Wild Sierra Rogue

by Martha Hix

  “. . . Well, you are way wrong, Mr. Villa.”

  Villa turned to Rafe. “Why did you marry a mujer who cannot cook?”

  He shrugged. “I was drunk.”

  The Villanistas got a laugh. Margarita, sparks popping from her blue eyes, did not laugh. She flounced off—as if the devil himself gave the marching orders. Rafe wasn’t worried. She’d be back. This was, after all, the desert. And she was, after all, a hothouse flower in need of creature comforts. Such as Dr. Pepper.

  “Your wife, she is spoiled.” Villa lit a cigar and threw the match down. “But she is pretty. Very pretty.”

  Rafe smiled. Yes, she was pretty, very pretty. While not the picture of her old self, she beat the average woman for looks. And she was spoiled. And she was bright. And she was learned. And a wanton pulsed beneath her schoolmarm veneer.

  His eyelids dropping to half mast, he smiled and recalled the way she’d looked in the peasant clothing he’d bought her. She might be too thin; so what? She was more than womanly enough. And all those chocolates and such that she’d been scoffing down, well, extra food was sure to make some soft padding. So, who cared if she couldn’t cook?

  Culinary talents might not matter, yet Rafe got the oddest feeling all of a sudden.

  Disappointment.

  He’d never figured Margarita for unadventurous stuffings. Back a long time ago, when he’d had ideas to sweep her off her youthful feet and get between her long Texas legs, he’d gotten intimidated by her gumption. She was the kind to go head to head with the likes of Tío Arturo and the entirety of his henchmen—and do it with no more than derringer and a daggerlike tongue. Being in the shadow of such valor would have reflected badly on Rafe’s virility. Now, though, he rather wanted a mujer with the stuff of a warrior.

  Why he’d had a change of heart, he had no idea.

  Maybe these were the wages of getting older.

  Margaret was fit to be tied.

  Thank you, Rafael Delgado, for sticking up for me with that Villa villain. Was it her fault she’d been born neither curious nor impoverished enough to conquer the cookstove? Lisette had never encouraged her daughters thusly. “I’ve done enough cooking for all my daughters,” she’d said, when her triplets were little and could still gather as a set at her sweet-smelling bosom. “You girls stay out of the kitchen.”

  Presently, the sun sank toward the western horizon; the air took a dip in temperature. And Margaret, having left bits of her suit jacket here and there for Tex until it was no more, wanted to hug her arms against the chill—or perhaps to try to relive those tender moments with her mother. Too angry for anything besides stomping, though, she charged forth in a meandering path, seething and wishing she’d never left New York City. Where do you think you’re going?

  Where had she been?

  In all her twenty-eight years, she’d never supported herself. The few dimes in royalties she’d earned from her book hadn’t covered research expenses. She knew her father, feeling sorry for her, had sent errand boys out to buy the unsold copies, which meant she couldn’t even take pride in accomplishment when that inflated check had arrived.

  In the domestic area she had nothing to recommend herself. She neither cooked nor cleaned. Of course, ladies of her station didn’t cook or clean, though they did study the art of making a home. When she should have been learning such graces, Margaret had been untangling her tongue around foreign languages, or reading about adventures and adventurers, or dreaming of discovering some heretofore unknown tidbit of history that would set the world afire.

  A lot of good any of that did her now, in the middle of her own adventure. Why was it not written that past explorers had to know their way around a skillet as well as a compass?

  Okay, but where do you think you’re going from. here?

  Since her trail led to this spot, she couldn’t go traipsing off, the portrait of outrage unavenged, and leave her brother a cold trail. She didn’t have as much as a handkerchief to rip for markers.

  “Margaret,” she muttered, “you are at a distinct disadvantage.”

  Her next move? She’d rather dine on a buzzard than eat any crow whatsoever, but she’d have to turn around. A good hundred yards separated her from the shack. Rafe and the other men continued to mill around in front of the place, she saw. She took a deep breath and blew it out. Hunger panged.

  A buzzard dipped to a low figure eight, sizing her up as a prospect for tomorrow’s nourishment.

  Ugh.

  She’d simply have to go back, be honest, and beg the men’s indulgence.

  No!

