The Wild Girl

by Jim Fergus

  “Because I want to, Tolley,” Margaret answered. “It’s the professional opportunity of a lifetime. If we actually make contact with the bronco Apaches, it will be the anthropological scoop of the century.”

  “Right, sweetheart,” Tolley said. “You can measure their skulls before they roast you over the fire.”

  “I’m afraid you’re confusing my scientific discipline, Tolbert,” Margaret said. “I’m a cultural anthropologist. I study cultures and languages, not skulls.”

  Tolley waved this distinction away with a flutter of his hand. “You’re both absolutely hopeless,” he said. “The big question is: Who are they sending along to babysit the two of you?”

  “Me!” said the boy Jesus, who had snuck up behind me. “I come with you, Señor Ned. I carry your camera.”

  “No way, boy,” Big Wade said. “You’re staying right here with me. I need you more than he does.”

  “I’m traveling light, Jesus,” I said. “I’m just going to take the Leica. I’m not even packing a tripod. Besides, you’re terrified of los Apaches, remember? You’re even afraid of that girl.”

  “I am not afraid,” said the boy with bravado.

  “Why don’t you come with us, Tolley?” Margaret said. “You’re a paying volunteer. You could come if you wanted. All you have to do is tell Gatlin. He’d probably be happy to be rid of you.”

  “Oh, please, darling,” Tolley said. “If you think I’m giving up the creature comforts of this delightfully cushy expedition in order to sleep on the ground and dine on jerky and wild roots with a bunch of savages, you’ve really lost your mind. Plus”—Tolley looked around confidentially—“just between us, in case you’ve wondered where I’ve been spending my evenings of late, I’m seeing a lovely Mexican soldier boy. Very much frowned on by army regulation; he’d be executed by firing squad if our liaison were discovered. Which only makes it all the more exciting.”

  “You’re a sick guy, Tolley,” I said.

  I was so keyed up that I barely slept all night and rose before first light. I walked over to Margaret’s tent and woke her, and together we walked silently down to the stock corral.

  The cold night air had settled into the river valley, so cold that the horses and mules blew plumes of steam from their nostrils. A few of them nickered softly at our arrival. It’s a lucky thing we weren’t horse thieves, because the wrangler on night watch, a skinny young fellow named Jimmy, had fallen asleep with his chair tilted back against the rails of the corral, his rifle lying across his lap, and even the stirring of the stock didn’t disturb him. Afraid that when we woke him he would fall off his chair and accidentally discharge his rifle, I put one hand on the barrel of the rifle itself while Margaret took hold of Jimmy’s shoulder very gently. He woke up as calmly as can be, just his eyes opening, not moving a muscle.

  “Jimmy, it’s Margaret Hawkins,” she said. “We came to get our mules.”

  Jimmy tilted forward in his chair. “I must have fell asleep,” he said. “Don’t tell no one on me, all right, Miss Hawkins?”

  I collected my jack mule, Buster, and Margaret her gray jenny, whose name is Matilda, and Jimmy helped us saddle them. To each he fixed two pairs of saddlebags for our personal effects, one in front and one behind the saddle. A third mule to serve as our pack animal was outfitted with panniers, which were half loaded with tents, food, cooking utensils, etc.

  “The injuns already come and got their animals,” Jimmy said.

  “When?”

  “’Bout an hour ago. I got a rifle scabbard here for you, too, Ned.”

  “I won’t be needing that, Jimmy. The only thing I know how to shoot is my camera.”

  “By golly, you are a city boy, ain’t you, Ned?” Jimmy said with wonder in his voice. “You can’t go into Apache country without a firearm. The chief has a rifle for you along with the rest of your gear down at the jailhouse.”

  Margaret and I split up again, leading our mules back to our respective tents to load our personal effects. We arranged to meet on the road at the edge of town in thirty minutes. At the tent I packed my saddlebags, trying not to disturb Big Wade, who, as usual, was snoring like a freight train. Just as I was about to leave, he snorted awake and sat up on one elbow. He looked at me vacantly for a moment with red, mescal-sodden eyes. He cleared his throat, a long, ugly process, and rubbed his hand across his face.

