by Clay Fisher
Lupe had known all of this, of course.
It was why he had turned back to finish off Chongo and Packrat, who might bear witness against him for his treachery in the field after the loss of Flicker.
What Lupe had not figured on was finding that he still had the same black Flicker to account to, rather than merely Packrat and Chongo. Flicker was counting now on the surprise of this discovery. Awakening to see his black war leader alive and standing over him must make Lupe muy chaveta, very rattled. Flicker hoped!
He moved away from Tule Moon and Go-ta-chai to the side of Lupe. Bending, he seized the long hair of the sleeping Apache and jerked Lupe completely free of the ground. His forearm barred the throat of the struggling Indian. The life of Lupe was shut off. The life and the voice. It was Flicker’s voice that now shouted to the arousing Tule Moon and Go-ta-chai. They were not to reach for their besh-e-gar, their rifles. Lupe’s death would be the price of the first movement from either of them.
Uncertainly, the two warriors agreed to the warning.
Flicker eased his stranglehold on Lupe. Lupe went to his knees, sucking for the breath of life. Flicker at once planted his Colt’s revolver behind the ear of the gasping Apache. Lupe was not that far gone that he did not understand how near to him in that moment was dah-eh-sah.
Flicker, however, took no chances with that understanding. There were only three of them, he reminded the Apaches, and he had six bullets. Were they going to argue with that kind of war trail arithmetic? Or were they of a wisdom sufficient to stand very still and listen?
Lupe was still troubled to breathe, and he did not answer.
Go-ta-chai and Tule Moon had a mixture of feelings.
They would not move against Flicker, they said, but why had he scattered their ponies? This was no good country to be afoot in. Too much Mexican cavalry about.
Flicker accepted that, but he said that neither was Arizona a good country to be afoot in. And the three of them had put Chongo, Packrat, and Kaytennae afoot up there, with too much American cavalry about. Wasn’t that a true thing?
It was, Tule Moon had admitted. And they were sorry for it, he and Go-ta-chai. It had been Lupe’s idea.
Flicker knew that, he said. But their only chance to gain tribal clemency for themselves lay in their willingness to now serve as witnesses in a Vengeance Rule fight between Flicker and Lupe—a fight then and there. Such witnessing would show Geronimo and the people that Tule Moon and Go-ta-chai had repented and were repudiating Lupe. What had they to say to that?
Go-ta-chai had a question to that question: How was Flicker to trust them, once the fight started?
Flicker had answered that he knew precisely how to trust them, and it would be in this way: He would have Lupe tie them both to saguaro trees before the fight, so guaranteeing their honesty during that contest.
Now, for the last time, what did they say?
“There was one hell of a pause, then,” Flicker said. “But finally they accepted their roles as witnesses. I made Lupe tie them to a couple of saguaros, and he and I stripped and took our knives and went at it.
“He damned near got me, padre. He sliced within a quarter inch of my life too many times. That Lupe was the best with a blade I ever saw. Finally, I had to take him with my hands.”
“Eh, you threw away your knife, Flicker?”
“It was that, or my life, padre.”
“Then?”
“Then it went fast. You’ve forgotten what I told you so many years ago—I was military academy champion in fighting with the fists.”
“I remember it now, yes.”
I moved my mount a bit away from that of the black man, the better to admire him. “You beat Lupe senseless. You took away his blade but spared him. Flicker, I salute you. What a brave and exceeding merciful thing to do.”
“It wasn’t as you think,” Flicker said. “When I had him down and out, I wanted to kill the son of a bitch, but I couldn’t do it.”
“Of course, Flicker! You—kill a helpless man? In cold blood? Never, hombre.”
“You still don’t know me, do you, padre,” he said. “I would have as soon killed him as spit on him. But something stopped my hand. I actually reached for the rock.”
“Hah!” I cried. “Something, eh, Flicker? Don’t you know the power yet? It was him, the Lord your God.”
“No, padre,” Flicker said. “It was the devil.”