  Again she whirled around.

  “Where is your pride?” she asked herself. “Your blood isn’t that of craven ancestors.”

  She was a McLoughlin, the get of such heroes as Robert the Bruce and King Duncan. The black Celts of the Highlands flowed in her veins, too, including that of the invincible Maisie McLoughlin. A son of that land of Scots, her father had arrived in the United States in meager circumstances, then served his adopted country in the Civil War. Afterward, with sheer grit and determination, and by the sweat of his brow, he’d become what he was today.

  Furthermore, Margaret was the child of Lisette Keller, an immigrant acquainted with hard times. The Kellers knew about beating the odds. They had scratched out a living in crowded Nassau-Hesse before they undertook a harrowing trip across the Atlantic in the bowels of a hell ship, Lisette losing her mother on the ocean. Arrived on the shores of Texas, the Kellers triumphed over the arid soils to stake their claim to freedom.

  Margaret herself had examined every nook and cranny in Spain and the far reaches to acquaint herself with Columbus and the Catholic kings, which was not to mention her triumphs over ill health and professional injustices.

  She could darn well prepare a chicken.

  Not long before dusk, Margaret gained a new respect for masters of culinary arts. Cooking was work. Thankfully the men, including Rafe, had disappeared; she took relief in not having witnesses to her calamitous efforts. The area in front of Villa’s shack looked as if someone had sliced open a pillow and scattered the contents to the breeze. Margaret was covered with feathers and worse, but the cursed chicken and a double handful of rice were assembled to toss into the fat pot of boiling water hooked over a cookfire.

  Feeling pleased with herself, she blew a hank of hair out of her eyes, as well as a bit of white fluff from the tip of her nose. “And I got most of the feathers plucked, too.”

  “Most of the feathers?”

  She wheeled around, catching sight of a sardonic mouth, and raised a hand of restraint. “Just get away from me. I’m not speaking with any Benedict Arnolds.” She noticed Rafe held a guitar at his side. “Pray tell, are you planning a dinner serenade for your new chums?”

  “If I serenade anyone, bruja, it will be you.” His nostrils twitched. “What’s for supper?”

  She began a snide remark, but quelled it when she saw something never before seen. She would be stripped naked in front of the Villa gang, if the look in Rafe’s eyes wasn’t admiration!

  “I’d like to help you,” he said earnestly.

  “You’re about seven million chicken feathers too late.” She laughed and batted at yet another piece of down that floated to her nose. “But if you’ve got a suggestion or two, I’m listening.”

  “I rummaged around inside.” He motioned to the hideout. “Came up with a few things that might add flavor to your . . ” He leaned to the left to look at the readied ingredients. “Arroz con pollo.”

  “What kind of flavor?”

  “Mexican, of course. Be right back. Start the chicken.”

  He set the guitar aside, then entered the adobe shelter, leaving her to smile and wonder at the wonders of Rafe. As well, she took a moment to straighten her hair, dust her clothes, and wash her face and hands. Rafe returned with a knife, a cutting board, and a mortar and pestle in one hand; in the other, a wreck pan. The pan was filled with a cornucopia for the kitchener, that would h
ave put the stores of her trunks to shame.

  St. Nicholas, it seemed, had come to Chihuahua.

  Santa’s bounty included chiles both fresh and shriveled, thyme, sage, oregano, onions, and a small bowlful of dried tomatoes; naturally, Rafe had to tell Margaret what was what in most cases. Thereafter, he patiently chopped, pulverized, and explained, then allowed her to add the ingredients to her witch’s brew. A delicious aroma wafted.

  “What will we serve as a beverage?” she asked, complacent at their bonhomie.

  “Dr. Pepper is out.” Rafe jacked up a light-hearted brow. “But I have a good substitute. Boil some water in that kettle over there, and we’ll make laurel tea.”

  “Laurel tea?”

  “Yes. The Tarahumara Indians of the Copper Canyon swear by it. And, what luck, our friends had a tin of leaves in their cupboard.”

  “Aren’t we fortunate?” With childlike enthusiasm she filled the kettle and hooked it on a cleek next to the chicken concoction. “My, this cooking business is fun.”

