The Forests of the Night - J P S Brown

by J P S Brown

  Adán leaned over the bed and carefully grasped the lobe of her ear. He held the lobe gently until the woman stirred. The eyes opened.

  "Adán?" the woman asked.

  "Yes," he said and kissed her on the cheek. "Anyone would have to be crazy to sleep like that."

  "I am crazy," she said. She stretched and kicked her legs out straight. The warm smell of her from under the covers made Adán kiss her lips. She stretched her arms over him in awakening and let them relax around his neck. She pushed him gently.

  "Don't kiss me, you prowling animal," she scolded. She stretched again. "Go out and let me dress."

  "Do you have coffee?" Adán smiled.

  "Find it. Sneak up on it in the kitchen."

  Adán left her to build a fire and put the coffee water on to boil. He went back and found her sleeping again.

  "What? Can't you wake up? Do you have to be lazy today of all days?"

  "I'm not the wife of the Martinillo. I don't have to jump up and feed the pigs, chickens, horses, cows, and a bunch of little mocosos, runny-nosed boys."

  "You wish you did," Adán said grinning. The woman feigned sleep. He stroked her hair back from the temples, hair smooth and straight, lying on her warm cheek. He moved his hand and felt her breath against the back of it.

  "Sleep. Sleep. Sleep," he whispered as he petted her. She settled into her pillow again, her face composed and turned away from him toward sleep. He covered her shoulder with the blankets. What was he going to do if she went back to sleep on him?

  "I'm going," he said softly. "I shouldn't have awakened you."

  "No," she said. "I'm not asleep."

  Adán put his face down into the private hollow where her breath warmed the pillow and kissed her carefully.

  "Unfaithful dog," Juanita said. "I hope my breath is stale."

  "Sweet," Adán relaxed outside her covers.

  "Don't kiss me. Don't skulk into my house. You don't love me." She kissed him and blew her breath softly against him.

  "I love you," Adán said.

  "I don't know how best to hate you. Odious. You are unfaithful to my sister being here with me. You are unfaithful to me when you are giving my sister my babies."

  "Not my fault."

  "Nor mine, dog. Running, chasing dog."

  "I brought you a child."

  "I don't want your child."

  "A hurt child. I found her."

  "What do you want this time?"

  "I'm telling you. I brought you Luz del Carmen to take care of."

  "Where is she?"

  "On the sofa. She's been beaten."

  "Who beat her, you dog?"

  "She's been beaten and raped."

  "Is she very sick?"

  "No. She'll heal if you look after her. Don't let anyone see her for a few days. Love her."

  "What made you think to bring her here? Luz del Carmen? She lives in Teguaraco. She lives only on the other side of the damned mountain from your own damned house."

  "She'll be our daughter. You and I can have her."

  "Where is Bonifacio?"

  "How do I know? I'm her father now. I'm your father. Stop asking me questions. Give me kisses."

  "Yes."

  "One kiss only and I have to go."

  "Don't go. Lie here and rest."

  "No. I left the real dog tied to a tree. I have to go for the authorities. Don't tell anyone Luz del Carmen is here."

  "Don't go."

  "Anyway, what do you care about me, a chasing dog?"

  "No. You're my man. Don't go-all right, go. But go far away this time. Go all the way back to the mother who bore you."

  "Now, you see? You've run me off," Adán smiled.

  "Nooooo!" said Juanita, begging playfully.

  Adán got up from as comfortable a bed as he had ever known, as warm a breast, as soft a breath on his cheek, and went away to see if he could find someone to put Chombe in jail.

