Paloma and the Horse Traders

by Carla Kelly

  After pulling on his smelly leathers, Diego fingered the good cloth of the shirt. “If I had some yucca plant, I could have washed my hair, too,” he said apologetically, his head down. “It has been a while. Sometime last spring, I think.”

  “There’s a tub where we’re heading, with towels and real soap, and a bed to sleep in.”

  “I can’t even remember when I last slept in a bed,” Diego said, his voice muffled as he pulled on the shirt. “If we’re lucky, we sleep in people’s barns.”

  “Not on my hacienda. You are doing me a favor by letting me take the horses.” Marco laughed. “I can even find you a straight razor to shave that bramble bush on your face.”

  Diego nodded and turned away. Marco knew too late how badly he had embarrassed the man. “Or you can do what you wish and not listen to me! I suppose I get this way because I have a wife who likes a bit of order around her. An obliging husband is generally a happy man.”

  Diego smiled, making no attempt to disguise the wistfulness in his eyes. “I’d like to save money for some land, but money is hard to come by. Maybe someday. As for a woman,” he shrugged, “who wants this life of mine?”

  Diego sat apart from the others while they ate, perhaps aware that although he had dunked himself in the stream, he still reeked of leathers worn too long, and that his hair was full of grease, dirt, and maybe even bugs.

  I made him feel small, Marco thought. Paloma would have handled this better.

  Chapter Ten

  In which Marco hopes he has a long lifetime to improve his character

  The trader sat apart from them, even after the long day of riding—not surly, not sour, but quietly sad, in a way that pained Marco and gave him more shame. Diego handed around what remained of his dried cactus and accepted his small portion of rabbit, but he was careful to stay downwind of everyone. Marco chafed inside at his own rudeness in calling attention to the young man’s appearance, odor, and clothing.

  I’ll pay him even more than the horses are worth, plus what I owe him for the inn, Marco thought, then writhed inside at such callousness, thinking he could throw money at a problem and make it better. What was he thinking? Diego had cheerfully paid Marco’s debt to the innkeeper and shared his food. And I repay him with unkindness. Paloma will make me sleep in the sala for this.

  Graciela was far more kind. She accepted Diego’s offer of a blanket on that second night and said nothing about the stench. Marco knew he should apologize to Diego Diaz, but that would only serve to remind the trader of his deficiencies, if such they were. Better to say nothing and make it up with money at the end of the journey. Even that felt hollow to Marco as he turned several times on the hard soil, trying to find a comfortable spot.

  “You are becoming the kind of soft man that The People would happily prey upon,” Toshua commented. “Someone could slice your other cheek and balance your face. Do you have a problem, beyond the fact that we really don’t want to run into Great Owl?”

  “Mostly I’m ashamed of myself,” Marco whispered to Toshua, even though Diego Diaz could not possibly hear, having deliberately chosen to sleep far away from them. “I should not have called attention to his uncleanliness.”

  Toshua rose up on one elbow. “You treated me kindly after you found me starving in that damned henhouse of Felix Muñoz.”

  “That’s different! You were nearly dead. Our friend Diego is just careless.”

  Toshua lay down. “Or perhaps he just doesn’t care.”

  “That’s what I said.”

  “No. There is a difference.”

  They repeated the same punishing day over again, rising before daylight and trusting to Toshua to guide them over unknown trails. Marco knew as well as the next man that August was still summer, but the heights they traveled more than hinted that autumn was on the way. The sky flaunted that vivid blue found at high altitude, and the sun shone, but without the heat of the lower valley. The grass had dried to the tawny shade that meant late summer and rustled as they passed.

  “I believe we are ahead of Great Owl and his warriors by now,” Toshua said.

  Marco listened for underlying conviction but heard none, which added to his uneasiness. Nearly four years in the company of the Comanche, the man who called him little brother, had convinced Marco that his great friend knew everything. Perhaps in Toshua’s world there were People who knew more than he did. It was a disquieting thought that made Marco long to see his own land and his wife and children again. Marriage and babies had turned him into a poor traveler, indeed.

