The man raised his eyebrows and looked around, as if he did not want to be heard saying something indiscreet. “Of course, the person who issued the threat has to be considered, though it is hard to believe he would actually do it. He would expose himself to immediate punishment, and after all, he did not have much of a reason.”
Perhaps in the public view, Devon thought. But he said, “Who could have a stronger one?”
The man widened his eyes again. “A jealous man. His rival.”
“The cousin of the young woman?”
“The same.”
Devon frowned. “He is not very probable.”
“Maybe not. But he was heard declaring, not long before, that Ricardo would not live to make Petra his.”
“Oh. I thought he said Ricardo would not be able to take her away.”
“I was not there.”
“Neither was I.”
“But his boast, however he put it in words, leaves him under suspicion, at least as much as the stepfather’s threat does to himself.”
“That’s unfortunate.”
“Oh, yes. But the youngman’s family has a right to demand a full inquiry. And he has many brothers as well as his father. They will not let it go unanswered.”
“Nor should they.” Devon took a sip of the lemonade, which was tepid and sweet. In order to leave the glass, he drank the rest of it down. “Thank you for the drink,” he said. “And for the information.”
“You’re welcome. May things go well for you.”
Devon went back to his bench and sat down to absorb the import of what he had heard. He could not believe that Carlos had committed the crime; it just did not seem to fit. On the other hand, he was stunned that Don Felipe could have followed through with it, if indeed he had. Meanwhile Ricardo’s family had the grief of losing a young man who had just begun to grab life by the horns, and as they mourned their loss, the rest of life went on in commerce, conversation, song, and wordless promenade.
Devon tried the door of the cantina and found it closed. Dusk was falling and the park was almost empty of people, so he went to sit again on a bench. Left to his own thoughts, he pondered the sensation of sitting here alone and in quiet, in this place where a few hours earlier there had been a bustle of life and the rippling news of death.
A dusty-looking human form appeared on his left, and at first he did not recognize the person, partly because he did not expect to see him in this setting. But the details came together quickly enough—the slender build, the dark hair, the long narrow head like a dolichocephalic stone figure.
“Buenas tardes, jefe.”
“Buenas tardes, Cayetano.”
“Did you just come out?”
“No, I was out earlier, during the paseo. I came out again a little while ago, but it looks as if La Sombra is closed.”
“Oh, yes. For being Sunday.”
“So I thought.”
Cayetano stood in a slouch, shifted his weight from one foot to another, then broke the silence. “Maybe you have heard the news, then.”
“I have heard some.”
“Of the death of Ricardo Vega?”
“Yes, I heard that. It is too bad.”
“Oh, yes,” said Cayetano, with a solemn up-and-down motion of his head. “It is a very bad thing.”
“And it is not yet known who did it?”
“Still nothing. Of course, there are two who are the most suspected.”
“So I understand. Do you think, really, that Carlos could have done such a thing?”
Cayetano put his hands together in a pious, supplicant gesture and moved his head back and forth. “Oh, I am no one to judge something like that.”
The answer struck Devon as a mealy-mouthed way of saying that Cayetano would not mind believing, or having it believed, that Carlos might have done it. But Devon just said, “Huh. And others, what do they think?”
“I cannot say, not for others. But if Carlos had not said what he did at the rooster fight, there would be less suspicion on him at the present.”
“And the other, the master of the rancho?”
Cayetano looked down. “Oh, it is a very serious thing to accuse a man of that class.”
The obsequiousness irritated Devon. “Does his wealth, or his status, put him beyond suspicion? Or are people afraid of him?”
“Oh, no, it’s not that. But he is very proud. He would not go to someone else’s rancho, in the night, to do that. He would do it in open day, in a challenge.”
“What if the young man came in the night and died there? They could have carried the body back.”
Cayetano shrugged. “It is not for me to say.”
“What about the caporal?”
“Alfonso was in plain view at the rooster fight and then for the rest of the night in La Sombra.”
“Who knows if there is a third party, then. But I cannot imagine Carlos committing such an enormous act. Where is he, by the way?”
“He is closed up in his mother’s house. He does not go out today. They say he is afraid to show his face.”
“That’s too bad.” Devon thought for a second. “Where does he live?”
“Do you want to see him?”
The man’s eagerness was distasteful. “I don’t know,” said Devon.
“I’ll show you.”
“You can just tell me. This is an easy town to get around in.”
“I’ll show you.” Cayetano took a couple of sideways steps andmotioned with his hand. “Come on.”
Devon figured the man was angling for a tip, and it was either this way or some similar way to get rid of the nuisance, so he got up.
“It’s not very far.” The man shook his head in an expression of assurance.
Devon walked along beside his guide and made note of the corners and cross streets until they came to a wide adobe house set back from the street some thirty feet and facing north. The front patio was enclosed by a six-foot adobe wall with a wrought-iron gate in the middle.
Cayetano picked up a pebble from the street and used it to rap on the iron railing. After a moment of silence he rapped again.
