Bitter Trail and Barbed Wire

by Elmer Kelton

  Hugh said, “Now you better go talk to Mrs. Valdez.”

  Luisa Valdez’s face was tense, and her hands were clasped together across her breasts. Frio saw the corner of a white handkerchief between two of her fingers. She had been crying. He took off his hat. Amelia went directly to the woman and took her hands.

  “Luisa,” Amelia said, “you have no idea how much we owe you.”

  Luisa Valdez shook her head. “You owe me nothing.” She dropped her chin. But Frio already had seen the tears in her dark eyes. She said, “This is a great day for you.”

  Frio replied, “But not for you, it seems. What’s the matter, Mrs. Valdez?”

  Head still down, she said tightly, “They sent me to tell you about Tom.”

  Frio frowned. “What about him? Who sent you?”

  “Florencio Chapa. Or rather, his men. They have Tom. They say they will kill him unless…”

  Amelia stiffened. “Unless what? What do they want?”

  “They want for Señor Wheeler to go and set him free. Florencio Chapa says you owe him two thousand dollars. He says he will wait at the Gutierrez place, the muleyard at the edge of Matamoros. He has Tom there. He says if you do not bring him the money, he will kill Tom.”

  Frio clenched his fists. “What makes him think I would do anything to help Tom McCasland?”

  “Chapa was in the chaparral the day you let Tom go before Colonel Ford could capture him. Chapa says you are still Tom’s friend. He says you will pay. He says you must come today and by yourself.”

  Amelia’s face had gone white. She turned away, hands over her eyes. Watching her, Frio said, “I thought you didn’t care anymore about what happened to Tom.”

  Amelia shook her head. “It’s easy to say things in anger. But he’s still my brother. Nothing has ever changed that.”

  Frio put his hands on her shoulders. “And you still love him.”

  “That doesn’t ever stop. I wanted it to, but I couldn’t help it. You can’t go back on blood.” She paused. “I never told you, Frio, because I didn’t know how, and I’ve never let Natividad tell you. But while we were branding cattle for you, we were putting Tom’s brand on some too.”

  Frio blinked in surprise. He looked back into the bleak face of Luisa Valdez. He said, “You saved my life.”

  Luisa Valdez slowly shook her head. “I will not ask you to save Tom’s in return. I think Chapa cares little about the money. I think he only wants to get you there so he can kill you. Then perhaps he will kill Tom anyway. Chapa likes to see blood. It is like a sickness with him. So I do not ask you to go.”

  “But you’re hopin’ I will.”

  She didn’t reply. She didn’t have to, for he could see the answer in her face, in the way her hand gripped the tiny crucifix that hung from her neck.

  Turning to Amelia, he said, “What do you want me to do?”

  She threw her arms around him and buried her face against his chest. “I don’t know, Frio. I just don’t know.”

  The boy, Chico, stood nearby, frightened a little because the women were crying and he did not understand what was the matter.

  Amelia cried, “Frio, I couldn’t bear to lose you.”

  He stroked her hair. “If I stay here and do nothin’, they’ll kill Tom. So it comes down to kind of a contest, doesn’t it? Which one is the most important, Tom or me?”

  “Frio, how could I make a choice like that?”

  “You don’t have to. I’ll go.”

  Her eyes were wide. “Chapa will try to kill you.”

  “I don’t figure on makin’ it easy for him.”

  “I’m not asking you to go, Frio. Don’t go just for me.”

  Frio shook his head. “It’s for all of you, I guess. You, because I love you. Mrs. Valdez, because I owe her my life. Tom because … because whatever he did, he thought he was right. Because for a long time he was my friend. And maybe because I keep rememberin’ somethin’ Rip Ford said to me. He said, ‘Any man can kill an enemy, if duty calls on him to do it. But it takes a strong man to be able to kill a friend.’ I guess Tom is a stronger man than I am. I had a chance to kill him, and I couldn’t make myself do it.”

  He told Hugh Plunkett, Happy Jack, and the others what he was going to do. As expected, Happy put up an argument.

  “You don’t owe him nothin’, Frio. If you ever did, you settled it that day you let him get away from Rip Ford.”