He stopped to gaze off over the desert. There was trouble in the dark face. And an unspent anger, also.
“The devil was saving Lupe for something worse than the skulling rock,” he continued. “I untied Tule Moon and Go-ta-chai and had them tie Lupe on his pony, still unconscious. It was in my mind to take him back with me and turn him over to the mercy of Chongo. That was what had stopped me from killing him, you see. I knew that Chongo’s justice would not be so simple, so quick.”
Again, the black rider looked away, and the look was not good to see.
“I let Tule Moon and Go-ta-chai go free on foot, advising them to tell the Bedonkohe that Flicker had returned from the dead to punish Lupe, but had declared them innocent. It was a good story and it convinced them. They took off like scalded cats. I then got a lead rope on Lupe’s pony, put the horses on drive, and headed back for Contrabandista Spring. But when I got there, the spring had been occupied.”
“Kifer!” I interrupted. “Do not say it!”
“Yes, and both Crench and Belcher with him. Plus they had their fresh stolen horses, guns, grub, blankets, everything. I couldn’t do anything but circle them wide and cut for your trail. Which I did, but I hadn’t run it a quarter minute when I came up on some heavy-bellied buzzards in the trail. They waddled off and I saw a human head there. They had been at it pretty bad, but one side of the face and one ear were left—the ear that Chongo wore that turquoise ring in. I cursed low from my guts and the devil brought Lupe back to consciousness just then, and the Apache bastard saw the head and the earring and let out a whoop of laughter and began to howl like a loafer wolf.
“The killing blood got in my eyes, padre. I recall running at him with my knife and cutting him free of the pony. Then I threw the knife as far as I could, and we both ran for it. It was a tie and we fought like panthers for the blade, and I got it and sliced Lupe above the eyes and around over the ears, each side. I had him throat-barred with the left arm when I cut him. I then seized the skin of his head and ripped it free with every ounce of hate I had in me.”
For the last time, Flicker broke his narrative to let his dark eyes run the distances of the Sonoran monte.
“The scalp came away in my hand,” he finally said, “like peeling a cooked calf’s head. I took it and put it on Chongo’s bare skull, where his own hair was gone. It was madness.”
“God’s name, Flicker; you scalped Lupe alive?”
“I told you, padre. The devil knew where he wanted Lupe to end. And how. Last I saw of him, he was walking around in circles feeling his head and laughing. He had his chance at the knife. That’s why I threw it in the Apache way. Neither of us ran until it hit the ground.”
I reached to touch Flicker’s great arm.
“Your mind was sick for that minute,” I said. “God will forgive you. You are all right now?”
“Yes. But Kifer saw me. He was alerted by Lupe’s wolf howls and wild laughing. You see that dust moving back there, padre? That’s Kifer and his deputies. But it isn’t all that simple that they’re just following us. Because, by God, they’re not.”
“What?” I rasped. “You say they no longer trail us?”
“I don’t know. Their line is easterly of ours now. They’re going around inside us and driving hard to pass us. Question is, why?” Flicker was frowning now. “If they hold to that course, they will wind up past Nacozari, into the forks of the Yaqui. You’ve heard about the Yaqui, padre.”
&nb
sp; “The people, you mean?” I said uneasily.
“I’m not talking about the river, Nunez.”
“My God,” I breathed. “I’ve just thought of a thing that pales the gills. Maybe Kifer is going home.”
“Home?” Flicker scowled.
“Yes,” I said. “Don’t you remember?”
“Remember what, padre?”
“His mother, Flicker; she’s a Yaqui.”
“Jesus,” said Flicker, long and slow. “You’re right.”
He spurred his horse out of line and rode up to join Kaytennae and Packrat at column’s head. There was an exchange of grunting Apache, and Kaytennae kicked his horse into a lope, waving our comrades to do likewise. They all responded. We made quite a dust, being now a dozen horses, one mule, and an old lame camp dog. Flicker dropped back in moments to rejoin me.
