by Gene Hackman
In the middle of a narrow trench lay a horse, its head moving slowly, a bone protruding from its left front leg. It must have stepped in a hole, Jubal thought. He looked ahead at the tracks, only one set of prints leading away, and they were deep. Pete Wetherford and his companion were riding double.
They wouldn’t get far in this weather. They had tried to skirt around the drifts piled high against the east wall of the ravine and hadn’t put the horse out of its misery, probably so as not to be heard. So maybe they do suspect they’re being followed, but certainly not by a boy. After examining Wetherford’s horse track, Jubal determined they had probably passed that way an hour earlier. The hoofprints in the light snow were just beginning to freeze at the top, where fine crystals had melted to form a soft mound.
He certainly didn’t have a choice where the horse was concerned. He felt bad for her and yet he knew a break that severe would never heal even if he could get her to a vet, which he couldn’t. He walked Frisk back around the bend and tied her firmly to a juniper, then proceeded back to the stricken animal. There wasn’t any rush. The farther away Wetherford and his friend were, the better.
Jubal sat on a large rock, pistol in hand, waiting. Having spent most of his life on a farm, he had a strong affinity for animals and hated seeing them suffer. The mare tried struggling to her feet, her eyes wide with fear. Jubal cradled her large head and gentled her. He then looked to the darkening skies to the west. A flash of light in pewter-colored clouds. Jubal raised his pistol. As the thunder clapped, he fired.
Frisk tramped about where she was tied. As Jubal approached her, he thought he saw an accusatory look, and as he eased into the saddle, she felt a little less welcoming.
NINETEEN
The rain had turned to snow, and Pete Wetherford and Ed Thompson were caught in it. Within minutes, a two-inch blanket covered the open plain. When the weather changed once again, they were well and truly soaked. At long last, a warm breeze coming from the west finally drove away the snow.
“We gotta find a spot to overnight.” Ed bundled his coat tighter around his neck. “I’m frozen and sick of packing double.”
Wetherford ran his hand around his growth of beard. “Nah, can’t you feel that warm air? It’s trailing in from Arizona or someplace hot. Why, hell’s fire, you’ll be stripping off your shirt in no time, bathing in the sun.” He tightened his hands around the reins.
Ed flinched as they rode on. To the west they spotted a small fire, and after another hour they came upon a community of Mexicans who had built a number of adobe homes along a meandering stream. They headed toward the village, soon closing in on a number of small pens housing goats and chickens behind modest dwellings.
“Let’s pass to the east of them shacks and skirt around, see if there ain’t some lonely places farther on,” Wetherford said.
“What you mean?”
“It might be there’s a house farther out in the countryside that would welcome a couple rain-soaked travelers.” Pete winked and gave a short dirty laugh. They continued to circle the dwellings, staying a half mile to the east and north. After a while the adobe huts were not as clustered, then the line of homes abruptly stopped.
“I can’t get warm.” Ed rubbed his hands together briskly. “Think we left that village wanting for visitors, Pete. Don’t see any more houses.”
“Bet you’re wrong. You have no imagination, boy. There’s always some idiot who wants to be different, thinks if he builds his ramshackle house in town he’ll be just like the rest of the folks. Nah, old Jose built his place on a little hill close by the river so he could see the relatives’ adobe shacks all crowded and nasty in town. Wait and see.”
The river took a turn to the north, ran straight for half a mile, then wound back toward the mountains. Perched on a small rise looking down on the streambed was a shack. To call it a house would be exaggerating; it was more of a makeshift shelter.
“Hola,” Pete called out as they neared the dwelling. They stopped short of a chicken coop. No answer from the house. Pete tried again. “Hola. Por favor, comida para dos hombres.”
“What’re you saying?” Ed asked.
“I’m asking for food.” He shouted once again. “We have mucho dinero, señor. Por favor.”
“There’s nobody here, Pete. Let’s move on.”
“They’re here, wait and see. See the couple horses in that corral and the wash on the clothesline? They’re here.”