  As the sun began its plunge behind the Cristos, they traveled the last pass and crossed into Valle del Sol, the land of Marco’s birth and the home of all that was dear to him. Marco let out a deep breath that he felt he had been holding since he left Taos. Maybe he was just a rough countryman, a paisano, the sort of fellow that townspeople chuckled about over their dinners on linen tablecloths, with fine china and silver. He knew he would never call anywhere but this harsh and unpredictable land his home.

  He rose slightly in his stirrups, always eager for that first glimpse of the Double Cross, with its walls that matched the color of the surrounding cliffs. It had been built as a fortress and camouflaged by the gray stone. No hacendado in the district had built such a rancho, and no one was safer than the people who lived behind its protecting walls. Still ….

  Marco was turning his head to make some comment to Toshua when he heard a quick whine and then a smack, followed by a groan. He turned in the saddle, his hand on his knife, to see Diego slumped over his horse’s head, an arrow poking from his back.

  “I was right. They’re behind us,” Toshua said dryly, even as he took a firmer grasp on his lance.

  To Marco’s relief, Graciela grabbed the trader and held Diego upright until he could manage for himself. With her help, he put both arms around his horse’s neck and hung on, while Graciela grabbed the reins.

  One arrow. That was all, or at least that was all anyone felt like waiting around for. “Hang on!” he yelled to Diego, and slapped the wounded trader’s horse. Graciela kneed her mount and thundered after him.

  Toshua had already dropped back. He motioned Marco forward.

  “I can hold them off, too,” Marco said.

  Toshua gave him a sour look. “My little sister doesn’t want a carcass in her bed!” He slapped Buciro with the end of his lance and Marco had no choice but to follow the slave and the trader.

  As they thundered along, the sun dropped like a stone, leaving them in that weird twilight of late summer. “Hang on, hang on,” he murmured to the trader up ahead, who was starting to list in his saddle.

  Marco had to admire Graciela’s skill on the bare back of a horse trained as part of a team. She rode like a warrior, leaning far out to grab Diego’s shirt and attempt to keep him upright. The riderless bay pounded along on her other side, keeping pace with his sister.

  And then even Graciela’s skills couldn’t keep Diego in the saddle. He lurched to one side, scrabbling for the horse’s mane. Puzzled, shaking his massive head, the horse stopped.

  Marco reined in immediately, rearing Buciro back in a punishing motion that hurt Marco all the more because he knew the worth of his old mount. “Don’t fail me, Buciro,” he said as he dismounted, grabbed Diego, and with strength borne of desperation, hauled the wounded man across his own saddle.

  Buciro did as he was told and stayed still as a rock until Marco was back in the saddle. The high pommel prevented Marco from actually stretching the man across his lap, but he knew Buciro would not react to a strange object lying against his neck.

  Graciela circled around them, her eyes big.

  “Go now!” Marco shouted. “I’m following. When you get to the gates, shout, ‘Santiago.’ They won’t recognize you and you need the password.”

  Graciela strained to look ahead toward the clump of trees by the cliff. “What gate? I don’t …. What gate?”

  “Follow me then,” Marco ordered, wishing she were in f
ront of him, but grimly pleased that she could not see the gray stone walls that blended into grove and cliff. Silently he thanked his great grandfather Victorio Mondragón, the stone mason from Jaén, España, who had insisted on such walls. Maybe if Paloma had another boy, he could be named Victorio.

  Marco turned around once to see too many Indians following Toshua, who rode so low across his horse that they blended into one object. He had seen the enemy and he did not look back. No matter how many years Marco had fought Comanches, the sight could still turn his bowels to water—one more complication he did not need.

  “God be praised,” he whispered to see the reassuring walls and the gate closed. His guards were watching from the parapet. “Santiago!” he shouted as the night settled around them. “Santiago!”

  He could hear the Comanches now, warbling their peculiar cry that was half death song and half unalloyed terror to anyone listening. He glanced at Graciela’s frightened face. Perhaps she was wondering what would happen to her this time if she fell into the hands of the same Indians who had sold her to a paisano from the eastern side of the colony.