  “You are quite a woman, bruja de dulce. Quite a woman.” Ladling a spoonful from the pot, he blew on it. “Take a taste. See if it’s pleasing.”

  Actually, she was pleased at his praise, along with being called a sweet witch. Was this why that spoonful of flavored chicken and rice tasted more scrumptious than the most exquisite dish served along La Gran Via of Madrid? No. It was because the accomplishment was hers. Hers and Rafe’s.

  Several minutes passed as they set the table. Done, Rafe took her hand. “Margarita . . .” His every feature turned intense and solemn in the flagging sunlight. “Villa thinks we are newlyweds. He offered to turn his casa over to us. That means he and his men will be sleeping outside.” A black brow elevated. “Are you going to pitch a fit at bedtime?”

  She ought to. She ought to be screaming right now, asking why he perpetuated the marriage charade. She ought to be begging him to help her find Tex, although, instinctively, she felt her brother was in safety’s embrace.

  Wanting what she’d wanted for ages, she leveled her eyes with Rafe’s and answered in a firm voice, “No. I won’t protest.”

  An hour later, Pedro belched and said, “Señora Delgado, you are a wonderful cook.” Javier rubbed his stomach, his eyes rolling in ecstasy to the back of his head. Both Villa and Rafe added expansive praise for the chicken and rice, and not one word about the occasional feather.

  She drew herself even taller than her five-eight. This afternoon she wouldn’t have given a hoot about pleasing these Villanista ruffians, but in pleasing them, she pleased herself. The most satisfying part? Rafe’s pride in her. Not so long ago, if anyone had accused her of wanting to please him, she would have bawled them out.

  “If you grow tired of your wife, amigo,” said Villa, “I will take her for one of my brides.”

  “I must disappoint you, señor. She is mine. Forever. An hombre could never grow tired of a wife like ’Rita. Or bored with her. Never in a million years.”

  Rafe seemed the epitome of sincere. A tiny voice warned her not to be gullible—any decent husband would praise his wife, for goodness sake—but Margaret wasn’t listening. She wanted to bask in all this glory. Her grin was as bright as the light of a crystal chandelier.

  Rafe picked up the borrowed guitar, adjusted the strings, then strummed the beginnings of a beautiful tune. His silver gaze reflecting in the moonlight above, he dispensed a weighty look Margaret’s way. It seemed as if they were the only two people on earth, his expression conveying want and need as ripe as her own. The tune he played was about love and romance and how nothing was finer in this world than a man and a woman together. Together in the deep of the night.

  She smiled, looking forward to the privacy of Villa’s abandoned bedroom.

  Twelve

  Was this night never going to end?

  The chicken had been reduced to a small pile of bones, hours ago. The moon hovered high in the star-sprinkled sky. A fire roared in the pit; the men lounged around it. The melodious tone of Rafe’s serenading guitar sharpened her senses. Her eyes kept wandering to the hideout, to its promise of privacy.

  Margaret, sitting at the outdoor table, faked yawn after yawn, until they were coming on their own, yet these Mexicans didn’t take a hint. The best part of the situation? The meaningful gazes Rafe sent her. Frequently.

  When Rafe excused himself for a nature call, he leaned to give Margaret a kiss on the cheek along with a gruff, “Later, querida.”

  She glanced up at his slate-silver gaze, at the sensual curve to his lips, and she grinned. “Oh, my, yes.”

  He winked and made for the bushes.

  Meanwhile, Javier and Pedro were passing a bottle of something horrid back and forth. Pulque, they called it. One taste of the milky white stuff was enough to turn Margaret off it for eternity Thankfully neither of Villa’s men seemed inclined toward intellectual dialogue. They were in their own realm, making fun of the world in general and Mexico City’s citizens in particular. “Chilangos” was the mocking term. Chile-eaters. Wasn’t that the pot calling the kettle black?

  Villa stood and walked over to fill her wineglass. Now that she had given in to cooking, he played the munificent host. “Pretty toothpick, has your husband told you about his noble deeds of yesteryears?”

  “No, Señor Villa, Rafe is much too modest”—wasn’t that laughable?—“to brag.”

