The English Horses Page 16

  Single file they proceeded through the dusk, keeping to the slow jog, never stopping. And he would have missed it if the paint hadn’t shied, stumbled, swerved hard to the left, and lifted its head, snorting and blowing like a racehorse. Something hung from a dead pine near the trail’s edge. It turned out to be Jack’s saddle and blanket. It was enough to spook anyone, Jack thought. He sat on the paint, eyed the gift of his own gear, and tried to figure out the why. He snorted when the answer came. He rubbed the soreness of his burned arm lightly and swung down from the quieted paint, pulled the ends of the rope, and slowly let the gear down, until it sat waiting for him on the nest of needles and cones under the high, dead tree.

  Sure enough there was a message pinned to the blanket, only a few words: Señor, this is to hurry you. To the arroyo of the cavalry. The man had a way with words. Jack grinned. The same cañon where he had gone swimming.

  “This place ain’t bad, Uncle Jack. Kinda pretty.”

  Jack nodded, surprised the boy even noticed the cañon they rode through.

  “It’s a nice place to bury a man.” The boy couldn’t keep shut and leave a good feeling, he had to go and say the wrong thing.

  It was a pretty place, and too well traveled now for Jack’s comfort.

  They rode the left side of a forked cañon, where wildflowers were scattered through the high Cañon grass. That was its name—Wildflower Cañon—but he didn’t tell the boy.

  Wildflower opened up with lots of pine spread under with grass, a few clusters of high fir, even a waterfall came through broken rock. It sounded nice and calming. Both horses pricked up their ears and turned toward the noise, eager as their riders for water and time to rest. Jack eased up in his saddle and thanked Refugio again.

  He dismounted from the paint and let the horse drink its fill. He found himself rubbing his sore arm, and knew it was infected. He cursed as he knelt down to drink, then rested the arm in the cold water. The chill hurt for a moment, and then soothed. After a few minutes the arm was numb, and Jack could relax.

  “I’m ready to go w henever you are, Uncle.”

  The boy still had a way of rolling “Uncle” off his tongue that goaded Jack. He caught up the paint, retightened the saddle, and mounted, silently blessing the simple use of a stirrup, the easy way a man’s backside settled in the saddle’s seat.

  They rode quietly for several hours, Johnny making no more attempts at talk. They had to ride in the day’s heat, with their hats pulled low to mask the sun, shirts quickly darkening with sweat rings. They rode with their horses’ gaits—the paint jogging easily, the yellow mare stumbling sometimes, the boy cursing ugly words and threats that did not make the mare any easier to set.

  A flash of distant lightning, a crackle of thunder. Jack’s arm hurt more, the walls of his throat tightened, and he felt edgy. The paint threw its head, slipped into a short-strided lope. Jack could not stop himself from searching for the darkening clouds, nor could he keep from turning his head to listen for the thunder, to find its direction. He rubbed his arm unconsciously, and the boy laughed at his Uncle Jack.

  Refugio was sitting on a rotted pine, smoking a foul cigar. “So, señor, what is it we do this time?” He asked even t hough he had left t he note.

  Jack pushed himself from the paint’s back, stood on the uneven ground, rubbing his arm again. The sore was becoming more than a nuisance.

  Refugio took out a second cigar, lit it, and offered it to Jack, grinning through the smoke. “It is a man’s cigar, amigo. Not like those imitations that the bankers and the Englishman smoke. Try one, amigo, you will find out soon what a man smokes in Mexico.”

  Jack puffed on the smoke and felt rather than saw Refugio leave his perch. A moment later he returned, in his hand bits of dried grass. “Señor, this will help your arm where it is burned.” Jack allowed the man to sprinkle the wound with the grass. The ugly wound leaked fluid and the weed clung to the moisture, prickling the skin but adding little to the discomfort.

  Refugio resettled himself. “There is a village not many days’ ride from here. A small place called Jewett. There a man has started his roundup early, hoping to confuse men such as us. The man is cheap and thinks only of himself. Those cattle he brings together, those handsome and fat calves, they will become ours, to sell so we may eat through the long winter. It is a fine idea, no?”

