“I might hear it,” Newt said, feeling keenly that the remark was inadequate. “It’s a real thin sound,” he added. “Haven’t they got birds down here? It could be a bird.”
Call drew his rifle from his saddle scabbard. Newt started to get his, but Call stopped him.
“You won’t need it, and you might just drop it,” he said. “I dropped one of mine once, and had to go off and leave it.”
Deets was suddenly back with them, stepping quietly to the Captain’s side.
“They’re singing, all right,” he said.
“Who?”
“Some white folks,” Deets said. “Two of ’em. Got ’em a mule and a donkey.”
“That don’t make no sense at all,” Call said. “What would two white men be doing in one of Pedro Flores’s camps?”
“We can go look,” Deets said.
They followed Deets in single file over a low ridge, where they stopped. A flickering light was visible some hundred yards away. When they stopped, Deets’s judgment was immediately borne out. The singing could be plainly heard. The song even sounded familiar.
“Why, it’s ‘Mary McCrae,’ ” Newt said. “Lippy plays it.”
Call hardly knew what to think. They slipped a little closer, to the corner of what had once been a large rail corral. It was obvious that the camp was no longer much used, because the corral was in poor repair, rails scattered everywhere. The hut that once belonged to the wranglers was roofless—smoke from the singers’ fire drifted upward, whiter than the moonlight.
“This camp’s been burnt out,” Call whispered.
He could hear the singing plainly, which only increased his puzzlement. The voices weren’t Mexican, nor were they Texan. They sounded Irish—but why were Irishmen having a singing party in one of Pedro Flores’s old cow camps? It was an odd situation to have stumbled onto. He had never heard of an Irish vaquero. The whole business was perplexing, but he couldn’t just stand around and wonder about it. The horse herd would soon be on the move.
“I guess we better catch ’em,” he said. “We’ll just walk in from three sides. If you see one of them make a break for it try to shoot his horse.”
“No horses,” Deets reminded him. “Just a mule and a donkey.”
“Shoot it anyway,” Call said.
“What if I hit the man?” Newt said.
“That’s his worry,” Call said. “Not letting him ride away is your worry.”
They secured their horses to a little stunted tree and turned toward the hut. The singing had stopped but the voices could still be heard, raised in argument.
At that point the Captain and Deets walked off, leaving Newt alone with his nervousness and a vast weight of responsibility. It occurred to him that he was closest to their own horses. If the men were well-trained bandits, they might like nothing better than to steal three such horses. The singing might be a trick, a way of throwing the Captain off guard. Perhaps there were more than two men. The others could be hidden in the darkness.
No sooner had it occurred to him that there might be more bandits than he began to wish it hadn’t occurred to him. The thought was downright scary. There were lots of low bushes, mostly chaparral, between him and the hut, and there could be a bandit with a bowie knife behind any one of them. Pea had often explained to him how effective a good bowie knife was in the hands of someone who knew where to stick it—descriptions of stickings came back to his mind as he eased forward. Before he had gone ten steps he had become almost certain that his end was at hand. It was clear to him that he would be an easy victim for a bandit with the least experience. He had never shot anyone, and he couldn’t see well at night. His own helplessness was so obvious to him that he quickly came to feel numb—not too numb to dread what might happen, but too dull-feeling to be able to think of a plan of resistance.
He even felt a flash of irritation with the Captain for being so careless as to leave him on the side of the house where their horses were. Captain Call’s trust, which he had never really expected to earn, had immediately become excessive, leaving him with responsibilities he didn’t feel capable of meeting.
But time was moving forward, and he himself was walking slowly toward the house, his pistol in one hand. The hut had seemed close when the Captain and Deets were standing with him, but once they left it had somehow gotten farther away, leaving him many dangerous shadows to negotiate. The one reassuring aspect was that the men in the shadows were talking loudly and probably wouldn’t hear him coming unless he lost control completely and shot off his gun.
