El Paso

by Winston Groom

  Bomba carried Johnny’s leg out to the grave he’d dug for him earlier and buried it there, next to Luis, Julio, and Rafael.

  Everybody drifted back to their various encampments except for Gourd Woman, who stayed around to help Ah Dong clean up. She seemed exceedingly grateful to him.

  “Now, I don’t understand what a woman is doing out in this wild territory,” remarked the Colonel. “How did you end up with Johnny?”

  She told him her story and the Colonel told her his. Ah Dong kept his fire going brightly and they basked in its warmth and light. Shaughnessy was glad to have the company of a woman, even if she was a Mexican. His own leg had stopped hurting as much, now that they were off the jolts and jostles of the trail. He explained who he was and why he was here, but Gourd Woman seemed remarkably unsurprised. He got an odd feeling that she already knew. She told him about selling brooms and how she had met Johnny and his brothers, and then about following after Villa and joining his army, and about Rigaz being killed and the failed rescue attempt.

  Still, Shaughnessy had a haunting intuition that he knew her from someplace. From a campfire not far away rang out the melodious sounds of a guitar and Death Valley Slim’s pure, high-pitched warble, singing “Oh Bury Me Not on the Lone Prairie.” The sad musical notes danced around the canyon’s walls as though it were an opera house.

  “You really feel something for that boy.” She made it a statement instead of a question.

  “Of course I do. He’s like my own.”

  “He ought to be.” There was a funny tone in her voice when she said it.

  “Well, he was found on my place. Wasn’t much more than a day old. Born in a ditch, they said. We took him in.”

  “You should have,” she told him.

  “Of course we did. The only proper thing to do. Buck and Rosalita Callahan raised him like their own.”

  “I thought you said he was like your own.” Something in the way she said it made the Colonel uncomfortable.

  “I did,” he replied.

  “Well, he is.”

  “Is what?”

  “He’s your own. But you know that already, don’t you?”

  “I don’t.”

  “Yes, you do, Señor Shaughnessy.” She said it so flatly that he was shocked.

  “What makes you say something like that?” he asked uneasily. There was something . . .

  “Because there was a woman at your Valle del Sol, a long time ago. A young girl. Just after you bought the property. You and she—”

  “No,” cried Shaughnessy. The eyes, the voice, suddenly came together. “Lurie? Lurie? But how can this be? I thought . . . ?”

  She looked at him intently from beneath her rebozo. Suddenly she swept it back from her head and smiled, while the firelight flickered softly on her face, the handsome nose, the piercing eyes, the full lips, the full lustrous hair.

  “Lurie Ollas,” he gasped under his breath.

  “After my parents found out, they disowned me and I went to live in a little hut out on the llanos. It was okay. There was a stream and I could pick corn from your fields down in the valley.” She spoke deliberately and in a faraway voice. “That was where it happened, one day after I was coming back with a basket of corn and there was no time. Just like that, he came. And then the rain began and a big windstorm came up and I got down with him into the ditch. Señor Callahan found me there that afternoon.”

  “But Buck told me you were dead,” he said in an intense whisper.

  “It’s what I asked him to say. You see, they took me in and let us stay there with them. For a while I wasn’t well, and Señora Callahan, she was so good with him. I hadn’t even named him—they did that afterward. I was just eighteen, and what future could I give him? So what was I going to do? No place, no home for the little one. All I could do was steal corn and beg. They offered to take him in as one of theirs.”

  “And after all these years. It would have been 1890 . . .”

  “I went south to Zacatecas, then Jalisco, and worked as a maid for a while. But it wasn’t so nice. Then I got a job selling apples on the street. That was better than a maid. Then I just sort of wandered around. Time really goes fast, doesn’t it?”

  “Lurie.”

  “I tried to keep up with him,” she continued. “Señora Callahan would write me from time to time. When I learned he had gone into bullfighting, sometimes I went to the arenas if they were near. I wouldn’t go in to watch, though, because I was frightened for him. But I could see through the gates when they came in. I was so proud of him, but I hate killing. I always read the newspaper accounts afterward. That time when he was gored . . .”

