The World in Pancho's Eye - J P S Brown

by J P S Brown

  "What's the matter?" Mary said.

  "Nothing."

  "Why did you belch? You been drinking gasoline or something?"

  Mikey got in bed with his back to the woman.

  "I wondered what I smelled on your breath. Did you drink gas to get drunk like your father? Gasoline won't make you drunk. That stuff will finish you off for good."

  Mikey was positive Mary had not smelled his breath. She had put gasoline in his water. He felt like bawling. He wanted to be friends with her. How could he visit his dad if this woman went on the prod every time he came to visit? Paul would have to blindfold her—use a tapojo on her—so he could see his son. That would surely never happen.

  Paul and the crew rode in from McNary before sunup the next morning. He asked Mikey how he made out, so Mikey told him he had been sick from the gas in the canteen. The canteen still hung by the nail on the wall. Paul tasted its water and said, "It doesn't taste like gas to me, son."

  Mikey tasted it. No gas in it, but this was a new canteen. The other one had been old and its blanket insulation had been frayed. Mary opened the kitchen window. "Paul, we've got sweet water in here to drink. Why are you drinking that old stale canteen water?"

  "Mikey said it had gas in it," Paul said.

  "How could it?" Mary came outside and tasted the canteen water. "Bull! There's no gasoline in that water. How could there be? I filled it for little Mikey myself."

  Now he was little Mikey. He could see the end of any chance that Mary would include him in her family. He moved his gear to the crew's camp and did not have much more to do with her for the rest of the summer. She never asked why he made that move, because that was the arrangement she wanted. He could tell that Paul liked it better, too.

  Mary lost interest in Eagle after one more ride and Mikey got him back. She would not even look toward the corrals. When the crew worked in camp she took herself to town.

  One day, Paul gave the crew the day off and he and Mikey rode to Blue Mountain on the Mogollon Rim. The Apaches said that maverick cattle ran there and watered in Williams Creek. Paul and Mikey rode into that country to see what they could find. Thunderclouds formed by midmorning and a quick shower made Paul and Mikey dismount and put on their slickers. They squatted with their backs against the dry side of a pine tree and watched the rain soak their horses until their ears drooped. Paul rolled a cigarette and gave Mikey a puff for the cold. He said tobacco was good because it was a blanket when a man was cold, a partner at work, a bite of food when he was hungry, a soother when he was nervous, a stimulant when he was tired, and a pal when he was lonesome. To Mikey, Paul and Uncle Bill Shane's cigarette smoke smelled like the toasted stuff of everything a workingman needed.

  Paul had stayed sober that summer. He did not drink even a snort in the cabin after work. Mikey asked him why that was. Paul said that he had not quit; he kept a bottle in the cabin. Mary poured herself drinks every evening. From time to time she even asked Paul if he wanted one. He did not like to drink when he cowboyed. If he had been alone at camp, he might have kept a drink for company. With that crew and Mary around, he did not think he ought to drink. He would drink when the work was done in the fall. Mexico was different. Vaqueros kept mezcal all the time but did not get drunk until the work was done. Mikey remembered that. That day in the timber Paul asked Mikey if he was afraid of the lightning and thunder, because it struck and roared around them in the storm. Mikey said he loved it. Paul said, "You must get that from me, because I do too." Mikey said the closer the lightning hit, the better he liked it. Paul said he thought it was great that nobody knew when or where lightning would strike, and wonderful that it happened at all.

  A man always knew when and where the whiskey lightning would strike. All Paul said he had to do was take one drink to get struck. Natural lightning killed a feller the instant it was time for his life to be over. The old whiskey lightning killed a man a little the first time he took a swallow and a little more every time he took another. A man could be hit more than once by real lightning and be numbed and hurt by it and still live, but that was rare, and even if he survived, he would never be the same again. That was the way Paul said the whiskey lightning affected him. It killed off a big piece of him every time he took one drink because he never stopped with one. He always went on and got drunk. Now there was not much left of him for the whiskey to kill.

  Mikey thought, "Well, if whiskey was that much like lightning, no wonder a man got attached to it." Just to be near it was risky. Real lightning was full of life. At Saint Michael's the Brothers taught that it put juice back in the earth so the cow and horse feed could grow. He had also seen the whiskey lightning put new spark in the eyes of his father and uncles.

