high vaulted ceiling, then she shut the heavy wood door behind them. The door itself was two inches thick, with iron hinges that growled as it was closed.

  Entering the grand room, he was immediately struck by the rich colors. Painted in bright colors, the blend of reds, yellows and blues adorning the walls seemed to leap out at him. The adobe walls were framed with heavy beams of native timber. He saw brown ceramic tile floors with richly painted ceramic mosaics in the center of the room. Harrison stopped to admire it. He saw that it depicted a local scene—Indian women carrying baskets filled with fruit and vegetables on their heads. Only two paintings adorned the walls of this room. One was of an older man dressed in black, wearing a sombrero and mounted on a great white stallion. The other was of a family—the parents seated and surrounded by four small children. At first glance, Harrison couldn’t tell boys from girls.

  Watching him with a smile, Maria finally spoke: “That was my grandfather. A great man.”

  “Impressive,” he said politely. “The family?

  “The smallest child was my mother. The woman was Dona Estrella, my grandmother.”

  Harrison nodded and continued walking through the large room. He felt a flow of cool air gently touching his face. He looked up and saw a fan with large wooden paddles slowing churning above them. Electricity out here? He was impressed.

  Crossing the room, they passed through a wide archway to enter another room equally spacious, but well furnished. Tapestries depicting hunting scenes hung from the wall and blended naturally with the rich wood furnishings. Everything appeared thrown together, but Harrison felt a warmth and harmony here. A glass chandelier hung from a great beam in the center of the ceiling. In its light the variety of colors were reflected like so many rainbows. The room had the air of grandeur from an earlier age, brought to life through electric light.

  Maria offered him a place on a dark satin couch done in an early French fashion. She sat beside him. “Your house is very beautiful,” he stated simply. “There seems to be no order, yet everything is harmonious here.”

  “Thank you. But this is only the appearance of wealth, Harry,” she replied, with a wave of her arm. “I inherited this house, these things, from my Mexican grandmother. La Señora Estrella was the wife of a very wealthy landowner and rancher. He loved her very much and built her this hacienda. Dona Estrella’s only son—my uncle—was killed as a young man, fighting for Mexico’s freedom. So, she bequeathed it to me.” Maria paused to remember. She looked around the room and then back at Harrison. “But the land, the real wealth of our family, was taken long ago by the Dictator, Porfirio Diaz. Do you know of Diaz?” She didn’t wait for him to answer. “My grandfather opposed that horrible man, and eventually paid for it. Diaz was a great killer of my people. What he wanted he took. He took our land, and then he took my grandfather’s life.” She shrugged.

  “You still have this beautiful house,” he said.

  She did not answer directly. “Harry, things here are not so simple to explain. The land that he took was everything to us.”

  “Not so simple to explain,” he repeated. “So everyone keeps telling me, Maria,” he said. “But I’m not here to judge you and, for me, understanding who’s right has been difficult. It’s my brother’s death that brought me here.”

  “Sí, I know this,” she answered, caught by his striking blue eyes. They seem so sad, she thought. Do they hold the sins of the world, I wonder?

  And Harrison was distracted and awed by her beauty.

  “Someday the war will be over and we will have won. We will have defeated them.”

  “Defeated them? Who, Maria?”

  “The revolution is against the rich landowners and the politicians and the Americans who make use of Mexico to enslave my people. It is to fight them that I must supply guns, but maybe tomorrow it will be corn and frijoles.” Her dark eyes blazed with conviction.

  Harrison suddenly wanted to believe in her passion and to share her conviction. For a moment, he felt a vast distance between them. “Those wagons outside? Are they loaded with smuggled rifles?”

  We bought them legally from the Revel Brothers in Columbus. They are a respected American company. They buy guns the American Army does not want,” she explained. “Since the Americans went to war in Europe, that is all we can get, and this shipment is the last even of those.”

  “Who smuggles them across the border?” Harrison asked.

  “That is a stupid embargo. Two years ago, the border was open and guns did not matter to the Americans,” Maria said. “Everyone on the border sold them to make money.”

  “I don’t want to know how they come across,” he said suddenly. “I shouldn’t have asked.”

  “Harry, please….” Then Maria suddenly dismissed the subject by touching her thick, dark hair lightly with her fingers.

  “I’m sorry if I insulted you,” Harrison said, noticing her delicate fingers. He was distracted by them, by her presence. “You are a lady. Of that I’m certain,” he told her, surprised to find he was sincere.

  “And you are a gentleman with very good taste!” she said smiling. “Come, I want to show you a very special place.” She took James by the arm and pulled him up. She held his arm while they slowly strolled through the large house. “Bart and I met at a fiesta in Juárez, hosted by the Alcalde and his wife. I noticed him immediately. He stood so proud and dignified in his uniform. And his Spanish was so, so like a Spanish gentleman’s,” she reflected fondly. “All the señoritas noticed him.”

