El Paso

by Winston Groom

  “Well, they’re also molesting Mr. Harriman’s railroads and Mr. Guggenheim’s mineral mines and everything else. Why, sir, you invaded Veracruz just a year or so ago over a diplomatic insult. Why can’t you do something now?”

  “Because Mr. Bryan and I both feel that Mexico must be let alone for the time being. We are aware of Mr. Villa’s activities, which is one reason we have chosen to recognize General Carranza as president. Another is that he seems to be winning now. When Carranza subdues Mr. Villa and his associate Mr. Zapata, peace will be restored to Mexico. That is our policy.”

  “Mister? Mr. President,” the Colonel shouted, “these people are criminals! And your Secretary Bryan doesn’t know his ass from live steam. Besides,” he added as an afterthought, “he is some kind of religious nut!” After a grumbling a thanks-for-nothing good-bye, Shaughnessy put the phone down angrily and waved his hands in frustration. “This is what happens when you put damn Virginians in the White House.” The Colonel had barely concluded his fulminating when Rodrigez, the new ranch manager, came through the door to report more cattle rustling the previous evening.

  “Three or four hundred head this time, boss,” said Rodrigez. “My people saw them but they’re afraid to chase when those guys might have got machine guns.”

  “Yes, I can understand that,” the Colonel said dejectedly. He sank back in a chair. “You sure this is Villa’s doing?”

  “No, sir,” explained Rodrigez, who had gone to school in New Mexico and spoke English well. “There’s several bandit bunches operating out in those hills.”

  “Hell,” said the Colonel, slumping deeply into the chair.

  AFTER DINNER THAT EVENING the Colonel announced his decision. The family was gathered around the huge formal Honduran mahogany table, being served grilled veal chops and asparagus fresh from Valle del Sol’s vegetable garden. Mexicans still grew good food.

  “The news is final,” proclaimed Colonel Shaughnessy. “We are on our own. No help at all from the imbeciles in Washington.”

  “What does it mean, John?” asked Beatie, who had left the table but wandered back into the room after hearing loud voices, thinking coffee might be served.

  “It means that if I’m going to lose this land I’ll be damned if I’ll sit around and lose everything on it as well. We’ve got a million and maybe more dollars of prime beef on the hoof that are going to be stolen away piecemeal unless I can get them up north and safely across the border. Those cows are worth ten times as much as I paid for this entire property. Furthermore, from all that’s gone on here recently it is obvious this place is far too dangerous for you women and children to remain. I had no idea; I shouldn’t have brought you.” This was about as close as the Colonel ever came to an apology.

  “You mean we can’t stay?” Katherine asked.

  “That’s right, honey,” said the Colonel. “I’m going to have to get you all up to Chihuahua City as soon as we can and put you on the first train back to El Paso.”

  “But Grandpapa, you said I could ride the horses we saw. You said . . . Please.” She said it so softly, as she always did; the mere sound of her voice gave the Colonel pleasure.

  “I know I did,” replied Colonel Shaughnessy. “But Mr. Woodrow Wilson just told me we are on our own. And we know what Villa’s capable of. I just can’t risk it.”

  Arthur shot a glance at Xenia, who looked absolutely crestfallen, her eyes glistening as if about to tear. She didn’t look at him, but stared straight down at the table as if she could see a thousand miles.

  After dinner the Colonel summoned Arthur to his private study. Along the walls were photographs of his famous bulls, including Toro Malo, as well as the ears and tails of others that had been raised to be killed in the ring. Matadors, including Johnny Ollas, had presented them to him over the years.

  “You’ll be coming along on the drive, Arthur?” he asked, more as a statement than a question.

  Arthur assumed that was why he’d been summoned. It made him cringe. This was the kind of thing for which he felt entirely ill suited. He could ride, of course, but this—some kind of screwy cattle drive over miles of desolate terrain . . . and with a madman like Pancho Villa on the loose . . . Arthur certainly wasn’t a coward; at least he didn’t think he was. But he was a businessman accustomed to fine suits, leather chairs, private cars, the telephone, and clubs and financial discourse. He was also a pilot, but that was different. Danger wasn’t really a factor in a thing with so much passion. About the closest he came to enjoying the great outdoors was when he was out collecting his butterflies.