  The gates opened too slowly to suit him, but no one was at fault. Graciela and Diego raced through, the bay following. Marco waited at the gate for Toshua.

  The Comanche’s horse looked riderless, but Marco knew better. Toshua was not a tall man, and given a bit to a paunch, as others of his nation. On horseback, however, there was nothing as elegant as a Comanche, and Toshua was no exception. He was flattened against his horse, his hair streaming behind him—loose as he liked to wear it. He flashed Marco a smile and made an obscene gesture as he rode through the gate.

  Marco followed and the gate slammed shut. He didn’t dismount until the massive beam fell into place in its iron holders and the Double Cross was as safe as anywhere in Valle del Sol.

  Emilio met him in the courtyard, and called over a servant to help him drag Diego from Buciro’s back.

  “Careful of that arrow,” Marco warned. He took a better look at Diego, who had lapsed into unconsciousness—a wise choice. The arrow protruded from the trader’s shoulder, always a pesky place to doctor. The arrowhead was well dug in, which would make it a trial to remove. What would Antonio Gil do? Marco thought, remembering that enigmatic and grouchy surgeon who had inoculated all of the residents of the Double Cross and Santa Maria as well as many Kwahadi Comanches, then melted into the Texas plains. He would grumble, Marco knew. Still, his quarrelsome presence would have been a blessing just then. There was nothing to do but turn Diego Diaz over to the rough medicine of a talented servant.

  “Carry him inside and put him face down on the bed in that room across from mine,” he ordered. “Gently now. I’d like him to live.”

  Graciela required no orders to follow the men as they obeyed. Marco stood a moment in gratitude to an all-knowing Father in heaven who had not forgotten his devoted followers managing a precarious living in a place on the edge of Christianity. He crossed himself and went in search of Paloma.

  She will be in the kitchen, he thought, and I am so hungry.

  She was not in the kitchen. In fact, no one was in the kitchen. The great fireplace hadn’t even been lit. He felt the cold logs, trying to recall the last time he had seen the fireplace with not even warm ashes. “Paloma? Paloma?” he called.

  No answer. She had to be in the children’s room. He ran down the hall, ignoring the groans coming from the bedroom where Emilio was just now cutting around Diego’s bloody shirt. He yanked open the door to the children’s room, thinking that Paloma would scold him if they were asleep and he had wakened them.

  No one. “Dios mio,” he whispered, as a rush of heat and then extreme cold spread from his head to his feet and back. His heart seemed to pound in his chest and he started to gasp for breath. This is not going to happen to me twice, he thought. God Almighty would not do that to me.

  Marco leaned against the doorframe because he was suddenly dizzy. No one had lit any lamps, and no fires burned. For one terrible moment, he was back in his house eleven years ago, sitting in the dark, rocking back and forth and wailing because his wife and twin sons had died and been buried while he had been away on a brand inspection trip.

  His legs wouldn’t hold him, and he sat down with a thump, knocking over a vase of dried flowers that Paloma had been fussing over before he left for Taos. The thistles and cone flowers spilled onto the floor as the vase teetered on the edge of the table he had jarred. Silent, he stared as it shivered then fell on the tile floor with a crash.

  Emilio looked out of the room where the trader lay, groaning louder now. Puzzled at first, his mayor domo’s eyes softened. “Hold him still,” he called into the room, then came to Marco, squatting beside him.

  “Señor, señor! Now where do you think your dear ones would be, during a time of crisis?” He touched Marco’s neck, then rested a warm hand on his shoulder, giving him a little shake, recalling him to 1784, and not eleven years earlier. “It is a precaution we all agreed on. Go to them, señor. We can take care of this rancid fellow. Take a deep breath now, then another.”

  Emilio helped Marco to his feet, then gave him a little push in the other direction. Marco stood a minute, unsure of his balance, as he breathed in and out. Embarrassed, Marco looked at his mayor domo, that patient man who had been through so much with him, the man who had buried his first family. He looked for derision in the old fellow’s eyes and saw none.

  “The … the … chapel?”