When he got within thirty yards of the house, he stopped and squatted behind a bush. The hut had never been more than a lean-to with a few piles of adobe bricks stacked up around it; its walls were so broken and full of holes that it was easy to look in. Newt saw that both the men arguing were short and rather stout. Also, they were unarmed, or appeared to be. Both had on dirty shirts, and the older of the two men was almost bald. The other one looked young, perhaps no older than himself. They had a bottle, but it evidently didn’t have much left in it, because the older one wouldn’t pass it to the young one.
It was not hard to make out the drift of their conversation either. The subject of the debate was their next meal.
“I say we eat the mule,” the younger man said.
“Nothing of the sort,” the other said.
“Then give me a drink,” the younger said.
“Go away,” the older man said. “You don’t deserve my liquor and you won’t eat my mule. I’m beholden to this mule, and so are you. Didn’t it bring you all this way with no complaint?”
“To the desert to die, you mean?” the young one said. “I’m to thank a mule for that?”
Newt could just make out a thin mule and a small donkey, tethered at the entrance of the hut, beyond the fire.
“If it comes to it we’ll eat the donkey,” the bald man said. “What can you do with a donkey anyway?”
“Train it to sit on its ass and eat sugar cubes,” the young one said. Then he giggled at his own wit.
Newt edged a little closer, his fear rapidly diminishing. Men who could engage in such conversation didn’t seem very dangerous. Just as he was relaxing a hand suddenly gripped his shoulder and for a second he nearly fainted with fright, thinking the bowie knife would hit him next. Then he realized it was Deets. Motioning for him to follow, Deets walked right up to the hut. He did not appear to be worried in the least. When they were a few feet from the broken adobe wall, Newt saw Captain Call step into the circle of firelight from the other side.
“You men just hold steady,” he said, in a calm, almost friendly, voice.
It evidently didn’t sound as friendly to the men around the fire.
“Murderers!” the young one yelled. He sprang to his feet and darted past the Captain so fast the Captain didn’t even have time to trip him or hit him with his rifle barrel. For a fat man he moved fast, springing on the back of the mule before the other two could even move. Newt expected the Captain to shoot him or at least step over and knock him off the mule, but to his surprise the Captain just stood and watched, his rifle in the crook of his arm. The boy—for he was no older—pounded the mule desperately with his heels and the mule responded with a short leap and then went crashing down, throwing the boy over its head and almost back to the spot he had left. Looking more closely, Newt saw why the Captain had not bothered to stop the escape: the mule was hobbled.
The sight of a man so addled as to try and get away on a hobbled mule was too much for Deets. He slapped his leg with his big hand and laughed a deep laugh, resting his rifle for a moment on the low adobe wall.
“You see, it’s a poor mule,” the boy said indignantly, springing up. “Its legs won’t work.”
Deets laughed even louder, but the baldheaded man sighed and looked at the Captain in a rather jolly way.
“He’s my brother but he ain’t smart,” he said quietly. “The Lord gave him a fine baritone voice and I guess he thought that w
as enough to do for a poor Irish boy.”
“I’m smarter than yourself at least,” the boy said, kicking dirt at his brother. He seemed quite prepared to take the quarrel farther, but his brother merely smiled.
“You must unhobble the mule if you want his legs to work,” he said. “It’s details like that you’re always forgetting, Sean.”
The mule had managed to get to its feet and was standing quietly by the Captain.
“Well, I didn’t hobble him,” Sean said. “I was riding the donkey.”
The baldheaded man hospitably held the bottle out to the Captain.
“It’s only a swallow,” he said, “but if you’re thirsty, you’re welcome.”
“Much obliged, but I’ll pass,” the Captain said. “Do you men know where you are?”
“We ain’t in Ireland,” the boy said. “I know that much.”
“You wouldn’t have a bag of potatoes about you, sir, would you?” the older said. “We do miss our spuds.”
Call motioned for Deets and Newt to join the group. When they did the bald man stood up.
