The Forests of the Night - J P S Brown

by J P S Brown

"Yes, a newborn bull calf. I fed her here three days ago."

  "How long has she been dead?" Juan Vogel rinsed his cup and shook the water out."

  "Two days."

  Juan Vogel stood up. "Well, let's go and fish her out. She picked a nice, cool, wet place to die. An elegant place."

  "I dragged her out of the water."

  "Did she at least leave us her hide?"

  "¡No, hombre!" How much could she and the vultures have left if she was so light I could drag her out without drawing a long breath."

  "To finish me she leaves no hide! Now, to find the calf. He'll be so well hidden only his mother could find him."

  The men saddled their animals and led them up to the patio of the hacienda. Cattle had been using the patio and the front porch for bed ground. Piles of manure were turning to dust on ground that Vogel women had once kept clean and hard. A rock corral bordered the patio. The corral was well kept. A snubbing post of forked mesquite was planted in the center of the corral, its arms and trunk burned with the grooves of many reatas wrapped in haste while a heavy catch bucked and charged and bawled to get away. Juan Vogel leaned with his forearms on the rock wall while he smoked. Smoke made him close his eyes to slits, and he did not relieve them by taking the cigarette from the corner of his mouth.

  "Our Tio Pascual used to bury a half dozen demijohns of his wine around that snubbing post every two years," Juan Vogel said. "The wine aged in that ground was his best. He bragged it was so good he could drink a demajuana by himself at one sitting without any harm coming to him.

  "He could drink wood alcohol without harming himself, I believe. He and four or tive friends could Finish a demajuana early in one night and nearly empty another by morning. The friends surrendered then and Tio Pascual drank on joking, singing, and calling for his breakfast. He could work all the next day and stay happy, while the friends were too sick to work.

  "He liked to stand over the corral while we crowded broncs through the gate. He'd pounce on the back of one like a tigre and ride him with a mane hold as he bucked off the hill and across the stream. He'd dismount when the animal started up the other bank. He said riding a bucking horse uphill was taking advantage of dumb animals."

  Adán laughed. Juan Vogel threw the butt of his cigarette into the corral. "I'm glad he isn't here to see the drouth," he said. "We never seemed to be short of pasture or provisions when my Tio Pascual lived. He would not allow any force of man or nature to ruin his country. This country ran twice as many cattle when he was here and even his burros were fat. He guarded his country with a roar of laughter. He defended it like a tigre. "

  Adán smiled. "Maybe that was him I saw yesterday at Tepochici. I just saw his track in the lime grove."

  "What did you see?"

  "I saw a tigre, a big one. He's been here today."

  "I'd like to have his hide to pay for my dead cattle."

  "He isn't bothering us. He has plenty of deer in the heights."

  "If that tigre was the ghost of our Tio Pascual he'd be bothering us. He'd be angry to see manure on his porch, vulture cuacha in his drinking water, his patio a bed ground, his winery dry and in ruins, orphaned calves, and no sound of laughter. He'd be haunting us for an accounting."

  "Well, if that tigre was Pascual, he was on the track of deer and he was in such a hurry he didn't see me."

  "Not a ghost, then," Juan Vogel laughed. "A ghost, Adancito?"

  The boy hid behind his father's leg. Only occasionally did he fear ghosts. He feared the gaze of Juan Vogel all the time. Adán did not blame him. Juan Vogel had the same clear amber eyes of a tigre. Tio Pascual had been called "Tigre" and "Devil" and acted like a devil jaguar having fun. To distract Juan Vogel's gaze Adancito unwound his slingshot. He glanced at the man out of the corner of his eye to see if he was still watching. He moved slowly, like a rabbit mesmerized by a predator, trying to continue with his everyday business but fascinated into slow motion. He moved away and chose a rock. He hefted it and swung it in his sling and then he winged it with sudden ferocity at the complacent vultures in the alisos. The vultures flapped, fell, gained momentum, and began to soar in the canyon. Adán tightened the cinches on the mare and lifted Adancito to the saddle. Adancito and Juan Vogel rode away toward Gilaremos. Adán started toward the place he had last seen the spotted bull calf of the dead white-faced cow.

