Jim Kane - J P S Brown

by J P S Brown

  "Maybe you bought him from someone who bought him from Arce," the Lion offered.

  "Yes. If the horse belonged to Arce we bought him from someone who bought him from Arce," Scratch Face said, closely examining the brand again.

  "He looks like a good little horse. Are you going to meat him?" the Lion asked innocently.

  "Oh, yes. He is for the meat, " Scratch Face said, straightening from his examination and walking back to the rock wall the Lion was sitting on. "He has much meat on him."

  "He looks like too good a horse to butcher, " the Lion said. "Why don't you ride him? He looks like a better horse than any of these ghosts you are riding."

  "Oh, yes. He is a very good horse," Scratch Face said, looking at his companion horse killers and laughing with them about something. "He has a good pace and he never tires. The kind of pace ideal for old women and young girls, an easy pace on tender rumps, or brittle ones."

  "How about for gringos?" the Lion asked. "My gringuito says he would like to own the little huinduri if the horse is docile. He does not like broncos."

  "The huinduri would be ideal for the gringuito as I just finished indicating. I bet the gringuito suffers from tender, soft little nalgas."

  The Lion made a series of profound signs with his hands to Kane and uttered words like "caballo," "quieres, do you want," "comprar, to buy," to Kane. Kane, in turn, made signs to Scratch Face that he wanted him to saddle the roan horse.

  "I thought you said the gringo couldn't understand Spanish," Scratch Face said to the Lion, ignoring Kane's communication.

  "He only asked you to saddle the huinduri and mount him and ride him so that he could see if he was gentle," the Lion said.

  "Yes, but he understood your words," Scratch Face said.

  "No, he didn't. I can make him understand anything I want without words. Didn't I tell you he doesn't understand a word of Spanish?" the Lion said.

  Scratch Face walked up as close to Kane as the rock fence i would allow and shouted, "You, buy horse, much money," gesticulating and pointing to the palm of his hand. Kane looked to the Lion for translation.

  "You see? He doesn't understand you," the Lion said. He gave Kane another series of signals slow and profound. Kane turned and looked speculatively at the horse and then at Scratch Face and then turned to the Lion and gave him a good series of gestures profound.

  "He wants you to ride the huinduri for him," the Lion said.

  "Saddle him and ride him, Leobardo," Scratch Face said to a wan-faced horse killer sitting on the fence.

  "You think I'm crazy enough to go along with your clowning?" Wan Face said soberly. "I don't want to get killed today."

  "The horse is gentle," Scratch Face shouted at Kane, twisting his face belligerently.

  "He doesn't understand. But I do. I understand why you don't use the huinduri for a saddle horse now. He is bronco. Besides that he has the maple leaf brand," the Lion said.

  "No, no, no, he would make the gringo a good horse. Tell him I'll trade him the huinduri for that sorrel horse he is riding. The huinduri is a better saddle horse for this country than the sorrel and the sorrel has more meat on him. I could ride the sorrel for a month and he would still give me more meat than all eight horses in this corral put together."

  "No deal. We can't trade. The huinduri doesn't belong to you," the Lion said, taking Kane's arm and walking away from the corral. He walked to a pile of corn leaves outside the corral.

  "Give this pile of tasol to me for my cattle and horses," the Lion told Scratch Face when he caught up to them.

  "Why not, Lion? Take whatever you want. We are going to kill these horses tomorrow. We won't need much tasol. Only enough for our saddle horses," Scratch Face said.

  The Lion called two of the vaqueros and told them to feed the horse killers' saddle horses and give all the rest of the tasol to Kane's cattle and horses and mules.

  "Wait a minute. How much are you going to pay me for the tasol, Lion?" Scratch Face asked.

  "What? I'm giving you back the good huinduri horse," the Lion said.

  "What? The huinduri is already mine."

  "Then take back the tasol and give me back the huinduri," the Lion said. "It is all the same to me. The huinduri is a good horse. Give me all the ownership papers on him. I need the papers."

  "But what have you given me for the huinduri?" Scratch T Face cried.

