Out of the Wilderness

by Max Brand

  Rézan saw that before the others. He called back his men and jerked his rifle to the shoulder. When he glanced down the sights and found the body of the blue mare gathered in their ominous circle, he shook his head and lowered the muzzle again. He was an honest fellow, this Rézan, and perhaps the very worst act of his entire life was this capture of the white mare from the hands of the man who had taken her on the desert. Evil breeds evil, and the heart of Rézan on this day was blacker than ever before. Yet there was not viciousness enough in him to permit the slaughter of this magnificent creature.

  It was said by some that, blinding as was the speed of beautiful Elena Blanca, with her legs of an antelope and her slender body, yet so much greater was the strength and the swiftness of the blue roan that it had borne the binding weight of a great range saddle and the impost of a two-hundred-pound master and still retained enough stamina and speed of foot to carry it up to Elena in fair racing over the desert.

  Rézan did not believe this wild tale, but he felt that the mare was indeed matchless among desert or mountain horses. He could not shoot her down now. Another plan formed at once in his mind.

  Old Valentino—the steadiest and the most formidable of all his vaqueros—together with young Pedro, was detailed to remain behind with Sandy as a prisoner, while Rézan galloped swiftly away with the rest of his men to carry the white mare to pretty little Catalina Mirandos.

  “Take him over to the shade of the trees,” Rézan said. “Give him water when he wants it, and roll a cigarette for him when he wishes to smoke. But see that his hands are tied together, and never take your eyes off him for an instant. I tell you, this man is more dangerous than his dull eye may lead you to think. Watch him till well past noon, and then you may take the rope from his hands and you may ride in. Ride fast, too, for fear lest he should overtake you on the way.”

  With this he galloped off, and his men followed, with only one thing to lessen the speed of their riding—the refractory conduct of Elena Blanca.

  Valentino and Pedro, the height of all respect while their master was with them, altered their attitude somewhat as soon as he was out of sight.

  They first fastened the wrists of Sandy behind him. Then they led him toward the grove of trees. They did not take him into the shade. Pedro felt, in some mysterious manner, that he had been disgraced in the eyes of his fellows by the strange manner in which this fellow had secured the drop on him even though he was allowed to make the first move toward his weapon. That union of speed of hand together with such vague blankness of eye composed a perfect mystery. Since Pedro could not solve it, he grew vicious.

  “The sun,” he said to Valentino, “will make this man less dangerous. Let him cook for a while out there, while we watch him in the shade.”

  “It may kill him,” Valentino said with some caution.

  “Well,” said Pedro, “do you think that our master will very greatly care about that? Does he really want this man to come in and accuse him of stealing Elena Blanca away from him?”

  The logic of this was great enough to beat down the objections of Valentino at once. The pair of them ordered Sandy back into the sun with a wave of their drawn Colts.

  There was no objection from Sandy. He settled down against a ragged-edged heap of rocks and sat there with the stolidity of an Indian—not a muscle of his face changing.

  Pedro settled back in the shadow of the trees. “We shall see when he begins to moan and beg,” he said, and he laughed until his glistening white teeth showed.

  There was about seven-eighths Indian in the blood of that Pedro. Valentino had his share of the same cruel spirit. They lay back in the shadow and smoked their cornucopia-shaped cigarettes, letting the ashes fall where they would, as all Mexican gentlemen should do.

  If you have ever ridden under the summer sun in the mountains, you know with what a force it descends. If you draw rein for hardly more than a moment, that sun begins to eat in through your coat and your shirt. It will scorch the surface of your skin. To sit motionlessly in that white heat, with the rocks and the sand reflecting it like dull mirrors all around, is more than human nerves can endure.

  The face of Sandy turned crimson, then it began to grow pale. Perspiration formed on his forehead and ran down into his eyes, stinging them like fire and turning them bloodshot. Valentino shrugged his shoulders in some sympathy with this agony; Pedro laughed aloud.