They were at the back of the shack. One tiny window looked out toward the chicken coop. “They’ll be coming now,” Wetherford said.
“Why you say that?”
“Have faith, amigo. Ole Pete wouldn’t steer you wrong.”
A woman rounded the corner of the house, the river to her back. With her weathered look, it was hard to determine her age, maybe mid-thirties. Her long plain dress was tattered and worn through at the hips and elbows, a denim apron tied around her slim waist. She was handsome in a manly sort of way, legs firmly planted, eyeing the two newcomers. After shaking her long black hair, she raised a Winchester rifle. “¿Qué pasa?”
Wetherford, smiling his best toothy grin, worked at making his eyes light up. He raised his hands in exaggerated surrender. “Comida para mi amigo and me. I pay dinero to you.” He pointed to her, took out several coins, and let her see them.
The woman motioned with her rifle for the men to get off their horse. She allowed the weapon to cradle in her arm with the barrel pointed toward the ground as Wetherford held the money out in front of him as a peace offering. The woman stopped his forward progress with a grunt, looking intently at the money.
Once again she motioned with the rifle for the men to dismount. She rounded the corner of the house and pointed for them to sit next to a rounded adobe fire pit. Propping the rifle next to the door, she disappeared inside while Wetherford and Ed warmed themselves next to the fire. Pete still had the money in his hand when she came out with a bowl of beans, rice, fresh masa, and a pan. She cooked fresh tortillas, wrapped them quickly, then heated the beans and rice and handed the food to the men on a long stick with a paddle shape at the end. They ate their fill, Big Ed continuing to ask for more. Wetherford watched the woman intently and leaned over to Ed.
“She don’t have no man, no sirree. She’s alone. I suspect the master of the house is away, dead, or lying in there sick as a horse. She’s lonely.”
“Don’t do it, Pete.” Ed grew nervous. “We got ourselves enough trouble as it is.” Wetherford ignored him. “Pete, you listening?”
“I heard you. What is it you think I’m gonna do?”
“I just don’t want to be party to no more killing and molesting.”
“Who said anything about killing?” Pete rubbed his stomach as if in gratitude. “Señorita, por favor, muchas gracias.” He handed her the money.
She seemed grateful as she counted it.
“Is possible, to sleep, dor—dorm—ah, hell, what’s the word for ‘sleep’?” He looked to Ed.
“Don’t ask me, Pete. I no hably Españo.”
Frustrated, Wetherford called to the woman and mimed sleeping, his two hands making a pillow next to his head. He pointed toward the house. The woman shook her head no and went about cleaning up the remnants of the meal. Wetherford dug once again into his pocket and waved more money at her, but she took no notice as she continued her work. The two men finished their food and prepared to leave. The sun was down below the tree line across from the stream, the light beaming through the leaves, making dark patterns on the side of the house.
The woman finished her chores and stepped to the door of the house. “Adios, muchachos, vaya con Dios.” She grabbed the rifle with her free hand and started through the door.
Pete had his pistol out and cocked it, the sound unmistakable. The woman stopped in the threshold of the door, her back to the men. She slumped just slightly, knowing she would be in for a long night.
The morning sun found the men still packing double heading north. They
rode for an hour without speaking. Finally, Ed pulled a canteen loose from his saddlebag and took a long draught. “You seem kinda with yourself this morning. What is it?”
Pete half smiled. “I went against my better judgment with that old gal.”
“Really? It sounded like you were having right good sport with her. Kept me awake most of the night.”
“No, I don’t mean that. I mean the leaving her alive to go to the law.” They rode on for a spell, then stopped. “You see that mesa up ahead, half a mile or so?”
Ed looked and nodded.
“Hop off and head up there. I’ll meet you later. Probably a couple hours.” He laughed in his peculiar way.
“The walk will do you good, cowboy. I gotta go back and take care of business.”
Big Ed slid off the back of the horse. “Ah, come on, leave it. That gal did everything you asked, let her be.”
Pete ignored him, turned the horse, and started back toward the house by the river.