  14

  Juan de Dios Felix stepped down from the bus in San Bernardo. He waited while the bus driver lowered his saddle and bedroll from the top of the bus. He picked them up and turned aloofly away from the staring occupants of the bus so they would have to look at the big silver-handled .45 caliber automatic pistol on his hip and not at his face. He was not a happy man, but he thrived on contention. He had never played, danced, sung, or laughed out loud in his life, and so his serious demeanor lent him no dignity. His serious demeanor only showed his contempt for other humans. He especially loved to hate meek and humble people and that kind of people especially hated him. He knew few men feared him any more. Back when men had feared him he had been good at showing contempt. Now he only showed it out of habit, and people did not pay much attention to his demeanor. But his demeanor still showed that he enjoyed killing. He preferred hanging. He did not get to hang anybody any more, and so he felt the world was going seriously wrong. No hanging any more had become for him the world's biggest problem. Now, in his seventieth year, Juan de Dios Felix was going to try to bring about a hanging.

  Juan de Dios had been retired from his job as Commissioner of Federal Law for the Municipality of Rio Alamos. He had served as commissioner for forty of his seventy years. People called him Juan the Law to his face. He liked this. During the first twenty years of his office he had been called La Vibora, the Rattlesnake, behind his back because of his reputation for killing men in the name of the law. Few criminals had escaped him to face the justice and mercy of their government. In his last twenty years of office he was called Caga Lumbre, Shitting Fire, behind his back because he so badly wanted to kill men, but the law would not let him. He spent his last twenty years in office blustering and sputtering hot words and threats, which were only the exhaust of his seared soul and no longer of any impact. He still kept an office in his home and considered himself a people's authority, though retired.

  He stepped up onto the portal of a store with his heavy saddle. He loved his heavy, horse-killing, wither-chewing saddle. He never carried it far himself. He stared at the young men who squatted insolently and did not rise in his presence. He laid the saddle carelessly on its curling skirts, laid the bedroll on top of it, and ordered a youngster to carry the gear to the back yard of the store. The young man, out of respect for an elder and because he was weak and humble in the eyes of Juan de Dios, stood up and did as he was told.

  Poncho Montenegro owned and ran the store. He was comisario of law in San Bernardo. He was waiting on a small boy who had asked him for soap powder. The powder came in tiny plastic bags and Poncho served them up to the boy with the same courtesy he used when he served one-hundred-pound sacks of flour to big customers. Poncho did not look up at Juan de Dios while he was attending the boy. Juan de Dios began turning over a stack of heavy cheeses on the counter, inspecting them, and hefting them for weight and freshness. The boy went out and Poncho began rebuilding the stack of cheeses.

  "You don't get good cheeses in this region. This is goat cheese," Juan de Dios said.

  "No, we won't be getting any cheese of the region until the rains begin and the cattlemen can milk their cows, but these are good dairy cheeses made by the Mennonites of Chihuahua and good afternoon to you, Juan de Dios," Poncho said in his gentlemanly manner.

  Juan de Dios never deigned to call anyone by name. He did not bother to remember the names of individuals. All men and women were fulanos, John or Mary Does and just so-and-sos to him, and they either helped him to hang other fulanos or they were hung themselves. He took out a new pocket knife I and cut a large wedge from a cheese. Poncho whipped a large sheet of wrapping paper from the stack on the counter and laid the cheese on it. He did not wrap it in case Juan de Dios should want to cut more for himself. He cleaned the cheese crumbs from around the scars the knife had made on his counter and dropped them into a can on the floor. He watched Juan de Dios fill his mouth with large bites of cheese.

  "I need four men, four saddle horses, and a pack horse to go up and get that murderer who killed the fulano at A
vena," Juan de Dios said, clamping on his bite of cheese. "Get them for me right away."

  "Avena is in Chihuahua and not in the jurisdiction of this Municipality," Poncho answered. "I have no authority yet."

  "He has to come this way. All those people come this way. They never go to Chihuahua."

  "Who knows where he'll go? He doesn't have to leave the Sierra. He doesn't know anything about towns. Why should he come this way?"

  "This should be of concern to you. I come to you because I want to catch that killer and you are the man I trust to help me."

  "Thank you. You honor me, but I have no intention of going into Chihuahua, nor have I any intention of asking any of our men to go."

  "I order you to. If you don't help me because I ask you nicely, then you are going to do it because I'll make you do it."

  Juan de Dios laid his hand on his pistol. "Either way, you will do as I say."