  “This will teach him,” he said, “that only fools have gentlemen for their enemies…at least, such gentlemen as José Rézan. It will teach a gringo dog to raise his eyes to such a lady as Catalina Mirandos. And this gringo…look at him, Valentino! He is no more than a pig.”

  If the pig heard, he made no sign. He was working his shoulders steadily, in a patient endeavor to shrug the heat off or to create a little air space between his shirt and his skin. This foolish, patient effort caused a shout of laughter from Pedro, who found it an exquisite amusement. Only, there was this to be noted—while the shoulders of the wretched Sandy were working ever so slightly and restlessly, his arms were moving behind his back still more. His hands and wrists were steadily tugging up and down. With the tips of his fingers he had located a sharp and serrated rock edge just behind him. He was sawing the rope that bound him, patiently up and down against that stone.

  Thirty-Six

  It was well for Sandy that he had been fastened with rope instead of rawhide. With rawhide, as a rule, your true vaquero much prefers to work. Made supple with oil, it is braided close and seasoned by weathering and dragging upon the ground. It is tested by using it to wrench a mesquite out of the ground; it is as flexible as the body of a dead snake, and as strong as iron. When it is cast through the air, it whistles like a thrown knife, and it cuts very nearly like a knife when it strikes. With rawhide young Pedro had wished to bind the hands of the prisoner behind him. In that case, all would have been safe for the guards. But it chanced that Valentino had a convenient rope end, and Valentino could imagine no better use for it than this. So it was wrapped tightly about the wrists of Sandy. Indeed, it seemed strong enough to hold a pair of raging horses, let alone a single quiet, patient man.

  That patience of Sandy was scrubbing the good rope up and down. The rock teeth would not bite into the fabric at once; each strand had to be frayed and then rubbed thin. Finally it parted, shred by shred.

  “I think that he is getting sick, Pedro. Look at his face.”

  To be sure, it was very pale and haggard, and the lines sank deep.

  “He is like a balky horse,” Pedro said. “He will not stir or complain. However, I shall see how he is.” He stepped forward and, with the loop of his quirt, dropped under the chin of the prisoner, jerked the head of Sandy suddenly and brutally back. His hat fell off, and his eyes looked up into the face of Pedro.

  Valentino laughed heartily, consumed with mirth at this prank of his companion.

  “His eye has not the look of the eye of a dead fish, as yet,” Pedro observed, returning with a smile to the cool of the shadows. “But we will let him cook for a while with his hat off. That may hurry the boiling. That sun has an edge like a knife. It bites through my coat.”

  Sandy sat without a hat, sweltering in that cruel sun, but never changing a muscle of his face in acknowledgment of the increased torment. It was not torment that he had to crowd back from his eyes and mouth. It was a savage exultation and an expectation of revenge, for now the rope was deeply cut. He worked harder than ever.

  “He is fainting, Pedro!” exclaimed Valentino at last. “See how he sways! You see that these white skins were never meant to endure the full sun of the day. See how he sways.”

  “Gringo,” Pedro hissed. “Will you beg for help now? Will you crawl on your hands and your knees, or will you wriggle like a worm, if we let you come into the shade?” He raised the quirt with an angry snarl. “Will you speak, pig?”

  He got no answer. Therefore, Ped
ro lurched a long stride forward, swinging the quirt high. The thought of how that quirt would feel, swishing down upon the scorched shoulders of the prisoner, formed an irresistible temptation to Pedro.

  This hurried the process that had been carried on with such patience. He forced Sandy to place the knuckles of his hands together and then to buckle the wrists outward. Under that tremendous strain, the last strands of rope parted with a snap, like a parting cable. The thick arms of Sandy swung far out from his side, free!

  Ah, Pedro, however swiftly you have leaped and side-stepped in your wildest dances, be far faster now, for there is need. Pedro leaped, you may be sure, with a scream of terror, forgetting his raised whip and clawing at the revolver at his belt.