  "The tasol, of course," the Lion said. "Must I talk plainer? I would not want to take the huinduri back to Chinipas where Arce would reclaim him for wont of papers, so I am going to let you keep him, but you are going to pay me the tasol for him.

  "¡Ah qué León tan listo! How smart you are," Scratch Face said, clapping the Lion on the shoulder.

  "Give the horse killers' saddle horses a good feed," the Lion ordered the vaqueros who were distributing the tasol. "I am sure by the looks of them they will appreciate a good feed."

  That evening while Lion was making supper, Scratch Face came to the campfire with a horse loin.

  "Here is fresh meat for you," Scratch Face said.

  "Horse meat? No me gusta, I don't like it," the Lion said.

  Scratch Face offered it to some of the vaqueros. "No me gusta the meat of a horse," each of them said. Kane refused it saying, "Thank you," in English.

  ''Do you think he knows it is horse meat?" Scratch Face asked the Lion.

  "No. Of course not. He thinks you are killing coyotes, wolves, and mountain lions out here," the Lion growled.

  "Well, I just thought gringos might eat any kind of meat. I heard they did."

  "This one doesn't eat the meat of a horse."

  "Is it true, Lion, that you can make him understand any word in Spanish?" Scratch Face asked craftily.

  "Naturally. I told you so, didn't I?" the Lion said.

  "Are you sure he doesn't talk the lengua Maya, the Indian tongue? Is that how you make him understand? He looks like an Indian of some type."

  "Didn't I tell you? He is a gringo. He speaks only English."

  "Leobardo says he knows a difficult word in English. He says he bets you can't make the gringo say the word," Scratch Face said.

  "Bueno, how much do you want to bet?" the Lion asked him.

  "I believe that between us all at our fire we can raise one hundred pesos."

  "Get it ready. We'll be up there after supper," the Lion said.

  Later, Kane and the Lion went to the horse killers fire. They were sitting there waiting, and grinning at Wan Face, who was in possession of the precious knowledge, the knowledge that would defeat the Lion. Wan Face was taking his knowledge and the responsibilities of his superior advantages of language very seriously and his countenance demanded respect.

  "Leobardo once spent a year working on the shrimp boats of Guaymas and during that time had many occasions to see the word ‘shrimp' written in English," Scratch Face began. "You might not know this, but much of our Mexican shrimp from Guaymas goes to the United States. The gringos cannot get shrimp in the United States and must come to Mexico for their shrimp. We have many products the gringo needs and one of the most valuable ones is shrimp."

  "Sí, sí, sí, sí, sí," the Lion said impatiently, "We all know how much the gringo needs our Mexican products. So what is the word you want to bet on?"

  "So now Leobardo has written on this paper which I hold the word for shrimp in English. If the gringo can write the word on the other side of this paper exactly as Leobardo has written it, you will collect the one hundred forty-five pesos we are betting. " Scratch Face laid the bills on the ground and the Lion counted them, showing a disinclination to handle the money. He didn't show any of his own money.

  "But my system of signals with the gringo only has to do with cattle and horse. I don't even know if my gringuito knows the English word for shrimp and if he does he probably doesn't know how to spell it. He is almost totally ignorant of letters because he is from a region in the United States where there are no schools," the Lion said mournfully.

&nb
sp; "Come on, Lion!" Scratch Face taunted. "You can't rajar, crack, now. Your big front is cracking. You can't back out. You already agreed to take the bet."

  "I didn't say I would take any bet. You said one hundred pesos," the Lion complained.

  "We bet one hundred forty-five pesos now. And we'll bet another fifty pesos and there they are," Scratch Face said, throwing another 50 pesos on the pile. "Don't show us you are afraid and don't cry because gringos are ignorant. We all know gringos are ignorant." The horse killers all, except the complacent Wan Face, laughed.

  "All right. I won't let you laugh at me for backing out. I'll call the bet, " the Lion said angrily, and took out the cash and matched the entire bet.