After a mile, Jubal made his way out of the ravine, thinking it would be too easy for the Wetherford party to be waiting around one of the many turns.
Out on the vast plain once again, he looked to the north. The wind had picked up and the occasional flurry of snow twirled about like small dust devils. Jubal thought he saw smoke miles to the northeast. He couldn’t be sure, as the sky and plain were the same gray smudge. He rode onto a small mesa and cupped his hands around his eyes to see where it was coming from. It would appear, then vanish. A movement, and a sound like the wind trying to find its way.
At last a train came into view about five miles away, appearing suddenly out of a gully as it labored its way north. It occurred to Jubal that Wetherford might abandon yet another horse and go north on the train. More than likely, he thought.
It grew warmer and the snow changed to drizzle, then rain. The northern sky was blanketed with streaked vertical stripes of a downpour dominating the vast open panorama to the east toward the mountains. Jubal dismounted and led Frisk over the bank of a steep arroyo with an overhanging large piñon dangling from its edge. The arroyo was eight to ten feet deep and ten yards wide, and provided protection from the deluge.
The arroyo looked as if it stretched for miles, winding its way eventually up into the foothills close by and then into the mountains. Jubal crouched down below Frisk’s belly, trying to stay dry. The center of the creek bed began to fill, the gradually slanted floor trickling with just the beginnings of a stream coming off the hills to the east.
Jubal found some joy watching the creek quickly meander through the arroyo, starting first to form a narrow wandering flow and then continuing to expand. To the east about forty yards the arroyo turned and disappeared, debris now beginning to pick up on the far bank where the stream curved.
Jubal was surprised to see a stray coyote hustling along the damp earth in the direction of the running water. It trotted past, intent on its journey, seeming not to notice the horse and huddled rider. Several times, the animal attempted to scale the sides of the arroyo, only to slip back and scamper farther along. It seemed desperate, almost in a panic, its clawing and futile struggle appearing unnatural. Jubal’s knowledge of coyotes was limited to hearing them and shooing them away from the farm, but he had never seen one so blindly afraid. Before it disappeared around a distant curve, the animal looked back toward the mountains. Jubal, in his hunched-over shelter, marveled at the mysterious behavior.
The rain continued in strange patterns. It would pelt down hard, making it difficult for Jubal to see more than a couple of yards in front of him. Then it would let up briefly, then shower down again in pea-sized drops just short of hail. Breathing became difficult, almost as if the driving force of the rain had pushed out all the oxygen from the surrounding air. Frisk remained still.
Jubal heard, above the rain, the rumblings of thunder from the east. The downpour lasted for nearly an hour. The stream was full. Jubal wished he could be under the shadow of Morning Peak to see the dark earth being saturated.
The thunder from the hills and mountains seemed to be increasing. The sound, Jubal thought, maybe wasn’t thunder—not coming from the sky but down lower through the canyons to the east. At a lull in the torrent, Jubal looked toward the mountains. They had cleared, though it was still overcast in the upper sky and a mist persisted in the largest of the canyons. It seemed to be moving downward. A cascade of water bounded over the edge of a distant cliff, the raging stream packed with trees, limbs, and chamisa rolling like wayward balls down the steep rock face.
The coyote must have sensed something long before Jubal’s instincts alerted him. A flood. The water ran off into the canyons and built into a raging wall.
Jubal mounted Frisk and attempted to regain the high ground where they had descended earlier. They made it nearly halfway up the water-soaked wall, then slipped back down. He dismounted and tried leading Frisk up the slippery clay embankment. Each time they would get nearly to the top, but no farther.
The noise became louder. Jubal remounted Frisk and began a hurried, determined gallop west, down the arroyo and away from the now-thunderous onslaught.
After a hundred yards there was still no easy access out of the trench. He knew the farther into the flatland he rode, the more the arroyo’s walls would descend, until at last becoming level with the endless plain.
