Mojado

by R. Allen Chappell

  Charlie studied the rim but still wouldn’t have spotted it if Thomas hadn’t finally pointed a finger. Just the hint of a shadow in the rock, nothing at all, invisible, if not for the little strip of cloth fluttering almost imperceptibly in the breeze.

  “He hasn’t been there since last night, I guess.” Harley gathered up his water bottle and peered toward their own camp, still enveloped in shadow. “He prob’ly left early last night, so he’s been gone awhile. We could climb up there and have a look… but that’s what he wants us to do. That’s why he left that little flag.”

  Thomas agreed with a meaningful nod toward the hidden retreat. “Probably has a little rockslide engineered, or if he has a gun, he’s maybe laying for us… but that’s not likely, I guess… He woulda already shot us if he had a gun.”

  “So where do you think he’s headed?” Charlie’s mind was awhirl as he puzzled through information so clearly evident to the others.

  “I’ve got a pretty good idea.” Thomas scooped up his own gear and was right behind Harley, leaving Charlie to work his mind around it all.

  It took over an hour to reach camp, and Charlie, even after catching up, had a hard time keeping up. The little clearing was already bathed in sunlight, and the warm fragrant smell of pine washed over the camp like a balm. Shorty lay not twenty feet from where Harley had last seen him, throat cut with one clean slash across the juggler. One hindquarter had been laid open and meat stripped away.

  Most of their food had been taken, and what was left was piled in a small mound, opened, and urinated on. The two horses were missing, though the saddles were there, for what little good it would do anyone. The chinches and latigos had been cut to pieces.

  Harley walked slowly over to Shorty and silently, gently, reached down and touched one long ear. No Navajo did this, nor any kind of person he was familiar with. Sam Shorthair had been right—this was a mojado, a cholló, a throwback to the ancient and fierce tribes of Mexico.

  Charlie, unnerved, stared at the mule, recalling a lecture by a noted anthropologist. All men are capable of all things. The cortex of the human brain comes preprogramed, and even today primitive responses can be triggered by the proper stimuli. Charlie could see truth in those words now and wondered at the disparity in the amount of stimuli required of certain individuals to commit those most heinous of acts.

  Thomas hardly looked at Shorty as he moved past to find what had befallen the horses. The intruder had not wanted the horses, otherwise they would be missing a saddle, and that meant he had no intention of making a run for it. No, this person was confident in his ability to elude his pursuers and whoever else might have an interest in him. The mule was just a warning. Again, the feeling washed over him that they were not dealing with a man at all, but something much more powerful, and the word Yeenaaldiooshii again played across his mind, causing him to tremble, and a shiver, fear perhaps, passed over him like an icy wind.

  The horses hadn’t gone far and he found them calmly grazing a little patch of grass in the pines, and though they were still hobbled, the hair was worn off around their fetlocks. They had probably panicked and bolted at the violent death of the mule and smell of fresh blood. A horse, hobbled by the front feet, still can travel a good distance, and at a remarkable speed when properly motivated. Thomas cut the now stiff burlap hobbles off the horses and let them drift on down toward the flats, where he knew they would fall in with one of the other bunches let loose to roam by area stockmen. It’s common for reservation horses to mingle freely with those of others, and owners only come for them when needed; usually someone will know where any particular little bunch is ranging.

  Thomas knew that in order to keep up with their quarry, they would now have to travel on foot, and just as fast and light if there was to be any chance of success. Mules can go where horses can’t, and that is why Shorty had been chosen. This person knew his business… if indeed he was a person.

  When Thomas arrived back at camp, the other two had salvaged very little beyond their blankets, which reeked of urine, and a small store of bacon Harley had hung in a distant spruce in case of bears. They also had what little food they had taken with them that morning in their jacket pockets, but unless they ran across another hogan or camp, the pickings would be lean. They would have to be as tough as the man they followed and in the end… maybe even tougher

  Thomas saw Harley standing over the mule and watched as his friend opened his knife and began cutting meat from the partially skinned hindquarter. Harley understood what they were up against and didn’t let sentiment stand in his way. Charley grimaced but said nothing as he stacked the saddles back under some overhanging brush and piled dead branches in front of them. They would come back for them when their business was finished. Not a single word had been spoken among the three since they entered the camp, and silently they left it now to the jays, and magpies and other wild things.