  “But surely you have heard—”

  “I’m afraid I’ve been at a disadvantage. I haven’t gotten much word of Rafe as he was in Mexico, in the bygone days.” She smiled encouragement at the brigand. “I wouldn’t be offended if you told me some of his exploits.”

  “I was but a muchacho, wet behind the ears, when he was our country’s great hope.”

  Even though the light fell dim, thanks to evening shade, it was unmistakable, the hero worship in Villa’s dark eyes. A mad thought struck, leaving her with the oddest feeling, rather a second sight. She visualized many thousands, if not millions of people giving their worship to this Pancho Villa.

  Well, she knew it was a deranged thought.

  Villa answered her query. “The Eagle was born rich as a king, yet from the time of his first cry as a babe, he gave all that he had to the less fortunate.”

  “Go on.”

  “It is said he was in swaddling clothes when he first transformed into the great bird of Zeus. The eagle is the symbol of Mexico, I assume you know. It is said he flew from his golden bassinet and soared over poverty’s reaches. In his claws were grains from the Delgado silos. He rained wheat on the hungry villages.”

  Oh, yes. Of course. Right. Tell me another.

  Villa sounded very like something she’d become acquainted with since crossing the Rio Grande. Mexicans were great ones for the exaggerated yarn. But fact was fact. Pancho Villa and his men revered El Aguila Magnífico, as Carmelita had. The question in Margaret’s mind was, what had turned a member of the moneyed Delgado family into a revolutionary?

  Actually, she wondered, too, about something else. What was going through his mind and heart, now that he was back in Mexico? Doing her own embellishing, she revealed, “My father said Rafe once had an army at his disposal.”

  Actually, Papa had said a cadre of sorry-looking, under-armed so-and-so’s had lounged around Rafe’s hacienda, close to the village of Santa Alicia.

  “Sí, he had an army. Like me, they robbed from the rich and gave to the poor. And when the defeated Yaqui Indians were given over as slaves to work the mines, El Aguila stood up to the Arturianos. The balladeers will always sing to his valor.”

  Impressive. “Tell me about this country.”

  “It is no fun to be a Mexican of low birth,” said Villa. “Most of our people live in servitude and eternal arrears to their patrón. Arturo Delgado could be emperor, so far-reaching are the powers Porfirio Díaz gave him. The Federales might as well be Arturianos alone. Señor Grandero Rico has them in his pocket. Our Eagle knew this is not fair, not right, and goes agai
nst all human dignity.”

  While she made no comment—she wasn’t versed in the plight of the Yaqui Indians—she, naturally, had an opinion. Rafe, courageous and brave, had been no complainer sitting on his tush. He’d shown the courage to act. And he’d had the wisdom not to take her advice and shoot these men who’d come to their aid.

  “. . . And it was such a sad day, when Hernándo Delgado died.” Villa shook his head in sorrow. “He was El Aguila’s most trusted colonel, you see.”

  “Hernándo Delgado?”

  “Yes, Delgado. He and the Eagle were cousins. Hernándo worshipped your husband. So much so that he rose up against his own father, Arturo Delgado.”

  The pieces of the puzzle started to come together for her.

  “A terrible accident happened,” Villa sighed. “Hernándo took a bullet during an abortive raid against the Santa Alicia silver mine. El Grandero Rico blames the magnificent Eagle. He claims your husband’s was the killing bullet. Don Arturo seeks revenge against his own nephew.”

  Poor Rafe. How awful, to have such a terrible tragedy happen in his family. No wonder he shied from guns. And the revenge—

  “Ah, here is your husband. He will tell you about it.”

  Villa’s confidences weighed on her mind, but Rafe, smiling warmly in her direction, didn’t appear in the confessional mood. Once she thought about it, she realized he wasn’t the kind of man to do a lot of talking about the pains of life that hurt the most.

  Villa’s sidekicks began to sing an off-key version of “Jesusita de Chihuahua.” Javier and Pedro, she observed when the song tapered off, were more than merely drunk. “Viva Mexico!” was their chorus, obviously a favorite ode, though tributes to Rafe, Villa, and a hoped-for revolution went along with florid praise for mothers, motherhood, and the smoothness of tequila. They moved on to slurred remarks against the President, his supporters, and foreigners wielding too much power in Mexico, namely Americans. She began to get ill at ease.