Preacher Dob and me got a rope off the pinto and tied up Hanlin’s legs and bound his arms behind his back. It was no fun binding his arms, as his hand commenced to bleed like before. It was blue and twice the size of the other and oozed in a ugly fashion. He hollered about the pain. Mr Pacheco said he would shoot him if he did not quiet down. We stood and eyed him whilst he laid on his side on the wet ground and cussed us and spit out more blood than you would think even a mouth of that size could hold.
Preacher Dob said, Nephew, you have undergone the will of the Lord.
Sam squatted beside Hanlin’s face and said, You got what you had coming.
Preacher Dob told her, Little girl, the Lord is having his way and it is not for you to comment upon it.
We was short of a clear idea of what to do next and commenced to debate our choices.
Mr Pacheco was not in favor of worrying over the fate of Hanlin. He said he wanted to shoot him. He said if we turned him loose, no good would come from that. He said he could shoot him and throw him into the river, and the current would take him off.
Sam was in favor of doing that.
Preacher Dob sat on a rock and give things thought.
Mr Pacheco shored up his argument. He said, a snake will not grow legs and get up and walk like a respectable animal. To the contrary it will always crawl.
Hanlin laid curled up like a grub and spit a great deal of blood. He said, Don’t shoot me. I am sorry. I did not help hang nobody. I was just trying to scare you all.
Preacher Dob said, You done it, and you know it. You cannot take back such words. I think there is no hope for you.
Hanlin said, Give me some time to come around, Uncle Dob. I need help and mercy. Don’t let the Mexican kill me, please.
Sam expressed she would like to have Hanlin’s poncho.
Mr Pacheco give Hanlin a kick and rolled him about and took the poncho off him and give it to her. It was quite large on her when she put it on.
Preacher Dob told Mr Pacheco, If we kill my nephew we’re no better than him and his cohort on the Julian stringing men up without a proper trial. I got enough sins to atone for in my life without giving a nod toward you shooting my sister’s boy.
Mr Pacheco inquired of Hanlin how far off the lawman and the fat man might be in pursuit.
Hanlin said the lawman had turned back on account of he thought well of Preacher Dob when he known who he was. He said only the fat man was coming, and he was a ways back.
Mr Pacheco give him another kick and said, That is not what you told us before.
Hanlin allowed he had lied about it before.
Mr Pacheco inquired how far back Hanlin had left his horse.
Hanlin said his horse had got loose of its tether and run off spooked in the storm in the night.
Mr Pacheco said, That is not what you told us. Where is he.
Hanlin said, I swear to God, I don’t know. Why would I not tell you. My chances are better if there is a horse to put me on, and there ain’t.
Sam helped herself to biscuits out of Hanlin’s haversack and give one to me and offered a share to Zechariah, although he laid there and did not eat it.
Preacher Dob said, What kind of lessons would we be giving to these young kids if we was to kill a man without a fair trial.
Mr Pacheco said justice would not get done in a trial by the Sesesh. Hanlin would get turned loose and cause more trouble to Sam and me, he said, and he did not see that as a good end nor even what God would say was right.
Preacher Dob argued that a good portion of Sesesh was fair people and he thought justice might get done, however he could not guarantee it.
We was in a quandary then about what to do. There was no hope left of finding the panther, as we did not have a viable dog and there was no tracks. Therefore chasing the panther was not considered. Preacher Dob would not agree Hanlin aught to be outright shot, though he did agree he deserved it. Mr Pacheco come around to that too. However, what else aught to be done with him was a puzzle.
At long last, Preacher Dob declared that Sam and me and him was to escort Hanlin to Bandera. He said Mr Pacheco was not to go along with us, but to head south, on account of the law was looking for him. He said the task would not be a easy prospect, on account of the mare would not be friendly to having Hanlin laid over the saddle, and how else was we to get Hanlin anywhere, for if we was to cut his legs loose and allow him to ride or walk he would run off. There was none of us willing to shoot him if he done that other than Sam, who we would not allow to. Also, Preacher Dob could not walk far on his hurt leg. He would not leave Zechariah behind, and I did not like the thought of having to carry Zechariah, as it was a task I figured would fall to me.
We sat to ponder it out.
Mr Pacheco noted the horses was in need of grazing and said he would take them up top to the mesa and let them graze whilst we considered. He stood and took the reins of both horses.
Sam sat on a rock and looked at Hanlin. She said in a bossy manner, Lord, give us a sign if he is to live or die.
Preacher Dob told her, The Lord will answer questions or requests that is made in a polite way but will not answer demands.
She become tetchy and said, Well, then, Lord, my question is, will you not hurry up and give us a sign.
There was pecan trees between us and the river, and I started down to fetch pecans for breakfast. I was nearly to the trees when a deep rumbling come from upriver. The ground shook under my feet and there was yelling behind me. Sam screeched my name. I turned about and looked up to where I had come from, and seen these four things. I seen Mr Pacheco grab hold of Sam and toss her onto the pinto. I seen her jump down from the pinto and come running at me in Hanlin’s big poncho that was dragging about her, hollering for me to run, which caused me to figure Indians was coming. I seen Hanlin get to his feet, which was bound, and stand hunched over with his hands tied at his back, shouting Cut me loose! Cut me loose! And I seen Preacher Dob look at him, and take up the knife as if to cut him loose, and hold back, and drop the knife, and lean down to pick up the dog.