  He stood up and motioned for Kane to stand up and then began an intense series of signals with hands and fingers, rolling of eyeballs, stamping of feet, gestures which he repeated several times, indicating the paper and pencil in Scratch Face's hand. Kane looked to the Lion and Scratch Face. He looked at the Lion and then at the paper and pencil, the Lion and paper and pencil, then, rapidly, Lion-paper, Lion -paper, Lion-paper. Finally he offered to take the paper and pencil from Scratch Face and looked to the Lion and the Lion indicated "yes." Kane took the paper and laid it flat on the palm of one hand and held the pencil over it to write with the other hand and gazed expectantly at the Lion for more instructions.

  "I must rest," the Lion said. "This is so difficult." He sat down and took several deep breaths. Kane stood as quiet as sin when it is in the next room and studied the Lion's smallest move.

  "How will I ever make him understand ‘shrimp'? I took five minutes trying to make him understand he was to take the paper and pencil," the Lion complained to Scratch Face.

  Kane thought, yeah, you son of a bitch and your games, and if I don't have a change of heart you will gyrate for two hours making me write shrimp.

  The Lion finally got up on his haunches and started going through his signals again. Kane stood dumbly, for as long as he could bear to see the horse killers seeing him act so dumb, until he no longer could stand their comments on his ignorance, through the Lion's usual signals. Kane did not take it to understand any of these usual signals so the Lion rested again.

  When he began again he changed his signals and began roaring like the waves, hissing like the wind on the foam on his mouth, swimming like a beached whale, showing the pink of his gums for the color of a shrimp, and showing the curved little finger to be the shape of the shrimp. Kane did not deign to understand these signals either. But when the Lion, in desperation, pulled out the end of his penis, presenting it as possibly resembling a shrimp, Kane surrendered and wrote shrimp on the back of the paper. The horse killers roared, mocking the Lion for his aspect-of-a-shrimp, size-of-a-shrimp penis. Even the money he won from the horse killers did not help the Lion feel the sense of triumph he wanted. He had been made to work too hard and give up too much for the money.

  "You mostrenco, you ladino, you don't have a loyal bone in your body, do you?" the Lion said to Kane on the way back to their fire. "If you hadn't taken that last signal I would have despaired. I would have let them take the money. "

  "I'm sorry, Lion. I am so dumb I just couldn't understand what you were trying to say and then I remembered you said if we stayed here with the horse killers it would be a diversion for us. I want to thank you for that. I was not having any fun until you put on that free show for me," Kane said.

  When Kane had finished counting the cattle out of the corral the next morning he rode over to say good-bye to Scratch Face.

  "I want to thank you for the fine entertainment and for the pleasure of knowing you. You and your men made the evening I spent with you a perfectly enjoyable one," Kane said to Scratch Face in fluent and well-rehearsed Spanish, and rode away.

  34

  Cuiteco

  The quiet valley of Cuiteco reverberated with heavy machines during the time the vaqueros called the second sleep, the time between midnight and four o'clock. Kane got up from the ground with his thick, Mayo blanket over his shoulders and met the Lion at the fire.

  "The trucks are on time," the Lion said. The lights of a line of trucks shone toward the village of Cuiteco from the upper end of the steep valley. They came on and stopped in the village.

  Elfigo Batista, the owner of the trucks, walked down to the camp of Kane and the Lion at dawn.

  "Are we on time?" Batista asked. "We drove all night."

  "You are just in time," the Lion said. "We got here with the herd yesterday at noon. We can start loading the trucks as soon as you bring them down."

  "We'll start loading at noon. The drivers are sleeping now," Batista said.

  The mayor of the town came smiling to the campfire and introduced himself. A small boy was with him. The mayor asked to see the guías and facturas of the cattle and Kane got them out of his saddlebags. The mayor took the papers and began examining the brands on the cattle. He seemed to be having difficulty reading the brands although all the cattle had the scorched Rv brand on their sides.

  "I'd better go explain the trail brand and save him the trouble he is having," Kane said.

  "He needs no explanation. These are just his preliminaries for collecting mordida, his bite out of the gringo's rump."

  The Lion laughed. "Leave him alone and he will waste less of your time and effort."

  The mayor came back to the fire. He pocketed Kane's papers. He was not smiling now.

  "Where were you taking these cows?" he asked Kane.

