by James Wade
The woman from the porch entered the room and was aghast at my presence and she stepped forward with a flurry of Spanish but the man simply raised his hand and she stopped.
“Huevos rancheros,” he said, and the woman turned and huffed and disappeared.
We set there, the old man and me, him slumped over the table in a frail arch which looked as if it might collapse at the slightest weight upon his back, and who knew what weight it might already bear. Behind him on the buffet was a handful of books titled in Spanish and a picture of a young man in Mexican military dress.
“That’s you, yonder,” I pointed, and the old man didn’t turn but raised his head and lowered it in some motion akin to a nod.
“They took this country from us,” he spoke and he closed his eyes as if there was a memory there he was trying to find or perhaps trying to hide from.
“Who did?” I asked, but the man did not answer, he only lifted a hand and waved it once through the air.
“Do you know of revolution?” he asked, his eyes raising just enough to find mine.
“Schoolmarm read to me once about the fighting with the British. I seen a bit of the trouble brewing down south.”
“Do you believe one is like the other?”
“Sir?”
“The fighting changes, yes—the land and the weapons and the color of the flags—but is it not all one revolution?”
“I imagine the cause separates things some.”
“The cause.”
“Yessir.”
The old man paused and seemed to consider this for a while and then a while longer, and then the woman returned to the room and brought with her two plates of bone china with yellow and blue birds painted round the rim and a gold line encircling it all.
The woman’s presence or perhaps the plate in front of him seemed to reanimate the old man.
“There is one cause,” he said, and he spoke with the certainty and sadness of the old.
“What is it?”
The woman came again into the dining room and placed on the table a silver bowl filled with scrambled eggs and another bowl filled with black beans. From a clay warmer she produced a slightly burnt tortilla and set it on the old man’s plate and used a silver spoon to scoop eggs and beans on top of it until the man raised his hand.
A young girl hurried into the room and the woman gave her a stern look and took from her a small bowl of salsa and ladled a single spoonful onto the man’s plate. She placed the salsa bowl on the table among the rest of the grub and turned to me. She let the spoon fall from her hand and it clanged noisily onto my empty plate and the woman raised her head high and looked down at me with spiteful eyes.
The man groaned and spoke to her in Spanish and she spoke back rapidly and with much frustration and pointed at my hat. I imagine she would have gone on at some length had the man not brought his fist down upon the table with what I thought to be considerable strength for his specimen.
“Enough,” he said, and the woman was gone again and there we set, young and old, and he motioned to the food and insisted I eat and I did so with a great fervor, the juices from the beans soaking into the eggs and muddying their color. When I had finished I used a second tortilla from the clay pan to soak up the salsa and beans left on the plate and this seemed to please the man who nodded his approval. He had only had a few bites of the food in front of him, but he seemed satisfied nonetheless, and it was the young girl who returned to clear the table and she looked at me and smiled a shy smile and I tipped my hat in return. The old man spoke to her in Spanish and whatever he said caused her to giggle and blush and the old man smiled and seemed pleased with this outcome.
“What’s the one cause?” I asked.
The man was still smiling and he nodded absentminded and looked down at where his food had been as if expecting to find it still there.
“Sir?” I said.
The man’s face went serious again and he looked up at me and then reached toward me with his hands and I gave him one of mine and he held it there on top of the table.
“Did you see the vacas when you rode in?” he asked me.
“Yessir, I saw quite a few many head.”
“This is how I am rich because this is how my grandfather was rich. You understand. The wars happen and different nations are drawn and undrawn and none of them own me because of these cows and the things they buy me. Do you know what money can buy?”
“Nossir,” I replied. “I can honestly say I don’t know much in that direction a’tall.”
The man waved his hand back and forth in an exaggerated motion of sweeping, and I couldn’t say if he was dismissing his own question or illustrating the vastness of the answer.
“Americans have their revolutions, Mexicans have begun theirs, the men fight for freedom and independence and honor and all of these things, but I am rich from animals. What do I care about such things? Do you know how men will be rich in the future?”
“If I did I imagine I’d be getting started on it myself.”
“They will be rich from the land,” he said.
“No offense, señor, but that ain’t exactly news. Plenty of folks been getting rich off the land for longer than you or your granddaddy been around.”
“Yes, yes. Men have long fought for dirt and been rewarded by it,” he waved his hand again. “But now they want what is under the dirt. They want to bleed the earth and harvest the black blood in its veins. And they will. And they’ll do it on land that belonged to my ancestors and even my cattle will not change their minds.”
“So you aim to have Grimes and them boys fight the oilmen?”
The old man laughed and coughed and smiled and regarded me as if I were a caricature of a child repeating phrases meant to amuse. He closed his eyes and held a napkin to his mouth and coughed vicious and then was still. When he spoke again it was quieter.