  By early afternoon Harley thought they might actually be losing ground to the killer. “This guy is like a machine—he don’ stop, he don’ rest, and he eats and drinks on the go.”

  Harley had found little sign of the man when leaving their camp and now admitted it was as though he had flown away like a bird… or a witch. Eventually he realized the man had wrapped his feet in the burlap bags their food donations had come in. It made him near impossible to follow on that hard ground. “It don’ matter none,” he muttered, “I got a bead on where he’s heading.” Harley had taken on a grim determination that could be seen in his eyes and the set of his jaw. This was not the carefree Harley the other two had come to know.

  “He’s only got about an hour or two on us, at most,” Thomas calculated, hitching up his Levi’s and shaking his head at the sky. The wispy “mare’s tail” clouds were harbingers of a weather front. In this season it would probably bring rain out of Mexico along with it—there would be the clean, fresh smell of wet mesquite running before it. The sign of this cholló, as Harley now called him, could disappear altogether should they get another downpour.

  By mid-morning all three of the men were sweating, and though they carried little in the way of gear, they were breathing hard, and Charlie wondered how long they could maintain such a pace. Already the muscles of his calves were trying to spasm.

  Thomas had moved out in front, and as they topped yet another interminable ridge, he swept the broken country beyond through slitted eyes. Well in the distance he could just make out what appeared to be a “summer” hogan. There had been a time in his people’s past when these brush shelters had been their only protection. Sometimes they might be covered with hides but only in the fiercest of weather. They had lived much like the Utes in those days and, like their cousins the Apache, in the not so distant past. The more traditional Diné still favored them, conditions permitting.

  While Thomas didn’t like the idea, Harley thought they should alter course to check out the dwelling, see if there might be a chance of adding to their meager supplies or maybe borrow a gun, which he had not been able to accomplish on his last foraging venture. He wanted a long gun. Charlie agreed with Harley, but Thomas allowed he would stay on the mojado’s trail, and they could just catch up with him if they were able. Privately, Charlie thought this foolish, but knowing Thomas’s stubborn nature thought it pointless to argue. The two men stood for a moment, staring at one another, each hoping the other might relent. Finally Charlie pulled his .38 from its shoulder holster, and for a moment Harley thought he meant to shoot their friend.

  Charlie passed the gun across to Thomas with a grim smile. “I guess you may as well take this then.” Though the gun was loaded, he reached in his pocket to produce another four or five grimy cartridges. “Try not to put yourself in the position of having to use this. If you run across this guy, just back off until we catch up before you do anything crazy—try using a little discretion for a change.” Charlie meant it too.

  Thomas smiled and nodded. “Anything you say, college boy. You know me.”

  Whil
e Charlie pulled off the shoulder holster and passed it over, Harley stood contemplating the pair. He had known Thomas a long time, and if discretion meant what he thought it meant, he knew it wasn’t his friend’s long suit.

  As the two of them watched Thomas move off through the scrub oak, Charlie felt it was a mistake to let him go on alone but could see the man would have it no other way. Thomas had the gun now and most of the food; he should be okay if he didn’t let his temper cause him to do something rash.

  Harley watched as Thomas disappeared in the underbrush. “Do you think I should go with him?”

  “No, you’re the one to talk to these people up here—if we are lucky, they will be clansmen of yours and willing to help us more than most. The old woman said there were lots of Reed People up here. Maybe these will be some of them.”