  Poncho did not look at the pistol. "I know you are a murderer, Juan de Dios. Are you going to kill us all if we don't obey you?"

  "I didn't come here to kill you. I came to organize a party to catch a murderer. I'll be severe with anyone who hinders me."

  "I know your parties. You killed my cousin at Calabasitas thirty years ago. He was guilty of nothing."

  "He was culpable. He ran."

  "He ran because you frightened him."

  "He ran because he was guilty and knew I was going to hang him."

  "He ran because he was leading a burro downhill loaded with corn leaves and their rustling muted the sound of your horse until you surprised him swinging a machete at him."

  "I was forced to chase him horseback all the way into his house. If I had not caught him inside the house he would have killed me. I stopped him inches from his rifle. He intended to kill me, otherwise why did he want the rifle? That was enough for me to hang him, even if he wasn't already a murderer."

  "Vilely, you forced him to try to protect himself. Vilely, you hung an innocent man."

  "He was never proven innocent. I wasn't the only man there. Several men were in the party."

  "You tied him and refused to allow his child to give him water. You hung him in front of his children."

  "He didn't need water. He had, at the most, fifteen minutes to live. Water was scarce at his hovel. Anyone can go fifteen minutes without water."

  "Go try your shitting fire on someone else, Cagalumbre. You'll find no one in this town to help you hang a man."

  "I'll find help. When I'm through I'll take you back to Rio Alamos for judgment."

  "If you take me back I'll be the first man you ever took to trial. You have never been man enough to take a man to trial. Take a bus back to Rio Alamos. You are no longer an officer with any authority here or anywhere. You were retired to the great jubilation of everyone in this region."

  Juan de Dios showed Poncho a credential he carried in the large pocket of his military shirt. "You see this credential?" said he. "This credential is authority for me to call out army troops if necessary.'

  "Call them then and leave us alone."

  "You'll answer to me when this is over."

  Juan de Dios put away his credential and turned to leave.

  "You owe for the cheese," Poncho said, smiling.

  "Put it on my bill," said Juan de Dios. Poncho had not expected payment. Juan de Dios had never paid for a cheese in his life. He considered himself a guest of the nation. He walked out and Poncho wrapped the cheese in brown paper. He would give it to someone who did not know Juan de Dios had handled it.

  * * *

  Juan de Dios knew exactly where to go to get the men he needed. He walked in the hot sun across the treeless plaza of San Bernardo. He had spent his life in featureless places, places where he encountered no trees, no sidewalks, no lights, no streets, no pavement, no smiles, no bandstands. This San Bernardo was for him only a place marked by squat housings in which leaderless, ambitionless slugs huddled for breeding and eating while they waited for the mule train and cattle commerce of the Sierra. This community was waiting for cows and mules with its mouth open like a nest of squabs.

  The man he was about to see, Don Jilo Mendivil, was the biggest squab. Juan de Dios walked up the iron steps to Don Jilo's store and struck his military heels in cadence to announce himself. Don Jilo was in a dark corner behind the counter with his back to the door. His fat daughter faced Juan de Dios with the countenance of a cow. Juan de Dios skimmed a copper coin across the counter at the girl. "Soda," he ordered. The coin bounced off the girl's stomach and stayed on the counter.

  "One peso," said girl. "Fifty centavos more."

  "By the law of prices you cannot charge me more than a tostón for soda," Juan de Dios said. "Bring soda." The girl looked to her father for support.

  Don Jilo turned. "Holo, Don Juan!" he said and hurried forward, reaching for the hand of Juan de Dios. Juan de Dios ignored the hand."Hombre, Juan, it gives me pleasure to see you. How long has it been since you were in our little town? I heard you retired. Now you are resting and complimenting us with a nice visit."

  Juan de Dios forced himself to smile at the weakling Jilo who was, after all, mayor of the town. "I'm here on federal business, and I've come to you, as usual, for help," Juan de Dios said.

  "Of course, Juan de Dios. I'll serve you in any manner in which I am authorized. Unfortunately you come at a busy time and my commerce is taking all my energy. But what is it? In what manner may I be of service?"