  Finally, they stood in the doorway of a large study. Harrison could see from her expression that she was very proud of it. They were surrounded by dark mahogany bookshelves, each filled from floor to ceiling with bound volumes. He saw a different mosaic in the middle of the tile floor. This one had classical Greek figures—older men with boys. James thought the scenes illustrated learning. On the walls hung only one painting—of the same man, but sitting in a great chair. That chair, he decided, looking at the chair behind a large desk.

  Maria waited patiently for his response.

  The electric lighting from a single large ceiling lamp illuminated the desk set in the middle of the room, with the black leather chair from the painting neatly pushed in behind it. The only other lighting was from a double framed window directly across the room between bookshelves. Heavy cotton drapes dyed brown and green concealed the outside, making the room very private—perfect intimacy for a reader and his books. The desktop was bare of anything, even an ink well.

  “I’m impressed,” James told her.

  “You like it?” she asked proudly. “My grandfather built this room. But, it was La Señora Estrella who collected the books,” Maria told him. “Do you believe that she read them all?”

  “She must have been a well-educated woman,” he responded. But it was a map of Mexico that caught his eye. He noticed a line drawn from the New Mexico border almost to Mexico City with arrows in the Pacific Ocean pointing eastward, all marked in ink with dates and numbers. “And you, Maria? Do you read those books also?”

  “Oh, Harry. When I was a child I came here often. Sometimes to read, other times just to sit in my grandfather’s chair and think. Now, it is different. I come only to visit the past, and to dream of a better future.” She smiled at him, but her dark eyes betrayed her.

  “Those moments are important,” Harrison said, putting his arm around her. It felt natural.

  “Come!” she said, pushing him away playfully. “
You must have a thirst. Tequila? It is our custom,” she said with a smile. She turned and left the room. Harrison followed her. They returned to the drawing room and the sofa.

  A young woman entered with a tray of tequila. She appeared to be of Indian descent—short and squarely built, with dark eyes, dark skin, and black hair that she wore long. Her face held no expression. Maria took the decanter and two glasses, handing one to Harrison. “Harry, this is Luna. She is mama of the children you saw outside.” The young woman smiled shyly. “Her husband was killed last year. He rode with General Villa.”

  “I’m pleased to meet you, señora,” he said, standing and bowing.

  The young woman smiled again and left the room.

  “There are many widows in Mexico.” Maria and Harrison watched the woman leave. “I do all that I can to help them,” she added gently. “That is also part of our business.”

  “You have great responsibilities, Maria,” he replied.

  “To your brother,” Maria toasted, holding the glass in the air. “A fine man.”

  Harrison responded by touching his glass gently against hers. He recalled Lieutenant Floyd making a similar toast. But Maria was sincere.

  “And to the Revolution!” Maria exclaimed, continuing her toast. “Tierra Y Libertad!”

  “Viva la revolución!” he responded.

  She smiled. “Now we eat. Then I tell you more about your brother. And you will tell me of your life in Paris, yes?”

  Harrison smiled back. “Yes, Maria, we eat. Then we talk.”

  “Come,” Maria said simply. Holding his hand lightly, she led him into another room adjoining the second. It was a spacious dining room. Again, it was decorated much like the other two, but this room had a huge stone fireplace that covered an entire wall. A fire burned brightly in its hearth. He felt its warmth.

  Harrison noticed two place settings on the long, deep grained oak table. Maria set the bottle of tequila between them. She motioned with her hand. “Please sit beside me.”

  He pulled out her chair.

  “Ahh señor, you are a gallant caballero,” Maria said. She brushed against Harrison’s shoulder with her breast as she sat down. The gesture did not go unnoticed.

  “Luna,” Maria called, pouring each another tequila. The young woman returned carrying a tray. She served them while they quietly sipped their tequila, placing a bowl of soup and tortillas with chicken in front of them. Then Luna left them alone.

  Harrison could not take his eyes from her. “How does one so beautiful survive in such a harsh world?” he finally asked.

  “Do you like the food?” she teased, avoiding his question.

  “Oh, yes,” he said, rolling a tortilla and dipping it lightly into the soup. Harrison had seen that done at the hotel. “But I don’t have much of an appetite. You’ve taken it away.”

  “Nor do I,” Maria said, and smiled at him. “Are you so charming among the women of Paris?”

  “What do you know of my life in Paris?” he asked, surprised that she knew anything about him.

  “Harry, I know much about you, the worldly older brother,” she said, touching his arm.

  “I think Bart may have exaggerated,” Harrison said. He did not want her to know too much about his wasted life.

  “Perhaps you’re too modest,” she suggested.

  “I don’t think there’s that much to talk about. I just run a business. Like you, Maria.”

  “Oh, Harry, Bart told such wonderful stories of your adventures. He told me about your battles with banditos in Bolivia. You are lucky to be alive.”

  Neither ate any more. Sipping at the tequila, Harrison quietly observed Maria. Her beauty continued to fascinate him. She, in turn, was content to glance at him, enjoying his attention. The time passed quickly.

  Finally, Luna appeared. “Señorita?” she asked.

  “We are finished, Luna. Gracias,” she said softly.

  Luna cleared the table. Harrison did not notice.