  As they drew closer to the brush arbor, Harley held up a hand for Charlie to stop and then studied the place from the shade of a larger than usual scrub oak. There was no one about that he could see, but that would not be unusual for this time of day. The herder would be off with the stock. It was then he saw a slight movement at the back of the shelter and motioned Charlie forward with him. Maybe it’s a dog, he thought, but no, if it was a dog, it would be out here raising a ruckus… if not trying to eat us alive. It was a Navajo dog’s job to raise an alarm; it had been their major purpose for thousands of years, and they knew their job.

  Charlie moved up alongside him, and Harley pointed to where he thought he had seen some sort of movement. There was nothing either of them could see now, still Harley hesitated, waiting, watching. He was almost ready to move forward when he heard a small noise, a whine, or tiny yelp… something.

  Charlie motioned for them to split up and move to either side of the shelter. He almost wished he had kept the gun now and moved forward with the sense that he might soon be sorry he didn’t.

  Harley reached the side of the shelter first and peered inside through the loosely woven wall of the structure. Charlie was at the open front, and Harley didn’t have time to warn him as a flash of brown lunged against the end of a chain and growled low in its throat. Fortunately for Charlie the chain was such that it ended just short of the opening, and the big female could not quite reach him.

  Harley moved to the entrance, considered the dog, and then grinned at the look on Charlie’s face. “You are lucky that dog didn’t get you. She’s got pups back there in a box. That’s why she didn’t bark right off—didn’t want to give them away unless she had to—they’re just like coyotes that way. The owner probably has another dog out herding with him. Those pups aren’t weaned, so he left the female with them.”

  Harley spoke softly to the dog in Navajo, and after a while she calmed down and let him approach and even ruffle the hair on her back. Harley had a way with dogs, and Charlie doubted he could have done the same. It was something in the way Harley spoke old-time Navajo or maybe the smell of him… something told the dog he was okay. Charley was finally able to edge past and have a look around. One pup was a blue merle color, and the other black and white, giving testament to their mixed heritage.

  It was not considered good manners for a stranger to enter even so loosely built a brush shelter as this one uninvited, but in this instance there were extenuating circumstances, and allowances would have to be made. The people who lived here might not be aware of the danger now stalking the area and should be warned, but time was short and they needed to catch up with Thomas. The person that lived here had already been lucky. If Harley had spotted this place so had the man they were following. Only the fact that they were close behind may have prevented him from doing more harm here. Harley called from the front yard, “I think we’ve got company. Someone’s coming, and they’re in a hurry.”

  Charlie once again squeezed past the chained dog, which lowered her ears and gave him the stock-dog stare, one that would stop a sheep dead in its tracks. He reached Harley’s side just as a rider came into view from the east, and the two of them stood watching as the horseman quickly closed the gap. He was young and carried a .22 rifle across his saddle. He waited till he was nearly upon them before pulling his horse to an abrupt stop, scattering dirt and small rocks over their feet. This was the way young men were these days, Harley thought—no consideration.

  Harley looked down at his boots and frowned before raising his eyes to the young man. “Eh t’eeh, Cousin. Where from?”

  The boy, Billy Zahnii, in his twenties, seemed suspicious of Harley’s old-time use of a language which he himself had only a partial understanding. He stared the two up and down and then looked around and beyond them, as though to confirm they were alone. He said nothing and kept the rifle in front of him. It was an old Winchester pump action with an octagon barrel. Charlie’s grandfather had one just like it when Charlie was a boy. He had used it many times to pot a rabbit or ground squirrel. They were fine rifles in their day, and the thought crossed his mind he should ask his aunt what had happened to it… maybe get it for his son.

  Everyone was silent for an embarrassing amount of time, and then the boy, seeing the other two were not intimidated, said, “I’m coming from our band of sheep down on “Water Springs Up”—about two miles from here. What are you people doing out here on foot? You don’t look like part of the search parties.”

  Harley thought the boy rude and was about to say as much. But Charlie answered first. “We’re not with them, but I’m glad you know what’s going on. The man they are looking for passed by your camp this morning. It was a good thing you were already gone with the sheep. He’s a dangerous person and might have hurt someone here if he got the chance… He doesn’t need much of a reason to hurt people.” He pulled his badge out of his pocket and held it out for the young man to see: Navajo Nation Legal Services. “We’ve been after this guy for several days now.” This seemed to mollify the boy to some degree, and he relaxed, even lowered the muzzle of his rifle a bit.