  On the other hand, he was troubled by his father’s recent behavior; the crazy trip to Ireland on the Ajax, the startling revelation of his personal financial decline, the impulsive insistence on a trip to Mexico in the midst of a war, and the baffling story Arthur had been told about the acquisition of a bear on the train at Memphis. Might be, Arthur thought, the Old Man needed looking after.

  “Who’s going to stay with Mother and Xenia and the children?” Arthur asked. “If they’re going to Chihuahua to catch the train, they need a man along. And even if—”

  “Of course they do,” the Colonel interrupted, “and I’m going to send Bomba with them, as well as several of my best men. They’ll be well taken care of.”

  Arthur had been trying to get a grasp of his father’s scheme for moving the cattle. If the railroads had been running, of course, they could have simply herded them to the railheads and loaded them on the cars. But this was very different, to drive that many cows hundreds of miles across a desert. He could hardly imagine it. How many head would they lose? Arthur had checked the wholesale price of beef in Chicago before they left: it was low—$75 a head. And how would the arrival of this huge herd affect that price? What could they hope to collect at the end of it, and how long could such a welcome infusion of cash affect the operation of the NE&P?

  “What do you think we will make out of this?” Arthur asked his father.

  Without blinking, the Old Man said, “Maybe two million dollars at best.”

  “Based on what price?” Arthur asked.

  “Twelve cents a pound. That’s been the usual price of beef lately.”

  “Well, when I left Chicago it was nine-point-eight,” Arthur informed him. “And don’t you think those cows are going to lose a lot of weight on this drive—let alone the ones that die or get lost? And have you considered what will happen to the price when that many cattle are flooded into the market? And have you calculated the expense of shipping them, and the auctioneers’ fees, and the feedlot fees, and—”

  “Dammit, Arthur,” the Colonel cut in, “we have to get those cows out of here before Pancho Villa and his gang run off the whole herd, or we won’t have any cents’ worth.”

  “The way I’m figuring it,” Arthur said, “you’ll be lucky to get half of what you think.” He ran his fingers through his hair. Whether or not moving the cattle across the border and selling them would keep the railroad afloat, he knew the Old Man needed him just now. In a way, it was almost flattering, and for chrissakes, somebody had to keep an eye on him.

  “I’m thinking tomorrow,” replied the Colonel. “We’ll put the family in the cars, and we’ll swing up north of Chihuahua, away from Villa’s operations. The cattle will be safe enough with us as anyplace else. I’ll have a good many men riding herd.”

  “I guess I’d best go and start packing,” Arthur said.

  “Oh, there’s plenty of time for that,” the Colonel replied merrily. “Why don’t you stay and have a drink?”

  Arthur didn’t stay or go straight to bed, or pack. Instead, he went into the parlor and privately poured a large tumbler of whiskey while he fretted over Xenia and what might be happening to the two of them.

  In the past few years she’d immersed herself in pursuit of art and intellectuals, while he drifted deeper into the task of saving the NE&P. Until her recent bout with melancholia, he’d watched impotently while Xenia grew more outgoing and
ebullient and he wasn’t feeling that way at all. It was like they were two comets whose orbits had matched for years but were now beginning to spin away in opposite directions.

  A lot of it was his own fault. He didn’t particularly enjoy Xenia’s friends; this new crowd of thinkers and doers who talked a mile a minute, much of it in a language he didn’t understand.

  They spoke of transcendentalism and of the greed of the psalm-singing Chautauqua programs. They talked excitedly of Vachel Lindsay, Carl Sandburg, Edgar Lee Masters, and Amy Lowell, and smoked cigars and swooned over realist painters like George Bellows or abstractionists such as Stuart Davis.

  Xenia’s smart set spurned Collier’s and the Saturday Evening Post for the New Republic and Seven Arts, and some spoke openly of socialism and free thought. On nights when Xenia held her salons, young men such as Walter Lippmann or Van Wyck Brooks might turn up, and the rooms would be animated and gay in a haze of alcohol and blue tobacco smoke, while Arthur often found himself standing in a corner, alone.