The house door opened, and a middle-aged lady in a jacket and skirt appeared. “What do you want?” she called out.
“Good afternoon, with my best wishes, Doña Flora. Comes here a gentleman who would like to visit with your son Carlos.”
The lady raised her head. “For what reason? Who is it who wants him?”
“The American artist. A man to be trusted.”
“Just a minute. Let me see.” The lady turned and went into the house. A minute later she reappeared. “My son says he will see the American. Tell him to come through the back entrance.”
“Thank you, señora.”
Cayetano led the way to the corner and back around through the alleyway, which was lined with weeds and piles of rubble. The two men came to an adobe wall on the left, and there at an iron gateway stood Carlos.
Devon fished out a dime for his guide, who tarried just long enough to wish a good evening and to assure Devon he was at his service.
Carlos opened the gate, and as Devon stepped in and shook hands, he saw that Carlos was not faring well. The man was dressed in a clean brown cotton suit, about the same tone as the corduroy he had worn earlier, and he had on a clean white shirt. He was well groomed and clean-shaven. But his face, with its rough complexion and large, expressive brown eyes, had a haunted look to it.
“Come and sit in the patio,” he said, “where we won’t bother my mother.”
Devon followed him to a roofed area on the east side of the house, where the shadows lay heavy and the daylight was fading. Two chairs of wrought iron painted white sat next to a matching round table, and on the table sat a bottle and a glass.
“I’ll bring a lamp,” said Carlos. “And a glass, if you’d like one.”
“Sure. Go ahead.”
Within a few minutes, Carlos carried out the mo tions of a good host, and the two men sat, each with a
glass of tequila in front of him.
“Very good of you to come by.”
“I didn’t really plan to, but Cayetano seemed to think he should show me, so I came.”
“Very well. I’m sure he likes to feel useful, though he doesn’t have much success squeezing money out of me.” Carlos gave a small cough, and as he reached for his drink, Devon saw that his hand was trembling.
“Are you not feeling well?”
“It has been a difficult day.”
“Yes, I was sorry to hear of the misfortune.”
Carlos looked up, and his eyes were brimming with moisture in the lamplight. “In spite of everything, I am sure my cousin Petra knows I would never have done any harm to Ricardo.”
“I guess that’s one of the reasons I came to visit you, to tell you that I, too, was convinced that you could not have done such a thing.”
“Thank you.”
Devon shrugged. “It is difficult for me to understand how anyone, in seriousness, could hold you in suspicion.”
Carlos, his eyes still moist, shook his head. “Yet they will. And it is all my fault.”
“How so?”
“For the foolish thing I said at the rooster fight, when I was provoked by Alfonso.”
“That was just talk, and the drink. I wasn’t there, but I know that much.”
“Yes, but I’m sure it has been exaggerated and distorted.”
“All the same, if you came home after that andwere here for the rest of the night, what can they say?”
Carlos heaved a sigh, and with a sad cast to his face he shook his head. “But there’s the detail. I did go out.”
“Really? I didn’t see you.”
“Not to the cantina. Iwent to RanchoAgua Prieta.”
It was Devon’s turn to exhale. “Is that right? For what purpose?”
Carlos shook his head again. “It sounds so stupid. But the moon was bright, as you will see it again in a few minutes, and I had a yearning to see the rancho. I did not hope to see my beautiful cousin, only to see the rancho and the light at the window, to know that she was there inside and to be that close to her.”
“So you went?”
“Yes.”
“Not on foot?”
“Oh, no. I took a horse from the stable where we keep them.”
“So a stableman saw you come and go?”
“Yes, though it would be nothing to lie about anyway. I rode out there, saw nothing except the ranch itself, and no one saw me. I achieved what I set out to do, which was to see the house beneath the moon with my beautiful Petra inside, and I came back.”
“How long were you gone?”
“Between two and three hours.”
“And you were back, let us say, by midnight?”
“I would say so.”
“Well, it may not look good, but like you say, it is nothing to lie about. And if you did, and someone found out, it would look much, much worse.”
Carlos had tears starting from his eyes. “But that is how stupid I am, my friend. I have already told them I was at home, and then when they said they knew different, I had to admit it.”
“Who is they?”
“Ricardo’s brothers. Two of them came in the afternoon.”
Devon shook his head. “Well, you just have to stick to the truth. This will all go to the law, won’t it?”
“Oh, yes. I’m sure the sheriff will come to see me tomorrow.”
“You just have to tell the truth.”
Carlos’s face clouded even more than before. “I am sure it is just a matter of time before they take me to jail, and after that, it is in the hands of God.”
“Don’t give up so soon.”
“That’s easy for you to say. The truth is, I should have given up much sooner.”
Devon frowned. “Why? So what if you went to see her house in the moonlight? People in love are always…they always do things like this.”
Carlos took a good gulp of tequila and shook his head again. “Sooner, much sooner. I should never have hoped.”
“One must always hope. The only thing I can see is that she is your cousin. But everything else—”
“Oh, for that matter, being a cousin doesn’t have much to do with it. It would be difficult, here, to find someone acceptable who wasn’t related in some way.”
