Rio Largo

Chapter 11

For Dar Pierce, it was the moment when all he believed in, all he stood for, all he had tried to make of his life, hung in the balance.

Dar had been about his youngest son’s age when he marched off to invade Mexico. The newspapers were full of editorials and rousing accounts designed to stir patriotic fervor to a fever pitch, and his was as stirred as anyone’s.

Mexico was to blame, the government proclaimed. Mexican troops had attacked American troops on U.S. soil. The Mexicans countered that it was their soil, and the Americans were there illegally, but in the rush to arms, few north of the border gave the view of those south of the border any credence. Mexico was evil. Mexico was vile. Mexico must learn that it was the natural right of the United States, formally known as Manifest Destiny, for America to hold sway over the entire continent.

Dar bought the bill of goods. He had fallen for every half-truth, for every appeal to his devotion to his country, and done as thousands of other young men did: He enlisted. Initially, Dar fought with distinction. The newspapers and his superiors convinced him that if he did his part, the war would soon end. He had his first taste of combat at Monterrey. The frenzy, the blood, and the gore were not as glorious as he had been led to believe.

It was at Buena Vista that Dar’s distaste for war became more than that. The senseless slaughter sickened him. He saw the Mexicans under Santa Anna charge again and again, only to be smashed by volleys of canister and grapeshot. The American artillery under a captain by the name of William Tecumseh Sherman felled the Mexican soldiers in droves, ripping their ranks to ribbons. After the battle, as the American troops cheered and whooped, Dar walked among the enemy fallen in a daze, appalled at the human capacity for butchering other humans.

By Veracruz, Dar was sick to his soul of the whole business. He had grown to despise war and all it stood for. He only wanted out, wanted an end to his part in the carnage.

Many American soldiers felt contempt for their Mexican counterparts. Insults were heaped on their adversaries. Mexicans were cowardly. Mexicans were runts. Mexicans were greasers, in every respect inferior to their conquerors.

Dar felt differently. He saw the Mexicans as brave. He saw them as dedicated. He admired their refusal to surrender after one crushing defeat after another. More, Dar saw that the common people, overlooked by both armies in the epic struggle, were possessed of a humility that endeared them to him.

Dar missed taking part in the battles of Contreras and Churubusco, thank God. He was detailed to guard prisoners. Not long afterward, Mexico City itself fell to the army from the north, and all that remained was the mopping up and the signing of a treaty that rewarded the conquerors with vast land holdings.

When Dar’s enlistment was up, he did not return home. By then he was in what would become New Mexico Territory with a detachment about to be mustered out. He decided to stay in the West. He took up Mexican ways, adopted Mexican dress, and met the love of his life.

Juanita was an angel in mortal form. Elegant, graceful, and exceptionally lovely, she possessed the added quality of being at total peace with herself and those she came into contact with. She never got mad, never raised her voice. She was everything the war had not been, and Dar fell so deeply and completely for her that he asked her father for her hand after knowing her only three months.

Much to Dar’s amazement, Juanita came to love him as much as he loved her. Her family had insisted they must wait a year before becoming man and wife, but neither of them minded. They knew, as surely as they lived and breathed, that they were meant for each other. One year or ten, they could be patient.

So it was that Dar found himself with the woman of his dreams, and no means to support her. He was working as a clerk at the time, and clerks barely made enough to feed a rabbit, let alone a family. So he had cast about for something else to do. Cattle interested him. Buyers in the States were eager for beef. Since Dar had been raised on a farm, he figured ranching would not be that much different, and took the plunge. He was wrong. Ranching imposed demands farmers never faced. It was hard, wearying work, that required him to be in the saddle from sunup to sundown, seven days a week, three hundred and sixty-five days a year. But it paid off handsomely.

Dar carved the DP out of the New Mexico wilderness. His rancho was one of the first established there by a white man. It prospered beyond his highest hopes. His family never wanted for anything. He saw to that. But he did not spoil them. He raised his sons to follow in his footsteps, working them as tirelessly as he had worked.