  “Lurie,” he said. He reached out and she came over to him and let him stroke her face. “I’m sorry, oh, I’m really so very sorry.” She was surprised to see tears well up in his eyes.

  “I would have taken him back to the States with me, you know. I considered it.”

  “You don’t have to explain,” she said gently, touching his side. “He’s gonna live now, I think. And that’s all that’s important. Your cook did a pretty good job, far as I can tell. Sewed him up like a goose.” The moon had dipped over the canyon rim but still washed the walls in a thin patina of light. Colonel Shaughnessy was gnawing on his thumb and trying to keep control of himself. Strange things had happened today.

  She took something out of her dress pocket and handed it to him. “Hold on to this tonight, it will make you sleep well.”

  “What is it?” He held the object up for a better look.

  “It’ll make you invisible,” she said.

  FIFTY-SEVEN

  “General, Señor Reed tells me you are a socialist,” Bierce said. “Is that true?” Four days had passed since the bullfight and they were riding abreast in the late afternoon along a broad stretch of canyon rimmed by dark green trees. Earlier Villa held a powwow with his leading officers and, shortly after that, Fierro took a small party and rode on ahead. The German Strucker was on Villa’s left, erect and superior-looking on a horse that he informed everyone was named Blucher. Reed was riding on Bierce’s right.

  “How could I be a socialist?” Villa replied. “I have just accepted an offer of ten million German marks from this man’s government, which is one of the great imperialist governments of the world. Does a socialist do business with capitalist-imperialists?” Strucker was so startled Villa would reveal their transaction that he barely caught his monocle as it fell out.

  “My appreciation of socialists,” Bierce responded, “is that they’ll do business with the devil himself if it accomplishes their ends.”

  “Not me, Señor Robinson. It’s been said I am a man of low character and no morals, but that’s not entirely true. I have morals when it comes to who I take money from.” Villa seemed remarkably cheerful.

  “Would you accept money from the Americans, if they offered it?” Reed asked.

  “Not anymore. They betrayed me. I don’t need their stinking money.”

  “This money that Herr Strucker here has offered—what’s it for?” Bierce asked.

  “To make war on your country,” Villa answered bluntly.

  “On the United States?” Reed was aghast. “Whatever for?”

  “Ask Señor Strucker,” Villa told him.

  Strucker was completely nonplussed at what he was hearing. He’d assumed the agreements made between him and Villa were top-secret.

  “My country was simply making an offer to assist General Villa in his revolution,” Strucker said, flustered.

  “You told me it would be in my best interests to attack the United States, at El Paso or some other place, didn’t you?”

  “I don’t believe it is in your best interest, or mine, to discuss our private conversations with these two Americans,” Strucker said.

  “Why not? They’re friends. They been with me a long time. I trust them, why shouldn’t you?”

  “Nationalism does not make good bedfellows,” said Strucker, “at least not in my exp
erience.”

  “Señor Reed here is a socialist,” Bierce interjected. “They’ll get in bed with anybody.”

  “Well, I won’t,” said Villa. “And Señor Strucker has promised that these ten million marks are going to be placed in a bank of my choosing, in gold, within two weeks. And he is of course going to remain with me until I can go and retrieve them, isn’t that correct, señor?”

  “Well, yes, of course,” Strucker said. He suddenly seemed further shaken. “But first I must communicate with my government. And I don’t know how long it will take to get the money transferred. These are hard times for all of us, and banking routes are interrupted.”

  “Oh, we’ll get you to a telegraph depot pretty soon. But you did tell me in two weeks, didn’t you?” Villa asked. “Surely the imperial government of Germany that wages big wars all over the world can accomplish something as easy as this.”

  “I believe so,” Strucker said darkly. His mouth went dry and he felt himself starting to break out in a sweat.