“Then why should you not have hoped?”
“Because the disillusionment is so strong.” Carlos lifted the bottle and tipped it toward his guest.
Devon held out his hand, flat, and moved it back and forth. “No, thanks.”
Carlos poured himself a couple of ounces. “Here it is. My brother went through the same thing. He was in love with a girl—a more distant cousin, actually—and he wanted to be her pretendiente. But her father said, no, not yet, the girl was too young. Then came another galán, with his parents, and they asked for permission for him to visit. The father conceded, and the young man had exclusive visiting privileges for a year, which of course he took advantage of, visiting every Sunday.”
“And during that time, no one else could see her?”
“Not at all. And after a year, he came with his parents again, and they asked for her hand, and that was it. Within another year, she was gone, living with him and his parents, washing clothes with her mother-in-law.”
“And your brother?”
Carlos gave a most mournful look. “May he rest in peace. He died of a broken heart.”
As Devon understood it, dying of a broken heart often meant a relentless siege of drinking. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“That’s the way things are. From his example I should have learned. But when I heard that Ricardo had declared himself and swore he would carry her away, and my cousin old enough to go, in spite of the pain it would cause her mother—”
“You reacted.”
“Yes, like a great fool. I made stupid remarks about Ricardo, and then I went to be close to her presence in the night.”
“You didn’t go to try to intercept him?”
“Oh, no. I wanted to see no one and for no one to see me. I hoped with all my heart he would not come that night, and I was glad he didn’t.”
“At least while you were there.”
“Well, yes. Beyond that, I know nothing, except that things look bad for me.”
Devon followed the streets in the moonlight, from the back gate of Carlos’s house to the front door of the dark house where he had gone a couple of nights earlier. He was sure of the way and did not need a guide.
He rapped on the door frame with his knuckles, and the woman with the reddish hair and wide face opened the door.
“Yes?” she said.
“Good evening. I came here the other night, and my friend Carlos introduced me.”
“Oh, yes.”
“And I was wondering if your place is…open.”
“It is Sunday. But if a girl would like to receive a guest, such as someone she knows, that is acceptable. Let me see.”
She backed away and closed the door, leaving Devon to stand by himself on the doorstep with no light other than that of the rising moon. After a couple of minutes, the door opened and the woman appeared again.
“It’s all right. Come in.”
As she moved aside, Devon stepped into the lamp-lit room, where Ramona sat on a divan. His eyes met hers for an instant, until he was distracted by the sound of the madam clicking the latch on the door and then the sight of her disappearing through a set of curtains that hung in a doorway. He brought his gaze around to meet Ramona’s again.
“Good evening,” she said. “Would you like to sit down?”
“Thank you.” He took a seat.
“And how goes your stay here in Tinaja?”
“Very well, I believe. I enjoyed sitting in the park this afternoon while everyone was doing the paseo.”
“Oh, yes. It is very nice.”
“Do you ever go?”
“Oh, no,” she said. “I do not know many of the people f
rom here.”
“I see.” From her comment he derived that she did not go out much in public and that she was not from this area. As for the latter point, it made sense that a local girl might find it difficult to be in this line of work if half the men who knocked on the door were relatives. To the extent that it mattered, he liked her being an outsider. “Do you come from very far?” he asked.
“From the Republic.”
He took that to mean Mexico proper, as opposed to this northern frontier, as the people seemed to regard it. “Do you expect to go back?”
She smiled. “Maybe some day. I need to save my money to buy a business, like a restaurant or a store.”
“I hope it goes well for you and that you may be successful in your country.”
“Thank you. Have you ever been there?”
“No. I’ve seen pictures, nothing more.”
“It is very nice. If you like to go to far places and see the sights, there are many things there.”
“A good idea.”
She brushed her leg against his and met him with her soft, dark eyes. “And tonight?”
He felt his boldness rising. “The same as before? What do you think?”
“As you say, a good idea. If that’s what you have in mind.”
“The same way?”
“Yes, if you liked it.”
“I was enchanted. For that reason my feet brought me back here.”
She laughed as she rose fromthe couch and took his hand. “You are very nice. And you have smart feet.”
In the room, she let him undress her as before. It was a little world unto itself where everything went well. He felt competent with his hands and the rest after that. When he lay beneath the cover a while later, admiring her loose dark hair on the pillow, he said, “It never occurred to me that my feet had any awareness, but you said they were smart.”
“If they brought you back here. We’ll see if they do it again.”
“I hope so.”
On his way to the inn, he savored the afterglow of his brief time with her. His senses were a swirl of bronze skin, tender touch, dark hair and eyes, and soft, flowing motion.
An image intruded of Carlos in his anguish, then another of young Ricardo Vega laid out in his best suit with his hands folded across his chest. Devon wondered if Ricardo had ever been to the parlor he had just left, or to some place like it. Probably so. It was too bad he would never know the pleasures of the world again, but life went on. As the old proverb said, not a plow stops when a man dies.
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