  When he and Xenia were by themselves she often tried to draw him into conversations with which he felt uncomfortable, either from ignorance or the radicalism of the topic. Much of the talk was either against his upbringing or so silly he didn’t want to expend the energy on something he couldn’t agree with anyway. To avoid this he became taciturn and distant, but this seemed only to drive Xenia deeper into the fantastical world of her friends.

  He even considered the old “If you can’t lick ’em, join ’em” solution, but quickly discarded that as impractical. Arthur was a man of commerce and honestly didn’t much care what most of those friends of hers were talking about; many of their ideas seemed weird, even dangerous.

  Arthur disliked the notion of sending Xenia back to those people. He had begun to believe they had somehow corrupted her and were a part of whatever was causing her troubles. He wished he could take her to El Paso and the two of them could climb into Grendel and just fly west, and keep on flying.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Villa’s whole army had moved out of Coahuila now, southwestward toward Chihuahua City. In the vanguard, journalist Reed rode next to a dark sour-looking aide to Butcher Fierro, a Lieutenant Crucia, who was wearing a charm necklace that Reed had trouble taking his eyes off of. There were dozens of blackened, dried fleshy objects strung on a piece of twine. They reminded Reed of noses.

  “What are those on your necklace?” Reed inquired.

  “Noses,” Crucia replied.

  Reed leaned over in his saddle and peered closer. He felt himself shudder. “Why noses?” he asked reflexively, and because he thought at least he ought to respond in some way.

  “Perhaps the owners stuck them where they did not belong,” Crucia said, his face suddenly cold and distant.

  Reed pulled back on the reins imperceptibly, trying not to give the impression of drifting away from Lieutenant Crucia. He took an instinctive dislike to Crucia, whose eyes were narrow and slitty and who had a long a face with big ears. His head was shaped like a meat axe and, Reed suspected, contained about as much brains. But Reed justified his current position by telling himself that being on the righteous side of politics—such as glorious revolutions—often brought you strange allies. These were amazing people, Reed thought: perfect peasants, mostly Indians and Mestizos, subsistence farmers, but also former shopkeepers and tradesmen, mine workers, peaceful men in real life, salt of the earth, roused to such revolutionary fury they would collect other peoples’ noses for souvenirs.

  In the present world the masses were so thoroughly oppressed, reduced to poverty and powerlessness and hopelessness, Reed believed that without the great revolutionary struggle to throw off the yoke of the past they’d sooner or later devolve into an entire race of undignified animals—a separate and lower species entirely. But here was the beginning of this grand insurrection that would sweep the world and awaken the giant sleeping masses of czarist Russia and middle Europe, of India, China, and South America—yes, even the jaded and complacent United States of America.

  Bierce rode up on a sleek black stallion Villa had lent him after the horse he’d bought from Cowboy Bob turned up lame. It was typical of Pancho Villa: kill a man in one breath, give away a horse in another.

  “Well, are you getting an eyeful, young fellow?” Bierce said.

  “Do you suppose this . . . this attack . . . is very important?” Reed asked in reply.

  “All attacks are important,” said Bierce, “especially to those doing the attacking.” For a while after Reed arrived, Bierce had kept his distance, worrying that even in his disguise Reed might identify him as who he was, and not as “Jack Robinson,” but after a few days the young reporter still hadn’t seemed to recognize him and Bierce let down his guard.

  “I mean, is it critical?” Reed asked.

  “Well, Carranza’s Federals are in Chihuahua City, and whoever controls Chihuahua City generally controls Chihuahua.” Bierce, who had risen to the rank of major in the Union Army, already fancied himself a strategist where the war in Northern Mexico was concerned. He had picked up just enough information among Villa’s entourage to sound convincing.

  “Chihuahua’s right in the center of a state that’s almost as large as England, France, and Germany put together,” Bierce said authoritatively. “All lines of communication go through it. You ask me, I’d say it is damned crucial.”

  To Bierce’s immense delight, Pancho Villa had taken him on as sort of a staff confidant. The general had been impressed by Bierce’s knowledge of tactics and engineering and was proud to have a former Union major from the great American Civil War to lend further legitimacy to his cause.