  "You'll have to leave your little commerce and come with me to procure men and horses for an expedition to bring back the Avena killer."

  "Ah, there I don't know if I can help you, Juan. I just turned my horses out. The country is so dry we have no pasture. No one keeps any horses around the town. The traffic has eaten all our pasture. Anyway I don't think there's any way we can go after that boy who committed the murder. He doesn't pertain to us. He pertains to Chihuahua."

  "You move yourself from behind that counter, put on your hat, arm yourself, and come with me, immediately," Juan de Dios ordered, slamming his Est on the counter.

  "Of course, Juan. I'm at your service," said Don Jilo, taking his hat and pistol from behind the counter. "We'll go right now." He turned to his daughter. "Notify your mother. Official business."

  Don Jilo and Juan de Dios crossed the plaza toward loafers playing cards on the porch of a restaurant. Four of the men at the card table were employees of Don Jilo. They were not steady workers, but he employed them for short seasons of work that would not endure. He never asked them to do any work that could not be finished long before dark. They would not start any work if they knew they could not look up at any time during the day and see the end of it. Their hearts quit on them the first time they looked up and saw each step and stooping over would be the same every five minutes on into infinity. They didn't like working stooped over, uphill or through brush.

  The four card players gazed in bad humor at the approach of Don Jilo. Within the next five minutes all four became recruits in the man hunt. In Juan de Dios they found a leader, and since he was brought to them by Don Jilo they knew they would be paid and fed. They hurried to their homes and got reatas and guns. They had been offered pay for the opportunity to become heroes.

  Juan de Dios, his four recruits, and eight of their town dogs walked with the peón of Don Jilo away from San Bernardo. They were going for the horses they would use in tracking down Chombe Servín. The four recruits were not accustomed to working with the peón of Don Jilo. The peón was a bachelor, a quiet Indian who never conversed with anyone, had no friends, and was available to perform any errand Don Jilo called on him to do, night or day. He earned a steady salary with Don

  Jilo, also a small room in which to sleep and three plates of food a day from Don Jilo's kitchen.

  The four recruits were capitalists. They would not work for Don Jilo unless he guaranteed them a share of the venture, whether he made money or not. Working for shares entitled them to Don Jilo's trust and finances a
nd enabled them to steal from him.

  On this venture they would ride Don Jilo's good saddle horses, eat Don Jilo's provisions, be paid to become heroes chasing the fearful murderer for as many weeks as they could prolong his running without ever meeting up with him or seeing his track. They knew if the track got too hot they could lose it. They were not so foolish as to risk the wages or their lives by catching up to the murderer. They would pursue, and pursue, and pursue in the company of Juan de Dios who was the most famous of relentless pursuers. The company of Juan de Dios would make a legend in the region and enable the four men to take some credit for the capture of the murderer when he was finally caught. This was the kind of job the four capitalists were best at performing. They could lead Juan de Dios around, hold their pace to his, and know the job would endure as long as they pleased.

  The four capitalists were too young ever to have been on a real hanging party led by Juan de Dios. If they had known him when he was forty years old and hanging people they would have run away to hide when they saw him get down off the bus that morning. They had heard the legends of Juan de Dios from their elders. They had never respected their elders, least of all when they were telling tales no intelligent youngster and future capitalist who used his head to get along could possibly believe. Now, looking at the real Juan de Dios, they saw a pale old man who wore a pistol so big and heavy the carrying of it was dangerous to his health, whose sweat was causing the whitewash on his new straw hat to run into his eyes and stucco them, and whose fragile feet in town shoes slapped thinly on the ground. After one mile of walking, two of the men who had gone ahead of the others began laughing so hard they had to sit down and rest because one of them had thought up a new name for Juan de Dios. He called him, "Patas de baraja, "meaning, "Feet like playing cards." The other two capitalists caught up to them, heard the name and hurried on, laughing with their heads together, but compassionately not looking back at Juan de Dios. The two labelers got up and went on before Juan de Dios arrived at their resting spot without sharing their joke with him.