Life was good.

Then along came the Toveys. Kent Tovey established the Circle T north of the Rio Largo. Dar didn’t mind. The land south of the river was extensive enough for him. He had all the cattle he needed.

Dar befriended Kent. Dar taught Kent the crucial aspects separating ranches that thrived from ranches that failed. He did all he could to help, and in the process, he and his wife became friends with Kent and Nance.

It was Dar who came up with the idea of the rodeo. For a week each year, the two ranches mixed and mingled. The vaqueros and cowboys took part in friendly competitions. Dances were held, and feasts for all. Ties that bind, Dar called them, and was pleased by the result of his cleverness.

Now this.

Berto had warned Dar that something was amiss. Someone—Berto had a suspicion who but he would not say without more proof—was spreading unrest among the vaqueros, and even among Dar’s own family.

Steady, dependable Berto. He had been more than a foreman. Berto had been Dar’s dear and close friend. His murder was a shock. The violence of the outside world had crept into Dar’s private sanctuary. Were it up to Dar, he might have buried Berto and left it at that. But his vaqueros, and his sons, demanded justice. They insisted he ride to the Circle T and hold the guilty to account.

Dar gave in, but he was troubled. The folding knife found by the body was too convenient. The initials on the grip were too freshly carved. He suspected a ruse, until Hijino stepped forward and said he saw a Circle T cowboy on the DP about the time Berto was slain.

A witness changed everything. Dar’s vaqueros were for riding to the Circle T in force and demanding at gunpoint that the killer be handed over to them. Dar refused. The potential for bloodshed was too great. He’d had enough of conflict in the war. So he compromised. He brought his sons and six vaqueros. Enough that they could defend themselves if need be, but not so many that he could not control the flow of events. Or so he believed.

Now Dar was confronted by his worst nightmare. His own son was about to commit the ultimate folly. Julio and Jack Demp were a whisker’s width away from drawing when Dar intervened. “Enough! There will be no shooting! Do you hear me, Julio?”

Kent Tovey sprang to Dar’s aid. “The same goes for you, Demp! We must get to the bottom of this without violence.”

The tableau froze. Tension crackled like invisible lightning. The vaqueros were ready to back up Julio. The cowboys were prepared to defend Demp. All it would take was a tiny spark, and the ground would run red.

That was when Nancy Tovey came calmly off the porch and joined her husband and Dar. She did not say anything. She did not need to. No man there would risk harming a woman. Any woman. As surely as if she had punctured them with a needle, their hatreds deflated, and Julio and Demp reluctantly restrained themselves.

Kent turned to Dar. “Feel free to question Demp as you see fit. I’m sure he won’t mind.”

“I have nothin’ to hide,” Demp said.

Dar got to the crux of the matter. “A vaquero saw Berto shortly before ten o’clock last night, so he was alive then. His body was found about midnight when one of the dogs caught the scent of blood, and took to howling its fool head off. It wouldn’t stop, so Paco had some of my men look around. They found Berto.”

Jack Demp brightened. “Between ten and midnight? Then it definitely wasn’t me! I was in the bunkhouse playin’ checkers with Shonsey. Everyone saw me.” He glanced at Walt Clayburn. “Tell them.”

The Circle T’s foreman nodded. “It’s God’s own truth. I was there the whole time and so was he.”

Julio refused to give up. “You lie to protect him! All you gringos stick together. But he dropped his knife. It had to be him.”

Bristling, Demp coiled as if to leap from his saddle. “I keep tellin’ you. I never carved my initials in my knife. If you ask me, you did it.”

“That is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard,” Julio declared. “I killed a man who was like an uncle to me, so I could blame you?”

Dar put a hand on his youngest’s boot. “Don’t start up again. If he was where they say he was, then we have made a terrible mistake.”

“You take them at their word?” Julio was incredulous.

“They are our friends. They wouldn’t lie.” Dar wanted to believe that with every fiber of his being. He needed to believe it.