“Since you’ve not bothered to murder us, I’ll introduce myself,” he said. “I’m Allen O’Brien and this is young Sean.”
“Are those your only animals?” Call asked. “Just a donkey and a mule?”
“We had three mules to start with,” Allen said. “I’m afraid our thirst got the better of us. We traded two mules for a donkey and some liquor.”
“And some beans,” Sean said. “Only the beans were no good. I broke my tooth trying to eat one.”
It was Call’s turn to sigh. He had expected vaqueros, and instead had turned up two helpless Irishmen, neither of whom even had an adequate mount. Both the mule and the donkey looked starved.
“How’d you men get here?” he asked.
“That would be a long story,” Allen said. “Are we far from Galveston? That was our destination.”
“You overshot it by a wide mark,” Call said. “This hut you’re resting in belongs to a man named Pedro Flores. He ain’t a gentle man, and if he finds you tomorrow I expect he’ll hang you.”
“Oh, he will,” Deets agreed. “He’ll be mad tomorrow.”
“Fine, we’ll go with you,” Allen said. He courteously offered the bottle to both Deets and Newt, and when they refused drained it with one gulp and flung it into the darkness.
“Now we’re packed,” he said.
“Get the horses,” Call said to Newt, looking at the Irishmen. They were none of his business and he could just ride off and leave them, but the theft he was about to commit would put their lives in considerable danger: Pedro Flores would vent his anger on whatever whites lay to hand.
“I’ve no time for a long explanation,” he said. “We’ve got some horses to the south of here. I’ll send a man back with two of them as soon as I can. Be ready—we won’t wait for you.”
“You mean leave tonight?” the boy said. “What about sleep?”
“Just be ready,” Call said. “We’ll want to move fast when we move, and you’ll never make it on that mule and that jackass.”
Newt felt sorry for the two. They seemed friendly. The younger one was holding the sack of dried beans. Newt didn’t feel he could leave without a word about the beans.
“You have to soak them beans,” he said. “Soak them a while and it softens them up.”
The Captain was already loping away, and Newt didn’t dare linger any longer.
“There’s no water to soak them in,” Sean said. He was very hungry, and inclined to despair at such times.
Deets was the last to leave. Allen O’Brien walked over, as he was mounting.
“I hope you’ll not forget us,” he said. “I do fear we’re lost.”
“The Captain said we’ll get you, we’ll get you,” Deets said.
“Maybe they’ll bring a wagon,” Sean said. “A wagon would suit me best.”
“A cradle would suit you best,” his brother said.
They listened as the sound of loping horses grew faint and was lost in the desert night.
11.
AUGUSTUS SOON FOUND the horse herd in a valley south of the old line camp. Call had predicted its location precisely, but had overestimated its size. A couple of horses whinnied at the sight of riders but didn’t seem particularly disturbed.
“Probably all Texas horses anyway,” Augustus said. “Probably had enough of Mexico.”
“I’ve had enough of it and I just got here,” Jake said, lighting his smoke. “I never liked it down here with these chili-bellies.”
“Why, Jake, you should stay and make your home here,” Augustus said. “That sheriff can’t follow you here. Besides, think of the women.”
“I got a woman,” Jake said. “That one back in Lonesome Dove will do me for a while.”
“She’ll do you, all right,” Augustus said. “That girl’s got more spunk than you have.”
“What would you know about it, Gus?” Jake asked. “I don’t suppose you’ve spent time with her, a man your age.”
“The older the violin, the sweeter the music,” Augustus said. “You never knowed much about women.”
Jake didn’t answer. He had forgotten how much Gus liked argument.
“I guess you think all women want you to marry them and build ’em a house and raise five or six brats,” Augustus said. “But it’s my view that very few women are fools, and only a fool would pick you for a chore like that, Jake. You’ll do fine for a barn dance or a cakewalk, or maybe a picnic, but house building and brat raising ain’t exactly your line.”