  He walked through the lime grove to a trail that was cut through vainoro brush. Each vainoro tree grew in several trunks sprouting long, supple branches. The trunks had inch-long spines jutting along their lengths. Limbs wielded short, hook-like spines. The limbs were locked fast among branches of more vainoro. The vainora forest formed a closed thicket where cattle could seclude themselves from sun, man, and predator. Vaqueros hacked tunnels through the thickets to search them. Adán knew every passage through every thicket in his region of the Sierra Madre the way a city man knows his streets. To another serrano he could explain the turns and bends and climbs to take in order to move fast over the Sierra the way one city man can describe to another the best avenues and streets to use to get across town.

  He knew he might possibly come upon the jaguar when he saw his tracks again. He did not want to meet any jaguars in that vainorál. He was afraid for the calf because the jaguar had gone toward the place where Adán had last seen him. He came to the end of the canyon. The canyon was in the shade of a mountain now and was cool. He heard the hint of a growl in a breath and stopped. He squatted. He barely moved. He did not unsling his rifle so as not to make a move. He took his breath slowly through his mouth while he listened.

  He became aware of another being only a few feet away. He felt his side and one buttock warm with the heat of the other body. He began to sweat, a condition his movement in the brush had not caused. He pivoted slowly on his heels until he faced the direction of the source of warmth. He saw only closed, bristling limbs. A sound showed him the flitting blue tail and wing tip of a russet chachalaca, the wild chicken of the region. A flock of them was coming toward him. The chachalacas flicked quietly together through the thicket, dropping to the ground for vainora berries; their round wings beating silently, their long tails slicing, their topknots alert as antennae.

  He turned back to the mass of brush against the canyon wall. He searched for some uniformity and saw two dark eyes pointing at him. They were narrow in the outer corners, dark and unmoving, unseeing. He smiled. They were not eyes. They were the small nostrils of a calf. The calf was lying on his belly, his head extended snakily along the ground, feet and legs snug beneath him. His eyes were closed, the delicate lashes unmoving. Adán searched again and found the track of El Yoco. El Yoco had passed so close to the calf he could not have missed him, yet he had not bothered him.

  Adán heard the growl again and looked to the head of the canyon. He saw the bright, spotted hide detach itself from the brush and climb out of the canyon, its lines of spots writhing like snakes. Adán smiled. The calf had detained him long enough so he had not crowded El Yoco into the end of the canyon. E1 Yoco, crowded, might have decided the easiest and most satisfying way out of the canyon was over the top of a Martinillo.

  Adán began cutting brush away from the calf. The calf did not move while Adán worked. The blows of the knife were loud in the dark quiet of the canyon. The calf's eyelashes lay like silver along his cheek. How clean he was. Adán stooped to pick him up. The calf started to his feet and shook his head, challenging Adán as though he carried thick, sharp horns. Adán pulled him out of his hiding place by the ears. The calf came running, bucking and kicking at Adán. He bawled, his last defense. He called for his mother's horns. Adán carried him to Gilaremos. The calf bawled in his ear the whole way. Cows in the corral at the camp answered the calf's bawling and trotted to him, summoned by him. They crowded Adán in the corral, smelling the calf, excited by his ordeal. Adán turned the calf loose in a small corral with other calves.

  Juan Vogel and five of his vaqueros were drinking coffee around a fire laid under the porta
l of the camp.

  "You found him," Juan Vogel said to Adán. He was tired. He was not yet in condition for the work he had come to do. "Where?"

  "Waiting on a platter to become a snack for your Tio Pascual."

  Lucia, the woman of Ruelas, set a cup of coffee on the table for him. She carried a baby on her hip. Her eyes showed pleasure in seeing Adán. She wore a bright red scarf tied around her brow. The long ends hung down her back. She was handsome.

  "Thank you, comadre, " Adán said.

  "For nothing, compadre, " she said and went back into her kitchen to nurse his godson.

  "What did you see at Limón?" Juan Vogel asked after he had watched his cousin closely to see what his humor was.

  "Didn't I just tell you?" Adán said in a good humor because he had delivered the calf. "Our Tio Pascual was in the vainorál in the form of a jaguar."

  "You saw the tigre?"

  "I only saw the color and movement of him as he left the canyon."

  "Is he a big one?"

  "He is in all the milk of a tigre, all the fullness of a tigre. "

  "Did he see you?"

  "He was not impressed by me."

  The vaqueros listened while Adán ate supper and told about finding the calf. One of them, José, was nursing a sore foot. He groaned softly as he listened, and when Adán finished his story about El Yoco he filled the silence with a moan.