Then I turned back to the river to check if Indians might be coming, and a mountain of water crashed down on top of me. The water knocked me so hard I was not in my right mind nor the master to my own fate. The river become the master. It said what I might do, and where I might go. There was no more deciding about going this way or that, or turning back, or tracking the panther or not, or which way the panther might be. There was just going with the river whilst not knowing where it might take me and not giving a lot of thought as to where that was, but just trying to keep my head above water.
It is a strange matter how a person’s need can come down to just air. Before the waters come over me I had a great deal of difficulties in my life. I had Sam and her ornery nature, and the panther’s whereabouts, and being lost, and a sorry house to go home to, and winter coming, and work I aught to get back to, and goats and chickens waiting on me to be fed. I had a future I had to think over. I had a stinking dog I thought I might have to carry, and a risk of Comanches and snakes and other things, and problems I felt I should think on. However, when the water come over me, my whole struggle in life become for air. Hunger meant nothing to me then. Cold meant nothing. They was small potatoes compared to what I needed.
I come to the surface, kicking and scratching. I do not know if my eyes was open or closed, as I seen nothing but dark about me until I got my head out of the water. The river hauled me off at a speed I had not traveled before in my life, neither on foot nor horseback. I think it might of been carrying me as fast as a train. My head was above water and then it was under, by turns. At times when it was above, I heard roaring water and screeching noises of things clashing and breaking. At times when it was under, I heard deep rumbling of things in a reckless jumble knocking me about. There was branches and creatures caught up. There was antlers and thrashing hooves churning. There was turtles and weeds and fish and items I can’t put a name to, as they was moving too fast
to make out. They moved swift in the water whilst things on the ground and above seemed like they come to a stand still, as I seen them only in short hints when I could get air. There was gray clouds in the sky and bright leaves in the trees and a gang of geese overhead, but I was never above water long enough to see the clouds move nor the leaves drop nor the geese so much as flap their wings. There was nothing above the water but still pictures and nothing within it but things soaring past and coming apart.
One picture I recall above water is Mr Pacheco. I seen him every time I come up for air. He was atop the canyon, against the sky, mounted upon the pinto and headed fast in the same direction the water was taking me and keeping abreast.
Another thing I seen when I was up for air was Hanlin in the river and going around the bend. I was working to get myself to the bank, where the current was not so lively, and he come alongside me in the dead center of the river and passed me in a tangle of river trash, neither thrashing nor kicking but laying on his back, nearly as flat as if laid out on a table, his eyes open like they was staring up at the sky. If he had not of been moving so fast he might of looked like he was enjoying a float atop the water on a summer day. However, he was in a stanch current. His face had a waxy look and he did not appear to be vital. He was moving head first in the water as the river took a turn. The fact he did not put up a fight against being swept at such a rate might of been sign enough he was passed, except the fact his legs was tied and his arms bound at his back meant he could not of put up a struggle no matter if he was vital or not. For that reason, I can’t swear to you he was dead when he went flying by me. But I can tell you it was the last I ever seen of him. And I can assure you, on account of I was in that roaring water myself, and tumbled about and beat up by sharp branches and whatnot at that time, there was nothing besides a merciful act of God that might of saved him, bound as he was, and it seemed to me like the act of God was that of sending the flood that done him in.
That is my own opinion. At the time I did not have a opinion. I was too busy scrambling for air, as you might think, and for the bank, and casting about for Sam, as I figured the water had taken her up same as it done me. It is a strange thing to say, but I had a inkling where in the water she was, even whilst I could not see her. My mind appeared to keep track of her. She had taken a chance with her own life to come running to me and warn me, and now I feared she was lost in the terrible mess of the frothy water, jammed in a tangle of branches or knocked out by wayward rubble, when instead she might of been riding atop the ridge on the pinto with Mr Pacheco if she had not been loyal to me.
I have told you that Sam is a bossy braggart, and will not work, and complains a great deal. It is all true. However, she risked herself for me, and even whilst the water carried me on, dragging me out of her sight and her out of mine, there was a pull on both of us that kept us close to each other in all the tumult.
It is a curious thing what a flood will bring together and what it will tear apart. It yanked trees out of the ground and ripped off their branches and skinned them of bark. It churned creatures under, and spit others out. It delivered some to the shore. It took my shoes and my shirt off. However, with all the taking it done, it give me a gift that was better than any of what it carried off from me, as it was a gift of hope. It was a large cypress tree pushed sideways up behind me and clogging a bunch of rubbish behind it. I got hold and pulled myself into the branches and climbed up out of the rushing water, and rode the river as it carried me full speed around the bend I just seen Hanlin pass through.