  “So you’re really going through with this, huh, kid?” Big Wade said at last. “Jesus, I hope you know what you’re doing.” He shook his head. “And the scary thing is, I know that you don’t have a fucking clue.”

  “I’ll be okay, Big Wade.”

  “Yeah, that’s what you kids always think, isn’t it?” he said. “Because youth has an underdeveloped sense of mortality. It’s why the old fucks always send young men off to fight their wars for them.”

  “I wouldn’t exactly say we’re going off to war.”

  “Oh, you wouldn’t, would you, kid?” Big Wade said. “I guess you’re right … you’re more like sacrificial lambs than you are warriors. I can hardly believe Carrillo is letting you go. But I suppose to him the lives of a couple of naive gringo kids is worth the risk if you can help him locate the Apaches.”

  “You got any last-minute professional advice for me before I leave, Big Wade?”

  Jackson considered this for a moment. “Yeah, as a matter of fact, I do, kid,” he said. “And I want you to pay close attention.”

  “Okay.”

  “Your camera is not a shield.”

  “What does that mean?” I asked.

  “It’s not a lucky charm. Or a weapon.”

  “I don’t get it.”

  “It means your camera does not protect you from harm,” said Big Wade. “It just takes pictures. Photographers can get themselves in a whole world of trouble because they seem to believe that in the face of danger, they can hide behind their camera and somehow it makes them bulletproof, or invisible. It doesn’t. Trust me on that one, Ned.”

  “Okay. Listen, I’d better be going.” I held my hand out. “Good-bye, Big Wade. I’ll see you soon.”

  “So long, kid, good luck to you,” he said. “Hey, before you go, hand me that cigar butt and the bottle of mescal at the foot of the bed, will you? Time to restart this old heart for another day.”

  I led Buster and the pack mule down to the scouts’ camp. It was daylight now, but the sun had not yet crested the bluffs above the river. Joseph and Albert sat cross-legged by the fire drinking coffee. Knowing better than to try to hurry them, I sat down myself and Albert filled a tin cup for me from the pot. “Coffee is the best invention of the White Eyes,” he said.

  They already had their mules saddled, and a burro loaded with packs. Behind the burro they’d rigged up a travois to carry the girl—a stretcherlike affair that consisted of a piece of canvas lashed to pine poles.

  We met Margaret as planned, and all rode into town together. Word had gotten out about our mission and a small group of townspeople had already gathered in the plaza. Chief Gatlin, Colonel Carrillo, and Mayor Cargill were waiting for us in front of the jail. With them was Billy Flowers, the old lion hunter who had caught the girl. He is a tall, gaunt, white-bearded man with fanatical blue eyes, who looks like he has wandered right out of the Old Testament.

  “Mr. Flowers will be trailing your party into the Sierra Madre,” Chief Gatlin explained after all the introductions had been made. “He will provide our contact with you. He knows the country and will report back to the expedition.”

  “Does the old savage speak English?” Flowers asked, nodding toward Joseph, who had stayed back with the animals.

  “His name is Joseph Valor,” Albert said. “He is my grandfather. He was a prisoner of war of the American government for seventeen years. Which was sufficient time to learn your language. Even for an ignorant savage.”

  “And is your grandfather now a Christian?” Flowers asked.

  “He was baptized into the Dutch Reform Church at Fort Sil
l, Oklahoma, in 1903,” said Albert.

  “That’s fine,” Flowers said, nodding.

  “But only because he enjoyed the church social activities,” Albert added. “He accepted your God so that he could play Saturday-night bingo.”

  Flowers looked hard at Albert. “And what about you, son?” he asked.

  “I was educated by your reverends at Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania,” said Albert. “They took us away from our families, cut our hair, and dressed us in white-man clothing. They beat us if we were caught speaking our own language, and they taught us about your God.” Albert smiled. “Why I’m almost as white as you, old man.”

  “And did the reverends teach you to accept the Lord Jesus as your only true savior?”

  “What is this, Mr. Flowers?” interjected Margaret. “Are we all going to be interrogated about our religious affiliations? Or just the Apaches?”

  “I like to know who I can trust, young lady,” Billy Flowers said.