“I still don’t know why Santiago’s so set to beat us to the Yaqui country,” he said. “Only that he is.”
“One thing we can be certain on,” I said. “His reason is evil. The brain of Santiago Kifer never rests.”
“He wants the gold,” Flicker frowned. “So why does he leave our trackline?”
“Remember, he is blind,” I said. “Perhaps it is that fear outreaches the wickedness within him. He may want only to be where Yaqui eyes can see for him.”
“Yes,” Flicker nodded. “Or Yaqui rifles stare us down where he can’t.”
“What will we do?” I asked, seeing the dust of Santiago Kifer and his henchmen fade farther yet to our inside and gaining still around us. “A prayer, perhaps, Flicker.”
“A letter would be better, Nunez,” the black rider suggested. “I will compose one; take it down:
“‘Dear Monkey Woman,
We are sorry that one of our redskin Indians shot out the eyes of your boy, Santiago. But you know how it is. Accidents will happen. We know you won’t hold it against us and will order your peaceable tribe to let us pass to go steal the gold of the orange grove, down in the Tepehuane country.
“‘Of course the gold belongs to you Indians but wouldn’t you rather that some good old niggers and half-breed priests and Mexican whores got it than some Yori sons of bitches, some damned white men?
“‘I remain, your favorite Chihuahua black robe.
Father Alvar Nunez,
O. F. M.
“‘PS: The Indian that shot Santiago can’t see anymore either; Santiago chopped off his head. Ha, ha. Your boy is certainly some funner. Chock full of laughs, isn’t he? Oh, you Yaquis—!’”
“Flicker!” I shouted, exasperated at last. “Enough!”
“More than plenty, padre,” he agreed. “Lick it shut and mail it at the first post office we come to. Meanwhile, kick your horse in the ass, and shut up.”
29
JUST NORTH OF BACOACHI
Late that afternoon, Kaytennae brought us to an Apache water hole in roughening monte. Now the ranges were running higher on either side of us. And were closing in on us. The country ahead seemed impenetrable. Kaytennae said it was not, but only more dangerous. He said we were now in the headwaters of Rio Moctezuma, westernmost of the Rio Yaqui’s two main forks. We could see no headwaters nor any water of any kind except that to which the Mexican Apache-raised youth had led us. Packrat, who had spent a great deal of time in Mexico, thought we were lost. So did black Flicker, who had ridden with the Mexican Apache people the past ten years. Kaytennae only shook his head.
If such as Packrat and Flicker knew of the secret way down into Yaqui land, then every Apache would know it.
Either they trusted Kaytennae to know where he was and how the legendary trail to El Naranjal lay, or Kaytennae would gladly turn over the guiding to any one of us who might feel he was being tricked or misled.
Of course there were no candidates for this duty, and Flicker smoothed over the matter by telling Kaytennae that we had already put our lives in his keeping. What we voiced now were merely uneasinesses. He, Flicker, knew, for example, that truly we were not yet in the headwaters country of Rio Moctezuma. And would not be until we reached the settlement of Bacoachi, perhaps tomorrow, with luck and a long ride. But, meanwhile, we all understood our guide to mean only that we were hard upon Rio Moctezuma and that this stream was indeed the big western fork of the main Yaqui.
This was not what Kaytennae had said, in fact.
But the Apache nodded to Flicker’s words and all was well. One must know Indians. They speak in sweeping ways. The same way as they think. The red man is not restricted of imagination. Nor of expression.
Neither will he tolerate being cornered.
I gave Flicker high marks for his astute intervention; it was only later that he told me the idea wasn’t his, at all, but had been given him by Packrat, who believed that Kaytennae would respond more happily to balm from Soldado Negro than from Ratoncito. It was in this same later confession to me that Soldado Negro advised me that Packrat was not a Mexican Apache but an American Indian—of the same band, and once closest friend to, the notorious bronco, Apache Kid. But this is another digression. Forgive it.