As he rode, the walls did shorten. But as the arroyo turned, it deepened as the valley curved back east toward the mountains. He dismounted and, with the reins in his hand, tried once again to lead Frisk up the steep side wall. She would make it nearly all the way, thrashing with her hind legs for purchase as the wall got steeper. Then, despite Jubal’s urging, she would stumble back into the now-ankle-deep water.
The roar from the oncoming flood had gotten impossibly loud.
Ahead, he could see a tributary spurring off to the right. Jubal headed for it. As he neared, a loud prolonged rumbling preceded a wall of water that emptied into the arroyo from the tributary.
He was trapped.
The water carried broken trees, stumps, and branches that drove hard into the arroyo wall opposite the formerly dry tributary. In moments the flood coming from behind Jubal caught up with him and then met the tributary. He scrambled off of Frisk and grabbed her mane with both hands just above her withers as the water whirled them in circles before carrying them down the tumultuous arroyo.
A giant limb from a tree passed wickedly close to Jubal’s head. He contemplated latching onto the treelike raft, but decided he would feel best if he survived with Frisk rather than leaving her behind.
They continued their chaotic journey. Between spitting out the brackish water and fending off tree limbs, Jubal had all he could handle, but he continued encouraging Frisk to do her best. The beast’s eyes were wide with fear, her legs slowing, she must finally have realized she was floating. A dead squirrel moved past, then a bush of yellow flowers hung up on the back of Frisk’s head before drifting away.
Jubal struggled to stay alive.
It once again began to rain.
At last Frisk snorted and seemed to get taller. Jubal realized the earth at least on this side of the arroyo began to ascend upward. Jubal struggled to hold on to Frisk’s mane as the animal gradually pulled herself out of the steep ditch. Jubal suddenly found himself standing upright next to a shivering Frisk. They were safe.
On a rise nearby, a copse of piñon looked like a welcoming shelter. Jubal led Frisk by the reins and tied her to a limb. The rain had stopped but the roaring floodwaters continued to carry debris down the arroyo. Jubal sat on the rise and watched as first a small wide-eyed deer came paddling by and later a dead horse floated downstream. It looked like the mare that he had shot earlier, its bloated stomach rising just above the muddy water. It would be many miles before the animal found its final resting place.
Exhausted, he drifted off to sleep under a sheltering pine. When he awoke, he rummaged through his soaked saddlebags. Fortunately, the tin box where he
had sealed his matches seemed intact.
He foraged and found a few broken pine boughs. In a small opening in the earth, he found a nest of dry tinder secreted away by varmints. When he lit a match, the twigs and small branches caught, and the larger limbs Jubal had stacked to the side dried quickly. Frisk eased closer to the fire as Jubal swept her hide with a flat piece of wood. The water poured from her long hair. After taking care of Frisk, he took off his clothes and, tying his shirt to a piñon tree branch, twisted it vigorously to wring it as dry as possible. After doing the same with his pants and long underwear, he hung them in a branch above the fire and stood close to the burning wood, dancing naked forward to back, trying to stay warm.
TWENTY
The following morning’s sun appeared as if the deluge of the century had simply not occurred, and within two hours Jubal had found the railroad tracks. He followed them for several miles, until he reached a group of stand-alone buildings in the wide-open plain. Signs reading TAOS JUNCTION and DENVER & RIO GRANDE R.R. hung on an old boxcar sitting to the side of the track. Next to the train station were a pair of wagons and a corral with a couple of horses. Jubal slid off Frisk and went up the steps into the railcar. An elderly man tended the desk inside.
“Good day, sir,” Jubal said. “I wonder if you could tell me your train schedule.”
The man looked down at a booklet. “You just missed the ten-forty to Antonito and on up to Alamosa. Won’t be another going that way until tomorrow, same time.” The old-timer looked up. “unless you want to go down south to Espanola or Santa Fe, of course that would be later today, around six or so.”
“So the train stops here twice a day, one south, one north.”
“Not exactly.” The man got up gingerly from his swivel chair and motioned for Jubal to follow him outside. “If we have passengers or freight, we lower that big white ball there.”