  Gatlin had sent a truck down from camp, loaded with the rest of our gear and food supplies, and two men now transferred this into the panniers on our pack animal. They slid rifles into scabbards on my, Albert’s, and Joseph’s mules.

  A few minutes later the sheriff came out of the jailhouse, carrying the girl, still curled in a fetal position and wrapped in a blanket. He was followed by the town doctor.

  They laid her on the travois, securing her there with leather thongs. Joseph knelt beside her and began to speak in a low, chanting voice. He opened his medicine pouch, took a pinch of powder from it, and sprinkled it over her.

  “Does this man have any medical experience?” asked el doctor in perfectly enunciated English.

  “Yes,” Albert answered, “he’s an Apache medicine man. Fully accredited by the tribal medical board.”

  The doctor didn’t appear to have much of a sense of humor. “Aboriginal quackery is not medicine,” he said severely, “and will not cure this girl.”

  “Yes, well, it doesn’t look like your medicine has helped her much, either, does it?” said Albert.

  Just then the sun crested the river bluffs, flooding the plaza with clear morning light, and in that precise moment, as the sun illuminated her face, la niña bronca opened her eyes. It was surely nothing more than a coincidence, perhaps simply a result of her having been moved outside, the sunlight striking her face after the darkness of the jail cell. But at the time it seemed to all present that Joseph’s magic powder and his strange guttural incantations had not only resurrected the girl, but had brought the sun itself forth. There arose an appreciative murmuring from those in the plaza who had witnessed this miracle. El doctor scowled disagreeably at their effrontery, as if in a kind of professional snit.

  Albert laughed and raised a fist in the air. “Aboriginal quackery strikes again!” he said. “There’s your newspaper headline, White Eyes,” he said to me. “‘Heathen Sun God Restores Life to Dying Girl.’”

  “I like it, Albert,” I said.

  The girl looked around her, panic beginning to flood her eyes. She stretched out of her fetal position, straining against the leather thongs. But Joseph took her by the shoulders and spoke firmly to her and held her until she relaxed and closed her eyes again.

  It was clear that in her weakened condition, the girl could not survive a long journey. And so it was decided that we would take her east into the foothills, just far enough from town to find a suitable place to camp. There we would rest a few days, trying to nurse her back to health. Billy Flowers would follow us, keeping far enough behind that his presence would not be obtrusive.

  “If the girl is still alive, and sufficiently recovered to travel,” said Colonel Carrillo, “we will send you on ahead with her to attempt to make contact with the bronco Apaches. If she does not survive, you will rejoin the expedition.”

  “She will be dead within three days,” the doctor pronounced solemnly. “She is already severely dehydrated.”

  “You almost sound like you want her to die, Doctor,” Margaret said. “So that you’re not upstaged by an Apache medicine man.”

  “Just remember,” Billy Flowers said, “in the off chance that she recovers, the first thing she’s going to do is run off.”

  “Maybe not,” Margaret said. “Maybe she’ll find that she’s among friends.”

  “Either way, Miss Hawkins,” Flowers said. “I caught her once, I can catch her again.”

  Margaret laughed. “And you, Mr. Flowers,” she said, “sound like you almost want her to run off. So that you can chase her again. It’s amazing the power this one poor child exercises over grown men.”

  We were just preparing to ride out when a commotion arose on the far end of the plaza, a clattering of shod hooves on brick and a high, familiar voice crying “Hiiiiii-yooooo.” Everyone looked up to see Tolbert Phillips Jr., mounted on one of his prize polo ponies, gallop grandly into the plaza. He reined up, his horse stopping on a dime and whinnying as if on cue; Tolley took his pith helmet off and waved it in the air. Behind him, trotting clumsily on his mule, and leading another pack mule, outfitted with panniers stuffed to capacity, came Harold Browning. Now Tolley spurred his mount on again, galloping toward us.

  Margaret started laughing. “God, isn’t he a terrific horse’s ass?” she said.

  Tolley reined his horse up short in front of us, kicking up a cloud of dust. “Good morning, gentlemen,” Tolley said. “Ladies. As you can see, I’ve decided to cast my lot with the advance guard. Terribly sorry to be late. Had a bit of trouble getting out of bed this morning. Damned chilly, wasn’t it? And I was up half the night trying to decide how to pack for our little mountain idyll.”