  He remembered the first jolt of mezcal Paul gave him in the Sierra de San Juan and knew in his heart that he would someday want to take the same risk with the whiskey that his father did. He did not know yet that it was no risk for a man to drink alcohol. It was a sure thing that the more a man drank the sooner it struck him down. He still thought a person did not have to drink more than he wanted and could stop anytime. He did not know some men would never improve their lot with alcohol like the earth was improved by real lightning. That afternoon in the rain, Mikey still had not learned that he and his father were a lot safer from the real lightning that could make a crisp out of their pine tree than they would ever be from the old whiskey lightning.

  After the storm, the whole country dripped water. Paul and Mikey climbed Blue Mountain and looked around, then rode down to the rim to look for tracks. Mikey knew this was the way his dad liked to take a day off. He didn't wonder why he did not stay in camp with Mary. He always said he would rather ride out and "rim around" than stay in camp any day.

  As they rode off the top of the Mogollon Rim they saw four mavericks on the meadow by Blue Lake. The breeze favored Paul and Mikey so the cattle had not discovered them. The riders rode into the brush by the creek to get closer. A ramshackle pen squatted on a pasture fence near the lake. Paul kept block salt in the pen. A long wing made of barbwire and brush gave Mikey and Paul a way to funnel the cattle into the pen. The cattle grazed inside the wing. Paul said they probably already knew the way into the pen because of the salt. When Paul thought he had a good angle on the cattle, he and Mikey rode out into the open so the cattle could see them. The cattle bunched like deer and watched them a moment, then turned and ran. The cowboys headed them and pressed them against the wing. They were still looking back at the cowboys when they ran into the pen.

  Paul and Mikey quietly worked the cattle back and forth in the pen a while to teach them respect for their horses, then left them to cool off. Paul brewed coffee in a little pot from his morral and he and Mikey ate a cup of pinole, corn flour mixed with brown sugar and water. In the afternoon after siesta, they worked the cattle again until they could be stopped, held, and separated.

  One of the mavericks was a snaky, black four-year-old corriente bull with a brown stripe down his back and a shaggy brown foretop. His horns were ivory with black tips. At first, he writhed and coiled inside the bunch and darted away when the horses came near. Then he got hot and backed into a corner, pawed the ground, lowered his head, and armed himself to fight. Mikey and Paul kept driving the other cattle up and down the fence past him until he saw that nobody would accept his challenge, then he rejoined his mates to be stopped and turned and stopped some more, but he did not like it. Mikey and Paul left the cattle in the pen for the night and rode back to the Haystack. They unsaddled their horses two hours after dark. Mary made an angry fuss at Paul for coming in late and pretended that she had been worried, but a half-empty quart of whiskey on the counter proved her insincerity

  Madam Hitler raved while Paul fixed supper. While they ate, Mary kept the bottle close and ranted on like the very Hun for whom she had been nicknamed.

  The next day Paul, Mikey, Severiano, and Victoriano went back for the mavericks. They worked them back and forth in the pen for two hours before the
y let them out for the drive to the Haystack.

  The black bull stared at the men like a thug. When Curry saw him in the pen at headquarters, he said, "He'll 1ook at a feller, won't he?" That was the cowboy way of saying that a thug like the black who would turn and stare at a man instead of turning tail had made the decision that he could become a meat eater.