It was a perilous ride among needled branches that rocked and shifted and might of tumped over and dumped me at any minute, or penned me under. However, there was a thrill to it, sir. I would be deceiving you if I did not say so. I felt as if I was mounted upon the masthead of the Pequod and sailing out at top speed.
I looked up and seen Mr Pacheco at full gallop alongside on the mesa atop the bluff. My perch afforded a wide view of the gray sky, the birds flying, the water on either side flowing eight or nine feet out of banks. It was snatching up trees by the roots and hauling them off whilst swamping them that held fast.
I had on nothing but trousers, and they was frayed to mere shreds. The cold air hit me full on. It stung my flesh and tugged my hair. But I did enjoy the freedom of moving fast and having a view.
I might of enjoyed it longer if I had not been looking about for Sam. I was peering hard into the churning water when my gaze settled upon the most awful vision. It was the black poncho jammed in the thick rubble behind the tree. It floated in a eerie way amongst bubbles and branches. Fear seized my body and soul. I figured Sam was under the poncho and drowned, and fast as I could I made my way down through the branches to get to her.
I was nearly down to the roiling water when the weirdest sight of my life presented itself to me. There clung Sam, holding tight to the end of a long branch of the very cypress I rode in, her head above water, whilst right alongside her, his claws dug into the same branch, his back end underwater but his head above the surface, was the panther. Side by side, sir, they was riding that river, both hanging on for their lives.
I took stock of the sight and it come to me that perhaps it was not real. It come to me I was knocked out and dreaming. It come to me Sam and the panther was both passed and swept off and done in, and this was their ghosts come back to pester and haunt one another. I thought, They are dead and will ride this river together forever all the way to the sea, and there they will be tossed into the stormy depths with Captain Ahab and Moby Dick.
However, they did not look passed. They looked sopping wet and scared. Sam was out on nearly the end of the branch, and the panther was between her and me. The two of them was no more than three feet apart, but took no notice of each other, as they was working hard just to hold on. The panther had his ears laid flat and his claws dug into the branch and his hind legs twisting around for a hold. He looked smaller in the water than before. However, I noted the ear with the notch that I noted before, and the scars on his face, and I was certain he was Dos Dedos. Sam did not waste her vigor to talk to me, but latched her gaze on me in a way that left no doubt she was counting on me to save her.
We was rounding a bend at that time and our tree become lodged in a jam near the bank, jolting me nearly from my hold and forming a strong eddy that sucked at the wreckage around us. I seen we was tangled with a upright tree. It was rooted but half under water. If we could climb from our tree into the branches of that one, then we might wait out the flood without drowning.
However, the fact of Sam being on the far side of the panther was a hindrance to that. The branch they was both hanging on to was limber and skinny. Sam was doing her best to hold on, but it was a task. She was nearly sucked under the branch by the eddy. The way things was set, I would have to get past the panther to get to her. I could think of no other way to do so than to knock him off his hold. I was in need of a firm branch to poke and whack him with, and I give it my all to break one off. However, I could not break one big enough with my bare hands, so I finally give up and pulled one out of the water that was hardly more than a needled twig.
Whilst holding on to other branches I made my way onto the one the panther and Sam was hanging on to and jabbed at the panther. He snarled and hissed but did not swipe at me, as it would of obliged him to turn loose of his hold and get swept off. I feared the branch would not support us all three, as it was sustaining a good deal of tug from the eddy as well.
I commenced to poke at the panther’s eyes. You could not of told me, at a erstwhile time, that I would one day find myself with the nerve to jab a stick at those eyes. When I done so, he must of got strength out of his dander, as he pulled with his forelegs and swung his hind legs up under him, and up he come onto the branch, snarling and swiping at me and causing me to lose my balance fending him back. I grabbed at branches about me but the tree tipped and dumped me into the drift that was bunched up in the eddy. I sank down under the tangle.
And h
ere come the panther, tumbling in on top of me. I do not know if he attacked me then when he hit the water, or if he was purely trying to get a purchase on some solid thing and I was it, as he had been dumped in the eddy against his will, same as me. He thrashed and clawed and climbed on top of me, shoving me further under. I made a attempt to dive down deep to get away from him, but we was both practically drowned by the eddy with nothing else to get hold of but each other.
It was a strong suck down there. The panther and me was caught up amongst branches down deep. I cut myself nearly to pieces trying to get out of that cage of needled branches that locked me in. The water was thick with mud, and I could not open my eyes enough even to see which way was up. My chest begun to heave and I thought I might have to go ahead and breathe the water. I did not have a clear sight of the panther but I felt him thrashing about with me in the snare of branches. His hide that Sam had been so eager to walk upon writhed against me in the struggle.
I guess you are wondering what might of happened next, as it is apparent to you that I am amongst the living or I would not be writing this testament. You might be thinking the jam broke up by a miracle and set me free to rise to the surface. However, that is not what happened. What did happen was I felt somebody take hold of my arm and commence to yank and pry me out of the snarl. I did not know who it might be, nor even wonder, as beggars are not choosers, so goes the saying. I give myself up to the yank, and thereby got untangled and dragged to the surface even whilst the panther twisted and tossed about in the snag.
The Which Way Tree Page 18