  “General Villa believes there are about twenty thousand Federal troops in Chihuahua,” Bierce continued. “But he doesn’t see it as a problem, even if they outnumber him two-to-one, because he says they don’t have the heart to fight. Of course, if the general had forty or fifty thousand men, like he did last year, instead of these ten thousand now, I’m sure he’d feel a little more comfortable. But his policy is to attack and not let the enemy have time to fortify. Besides, it’s General Villa’s studied opinion that the Federales in Chihuahua by now will have drunk up all the liquor in town and be nursing hangovers precisely at the moment of his assault.”

  “That’s good thinking,” Reed said. “But it seems like a strange way to fight a war.”

  “Not a war like this one,” said Ambrose Bierce.

  “Did you know one of General Fierro’s men wears a necklace made of human noses?”

  “That not surprising,” Bierce replied. “They’re savages.”

  “You’re wrong,” Reed said. “They’re men caught up in savagery, but they aren’t savages themselves. The war’s made it so, but when it’s over, they’ll go back to being men.”

  “So you say, Mr. Reed. But most of these soldiers are direct descendants of tribal Indians. Killing and maiming each other and even collecting people’s ears and noses has been their natural condition since the dawn of their existence.”

  Reed was silent on this declaration, but Bierce certainly believed it was in their blood. The ancestors of these people, the Aztecs, before them the Toltecs, were the very same people who plucked out the still-beating hearts from their sacrifice victims’ chests and ate them in front of God before they chucked the bodies down the sides of their temple steps. If that wasn’t savagery, Bierce didn’t know what was.

  When Reed sent his first dispatch to New York, noses would not be mentioned, and this old fool wasn’t going to convince him otherwise.

  NEXT DAY, VILLA’S ARMY ARRIVED at the outskirts of Chihuahua City and camped behind a low ridge of hills that wound around the eastern part of the city, inside the mountain range that ringed it. The trains of Villa’s men began converging, too, carrying the main body of troops, cannons, mortars, mounds of equipment, and the general’s pride and joy, twenty-eight immaculate hospital cars (which he had liberated from the previous government) containing operating t
heaters lined with white porcelain tile and staffed by sixty trained doctors (whom he had also liberated).

  Villa didn’t really need to study the terrain; he knew it by heart. He usually planned a predawn attack, which had become something of his specialty, but this time he reconsidered for a peculiar reason.

  A week earlier, about the time Reed and Bierce had joined his army, a motion picture crew from California had also arrived, with a request that they be allowed to film him in battle. One of Villa’s favorite pastimes had been going to moving pictures. He especially enjoyed American cowboy films, newsreels, and the Keystone Cops.

  The enthusiastic Hollywood crew persuaded Villa that a movie of him leading his army in battle would add vast political value to his cause in the United States, if not the entire world. So when he issued his final battle orders, General Villa set the time of attack at six-fifteen a.m., shortly after sunrise, hoping the day would be clear and the light good enough for the cameras to record his victorious assault. That, if nothing else, would certainly get the attention of the doubting Americans.

  In the evening, he held a counsel of war, carefully giving instructions to his generals. First the presidio on the northeast side of town must be reduced. He would lead the attack himself, captured on film. As the battle progressed, other regiments of the Grand Army of the North would move in a vast sweep east to west against the city. There was a long sloping plain ending at the outskirts of town where Villa hoped for the main breakthrough. Federales would be manning positions in and around the rickety houses, and consequently speed was important—get into the city and let the fighting be in the streets. This would mitigate the Federales’ artillery and manpower and throw them into confusion so he could bring up the reserves for the final coup.

  Bierce was silent through it all.

  It was a good plan, as far as he could tell, but he was dubious about how the army would fare against entrenched machine guns and barbed wire. Just one of those vicious little hornets would have been worth the firepower of an entire company of riflemen during his war. He’d suggested to Villa a siege instead, but the chief reminded him that the Federales were likely sending up reinforcements from the south even as they spoke. Bierce was sitting on an ammunition crate next to Reed when Villa pointed a finger at Butcher Fierro.