  He was pulled down from below. Fingers stronger than the talons of an eagle laid hold upon his ankle and wrenched him to the ground, where his back struck with such force that all the air was knocked at once from his lungs and the revolver shot far away across the sands.

  Valentino, filled with amazement and horror, whipped out his own gun and leaped to his feet. As he rose, the gringo rose, also, with the helpless body of Pedro in his arms. Where could Valentino shoot, without sinking a bullet into the body of his compatriot?

  Pedro danced backward and then to the side, in an ecstasy of terror and of impatience.

  “Valentino! Do not fire! Do not fire, Valentino, my friend, my brother! I shall give you my gray colt and my blue silk shirt.”

  “God teach me what to do,” Valentino gasped out. “I shall shoot for his legs, amigo. Raise up your feet.”

  Then a miracle happened. The body of young Pedro shot backward through the air straight at Valentino’s head, propelled from the inhumanly strong hands of Sandy Sweyn.

  There was no more than time for a partial dodge; one of the wide-flung arms of Pedro struck full across the face of his friend. Valentino was man enough to rally in spite of this handicap. He fired, but still more than half blinded by that unexpected blow, and, before his eyes cleared, the wrist of his gun hand was in a grip that made the bones bend. The Colt dropped from his numbed fingers.

  Sandy gathered his captives together, one in either arm. Then he shifted his grip. In his left hand he gathered the long hair of their heads and held them so. With his right, he went leisurely through their pockets. He said nothing as he worked, but he proceeded with care. Nothing escaped him. Not even the brown papers of Valentino’s cigarettes. Even these were extracted and tossed into a careful little pile.

  Then Sandy stood up. Still holding them by the hair of the head, he dragged them backward to the spot where their horses stood.

  “Kill me at once!” Valentino cried. “After such shame, I do not wish to live!”

  Sandy only laughed, and that laughter made Pedro scream again. He wrapped his hands around the leg of Sandy.

  “¡Señor!” he gasped out. “I swear that I shall be your servant. I shall always….”

  “Peace!” cried Valentino. “Peace, cowardly dog, because if we live, I shall slit a throat that shames our whole race. Will you beg…after what we have done to him?”

  Pedro begged no more; he had fainted in utter anguish of spirit.

  In the meantime, from their own saddlebows, two rawhide lariats were detached. With these Sandy tied them, back to back and heel to heel. He secured their heads together by plaiting their long black hair—an ingenious device that pleased Sandy. After that, he tied them to the rocks. Then he stood up and regarded his work.

  “So,” Sandy said, “you will toast a little, also. Come, Cleo!”

  At his call, the blue roan mare, which had lingered not far off all of this time, came sweeping in to him with a joyous whinny.

  He leaped into the saddle and regarded the prisoners with another critical stare. The sun was hanging at its hottest pitch, and every instant of their exposure would be a keen agony. Unless they died of panic, before very long the setting sun would throw a shadow from the pines toward them. For that shadow, how eagerly they would wait.

  These things were noted by Sandy, and he nodded his head and smiled to himself. Although he felt in his heart a loathing for all humans that he had ever seen, he could not bring himself to downright laughter.

  He turned loose the two mustangs, also. From the back of the lamed horse of Pedro he removed the saddle and the bridle with care. He nodded while he watched it hobbling slowly off, throwing its head as the strain came at each step upon its injured leg. Quiet and the heat of the sun would restore that leg by the next morning, Sandy believed. He turned for a last look at the vaqueros. Valentino was silent, as ever, composing himself.

  “Water!” screamed Pedro, who had revived. “A little water, kind Señor Sweyn! A little water!”

  The deadly snarl of Valentino interrupted him. “It is not ten minutes since you half emptied your canteen. Be still, or I shall find a way to kill you sooner than the sun would do that good work.”

  The voice of Pedro broke into a wild sobbing. Sandy, with a shudder of disgust, turned his back and sent his horse cantering swiftly up the valley in the pursuit of the troop that had carried Elena Blanca away.