  Frio resolutely shook his head. “I’m goin’. I have to. And you men are all stayin’ on this side of the river. I’m afraid if you try to interfere, they’ll kill Tom.”

  “Chapa won’t give you a chance!” Happy argued.

  “He will if he wants that money.”

  Frio rode across on the ferry. It took him awhile at the British consulate to get the cash together. When he had it, he put it in a set of saddlebags and started upriver on the sorrel, toward the wagonyard. As always, he saw the washerwomen rinsing clothes in the Rio, though drought had caused the river to recede so much that they had to go far out into what was normally the riverbed to reach the water. Naked children splashed and played.

  Riding, watching, Frio remembered with a tug of sadness the day he and Blas Talamantes had come this way together, headed for the Gutierrez place. Nervous now, Frio saw the brush corral of the Gutierrez wagon and muleyard ahead of him, and beyond that the portion of stone fence and the rock building.

  Movement to his left brought him to a sudden stop. In an instant he had the saddlegun up and ready.

  Happy Jack loped his horse out from between two brush jacales. Behind him lumbered a pair of the cotton wagons, both full of Frio’s teamsters. The wagons bristled with guns.

  Angrily Frio said, “Happy, what do you mean by this? I told you to stay on the other side of the river.”

  Happy was defiant. “So we disobeyed you. Fire us!”

  Frio glared at them, but his anger couldn’t hold. Gratitude swelled within him, despite his impatience. “Look,” he said, “I know you want to help, and I wish you could. But Chapa said for me to come by myself. If you-all show up he’s liable to panic and shoot Tom in cold blood.”

  Happy replied, “For all you know, he already has. And it’s a cinch he aims to kill you too if he can. We want to see he don’t get the chance.”

  Frio braced his hands on the saddle horn and leaned forward on stiff arms, letting his gaze roam across the eager Mexican mulateros who had come with Happy. He knew he might need their help. He wished he could figure a way to use them. But he said, “No, boys, you-all stay back out of the way. You’re liable to be more of a liability than an asset.”

  Happy was plainly of a mind to argue, but finally he shrugged. “All right, Frio, play the game your way. But we’ll be here. First sign of a double cross, we’ll be on top of Chapa like a hawk on a rabbit.”

  Frio nodded. “Thanks, Happy. Thanks to all of you. Now, you must let me handle it.”

  Riding ahead, he kept his eyes on the rock building. There was no sign of life, and the wooden door was closed, but he could feel eyes watching him through the two open windows that faced to the front. A chill played up and down his back. He tightened his muscles, half expecting a bullet to knock him out of the saddle. His breath was short as he stopped the sorrel horse and stepped down carefully from the saddle. He unfastened the saddlebags and draped them across his left arm, holding the saddlegun in his right. Standing beside the stone fence, a hundred feet from the door, he called.

  “Chapa! Chapa, you in there?”

  He heard movement inside. He still had that chilling feeling that eyes were watching every move he made.

  A voice answered from behind the rock wall. Frio thought he saw a man behind one of the windows. “Gringo, did you bring the money?”

  Frio raised his left arm a little. “I brought it. Got it right here.”

  “Bring it.”

  Frio shook his head. “No. I came for Tom McCasland. You turn him loose out here and you get the money.”

&nb
sp; “Bring the money here and you will have your friend.”

  “And give you a chance to shoot me down at the door? No, I came to trade with you, not commit suicide.”

  “You have no choice. Bring the money.”

  “You just come on out here and get it.”

  Silence. Then a Spanish command was shouted out a side window. Chapa’s voice said, “Gringo, you are a fool. I have men outside. They will take you and the money!”

  Frio glanced to his right. Three men hurried toward him from behind another building. At his left, he saw two men rise up from where they had crouched behind the brush fence.

  Trapped! he thought, in sudden desperation.

  Two shots barked. The Chapa men stopped abruptly. Happy Jack and the teamsters rushed out from their hiding place, guns ready. The Chapa men hesitated, knowing they were caught in the open, that they couldn’t get away. They dropped their guns. At a command from Happy Jack, they walked out with their hands up.

  Relief washed over Frio. If it hadn’t been for Happy.…

  He shouted at Chapa, “I have men too. They’ve come to see that you give me an honest deal. Now show me Tom McCasland.”