  “You better be right,” Villa informed him. “I don’t like to be delayed or go out of my way over false promises from a bagman.”

  Scheisse! Strucker realized; he wanted to slap his forehead. I am kidnapped, too.

  “So where are we headed now, General?” Bierce inquired. “I understand we’re about to get out of these wastelands.”

  “We are,” Villa said. “And we’re going to a stinking Federale outpost at a town called Agua Prieta and wipe it out. I have already sent General Fierro to bring up the rest of the army.”

  “Where is that?” Reed asked.

  “Right across from your American border,” Villa said. “So they can get a good look at how Mexicans fight.”

  “How far is it?” asked Bierce.

  “A few days away if we rode straight there. I told you I was going to be a pesky horsefly, didn’t I? Well, let’s see how long that bastard Carranza can keep putting out fires I start all over this territory. Pretty soon I’ll have him running around like a chicken with his head cut off.”

  Reed was trying to digest the news he’d just heard and fit it into a story he would write. But Bierce had gone beyond that, apprehending that by revealing the information, Villa had already decided that neither of them was going to be given any opportunity to file stories.

  “This town Agua Prieta,” Beirce said. “Agua is water. What—”

  “In your language, señor, it means, ‘Dirty Water,’” Villa said.

  When they camped that night, Katherine continued the reading lessons she’d begun with Villa. She had written out an alphabet for him to memorize and was amazed when he’d learned it in a single day. For his first writing lesson she told him to copy it down several times. Now she was working him through some simple sentences, such as “This is a cat” and “See the cat run.” She wished she had an English-language dictionary, and Villa had promised to send somebody to find one when they got close to the border.

  Since he hadn’t wished for others to know what they were up to, Villa insisted that the lessons be done in private, and the routine was that after supper they would go off where they could be alone and Katherine would pull out the papers and pencils Villa had provided.

  Invariably Tom Mix would find an occasion to pass by or pretend to do something in the distance, just keeping an eye on things. She couldn’t help being drawn to Mix: he was so handsome, and there was an almost childlike aura about him; almost everything was a happy surprise to him. Sometimes Katherine thought Villa sat too close to her, but he made no move to touch her. Once when it looked about to happen Mix suddenly materialized to ask the chief an inane question, and the look in Mix’s eyes told Katherine he was being watchful over her.

  Actually, she was softening a little toward Villa, as well. He seemed very tired, she thought, and worried. But he exerted his best efforts in the reading-and-writing endeavor and she was impressed. They were getting places.

  “I been observing you, señorita,” Villa said when they took a little break. There was a fine chill in the air and Villa stuck his hands in his pockets. “You are a good rider and have adapted yourself to the trail. That’s tough to do.”

  “I do what I have to. For myself and my brother.”

  “He beat me at checkers yesterday,” Villa said.

  “You let him win. I thought that was a nice thing to do.”

  “How do you know he didn’t beat me fair and square?”

  “I watched.”

  “You watch good,” Villa said.

  “We’d better get back to the lessons,” Katherine told him. “We’re running out of light.”

  “I think I am going to set you free,” Villa said suddenly. Katherine looked at him, not believing what she’d heard.

  “First I have to go to a bank and get some of that German’s money. Then we are going up to your American border, and after I defeat my enemies there, I’ll take you across the river and deliver you to the gringo soldiers on the other side.”

  “You’ll do it!” Katherine gasped.

  “I will,” Villa told her. “If I get my German money and I destroy those people at the border.”

  “But what if you don’t?” she asked. “What happens to us then?”

  “I don’t know,” he told her. “You better say your prayers.”

  She put her hands to her mouth and, somewhere between elation and fear, she began to cry. Villa stepped to her and took her in his arms. It was a fatherly embrace, and she could smell his cheap perfume mixed with sweat and the stench of cigars.

  “Let’s get back to the reading, little señorita,” Villa said. “Like you said, time’s running short.”

  Timmy had been curled up with Pluto when Katherine arrived back with the news. At first he seemed hesitant.