Jake kept quiet. He knew that silence was the best defense once Augustus got wound up. It might take him a while to talk himself out, if left alone, but any response would just encourage him.
“This ain’t no hundred horses,” he said, after a bit. “Maybe we got the wrong herd.”
“Nope, it’s right,” Augustus said. “Pedro just learned not to keep all his remuda in one place. It’s almost forty horses here. It won’t satisfy Woodrow, but then practically nothing does.”
He had no sooner spoken than he heard three horses coming from the north.
“If that ain’t them, we’re under attack,” Jake said.
“It’s them,” Augustus said. “A scout like you, who’s traveled in Montana, ought to recognize his own men.”
“Gus, you’d exasperate a preacher,” Jake said. “I don’t know what your dern horses sound like.”
It was an old trick of theirs, trying to make him feel incompetent—as if a man was incompetent because he couldn’t see in the dark, or identify a local horse by the sound of its trot.
“ ’I god, you’re techy, Jake,” Augustus said, just as Call rode up.
“Is this all there is or did you trot in and run the rest off?” he asked.
“Do them horses look nervous?” Augustus asked.
“Dern,” Call said. “Last time we was through here there was two or three hundred horses.”
“Maybe Pedro’s going broke,” Augustus said. “Mexicans can go broke, same as Texans. What’d you do with the vaqueros?”
“We didn’t find none. We just found two Irishmen.”
“Irishmen?” Augustus asked.
“They just lost,” Deets said.
“Hell, I can believe they’re lost,” Jake said.
“On their way to Galveston,” Newt said, thinking it might help clarify the situation.
Augustus laughed. “I guess it ain’t hard to miss Galveston if you start from Ireland,” he said. “However, it takes skill to miss the dern United States entirely and hit Pedro Flores’s ranch. I’d like to meet men who can do that.”
“You’ll get your chance,” Call said. “They don’t have mounts, unless you count a mule and a donkey. I guess we better help them out of their fix.”
“I’m surprised they ain’t naked, too,” Augustus said. “I’d had thought some bandit would have stolen their clothes by now.”
“Have you counted these h
orses, or have you been sitting here jawing?” Call said brusquely. The night was turning out to be more complicated and less profitable than he had hoped.
“I assigned that chore to Dish Boggett,” Augustus said. “It’s around forty.”
“Not enough,” Call said. “You take two and go back and get the Irishmen.”
He took his rope off his saddle and handed it to the boy.
“Go catch two horses,” he said. “You better make hackamores.”
Newt was so surprised by the assignment he almost dropped the rope. He had never roped a horse in the dark before—but he would have to try. He trotted off toward the horse herd, sure they would probably stampede at the sight of him. But he had a piece of luck. Six or eight horses trotted over to sniff at his mount and he easily caught one of them. As he was making a second loop and trying to lead the first horse over to Pea, Dish Boggett trotted over without being asked and casually roped another horse.
“What are we gonna do, brand ’em?” he asked.
Newt was irritated, for he would have liked to complete the assignment himself, but since it was Dish he said nothing.
“Lend ’em to some men we found,” he said. “Irishmen.”
“Oh,” Dish said. “I hate to lend my rope to an Irishman. I might be out a good rope.”
Newt solved that by putting his own rope on the second horse. He led them back to where the Captain was waiting. As he did, Mr. Gus began to laugh, causing Newt to worry that he had done something improperly after all—he couldn’t imagine what.
Then he saw that they were looking at the horse brands—H I C on the left hips.
“It just goes to show that even sinners can accomplish Christian acts,” Augustus said. “Here we set out to rob a man and now we’re in a position to return valuable property to a man who’s already been robbed. That’s curious justice, ain’t it?”
“It’s wasted night, is what it is,” Call said.
“If it was me I’d make the man pay a reward for them horses,” Jake said. “He’d never have seen them agin if it hadn’t been for us.”
The Lonesome Dove Chronicles (1-4) Page 139