  “Traveling light, are you, Tolley?” I said.

  “Just because we’re entering the heart of darkness,” he said, “doesn’t mean we have to be barbarians ourselves.”

  “Mr. Phillips,” said the mayor, “I don’t see how the expedition can possibly spare you, sir. Nor could we guarantee your safety were you to leave us. Your father would have our hide if anything happened to you.”

  “Nonsense,” Tolley said. “My father would love nothing more than for me to be captured by the Apaches. Tortured? Staked to an anthill? I can just hear him now: ‘That’ll make a man out of you, Tolbert.’ And don’t worry, Mayor, even if I vanish without a trace in the Sierra Madre, you’ll still get your thirty dollars a day. My father is good for it.”

  The mayor laughed nervously. “Well, of course he is, son. Never any doubt in my mind about that.”

  By now poor Harold Browning had reached us, huffing and puffing and bouncing painfully in the saddle.

  “How nice to have you join us, Mr. Browning,” Margaret said.

  “The pleasure is entirely mine, miss,” he said gamely.

  “Gentlemen,” Tolley said. “Just so that we have our chain of command straight, may I assume that as the sole paying member of your volunteer army in the present company, I shall be in charge of this mission?”

  “Why, yes, Mr. Phillips,” said the mayor, looking for confirmation from Gatlin and Carrillo. “I would assume so. Chief? Colonel?”

  Gatlin chuckled deeply. “Well, let’s see,” he said, looking us over, “we’ve got a woman, a city boy, pair a’ injuns, a dying savage girl, and an English butler. Hell, if the pervert wants to be in charge of this little troop, I have no objections. You, Colonel?”

  The colonel smiled sardonically. “Captain Phillips,” he said with a brisk salute, “I appoint you commanding officer of this company.”

  “Splendid!” Tolley said. “Let’s be under way, then, shall we? We have an important mission to accomplish. And by the way, Chief Gatlin, speaking of perversion, I’ve gotten to know a few of the girls in your pimp stable, and I think that the mayor and the good citizens of Douglas will be interested in learning what their chief of police has been up to … south of the border … if you understand my meaning. Wouldn’t do the expedition a bit of good, if that were to get out in the newspapers. It’s
a conversation we must all have upon our return.”

  Gatlin’s face darkened and he did not respond.

  “Company, move out!” Tolley called. “Look sharp, there, men! Woman!”

  “Oh brother, Tolley,” I muttered. “We’re happy to have you along, but you’re dreaming if you think anyone’s going to take orders from you.”

  “You heard the colonel, Giles,” Tolley said. “That will be Captain Phillips to you from now on. And don’t make me cite you for insubordination before we’re even under way.”

  And so we started off down the street, the scouts Albert and Joseph leading the way, the travois with the girl bouncing lightly behind their pack mule. Behind them, Margaret and I rode on either side of Tolley, with Mr. Browning leading his pack mule bringing up the rear. Some of the crowd began to follow us, but quietly this time, even the boys and the town dogs keeping a respectful distance. It was as if the girl had become a kind of town mascot, and they were sorry to see her leave. They dropped off one by one as we reached the edge of the village.

  We were just about to cross the wooden bridge over the river, when I heard, “Señor, Señor Ned, wait, wait for me!” and turned to see Jesus riding toward us on a burro. The burro trotted along at a brisk, rough gait, the boy kicking his flanks and swatting the animal on the rump with a leafy branch. “Wait for me, Señor Ned, I come with you.”

  “What are you doing here, kid?” I asked when he caught up to us. “Didn’t I tell you to stay with Big Wade?”

  “I come with you,” he said.

  “Where did you get the donkey?”

  “I borrow him from the corral.”

  “You mean you stole him.”

  “I borrow,” he insisted. “I give him back when we return.”

  “You’re not coming with us, Jesus,” I said.

  “Yes, I come with you,” he said.

  “I mean it, kid, I want you to go back.”

  “You cannot make me,” the boy said. “I come with you.”