  “It’s a stupid idea if you ask me.” Johnny Thackery throwing in his unwanted opinion. The boy was ragged and sullen, had grown dirty in the days he’d ridden with his uncle.

  “You are not asked, niño.” Refugio’s voice was soft, but the words hard edged.

  Jack shrugged; nothing would change between these two. The boy had forgotten about his dragging lesson, forgotten the power behind Refugio’s polite requests. Jack wanted to save the uneasy peace. “Johnny, you ride with me and do what I say. Refugio and me, we’re talkin’. You tend to the horses, boy. See they don’t drink too much water. And watch out for the paint, he’ll kick you, boy, you mess with him.”

  “Sure, Uncle Jack.”

  There it was again, but the boy went for the stock and left t he two men to t hemselves.

  Refugio stared at Jack, as Jack watched the boy. “It is the posturing of a child, señor. There is nothing more to him than to any growing boy. You are not, perhaps, used to the rôle, señor? I have three daughters, and their mama and I know something of a child’s mind.”

  Jack thought about that, thought about Refugio as a father, watching the boy slap the yellow mare when she pushed to get into the stream. He shook his head. “No, Refugio, he is not just a growin’ boy. Some of them come up to be killers, remember that.”

  Refugio’s thick hand clapped Jack’s shoulder. “Let us ride to those fine cattle that wait impatiently for us. There the boy will find enough action and excitement to keep him busy.” Refugio looked away from Jack as he continued. “I know hatred, señor. I have felt it many times. It does not come from you. Your sister was right to send him to your care. You are good for him, señor. Although I suspect that having the boy in your camp sometimes spoils a good night’s sleep. You do not think in color, señor. You think only of stealing cattle, and horses, and women.” The man glanced slyly at Jack. “It is not much for a man’s days, is it, mi amigo? But it is better than hate.”

  He wasn’t living a high moral life, Jack thought, and Refugio was right, and knowing it was a scalding tonic. Jack swallowed hard. “Señor Refugio, I thank you.” He extended his hand.

  Refugio laughed. “Let us ride to our cattle, señor.” And then he shook Jack’s hand.

  It was well after dark when they made camp on the mesa. Refugio told the boy to set up a picket, cut grass, and portion out handfuls of the precious grain for the horses. They would need the extra strength in the coming day, and it could not be risked to hobble the broncos and turn them loose.

  Jack laid his left hand on a bleached pine log and stared at his long fingers, raising each oneand feeling the strain of each particular tendon. Since the lightning strike, his hand hadn’t worked right. It puzzled him to see his fingers fail to respond to simple commands.

  When the boy was done eating and had fallen asleep, Jack and Refugio sat together companionably. Refugio gave Jack more of the crumbled herbs to spread over the burn. It looked better than it had this morning, and Jack nodded his thanks.

  Refugio talked, more to hear something than for any reason. “This rancher we are to visit, he had ranged his herds up on the mesa on grass that was claimed by another man. His cattle have been driven off, so he will be an easy target for us. The others will not come to his side and fight. This will make our life easier, eh, señor?

  It was simple with Refugio, no need to play any rôle, no need to be more than a lazy thief.

  Well before dawn they saddled up. Refugio led them to the mesa that ended abruptly, the rim scarred with flat shale, slab rock, small prickly pear, and stunted juniper. The roan casually headed over the edge, flipping its tail high as its
rump disappeared over the ridge. All Jack could see at one point was the top of Refugio’s faded hat.

  The boy followed Jack, fretting with the yellow mare. Jack headed the paint downhill. Halfway down, there was a small bench, and he caught up to Refugio.

  “See, señor, there is Slaughter Mesa. We have saved more than a day’s ride.”

  Jack followed the motion of Refugio’s hand and saw in the newly breaking sun a glittering shaft of light on a boulder set precariously into a straight run of shale and trees. It inspired awe, how the boulder clung to that hillside.