“Grimes cannot fight the oilmen, no more than the leaves can fight the changing of the seasons. It is a nasty business, progress. But it is a business. This rebellion Grimes believes in will never come to pass.”
“Then how come you back him?” I asked.
“How many people were killed in this town, Perry Springs?”
“A good many.”
The man nodded.
“And do you believe this was the first?” he asked. “How many towns do you think Grimes has gone to? How many towns sit atop rivers of oil?”
“So you just want the land? Why kill for it? Why not buy it? Seems you got plenty of dinero.”
“How much would a man pay for land?” he asked.
“Whatever price is fair, I guess.”
“What price is fair for land where outlaws and murderers run loose?”
“You’re trying to drive the price down,” I said.
“Not trying,” Grimes said from the doorway into the hall. “Succeeding. Abe just bought up almost ninety percent of the deeds in Perry Springs at half the price they cost last week.”
Grimes knocked his fist on the wood table in victory.
“Caleb,” he said. “I see you’ve met Señor Abel Guerrero. Abe, this young fella is Caleb Bentley.”
Grimes removed his hat and placed it on a hook near the doorway, then raised his head high and looked down at me.
“This,” he said, “is the man who saved my life.”
He pulled a chair from the table without being asked and Señor Guerrero nodded as he sat.
“Abe here is gonna buy the land, and he and those oil boys can go on and make money come up from the ground or fall from the sky or whatever suits their fancy.”
“And you’ll have a chunk of the country to grow your new world.”
Grimes smiled and gave one long nod.
“Still a smart boy,” he said. “Now tell me, how come it is you’re setting here in the first place?�
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I looked to the old man, who looked to me, both of us wondering what I was going to say.
“You see them señoritas out yonder? I was trying to get lost and have one show me the way home, if you get my meaning.”
“Does this mean you’re not still enchanted by my daughter?” Grimes asked.
“To tell the truth, it ain’t my enchantment that’s the problem. She don’t want nothing to do with me, and I ain’t much for begging.”
Grimes leaned back and considered the news and then smiled again.
“Well, she’s always been a tough one to break. Probably for the best. When we ride out, Sophia’s gonna stay with Abe here.”
I watched the two men exchange looks; their meaning I could not place.
“Alright then,” Grimes said. “Go on down to the barracks with the other boys and we’ll send some girls down shortly to call y’all up for supper.”
“All that out there’s for us?” I asked.
“Sí, señor, I hope you’re hungry.”
I rose and looked again at the old man.
“The leaves don’t have to fight,” I told him.
“Qué?”
“The seasons change, but it’s always the same. The leaves come back around the next year. I hear what you’re saying about progress, Señor Guerrero, and I know the world out there might look a good bit different than when our granddaddies were young in it, but things have a way of coming back. Triumphs and mistakes alike.”
The old man considered this.
“Do you know the one cause?” he asked.
“I know what yours is, but that don’t mean it’s everybody’s.”
I tipped my cap and walked back out into the yard and to my horse and rode down to the barracks and left the two men to discuss their plans of progress.
26
They departed on the morning of the fourth day. Randall rode Storm with Charlotte behind him. Tad rode Mara, and the child sat atop Pumpkin. They moved south across the eastern ridge of the Guadalupe Mountains, passing in and out of arbutus trees and stands of evergreen sumac. The boys foraged for prickly pear pads, and Charlotte continued her thinning of the rabbit population. Randall mostly slept.
There were no roads to speak of and each morning they would look out at the Chihuahuan Desert never-ending and at night they would camp at the furthest point their eyes had seen. It was a process unbroken until they reached the low hills overlooking the town of Boracho.
Boracho was one in a long line of settlements and trading posts along the western route of the Texas frontier. Kent, Plateau, Wild Horse, Van Horn, Allamoore, and many others were lined along the road, which ran east to west, with the Guadalupe Mountains to the north and the Davis Mountains to the south.
The buildings were mostly still made of wood, but some brick and steel manors stood along the main street. The overcast skies gave the noon a weary look. The desert passage had left tired the animals and their riders and all were anxious and ready to stop for a good night’s sleep. Randall was back in Mara’s saddle and felt almost a man again. Charlotte had attended to his bandages each night and again in the mornings and had kept him well fed with rabbit and cactus and pinto beans. He stared into the valley at the town below and saw what may have been a parade of some sorts. Through his spyglass there were many figures gathered at one end of the main thoroughfare and he saw what he thought to be children being hoisted upon the shoulders of men.
The closer they came to the town the more unsettled things appeared. What had looked like a parade was revealed to be an angry mob with ill intent. There were indeed children riding on the shoulders of their fathers, but from their mount they threw rocks into glass windows and shouted down at people on the streets.
Randall stopped his party in an alley a couple of blocks from the chaos.
“I don’t know what this is, but it’s not good,” he said.
“Horses need food and water. We could do with a little ourselves after coming through that damn desert,” Tad said.