  "Cows?" Kane asked him. "We don't have a cow in the bunch. They are all toretes."

  "Toretes then". Where were you taking them?"

  "I am taking them to Creel as the papers state."

  "Where did you get the cattle?"

  "I got them in Chinipas. They have already been inspected through to Creel."

  "These cattle are not going to Creel or anywhere until I have inspected them properly and have made sure they were inspected in Chinipas?

  "The papers you have in your pocket all have the seal of the inspector in Chinipas. They also describe each torete and the brand of the ranch he came from. They also show the trail brand."

  "Yes, but they cannot leave here until I have made my inspection. I just looked the cattle over and I am satisfied it will take me a few days to complete my inspection. Also, I may have to go with these papers to Chinipas and verify the Chinipas inspectors inspection."

  Kane, speechless, turned to the Lion.

  "Ha, ha, ha," the Lion said.

  "Ha, ha, ha," Kane said mirthlessly.

  "You may think this is all ridiculous and a matter for jokes but I take the matter seriously," the mayor said. "We of the Sierra take any movement of cattle seriously. I must be in complete accord with the inspector from Chinipas before I will allow these cattle to go on past Cuiteco."

  "You have telephone communication with Chinipas, do you not?" Kane asked.

  "Yes, we have a line," the mayor said.

  "Then why don't you call Chinipas and talk to the inspector? I am sure he will advise you to allow the cattle to pass on." Kane was remembering happily his contribution to

  the Chinipas water system.

  "We might call. I don't guarantee we will resolve the matter by telephone, though," the mayor said.

  Kane and the Lion followed the mayor and the little boy up the hill to the village. The telephone of Cuiteco was in the mayor's front room. He graciously offered chairs to Kane and the Lion and called in his daughter to make the call. She left the earpiece of the telephone on its hook and wound the crank of the bell several times. She did not pick up the receiver to see if anyone answered in Chinipas but let it stay on its hook. Then he left the room. The girl sat by the phone reading a copy of Romance juventud, a comic-book type of true love magazine that used photographs of its soulful protagonists instead of drawings and caricatures. Jim Kane squirmed in his chair. The girl slumped over the magazine, protecting it lest anyone steal a look at its pages. The Lion lit a cigarette, s
ighed, and stretched his six feet four inches like a board against his chair.

  "Señorita, would you please try to ring Chinipas again?" Kane asked the girl.

  The girl did not look at him but raised her head from where it hung on her slumping spine and called "Papá" through curtains to another room. The mayor came back in the room chewing on a bite of his breakfast.

  "Yes, daughter? What is it?"

  "El señor," the girl stated, letting her head loll back and taking the pages of another magazine, one entitled Novelas de Amor, in her slack hand.

  "And what can you be offered, señor?" the mayor asked Kane.

  "Would you please ring Chinipas again? They didn't answer," Kane said.

  "They didn't answer? Don't they answer, daughter? I'll try again." He cranked the telephone violently several times and started to walk out of the room.

  "Aren't you going to pick up the receiver?" Kane asked him.

  "There is no need of that," the mayor of the village of Cuiteco, Municipio of Chinipas, Chihuahua, said. "They will ring back when my ring reaches Chinipas. This is an old line with old wire and sometimes it takes days for a ring from Cuiteco to reach Chinipas. We need a new line."

  Kane left the house and walked back down to his cattle with his head down. Later the Lion came down off the hill with the mayor.

  "Give him five hundred pesos," the Lion said. Kane dug in his saddlebags, his back to the mayor, and got the 500 pesos and gave up the money.

  "Ah, is this a contribution for the new telephone line?" the mayor asked Kane, smiling.

  "Yes. I hope this helps you. You have been most hospitable to us," Kane said.

  "In that case I believe you can go ahead and load your cattle. I don't want to hold them any longer. It is not the poor cows fault that the wire to Chinipas is bad. I will continue to attempt to get in touch with the inspector of Chinipas but I am sure all your papers are in order. I will let you know what the inspector tells me if he calls back before you leave."

  "Thank you. My cattle appreciate it," Kane said. The mayor gave Kane the inspection papers and went back up the hill.