  "And you, José? What's wrong?" asked Adán.

  José lifted a swollen foot for Adán's inspection. "I was stomped by the dun Brahma bull," he said, grunting. Ruelas laughed. "The big dun liked his body for a place to leave plain tracks."

  José sipped coffee noisily, grunting. The grunt was half satisfaction with the coffee and half acknowledgement of a message of unpleasantness his foot was sending him. Adán laughed. The rest of the vaqueros took his lead and laughed with him. José smiled. "I surprised the dun bull at the winery springs. I roped him riding the palomino mare mule, La Gabardina. To save the mule until Alfredo came to help me, I got off her to tie the bull to a tree. I had not seen Alfredo. I tied too fast, used a poor knot, and gave the bull too much slack. He charged me, hooking at me with horns that are the greatest of keys for unlocking the buttocks of a vaquero. "

  "'Ow! Ow! Owowowowow!' He was saying when I rode up," Alfredo said, imitating his comrade without looking up from the fire. "He thought he could get away, but he couldn't tie knots with big bulls chasing him."

  "I was in my chaps and spurs. I couldn't have run further than the length of the rope. I stretched all the run I could find in myself going uphill to the spot where the bull would stop at the end of the rope."

  "The knot slipped," said Alfredo, "and the bull caught José crawling on the rocks. He got down on his back like a coon and the dun bull passed over him, turned on top of him, and went back over him. Then the bull ran into the vainorál where we couldn't see him. I rode away to catch La Gabardina. I looked back and José was getting himself in trouble again. He was catching the end of the reata the bull was dragging."

  "I picked up the reata only to hold him so he wouldn't go further into the brush," said José. "He came out of there as though he was broken to lead and over the top of me he came again. He trampled my same foot three times."

  "Anyway, he didn't get away," Alfredo said.

  "Yes, and isn't he there in the corral?" José said.

  "On your saint's day, José," Adán said. "Today is the day of the Josés."

  "The dun bull is my niña, "said José. "My godfather. He baptized me with squirts of manure."

  "Angry manure," Alfredo said. "Hot manure for your sins."

  "Angry manure stinks, sounds bad, and tastes bad. My niña baptized me in the nose, ear, and mouth."

  "Do they smell as bad as your scared manure, José?" asked Ruelas, teasing.

  "I wouldn't know. I wasn't scared. I was busy."

  "Lucia, bring the chicura for my compadre, José," Ruelas called, laughing. José unwrapped the sore foot and presented it to the warmth of the fire. The skin was shiny with swelling. The shine broke through a crust of body oils, spilled coffee, food, dust, and manure. Lucia brought the broad leaves of wild chicory she had heated on a steel tortilla disk. José held up his foot and Lucia plastered the hot leaves on the foot and ankle. The leaves secreted a sticky juice that smelled like creosote.

  "Ahhhhhh!" said José, the foot covered and steaming.

  "¡Ah, ah, hay agua!" Juan Vogel said, yawning and stretching. He walked along the portal in the dark away from the fire. He found a cot and unfolded it. He untied his blanket from behind his saddle. He spread his saddle blankets on the cot, lay down, and covered himself.

  Adancito was nodding, his eyes on the fire. "Let's sleep, son," Adán said. He rose and went to the olla. He dipped a cup of water for his boy. Adancito drank and handed the cup back. Adán drank the rest of the water. They spread their saddle blankets on the clean patio and lay down together under Adán's serape. Adán smelled the warmth of Lucrecia in the blanket and in that moment Adancito was asleep. Adán lay with his eyes open.

  "We'll have a full moon tonight, cousin," Adán heard Juan Vogel say. "You better sleep under the portal. If the moon doesn't make you a lunatic, the dew will give you pneumonia."

  Adán did not answer. The patio was clean, packed, sandy loam burned all day by the sun and did not house scorpions, spiders, or cockroaches. This camp was only used once a year and the men were encroaching on their habitat. He thought of the essence of color in the clean hide of the jaguar, and it thrilled him. He stared at the moon, the color of the jaguar's hide. El Yoco's range had extended with the growth of his power and brought him here. Adán hoped he would go away to fatter country. Jaguars liked water, humidity, damp jungle. This country could not support a predator so formidable. The only fat produce of the country this year was the newborn crop of calf and colt. El Yoco was in the finest stage of his life and he needed plenty of meat. He was not afraid to take any region, any meat, any mate. He was not afraid of anyone who chose to be his enemy. He was best at killing. He could become cebado, spoiled on his own fine power and beauty.