  Paul and Curry roped the mavericks by the horns and heels and stretched them out on their sides to be branded, vaccinated, castrated, and earmarked. When the chore was done, Mikey opened the gate and let them out into an alley. They snuffed and shied as they rushed past him and ran down to the end of the alley. Paul and Curry rode their horses past Mikey to the other end and rolled cigarettes. Mikey closed the gate so the cattle would not go back into the corral. Afoot, Lyle and Art swung their ropes and followed the cattle into the end of the alley to bring them back and turn them out. Mikey crossed the alley to open a gate to the outside. The cattle crowded into the end of the alley to get away from the men on foot. The black stag turned and charged them. Art and Lyle split and climbed the fence. The stag's eye fell on Paul and Curry as they peacefully lolled in their saddles at the other end of the alley and Curry droned along on a story. A greenness pooled in the stag's eyes as he speared toward them. Mikey was between Paul and Curry and about to open the gate to a corral that led outside to the pasture where the cattle were supposed to go. The stag was only forty yards away when he picked the horsemen for a target. Mikey just had time to run behind the heavy gate and shut off the alley in front of him. The stag barreled into the gate and knocked Mikey head over heels under the horses, but the gate stopped him. He bounced back on his haunches, shook his head, trotted back toward his mates, and put Art and Lyle on the fence again. Paul's horse came awake and walked on Mikey's hand and leg. Mikey jumped up and opened the gate so the cattle could go outside.

  Later, as the crew walked toward their camp for coffee, Art caught up with Mikey and whapped him softly on the butt with the coils of his rope.

  "Boy, that old snuff put us grown men up the fence with no argument," Art said. "But Mikey stepped out in front of the old thing and stopped him cold.

  "Lucky you thought fast, son," Paul said. "We weren't watching him anymore."

  Mikey was embarrassed. "I thought I'd better not let him get by me," he said. "I didn't think about anything but that."

  Paul fell in step and put his hand on Mikey's shoulder, but his eye was stern.

  "I just wasn't going to let him by me, that's all," Mikey said.

  "You could have been hurt, son. Then what would I do?"

  "I'm sorry daddy." The corners of Mikey's mouth drooped and his face threatened to fold.

  "Aw, son, don't feel bad; I'm the one who's sorry. I only want you to know we all think you're a pretty brave partner."

  That day, each man in the crew showed Mikey his appreciation and then went on about his business. That evening, Paul proudly told Mary about the escapade, so she decided it was her business to scold Mikey. In a tone that almost screeched, she told him he was stupid to think he was big enough to make a hand in an alley against a charging bull. Paul said it was a good thing Mikey was so little because he'd stopped the stag and bounced off the gate like an ant. If he had not bounced, he probably would have broken an arm, a leg, or his back. Cowboys knew that men were often seriously injured when they backed up a gate in the face of a charging animal. Ten days later, Mikey's stay at the Haystack was over. Mary wanted to take him to McNary to meet Maggie, but Paul opposed her and did it himself. On the way, Mikey told him that he was concerned about what Mary might do when she was mad.

  Paul laughed. "What makes you say a thing like that, son?" he asked.

  "She's awful mad all the time," Mikey said.

  "Then I bet you're glad she isn't driving you to meet your mom."

  "l'm glad you and mom will get to see each other."

  "I'm a sandwich. Today I get Madam Queen on one side and Madam Hitler on the other. What do you think?"

  "It's my fault you're a sandwich."

  "Listen, son, nothing about my married and divorced life is your fault. I'd do anything to spend more time with you. Getting to see your mom is a bonus, even though she'll probably try to make me feel bad. Getting away from Mary for a while is another bonus, no matter how bad she'll try to make me feel after your mom makes me feel bad. The good parts of it are worth a whole lot to me and the rest is funny. The main thing is that I have a son who makes me proud. How can a man complain when he is given so many bonuses in one day?"

  The prospect of being separated from his dad again had made Mikey's breast ache for a week. "Dad, do you think we'll ever be able to stay together and not have to say good-bye all the time?" he asked.

  "Sure, son," Paul said. He searched the boy's eyes for tears. "Anytime now. Maybe we'll start when you come home from school next year."

  "We wouldn't have to do it every year, if you didn't want to."

  Mikey started to bawl. "Only one whole year out of maybe every ten years. I'm ten today, daddy, and I've never spent a whole year with you."

  "Aw, son, I forgot your birthday, didn't I? Someday we'll be together for good, I promise."

  "Yeah, when we're dead/'

  "Lord, son, why do you say that?"

  "The Brothers say we all get separated from the ones we love in this life, but we'll be together after we die."

  "That sounds like a kind of heaven. I can't imagine any place that good, can you, son?"

  "I'd like it if you and me could have our own country and stock to work."

  "Feel better, son?"

  "Yeah."