  He thought of the little white mare and the injustice of the men. As for Catalina Mirandos, he hardly thought of her at all. She was to him a strange mystery. Why men should hunt the little mare for the sake of Elena’s swift-footed self was explicable. Why they should wish to hunt her merely for the sake of a woman, he could not understand. He had been filled with only a mild curiosity to look upon the face of Catalina.

  Thirty-Seven

  In riding up the valley, Señor Rézan had not neglected to place final outposts—two reliable men. Where the valley narrowed to a simple gorge they were instructed to wait among the rocks, so that, if Sandy should escape from his guards, they could block his way from these final points of vantage.

  When he had established these final marks of safety, Rézan hurried on. Finally he reached the Casa Mirandos. Straight into the patio he rode. Others had seen him coming. They had heard the trampling of the hoofs of his horses. They had looked out and seen the famous beauty of Elena Blanca, and in that single picture they were able to read a story that told them that the long chase was over, at last. The most romantic incident that had ever taken place in those old mountains was now preparing for its last act. They tumbled out and mounted their horses in haste to follow.

  It was a happy party. There was hardly a young man in that party who had not striven for the prize or yearned to have good fortune in it. Now that they had failed, and the quest was over, there was not one of them who was not glad that José Rézan had been the lucky man. They all knew that he had loved beautiful Catalina Mirandos longer than any other man. He had, at one time, been the accepted lover of the girl; she had been engaged to him and all but the wedding day had been arranged. What more fitting, then, than that he should return to her in such a triumph as this?

  Besides, there was no other man in all the mountains who had half the stately dignity, the fine bearing, and the handsome face of this same Rézan. Just as Catalina exceeded all the women in her beauty, so did José exceed all the men. The babble of talk that went up and down the procession was gay and rapid.

  “How did he find her? How did he take her? He was at his house, only this morning, and now he is here with Elena. How did it come that she wandered back here from the desert?”

  “We shall tell you the truth,” they explained. “It has to be known. She was captured by another man. And that other man was bringing her in…when our master met him with us all behind him…and we took the mare from the stranger…a half-wit with a stupid, dull eye. His name is Sweyn. We left him sitting like a fool in the valley, guarded by our men. Now he is losing the price of all of his work.”

  “There will be trouble, then, if he comes to make a claim to the sheriff?”

  “Oh, there might be trouble, then. But what would they do
, except to put a great fine upon Don José, perhaps? They cannot take the mare away from Catalina Mirandos again, because all men know that the mare belonged to her and merely had strayed away. Neither can they accuse Don José of refusing to pay the worth of the mare. What is money to him? Is he not rich? Does not this marriage mean everything to him? When the sheriff comes to him, he will simply say…‘Let the man Sweyn put a value upon the horse that he says that I took from him, and then I shall pay him his money in full and a bit more.’ That is how the business must turn out.”

  The procession passed toward the house of Mirandos. When they arrived at the patio, Don José would have kept the others back, but there was a great roar from all their voices.

  “We will have Catalina Mirandos come down to the patio. Where is she? Let her come. Señor Mirandos, bring down your daughter to the patio.”

  Señor Mirandos would have been glad to escape from such a necessity. He would have sent Catalina closely to her room, to stay there until the mob was gone, for he was not one to enjoy having his daughter stared upon.

  But how could he control her? The chance of being looked at was so charming to Catalina that the roses blossomed at once in her cheeks. She was at her glass only long enough to crowd a red rose into the shadows of her hair. Then she was flying down the stairs and dodging past the sedate form of her father. Yet when she slipped out onto the patio, it was with the shrinking step of a deer frightened by the hunter from its covert. The color that vanity and haste had put in her cheeks appeared the blush of maiden modesty. Oh, wise Catalina! So well did she manage it that a veritable shout went up from the crowd, not only from her Mexican compatriots, but from the true Americans, also, who had ridden up to join in the formal triumph of José Rézan.