  “When?” Timmy asked.

  “Soon as he gets to the border and fights his enemies,” Katherine said.

  “When is that?”

  “He didn’t say.”

  “He’s a bloodthirsty liar,” said Donita Ollas. “All along he’s been telling people we’re not kidnapped, but we are. What kind of man would refuse me even to see my dying husband? He’s a monster!” Ever since the bullfight in the box canyon she had refused to speak to anyone, until now. Katherine took her anger as a good sign.

  “But how long will it be?” Timmy asked.

  Mix had been whittling on a stick and listening. “A week, maybe two,” he said. “Maybe less.” Mix was surprised at the news and wasn’t quite sure what to make of it. If Villa had said that to Katherine, he obviously had a reason. But Mix wasn’t sure what to make of his own feelings about this, either, assuming it was true. On the one hand, he’d be relieved to get shut of the responsibility of babysitting, and maybe even be able to get away from there. On the other, he’d grown fond of the kids and even enjoyed the company of Donita on those infrequent occasions when she chose to be pleasant.

  “Who are these enemies he talks about?” Katherine asked.

  “General Carranza,” Mix replied.

  “I know that. What I meant was, who are his enemies at the border?”

  “Carranza has a Federal post there—about fifteen hundred troops.”

  “But if they are there, why doesn’t General Villa just go somewhere else?”

  “The general commands an army, missy. Armies only have one reason to exist, and that’s to fight.”

  “But why?” she asked.

  “Who knows?” Mix told her. “These people been fighting each other so long they’ve forgot what they’re fighting about.”

  JUST BEFORE THEY BEDDED DOWN FOR THE NIGHT, Katherine went to Mix and excused herself to go into the bushes. It was the most humiliating part of her experience in Villa’s company, but she’d had to get used to it. Pluto was barking at something in the darkness when Katherine walked out of camp. The canyon floor was broad and open, and she had to find some low scrub near a little rivulet that cascaded down from the side of the bluffs.

  She had
just pulled down her pants and squatted when she heard a noise that sounded like a large piece of furniture being moved. She didn’t give it much thought until she heard it again. A quarter moon gave off just enough light to see a bit, once the eyes adjusted. Suddenly she had the cold, breathless feeling that something was lurking. When she heard the noise again, Katherine thought it sounded like a large animal. She could feel its presence, its heavy breathing, like a dragon in a fairy tale. Immediately she straightened up and began backing away slowly toward the camp. Then in the faint light of the moon she saw its eyes, bright, wild, yellow.

  Mix heard the scream and bolted from his blanket bootless and wearing only pants. He grabbed his pistol and the end of a burning log from the fire and dashed toward the sounds. He spotted Katherine in the moonlight, slowly backing through the scrub, and then he saw the jaguar, too. It was a huge cat, two or three hundred pounds, and looked like it was seven feet long, teeth to tail. It was stalking her, crouched, from about twenty feet away; with each step she took backward, the jaguar would take one of its own.

  Mix arrived at her side, brandishing the burning log, and the cat halted and hissed. Its fangs were bared and ferocious-looking, and its quick breath made little white clouds in the chill air.

  “Get on behind me,” Mix told her under his breath, “but for heaven’s sake don’t run.”

  Katherine backed farther away. Mix was backing, too, but the jaguar was moving in on him now. Mix turned a moment to see where Katherine was, and as he did he stumbled over something and lost his balance. He caught himself from falling with a hand on the ground, but the cat sensed a kill and sprang at him. Mix managed to hit it in the face with the glowing log and the jaguar recoiled, screaming. Others in the camp heard this and dashed toward the scene. The cat recovered and was about to spring again when Mix shot it straight in the eye with his pistol. The creature spun five feet in the air, twisting and shrieking, hit the ground, and keeled over, finally still. Mix was trembling, and a shiver ran up his spine. The smoke from his revolver hung in the air and his ears rang from the shot.