  “Maria, why have you brought me here?” Harrison asked finally.

  She looked at him smiling but, Harrison noticed, hesitating.

  “Yes?” He asked.

  “First we must make a deal and shake on it,” Maria told him.

  “We can do that,” he said, curious.

  “I will tell you something. In return you will tell me something. Agreed?”

  She extended her hand with a smile and a sparkle in her eyes.

  “It’s a deal,” Harrison responded, and gently grasped her hand.

  “Harry, your brother was much more than an infantry officer. There were men, very dangerous men, he was working with. Mexicans and Americans. He paid them for information.”

  “On smuggling weapons?”

  “Sí that, but also for information on what the Germans are doing in Mexico.”

  “German agents in Mexico?” Harrison felt almost a panic.

  “Yes, the Germans were supporting General Villa then,” Maria told him. “Your Army wanted—needed—to know what they were doing in Mexico. It was confusing. The Germans first helped General Villa. And when the Americans invaded to catch him, they worked with General Carranza—El Presidente.”

  “German spies,” Harrison said softly, remembering what Butcher had said in Monte Carlo. “Do you think one of them killed Bart?”

  “That is possible. I know this because I helped him. I introduced him to different people, people he wanted to know.”

  Harrison quietly considered her words. “Their names?” he asked finally.

  “There were many people. I helped him contact a person in the home of the German Consul in Monterrey. A woman.”

  “A Mexican woman?” Harrison asked.

  “Yes,” she answered. “I told you. Things here are very complicated.”

  “Could I meet this woman?”

  “No, you cannot,” Maria said abruptly.

  “Is it too dangerous?” he asked, watching for her reaction.

  “She is dead. The Germans killed her.”

  “They killed her? Because of Bart?”

  “Yes,” Maria answered. “The Germans discovered what she was doing and they killed her. She gave Bart information, and they found out. Colonel Moltke, their military attaché, had her shot.”

  “Was it very valuable information that she gave my brother?”

  “I don’t know, Harry, but that would not matter. The colonel is a butcher.”

  Harrison sat, thinking. For a moment neither spoke.

  “This woman…she was very brave to have done this,” Harrison finally said.

  “She believed in Bart. That was the reason she helped him.”

  “How did the Germans find out about her?”

  “Oh, Harry, they were angry that the Americans stole this information. The colonel and General Carranza, they searched everywhere. Bart was in El Paso, out of their reach, but he could not save her.”

  “You didn’t answer my question, Maria. How did they find out?”

  “They received information that she was their spy. I don’t know how.”

  “Was my brother operating some kind of spy ring in Mexico?” Harrison asked.

  “No, Harry,” Maria said slowly. “I think Bart was a spy catcher. Yes, he tried to catch German spies.”

  “Do you think the woman’s spying for Bart might have something to do with his death? Revenge maybe?” Harrison asked.

  “I think it is possible. Colonel Moltke is like ice. I know him. And the Germans punish everyone who will not help them,” Maria told him.

  “Help them to do what?”

  “Colonel Moltke is working in Mexico to help Germany win the war in Europe.”

  “How do you know this colonel, Maria?” James asked.

  She looked at him and felt his eyes on her. “I know him. We do business together. I also sell guns to the Mexican Army, as I told you.”

  “I see,” Harrison said slowly.
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  She thought she could see accusations reflected in his blue eyes. “We sell arms. I do not concern myself with European politics. I have my own struggle here,” she told him.

  “Who were the Americans supporting when Pershing invaded?” Harrison asked, trying to understand.

  “The Americans invaded to chase General Villa,” Maria answered him. “At that time, General Carranza worked with your Army. But the Americans stayed too long in Mexico. General Carranza was afraid they would never leave. So, he asked the Germans to help him get the gringos out of the country. They talked of an alliance, I think.” She took a breath. “This information was of great interest to your brother.”

  “What happened then?” Harrison asked.

  “What then? Harry, the Americans chased Pancho Villa through northern Mexico for many months. They finally gave up and went home. Everyone knows that.”

  “My brother knew you were selling weapons to Villa?”

  “I told him. That was not important to him.”

  “Then what was important, Maria?” Harrison sipped at the tequila slowly and looked at the young woman.

  “As I told you—the Germans,” Maria said, patiently. “He was concerned that a German alliance with the Mexican armies would threaten the United States. Maybe the American Army came to Mexico to keep the Germans from gaining too much influence? It is possible.”

  He looked at her skeptically. “What else can you tell me, Maria?”

  “Harry, the generals always knew too much about where the American Army would go. Your brother began by investigating this.”

  “Their spies?” James wanted to know.

  “Everyone has spies,” Maria said. But with General Villa, the people are his eyes. The American Army invaded Mexico just like many years before. We did not support this. So many people, I think, helped General Villa. The Mexican people have long memories. Yesterday, today—it is all the same.”

  “From what I read, we entered Mexico only to catch Pancho Villa, and with permission from the Mexican Government. Maria, he invaded our country. His soldiers are considered bandits and murderers.”

  Maria bristled. “General Villa has the support of the people.”