  Harley spoke now, first in Navajo, and then seeing the boy wasn’t connecting, switched to English. “Are you out here alone, little brother?” At this boy’s age he himself often had to spend weeks alone with the sheep up in Tsé Bii’ Ndzigail, Monument Valley, where his people still lived.

  The boy sniffed. “I only work for these people who own the sheep. This is Delbert Natanii’s camp. They’ve gone to town for groceries, most likely won’t be back here till evening.” The young man straightened himself in the saddle. “They own a lot of sheep and run two camps up here in the summer. They have to drop off supplies up above first, then they will circle back down here on the road.”

  Charlie shot the boy a sharp glance. “You mean farther up under the rim and on around the mountain?” There was an urgency there that took the boy by surprise.

  “…Uh, yes, over there.” He indicated Pastora Peak with a push of his chin. My uncle and younger brother are up there.” And then he said, “Why!”

  Harley looked in the direction the boy had pointed. “Can you get a horse up to their camp from here?”

  “Naah. You would have to come in from the other side if you were horseback. My uncle or brother will have to ride down from that camp and pick up their groceries from the truck on the other side of the mountain and then pack them up to their camp. There’s no road up there.” Worry was becoming evident in the boy’s voice, and he looked from one to the other of the two as if deciding once and for all if he could trust them. “You think this crazy person is headed that way, do you?”

  “The sign points to that, yes, and I’m not going to tell you otherwise. But this guy has food enough already and may not bother your people at all. We’re pushing him pretty hard, and he may just go ta ground again—hide until he sees a way out.” Harley wanted the boy to know the situation just as it was. After all, his life could depend on it.

  Charlie interrupted, “Right now we need food.” And looking the boy in the eye asked, “Do you have any other gun than that .22. Something bigger?”

  The boy though
t only a moment before deciding and said, “We have an old 30-40 Krag in there under my bedding. We hardly ever take it out unless we see bear sign around.” He thought again. “…Probably only have a handful of shells for it. It kicks like a mule and is too heavy to carry around all the time. I don’t like it myself, but it shoots straight.” And then he said, “I can come with you!”

  Charlie shook his head. “No, we already have one man up there on his trail. We’ll catch up to him by evening, if we hurry. We don’t need any more help other than some food… whatever you have will do… and that rifle.” He again saw a shadow of doubt cross the boy’s features. “I’ll personally see that it gets back to you, and we can pay you for whatever food we take. I don’t suppose you are a Reed People, are you?”

  “No, I’m of the Red Clays and born for the Bit’ahnii. The owner of this camp is a Reed People.”

  Charlie blinked. “I’m Bit’ahnii, and Harley here is of the Reed People, so we are related, all of us, family… We will treat you right.”

  Upon hearing this, the boy slowly nodded and headed inside, where he retrieved the old military rifle and whatever cartridges there were, then began collecting food. It was more than the two had hoped, and they took it with many thanks.

  “Well,” Harley said taking the bag of food, “we are falling behind and need ta be on our way. Thank the owner of this place for us. Let him know that it is family that has his gun. He can ask his clan sister, She Has Horses, the old woman down below whose granddaughter was killed. Maybe it will be one of these very bullets that settles that score.” This was more than Harley was used to saying at one time, and he seemed pleased when the boy acknowledged it with a grim smile and waved away their offer to pay for the food. He stood waving goodbye till they were nearly out of sight.

  ~~~~~

  Thomas Begay did not stop till he was at the base of the bluff and could see no apparent way to go higher without continuing around the mountain, and even then he wasn’t sure what he would find. Anyone who hunts knows the secret is to stay above the game—hunting up into the quarry puts a pursuer at a disadvantage, and a dangerous one too, should the game be man.