  "I think those Brothers are real good partners if they taught you how to talk yourself out of feeling bad the way you just did."

  "They're okay, but they're not my dad." Mikey clouded up again.

  Paul hugged him to his side and Mikey buried his face into his smoky old ribs. When he looked up, Paul's green eyes were smattered with tears, so he figured he'd better talk about something else. "I wonder where Pancho is now," he said.

  "Lord, son. Roy and Viv are probably using him somewhere. He's long gone, but if we look hard enough, we'll find another horse just as good. That happens with horses. We outlive them."

  Maggie and Nina were at the boardinghouse and Paul treated everybody to dinner. To Mikey's and Nina's delight Paul and Maggie laughed about other rampaging stags in their life together, about Uncle Buster and a lot of good whiskey, and about the fun they'd all had. They laughed about misfortunes they had shared and seemed glad they did not have to be angry about them anymore. Maggie asked Paul how his shoulder had healed after he hurt it the time he rode Little Buck without her permission. Then she asked him if the scar of his devil's ear and the scar he got the time his pistol went off in his hip pocket and shot half his fanny off made it hard for Mary Bell to look at his carcass. He said it sure did and Mary especially did not like to have his feet in her bed.

  Maggie looked him straight in the eye and said, "That sure never bothered me."

  During the last week of Mikey's vacation in Nogales, Maggie took him to town almost every day to buy new clothes. This was business and he did not have time to see his other relatives and friends, except his Nina. He went over to see her every day. Forbes's dad drove Mikey and Forbes to Phoenix and put them on the train to Lamy. All of Mikey's summer victories evaporated in that one seven-hour auto trip with Forbes and his father. Another strange man who knew nothing about cows became the captain of Mikey's ship again. Forbes's father expounded more on the responsibilities of a good son in those seven hours than Mikey heard from Paul Summers during his whole life, even though Forbes's father did not know from which end a horse shat.

  Mikey wanted to be with regular cowboys, not correct, self-righteous sissies who spent more money on their raiment, hair, and manicure care than a cowboy spent on his saddle and outfit. Then he realized that the Brothers were dressed for religion and prayed a lot, but they were regular as cowboys and darned s
hort on sermons and preaching. They were not to blame if they did not know anything about cows. They made up for that with their style and verve as mentors.

  Mikey and Forbes boarded the train in Phoenix and Forbes went right to sleep. Mikey cogitated about making the best of another school year. The greatest sorrow of his life was already established in the core of his heart. He did not have a home of his own anymore. That sorrow would go away when he owned the place he had seen in Pancho's eye. Nobody, not even Mikey, could tell that he was an orphan. He did not acknowledge that because he had long since put it aside with no identification card. He looked on himself in the same way everybody else did: he was the son of Paul Summers and Maggie O'Brien, and also the stepson of Vivian D. O'Brien. How could he be an orphan? Besides that, he had a legacy and orphans did not.

  Back at Saint Michael's, Mikey fell in with the routine as a fifth grader and did not have time to feel sorry for himself. No one was as much a ninny than a motherless ninny who felt sorry for himself. Paul Garcia, Mikey's boxing coach and the star fullback on the Horsemen varsity team, coached a Day Shift football team for grades five to eight. Games were scheduled against boys of the same age in the public schools. Mikey was one of the smallest kids on the Day Shift, but Paul did not care. Everyone played. The fifth grade boys practiced against the sixth grade and the seventh grade practiced against the eighth grade. On Fridays, Paul fielded a team against one of the public schools, and everybody played.

  Paul coached Mikey to play quarterback. That meant he had to hide the ball and call the plays on offense and make touchdown-saving tackles as safetyman on defense. Mikey learned that it did not matter how little he was. If he could hide the ball, he might break loose and make a gain while eleven big tacklers looked for the ball. As the last man between the opposing ball carrier and the goal line, he could be a hero every time he made a tackle, or a goat if he missed. He did not ever miss, or even believe it was possible to miss.

  To Mikey, Paul Garcia was a full-fledged hero. He gave every boy in his charge a chance to have fun at the game of football. He proved by his performance on the varsity team that he was graceful, fast, courageous, and smart. He coached the Day Shift out of the purest goodness of his heart.