A true story such as this one of mine never comes all of a piece and flowing in order. One must tell it in the same fashion as it happened, by episodes, accidents, oversights, rememberings, and, betimes, happy invention.
After all, where memory fails, fabrication will do as well. Ofttimes better. The heart of the matter is that one bear sternly to the real trail where he may. And the way Kaytennae now led us, from that water hole of mountain quail and kit foxes just north of Bacoachi, through the land of the Yaqui and beyond, to the country of the fierce Tepehuane, even to the very towering brink of Ghost Canyon above River of the Oranges, was the true trail. If it must be shortened here, do not believe that Nunez has also shrunk its truth. We faced the real death in a dozen places. Of these, I give but the most central to our dangerous track. Where the way lay but frightening and awesome for its heat; its dizzying heights and fearsome deeps; its lack of water, of game to eat, of fuel for fire, of shelter from raging mountain winds and rains and bolts of rivening electric fire from the skies, the listener will be spared his fellow suffering. What follows now is the meat and bone of the soup. No broth is included. Nunez thinks that the deadlinesses of people unto other people is the stuff that excites man. The hells of nature are too large, too overpowering, and moreover too well known to all travelers of the wild places.
But man—ah, may one ever say it better than the Bard, not of the Yaqui but of the Avon, said it these two and one-half centuries gone? Oigan Uds:
… but man, proud man,
Drest in a little brief authority,
Most ignorant of what he’s most assur’d,
His glassy essence, like an angry ape,
Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven,
As make the angels weep.
Our little company was to play its own fantastic tricks before the angry apes and the mountain mirrors of Sonora. Our glassy essences were in fact to make the angels—and our poor Apaches—weep. But two proud men, Flicker and Nunez, dressed in their tiniest of least authorities, were indeed most stupid where they should have been the brightest. And disaster followed.
30
INTO THE DESERT OF DAH-EH-SAH
Next day, the country opened out. We came from the narrow darks of the previous night’s camp into a land of sere yellow bluffs and thinly grassed savannas. A pocking of trees and scrub growth marked a few of the dry watercourses. Some small desert quail scurried ahead of us. A red hawk floated above our cavalcade, seemingly glad for any company in that empty place. During the march we saw several bands of mustangs far off. Just before noon, Flicker shot a wild burro. Packrat prepared it in the Apache manner, throwing away everything but the loins and the intestines. At noonhalt, we ate the loins broiled over mesquite coals. Young Grass took the large intestine to clean and t
ie off and so fashion into an Indian water bag. We had no coffee, bread, flour, salt, beans, or other decent provision. Wiping his hands on his thighs after the last mouthful of smoking burro loin, Flicker announced that we must seek supplies, and soon. Our animals, being desert-bred, could survive in passage of the unfriendly land. But we humans could not. Not we half-breed priests and adopted Negro Apaches, at least. And not the sultry white-sired Charra Baca. Probably even the aged Young Grass, Apache or not, would also die unless the expedition were speedily outfitted.
I did not care for the idea that Kaytennae and Packrat could make it through without our company.
Somehow that thought preyed upon our trust of them.
Why ought either to be loyal to our deaths in their leading of our chanceful mission to find the gold of El Naranjal? What was in it for them as pureblood Apaches?
Then Flicker reminded me.
They were members of his raiding party. It was Apache law that they should cleave to the very end to his direction. They might leave us only when and if our lives were doomed, while theirs were not. Such a condition could arise momentarily, of course. The while, Flicker chided me, I should do well to show a more confident face.
After all, it was my dream that we pursued.
Restored of some strength by the burro meat, we went on. Skirting the settlement of Bacoachi that afternoon, we traveled until well after twilight. Kaytennae wanted to be safely around the Mexican town. Also, the water he had expected to find just east of Bacoachi had dried up. The next Apache well was many miles on, but we had to reach it. Even our Indian comrades were worn to exhaustion by the time our guide said softly, “Here it is, this is the place,” and we all literally fell from footsore mounts.