  “Believe me, señor. You can ride from the top of that mesa straight into that rock and there is a trail that follows its base, which brings a rider down to the bottom. It is not a trail to be used lightly, but a man with nerve and a good horse can make the trip.” Then Refugio laughed. “Of course the steady horse is important.”

  Refugio lifted his reins when the yellow mare came puffing and blowing in beside them. Time was wasted letting her recover. Refugio covered the time by talking. “It is beautiful, is it not, señor?

  ”

  The boy’s face was drawn white; his hands barely kept their hold on the reins. The two men ignored these signs of nervousness; there was no other way off the small mesa.

  Jack agreed with Refugio. It was truly beautiful to look out and see into the distance. The sun was against the top of Slaughter Mesa now, turning the flat expanse blood red. Small dots could be seen—cattle moving, bawling for their sleeping calves. The sound carried lightly on a quick breeze. Refugio sighed contentedly.

  Below them the trail turned back on itself. Refugio’s roan gathered its hind legs underneath to jump a fallen pine, and Jack watched as Refugio leaned back slightly to help balance the horse. The roan easily evaded a series of tangled branches and walked out to a smoother section of the trail. Jack let his paint have a go at the treacherous descent.

  Something floated past Refugio’s head, slowly at first, then picking up speed with the wind. Floating out over nothing, it caught a current and dropped quickly, sliding down the roan’s shoulder, flapping between the horse’s front legs. The spooked horse threw up its head, tried to swing about on the narrow trail. Refugio’ face turned up to Jack—the dark skin was pale, the eyes wide. Then the roan buck-jumped over the object—John Thackery’s hat—stumbled, and one hoof slipped from the trail. The animal snaked its heavy neck, staggered, fought to stop sliding. Refugio threw his weight with the roan, but the slick-shod hoofs could catch on nothing but mud, wet pine, and moss. The roan tumbled off the trail’s edge.

  Jack hauled back on his trembling paint. He thought he could see the side of Refugio’s face; he thought he could feel the terror and fear as horse and rider tumbled into aspen and pine.

  The faded hat lay in the trail. Jack urged his paint forward, spurring the horse over fallen logs and tangled branches, but the horse would not pass by that hat. Jack rammed in his spurs, and the paint backed up from the signal, responding more to panic as Jack called out but heard nothing in response.

  He scrambled from the saddle, falling to his knees on the slippery hillside, catching hold of a shaky pine. Listening for Refugio’s voice, for any sound. Nothing. So he stuck out his feet and skidded them downslope, following the deep gouges of the roan’s fall. He looked up once and saw the yellow mare’s underbelly as she too leaped from the trail.

  Jack could barely protect himself from the branches that slashed him, the rocks that pounded his legs and backside. He dug in his boot heels, planted his spurs, and rode the slick hill. His fall was broken by the half-buried rump of the roan. Jack fell forward, grabbed a tree, yanked himself upright.

  A call drew him to a clump of tangled aspen, young trees that had given way to a stronger force. A boot was caught between two slender trunks. Gently Jack knelt and freed the boot, laying Refugio’s leg carefully on the mossy ground. He heard the accompanying groan. He made himself crawl closer. He had smelled the smell before in a gutted horse, a wounded bear, a deer taken with a bad shot.

  “Señor?” The voice was weak.

  Jack braced one trembling hand on an aspen and lightly touched the undamaged side of the man’s face. “Mi amigo.” He choked out the words. “I didn’t know you wanted to fly.”

  “It seems, amigo, that in truth I cannot fly at all.”

  Jack did not flinch or betray his horror, for it was Refugio and not a broken animal. He had never seen an eye torn from its socket before. The ruined face made an effort at a one-sided grin.

  “It is good I was not handsome before, señor. Not like you. For now, indeed, I would be very angry.” Refugio tried to lift one arm, but it was broken at the wrist and again above the elbow. Even so, the weak effort caused a spasm through the body.

  Jack sank back on his heels and closed his eyes. When Refugio coughed, he opened them. A dark stain widened around Refugio’s shoulders, more blood soaked into the ground by his hips.