  With these preoccupations Adán Martinillo, the hunter, slept.

  4

  Adán was awakened early by a sow with four sorrel piglets rooting at his feet. "Shhhhhhhtah--ssssssst!" he said in selfdefense, kicking at her. The sow tucked her chin, shifted on her shoulders like a boxer, and backed away, an experienced dodger of kicks and thrusts. Adán lay still a moment, waiting to become fully awake while he was still comfortable. He saw Alfredo squatting by the fire. Adán watched him while he gauged how much time remained until sunup. Alfredo's Indian face in the light of the fire was immobile. His wide mouth was sealed straight across his face against the heat. The eyes slit at the corners to cheekbones that buttressed the face the man had turned toward the day. The wide-brimmed hat obscured movement of the eyes. The highlights of the face shone with fire. He was stirring coffee with a wooden spoon as it boiled.

  A flock of parrots passed high over the camp, flying higher than the tall mountains, flying clumsily and complaining of the difficulties of flight for parrots. Adán rolled from under the blanket, put on his hat, tied on his huaraches, and went to the fire with his cup.

  "Buenas dias, " he said, pouring coffee for himself.

  "How was your awakening?" Alfredo asked. "Did the bugs disturb you? I either had bedbugs or jejenes, those little flying animals you hear but never see. Whatever bit me burnt me like fire. I got up early because I couldn't stand it anymore."

  "No bugs. I had a larger animal guarding my sleep. Weariness. Bugs didn't bother me. Their stingers and fangs are limp as far as I'm concerned if I'm sleepy when I go to bed."

  "They burn me like fire," Alfredo said.

  "They like you," Adán said. "They don't like me. I brought Adancito for insurance. They like him and they would be fools to leave him for me."

  Juan Vogel rose from his cot, his heavy body clumsy from sleep and spilling from hi
s unfastened clothing. He put on his hat and caught his tangled hair. The cock crowed. The cock of Gilaremos had an injured voice that gurgled when he sang.

  "That rooster is about half adenoidal, the cabrón, " Juan Vogel said. "And he sang that way all night." He stared at the fire while he buttoned his trousers. He sat in a chair with no thought of comfort. "I smelled the coffee boiling," he said.

  Adán handed him a cup of Alfredo's café arriero, drovers' coffee boiled in a can and settled with cold water. Juan Vogel buttoned one shirt cuff. He pushed the other sleeve up and scratched his elbow.

  "The animals pastured on you." Alfredo smiled.

  "¡Válga! We've infringed on the querencia, the very haunt, of all fanged and poisonous bloodsuckers," Juan Vogel said. "What do you suppose they do for a living when we aren't here for a roundup, eat vipers and Gila monsters? They've filled me with poison."

  José limped to the fire.

  "Your hoof? How was its dawning?" asked Alfredo.

  "My pata is lumping on me as I stand on it. Last night it hurt me so much--eh." José broke off explaining, as though any statement was too much an extension of the ordeal. "And then when I put my weight on it this morning--eh." He smiled, but his eyes were without joy. "In the night, when I tried to rest it--eh."

  "I want that barren brown-and-white-spotted cow," Juan Vogel interupted, his eyes on the fire. "We're sending the cattle you've gathered to San Bernardo with drovers tomorrow. I want to send that cow with this first drive. Is she fat?"

  "Fat as cheese, fat as butter. A little dove for fat," José said, relieved to speak of business and not sore feet.

  "Do you know where she runs, cousin?" Juan Vogel asked Adán.

  "Yes."

  "Well, you should be able to bring her down today by yourself, shouldn't you? After all, she's gentle."

  "Yes, real gentle. That cow is gentle if a vaquero can bring her out of the canyon under the Guasisaco escarpment, turn her off the file of the sawtooth, run her through the oak forest where he can keep her in sight, turn her downhill when she gets to the cliffs of the Lion and then follow her off the cliffs into the arroyo. There, in the arroyo she'll gentle if a man can rope her and still have breath to tie her to a tree so he and she can get their tongues back inside their heads for the march into camp. She'll be gentle here in the corral, all right."