  “He is here. I do not lie to you.”

  “I don’t believe you. I think you’ve already killed him. Before you get this money you’ve got to bring him out here and show me he’s still alive.”

  There was a minute or two of quiet, as Chapa and those with him inside the building talked it over. Finally the door opened. Tom McCasland stepped out into sunlight, his hands tied behind him. With him came the renegade Bige Campsey. Frio narrowed his eyes. Tom was disheveled, and a big splotch of dried blood showed on the side of his head.

  Campsey said loudly, “All right, Wheeler, here’s your friend. Come get him and bring the money.”

  Frio stood undecided. He liked this rock fence in front of him for protection. Once he stepped beyond it, he was an easy target.

  Campsey said, “Come on, Wheeler! We ain’t goin’ to wait all day!”

  Frio felt his mouth go dry. He gripped the saddlegun so tightly that his hands cramped. But he looked at Tom, and he decided there was no choice but to take the risk. He moved toward the open gate.

  Tom saw what Frio was about to do. “No, Frio!” he shouted.

  Campsey turned to strike Tom. Tom bumped his body against the renegade. Caught off balance, Campsey staggered. Tom ran toward Frio, moving awkwardly because his hands were bound at his back.

  “It’s a trap, Frio!” he shouted. “They’re goin’ to kill you!”

  Campsey raised his pistol. Before Frio could bring the saddlegun into line, the pistol barked. Tom stumbled and went down. Frio’s rifle blazed. Campsey was slammed back against the wooden door. He staggered two steps out from the building, trying to bring the pistol up again. Then he fell forward on his face and lay still.

  Frio shouted, “Tom!” And started to go on out. Guns flamed from the windows. Bullets flattened against the stone fence, forcing Frio back. But he had time to see Tom lying on the ground, motionless.

  From behind Frio came the sound of other guns. His men had seen Tom go down, and they figured there no longer was anything to lose, no reason to stand back. They came running, Happy Jack out in front. They fired as they ran. At least twenty men joined Frio at the rock fence. Others circled around to the sides. They poured a murderous fire into, or at, the open windows. Powder smoke clung thick and choking. Inside that stone building the ricochets must be pure hell.

  Happy Jack said triumphantly to Frio, “See there, I told you Chapa wouldn’t tote fair. He’s got no respect for an owner.”

  Frio raised his hand. The gunfire eased off. He took a long look across the fence. Tom had crawled a few feet, but now he lay still again.

  “Chapa,” Frio called, “you haven’t got a chance anymore. Come on out of there with your hands up.”

  He heard angry argument from inside the building. The door opened. Half a dozen bandidos came out with hands over their heads. Some of them bled from wounds inflicted by the ricochets. A fat man crawled on his hands and knees, sobbing in terror, begging for mercy. This was El Gordo Gutierrez.

  Frio waited, but there was no sign of the man he wanted.

  “Chapa! No use you stayin’ in there. Come on out!”

  A voice cursed in violent Spanish, and a gun flashed in a window. A slug whined off the rock fence, sending stone chips flying.

  “Gringo!” Chapa shouted. “Do you hear me?”

  “I hear you.”

  “Your friend, he still lives. But I can kill him from here.”

  Dismayed, Frio realized the outlaw was right. Frio could see that Tom was breathing. He knew the bandido could fire on Tom from the darkness behind the window or the open door.

  “If you kill him, you’ll never get out of there alive!” Frio answered.

  “Every man has to die sometime. He likes to take his enemies with him.”

  Frio swallowed, knowing he was helpless. It was hard to get any leverage against a man who was unafraid of death. “All right, Chapa, what do you want?”

  “I want you, gringo! We finish this fight, the two of us. Nobody else.”

  Dread crept over Frio. He looked around him, desperately clutching for some idea. But none came. Tom would die for certain if Frio didn’t act. “All right, Chapa. We both step out into the open. It’ll be just us two, no more.”

  “Agreed. Come ahead.”

  Frio moved toward the open gate. Happy Jack stepped forward as if to stop him. Resolutely, Frio shook his head. “I’m goin’ to do it, Happy. Chapa and me, we’ve had this a-buildin’ for a long time. Stay out of it.”