  “Mi amigo, you have a task ahead that is not often asked of one friend by another. But it is necessary. I will die. Nothing and no one can help. But you…you can let me know I have had one good friend in this life which we all must leave.” He looked with that awful, single, bloody eye at Jack’s hand, which by instinct rested on the butt of the pistol.

  This was asking too much, but it would be done.

  “Gracias, señor. Muy hombre…ah, la Santisima.”

  The one eye stayed focused on Jack as he pulled the trigger. Standing slowly, pistol gripped in his hand, Jack looked down at the corpse, trying not to see the remains of what had been a good man.

  It was the plaintive whinny of a horse that broke the spell that had formed around him. The sound carried all the pain and fear, all the destruction that lay at his feet. Wherever he looked, there was blood. He could smell nothing but fouled manure and gasses, voided bowels, and emptied bladders. Not even the trail of broken aspen and shattered pine, their hearts exposed to the hot air, could hide the incredible stink.

  The whinny reached him again. He twisted his neck, tried to stare uphill into the bright sun. He could not bury Refugio for he had no tools for grave digging, no hope of finding enough rocks in this grassy place to cover him. And his shot might have caught the attention of curious men—ranchers and cowhands—who were now riding to investigate.

  Jack knelt again in the ruined earth and, with his knife, shaved two sticks from a dying aspen, twined them in a cross, using rawhide strings cut from Refugio’s own saddle. There he jammed the cross into the bed of moss and leaves at Refugio’s head. A poor marker for one life. Then he pulled his way out, returning on the trail left by their falling bodies.

  When he climbed over the lip of the trail, he was surprised to find the paint gelding waiting. Jack used the near stirrup to haul himself to his feet and found, as he looked over the paint’s back, that the yellow mare was huddled behind the bigger horse. There was no sign of the boy.

  Jack called out but only birds sang to him. A small animal scurried through the underbrush behind him. He backtracked the mare and found the boy near the base of a sturdy pine. Jack knew nothing would ever wake the child. The head was tilted, the bones in the neck snapped clean. Jack wiped his suddenly wet mouth, glimpsed his hands soiled with Refugio’s blood. There was no blood around the boy.

  He shuddered once and grabbed the boy’s boots, dragged him slowly downhill, talking all the time to the horses. The animals were eager to hear his voice. The mare took several steps toward him, reached out her muzzle, and brushed against his back as he labored with his burden. He lifted the body and let it slide onto the mare’s back. The boy was barely fourteen, never had grown much height and never had weighed more than a three-week old calf.

  Then he went to the paint. He’d bury that old saddle with the boy, he’d bury all the kid’s meager gear with him, but he’d have to do the burying without Johnny Thackery’s hat. He knew right where he’d take the kid. Wildflower Cañon, where the boy’d talked about it being a pretty enou
gh place for a dead man to lie.

  I regret Johnny’s death for it was an accident of a kind seen too often here. Man is at nature’s mercy in this land. I can say that he did not suffer at the moment of death.

  Here he considered the harshness of the word “death” but could find none kinder. The more civilized folks used words to deny death’s importance. “Passing” was one, a word Jack hated. It destroyed the death itself. Dying was no passing to anything, it was the end, right here and now, at the time that the last breath fled through clenched teeth.

  It was even more difficult to be polite when he recalled Refugio’s single eye watching him at the very second of his own death. There would never be a word to describe the act and its consequence. Making such a death civilized by talking around it was something Jack could not accept.

  He finished the letter and took up a bottle of tequila. It was another full day and night before he could stand straight and take the letter to the Gutierrezville post office.

  The same smiling man took the folded paper and told Jack the fee for its mailing. They exchanged coin and Jack was finished with his contract.

  “Señor, we are sorry to hear of Refugio and wish to thank you for his final care.”

  Jack’s boot stuttered on the puncheon floor. A small, squat, dark-haired man with heavy whiskers shadowed Jack’s elbow. “His wife…she is my cousin. We are in your debt, señor.”

  Jack could not speak.

  The killing was known. The thought made him sick. He pushed past the sad-eyed man and hit sunshine, walked to the pens where the paint was stabled. Jack Holden was a thief, not a murderer.