“Oh, Father,” Julio said.

His tone seared Dar like a red-hot poker. His own son, the fruit of his loins, one of the six people he loved most in the world, had lost faith in him. It crushed him almost as much as Berto’s death.

“Come inside,” Nance was saying. “All of you. We can talk this over like civilized folk.”

“My father can talk if he wants, but I will not be made a fool of.” Julio reined his mount toward the stable. “I will wait, and go back with him.”

The vaqueros went along.

“Please forgive my son,” Dar said to Kent. “Julio has always been wilful. When he gets like this, only his mother can talk any sense into him.”

“If only he knew how highly we value your friendship,” Kent Tovey said.

Nance was ushering Steve and Armando into the house. Dar climbed the steps, and paused to gaze regretfully at his youngest. When they got back to the DP, Dar would sit Julio down. He had to make Julio see past his fury to a troubling possibility: If the Circle T cowboys were telling the truth and Jack Demp could not have murdered Berto, then clearly someone had plotted to put the blame on their shoulders. Who? And why? Dar could think of only one motive, namely, to cause trouble between the two ranches. To drive a wedge between the Toveys and himself. To what end, though? The ultimate goal eluded him.

“Are you all right?” Nance asked.

“I fear we have a sidewinder in our midst, and they’ve drawn first blood,” Dar sought to enlighten her.

“If that’s the case, working together we’ll settle their hash for them,” Nancy vowed. “As for your son, don’t fret. He’ll simmer down eventually.”

Dar hoped so.

Over by the stable, Julio dismounted and paced back and forth. Clenching and unclenching his fists, he snarled, “My own padre, duped by these gringos! He is blinded by his own goodness.”

“I warned you,” Hijino mentioned. “I told you the gringos would deny it.”

“And you were right,” Julio said in disgust. He stopped and smacked his hand against his leg. “But I swear to you, to all of you, that Berto’s death will not go unavenged.”

“What can you do?” Paco asked. “What can any of us do? To go against the Toveys is to go against your father.”

“Perhaps . . .” Hijino said, and stopped without finishing his statement.

“Perhaps what?” Julio goaded.

“There is a saying the gringos have,” Hijino said. “Fight fire with fire. We must do to the guilty one as he has done to Berto.”

Paco recoiled at the suggestion. “Kill Jack Demp? The other cowboys would seek our blood.”

“Let them!” Julio spat in disdain. “I am not afraid of the Circle T. I would welcome an excuse to crush them.”

“You are talking about a range war,” Paco pointed out.

“So? Maybe it is long overdue. My father should never have permitted the Toveys to settle here. He gave up half the valley without a fight. I hate to say it, but he has always been timid.”

Roman, who had remained quiet until now, stirred. “How do you propose to go about it, patrón?”

“You will find a way to challenge Demp,” Julio said. “He is no match for you with a pistola.”

“I must be clear,” Roman said. “You command me to kill him? To goad him into going for his gun?”

“I would never force you to do anything against your will,” Julio said. “It must be your decision.”

“Your father would fire me.”

“Not if we do it right. Not if we arrange things so the gringo appears to be to blame,” Julio proposed.

Paco whistled softly. “I say again, we risk a range war. Rancho against rancho. It is not to be taken lightly.”

Hijino sleeved dust from his silver saddle horn. “I agree. But either that, or we swallow our pride and our manhood and let Berto’s killer go unpunished. I, for one, can not stand for that.”

“Nor I!” Julio declared. “But we will let the gringos think they have tricked us. We will bide our time until the rodeo, and then Roman will uphold the honor of the DP.”

“I hope we know what we are doing,” Paco said.

Julio glared at the white house. “The more I think about it, the more I realize there is room in this valley for only one rancho, and that rancho is the DP.” He looked at each of them in turn. “Are you with me?”

“Need you ask?” Hijino smiled. “You can count on me to back you in anything you do.”

“I wish all the vaqueros were like you,” Julio said.