  He walked into the open, the saddlegun in his right hand, hanging free at his side. He saw a movement inside the building and steeled himself, half expecting treachery. But Chapa was true to his word. He appeared in the doorway. For just a moment the bandit’s eyes touched the dead Bige Campsey. Then they lifted back to Frio.

  Chapa’s face was covered by a black neckerchief, all but his eyes. He stood one pace out from the door, those evil eyes narrowed with hatred. Dry-lipped, Frio moved toward him slowly, watching for the first indication of movement. Chapa gripped a pistol in his left hand, his arm hanging at his side. The right hand, which should have held the pistol, was shriveled and misshapen, like a claw. It was useless. Frio realized this must have happened to Chapa the night the pistol had exploded in his hand, near his face. That was the reason for the mask. The face must have suffered like the hand did.

  Frio kept walking, closing the distance between the two of them. He was aware that Tom had raised himself up on one elbow. Tom was calling weakly for him not to go through with this. But Frio went on.

  Chapa said in a raw, lashing Spanish, “You have come far enough, gringo. Before you die, I want you to see what you have done to me.”

  Black eyes burning, Chapa slowly raised the claw-like hand to the mask over his face. Frio swallowed, not wanting to see, but he was held by some strange compulsion.

  The hand ripped the neckerchief away. Frio gasped aloud, not ready for the hideous thing that had been a face. “Look, gringo,” Chapa hissed, “see what you have done to me! See why I am going to kill you!” The face was a mass of angry red scar tissue from the cruel burn of the powder. The nose was half gone. The vicious mouth had healed back crookedly after white-hot metal had torn the lips.

  Chapa said, “It makes your stomach sick, verdad? Think of how it must feel to own such a face and have to hide it behind a mask because children scream at the sight of it, and women turn away. For months I have wanted to die. But even more, I have wanted you to die. I have told myself that if I could see you dead, I would walk into the fires of hell content.”

  Chapa’s eyes smoldered with the hatred that had eaten at him like a cancer. “My left hand is slow with the pistol. I know you will kill me, and I am ready. But before I die, I will also kill you. We will go to hell together.”

  Frio saw the bandido
’s hand start up with the pistol. “Die, gringo!” Instantly Frio dropped to one knee, swinging the saddlegun around. Without waiting to raise the stock to his shoulder, he squeezed the trigger. The rifle leaped.

  Chapa stepped back under the impact. The pistol blazed. The bullet snarled over Frio’s head. Chapa buckled, bending forward from the waist. His eyes were on Frio to the last. He tried with all the ebbing strength that was in him to raise the pistol again. He never could.

  “Gringo!” he hissed. “Gringo apestoso!”

  Even after death came, Chapa lay there on one shoulder, his glazed eyes still open, his pitifully butchered face scowling the bitter hatred that he had carried into death.

  * * *

  TOM MCCASLAND LAY pale and still in his little Matamoros house. Luisa Valdez sat in a chair at the head of the bed, silently watching him, a glow of contentment about her. Tom was hit low in the shoulder. The doctor had said he would live, though he might be months in recovering. Those were months in which he wouldn’t be riding out—months during which she would not be spending the dark, lonely nights wondering if he would come back alive. For these months, at least, she would have him.

  Frio Wheeler stood frowning down at Tom. “One thing you can say about that Bige Campsey, he was a consistent shot. He hit you in the same place he hit me.”

  Lying on his side, Tom looked up at Frio. “I never expected you to come help me. You didn’t owe me anything. Why did you do it?”

  Frio looked first at Luisa, then at Amelia, who stood beside him, her hand on his arm. “The women, for one thing. And, I reckon, for us. We were friends a long time before we were enemies, Tom. When it came right down to the taw line, I couldn’t forget that.”

  Tom said gravely, “You know that as soon as I can get up from here and ride again, I’ll be fightin’ you the same as before.”

  Frio nodded, his face sober. “I know. I’ll likely be fightin’ you too. We’ve each fought this war accordin’ to our own lights and done all we could for the side we were loyal to. Whichever way it goes, we’ve given our best. We’ve got nothin’ to be ashamed of, either of us. Maybe someday, when the war is finished, we can find a way to be friends again.”