“The boy’s right,” Charlotte said. “Maybe we can find supplies without getting mixed up in whatever is going on out there.”
Randall sat his horse and thought.
Two young people, a boy and a girl holding hands, came running down the side street and into the alley.
“Hey,” Randall called as they passed. “What the hell is happening?”
The boy stopped. He looked confused.
“You ain’t heard?” he asked and the girl pulled at his arm. “They hung Antonio Rodríguez over in Rocksprings. The Mexicans are up in arms. Say they’re gonna burn the place down.”
“Who’s Antonio Rodríguez?”
“Sorry, mister, me and Callie are gettin’ while it’s good. I suggest you do the same. Half the damn town is Mexican. More coming up every day trying to get clear of the fighting down there. This ain’t no place to be.”
The couple fled and soon more people dashed past Randall and toward the hills.
“Alright, Tad, you and the child take the horses back toward the east side of town. Find a trough if you can. Charlotte and I will try to grab some provisions and meet you out there. We’ll have to head east a while. Any further south and we’ll only be getting closer to the border and the mess that comes with it.”
He held Charlotte’s hand and they stayed low against buildings, ducking in and out of doorways and windows to see if there was a mercantile untouched by the rioting. Fires had begun across the town and the air collected the smoke and the shouting and the day sounded of war. Randall’s breathing was labored and he held his hand against his stomach as they moved.
“There.” Charlotte pointed, and he could see a café on the far side of the street that had seemingly been passed up by the mob.
They ran, still crouched, across the street, their heads swiveling in all directions, and burst through the door of the café, quickly shutting it behind them.
“We need food. We have money,” Randall said hurriedly as he turned to the woman behind the counter. She was a young, dark-haired girl and she stared at Randall with fear beset in every corner of her face.
“She’s Mexican,” Charlotte said. “That’s why they didn’t stop.”
“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Randall told the girl, reaching toward her. “We’re not going to hurt you.”
The girl screamed and ran past the two of them and out the door.
They looked at one another, then raced behind the counter and through the curtains to the back of the café, where the food was stored. They began grabbing things from the shelves, and were readying their escape when they heard the door open out front.
Randall put his finger to his lips and Charlotte nodded and they stood frozen in the supply room. The footsteps and hushed Spanish voices grew closer.
Charlotte pointed up. A ladder ran from the corner of the room and disappeared into a hole in the ceiling. They climbed.
Charlotte was the first into what was an attic of sorts. It was a small hideaway with one window and barely enough room for two people to sit comfortably. Charlotte pressed herself against the window as Randall crawled up from the hole.
“Ay!” a voice called just as Randall pulled himself into the crawl space. Men flooded the supply room and scrambled toward the ladder.
“Window, now!” Randall said.
Charlotte yanked at the bottom of the pane but it wouldn’t open. The first man poked his head through the hole and Randall kicked him in the face with his boot.
“Move,” he cried, and Charlotte stepped aside as Randall crashed through the window and rolled out onto the pitched roof. She watched as he slid down the shingles and then disappeared over the edge. She cracked the skull of the next man through the hole and then climbed through the window and stutter-stepped to the edge and looked down.
Randall was slowly lif
ting himself from the dirt. He held his arms across his stomach and bent forward in pain. She heard movement near the window behind her. She jumped.
She bent her knees and braced for the landing and when she hit the ground her left foot twisted over onto her ankle and she screamed but kept moving. She hooked Randall’s arm and the two of them hobbled into an alleyway with none of the food they’d come for.
They made for the edge of town and were relieved to see Tad and the child standing with the horses near the back corner of a blacksmith and saddlery shop. As they approached, Tad did not look at them but rather at something on the other side of the building and then he put his hands into the air and nudged the other boy that he might do the same.
“Stop,” Randall whispered, and he and Charlotte pulled up short just feet from the two boys.
Around the corner they could hear men shouting directions. Soon a man appeared and began to tie Tad’s hands behind his back. The child looked at the man and then behind the building at Randall and Charlotte. Randall shook his head and put his finger to lips.
“Alive,” the child said and pointed.
The man paused and raised his head toward the two of them. He let the rope fall and reached for his gun. Randall was faster. He drew and shot the man in the shoulder and then in the chest. Tad hit the dirt and the child crouched down and tapped him on the head.
“Alive.”
Charlotte and Randall turned the corner with guns blazing and saw two of the men fall and a third running back into town to find more strength in numbers.
“Let’s go, now,” Charlotte said, and within seconds they were mounted and driving the horses at full sprint down the road headed east.
A mile or more from town they crested a rise in the road and looked back and there saw the thing they hoped most to avoid. Dust rose and spread from the road and crawled into the hazy sky heading toward them with a group of mounted men under it all.
“We don’t have the horses to outrun them,” Tad said.
“You don’t know that,” Randall told him.
“The hell I don’t. Wasn’t exactly a nice rest they got back there.”