  Emilio nodded. “She told me to watch for you, because she did not want you to worry, but,” he looked back into the room, “we were busy, no?”

  Marco nodded. “I am sorry for my foolishness,” he began, but the old man took his arm and gave it another shake.

  “You care and you love. That is all,” Emilio said. “When you are not here, we watch them as you would. Go now.”

  Marco ran to the chapel. With no hesitation, he folded back the rag rug in front of the altar, grabbed the candle snuffer, and lifted the ring in the floor. The wooden flooring came up smoothly and silently. The stairs his great grandfather had built were wide enough to walk down, facing out. He felt the tension leave his body as he saw the soft glow of lamp light and smelled Paloma’s good posole.

  He continued along the brief passageway, following more lights as it widened into a room tall enough to stand in. And there they were, Paloma with Claudio on her lap, her eyes closed, her lips in his dark hair. Exhaustion seemed to radiate from her like heat. Or was it something else? Had she missed him as much as he missed her? The knowledge that she had, covered him like a benediction.

  Eckapeta held Soledad, who looked up and saw him. She clapped her hands and leaped from the Comanche woman’s lap. “Papa!”

  As much as he adored Soli, Marco had eyes only for his wife. As he watched, she opened her eyes, blinked in the gloom, then let out a sigh. “Marco, my goodness but I have missed you.”

  With a sigh of his own, he sat beside her, Soli on his lap, closing his eyes in pleasure and relief. He leaned against her breast, relishing the softness of her. She was the heart of his home, his true star in the meadow.

  She kissed his head. “I hope you did not worry when I did not meet you at the door.”

  “I did. I am a fool,” he whispered.

  She kissed his head again, pressing her lips down more firmly. “You are no fool. We just aren’t much good apart.”

  Soli curled up in his lap and he leaned on Paloma. In a few months he would be able to put his hand on her belly and feel the next Mondragón. After Paloma’s earlier troubles, Claudio had seemed like such a miracle, and yet here was another proof that God loved them. He was dirty, tired, and frightened at his own irrationality, wondering if the Comanche Moon would rise tonight, and here he sat under the church in his hacienda, grateful. Who could understand God’s tender mercies?

  “I have a smelly trader upstairs with an arrow wound that must be tended,” he said finally. “I spent all my Taos money on a captive
girl for you, because if I had not, the Comanches who brought her in would have killed her.”

  “Are you the only good man in this entire colony?” she said seriously.

  “I might be,” he said, not so serious. “Anyway, the youngest trader, Diego Diaz, has brought back the two matched bays I want, and I will pay him here, since I spent it all there.” He nuzzled the back of his head against her breast and she laughed. “Come to think of it, we could have left him behind to die. I wouldn’t have to pay for the horses.”

  “And you would be sleeping in the sala forevermore,” his sweet wife told him. “Will we be safe above ground? We are heartily tired of sleeping down here.”

  “I believe we are safe enough. My guard is good and Toshua and I will take turns on the parapet during the night.” He set Soledad aside and helped Paloma to her feet as Claudio slumbered on. “Let me carry him up the stairs and put him to bed. You might want to look in on the trader.”

  He raised the trap door, but stopped as a scream cut the air and wavered on, before dropping into a whimper. Paloma clapped her hands over Soledad’s ears. The anguish came from the room where the trader lay. More than likely, Marco’s most proficient curandero had just cut out the arrowhead.

  Marco held out his hand for Paloma. When she was upright in the chapel, he enveloped her in a tight embrace. She clung to him, her hands splayed across his back as if she wanted to feel him everywhere and assure herself that he was home and alive and not lying down the hall in pain.

  Emilio waited for him. Marco patted Paloma’s hip and whispered for her to take Soledad to bed. He held his sleeping son.

  “The guards are mounted,” the old man said. “Keep the trapdoor open, in case the women and children need it tonight. I think you will sleep well enough.” He glanced back into the room and Marco looked, too, wincing to see Graciela dabbing at Diego’s wounded back with its gaping hole, now that the arrow was gone. Blood filled the basin she held and dripped on the floor.