Valdez Is Coming

8

“Christ,” R. L. Davis said. “I need more than this to eat.” Christ, some bread and peppers and a half cup of stale water. “I didn’t have nothing all day.”

“Be thankful,” Valdez told him.

Davis’s saddle was on the ground in front of him, his hands tied to the horn. He was on his stomach and had to hunch his head down to take a bite of the pan bread he was holding. The Erin woman, next to him, held his cup for him when he wanted a sip of water. She listened to them, to their low tones in the darkness, and remained silent.

“I don’t even have no blanket,” R. L. Davis said. “How’m I going to keep warm?”

“You’ll be sweating,” Valdez said.

“Sweating, man it gets cold up here.”

“Not when you’re moving.”

Davis looked over at him in the darkness, the flat, stiff piece of bread close to his face. “You don’t even know where you’re going, do you?”

“I know where I want to go,” Valdez answered. “That much.”

Toward the twin peaks, almost a day’s ride from where they were camped now for a few hours, in the high foothills of the Santa Ritas: a dry camp with no fire, no flickering light to give them away if Tanner’s men were prowling the hills. They would eat and rest and try to cover a few miles before dawn.

Ten years before, he had camped in these hills with his Apache trackers, following the White Mountain band that had struck Mimbreno and burned the church and killed three men and carried off a woman: renegades, fleeing into Mexico after jumping the reservation at San Carlos, taking what they needed along the way.

Ten years ago, but he remembered the ground well, and the way toward the twin peaks.

Valdez had worked ahead with his trackers and let the cavalry troop try to keep up with them, moving deep into the hills and climbing gradually into rock country, following the trail of the White Mountain band easily, because the band was running, not trying to cover their tracks, and because there were many of them: women and several children in addition to the fifteen or so men in the raiding party. He knew he would catch them, because he could move faster with his trackers and it was only a matter of time. They found cooking pots and jars that had been stolen and now thrown away. They found a lame horse and farther on a White Mountain woman who was sick and had been left behind. They moved on, climbing the slopes and up through the timber until they came out of the trees into a canyon: a gama grass meadow high in the mountains, with an escarpment of rock rising steeply on both sides and narrowing at the far end to a dark, climbing passage that would allow only one man at a time to enter.

The first tracker into the passage was shot from his saddle. They carried him back and dismounted in the meadow to look over the situation.

This was the reason the White Mountain band had made a run for it and had not bothered to cover their tracks. Once they made it through the defile they were safe. One of them could squat up there in the narrows and hold off every U. S. soldier on frontier station, as long as he had shells, giving his people time to run for Mexico. They studied the walls of the canyon and the possible trails around. Yes, a man could climb it maybe, if he had some goat blood in him. But getting up there didn’t mean there was a way to get down the other side. On the other hand, to go all the way back down through the rocks and find a trail that led around and brought them out at the right place could take a week if they were lucky. So Valdez and his trackers sat in that meadow and smoked cigarettes and talked and let the White Mountain people run for the border. If they didn’t get them this year they’d get them next year.

Valdez could see Tanner’s men dismounted in the meadow, looking up at the canyon walls, studying the shadowed crevices and the cliff rose that grew along the rim, way up there against the sky. Anyone want to try it? No thank you, not today. Tanner would send some men to scout a trail that led around. But before he ever heard from them again, after a day or two in the meadow, seeing the bats flicking and screeching around the canyon’s wall at night, he’d come to the end of his patience and holler up through the narrow defile, “All right, let’s talk!”

That was the way Bob Valdez had pictured it taking place: leading Tanner with plenty of time and setting it up to make the deal. “Give me the money for the Lipan woman or you don’t get your woman back.”

He had almost forgotten the Lipan woman. He couldn’t picture her face now. It wasn’t a face to remember, but now the woman had no face at all. She was somewhere, sitting in a hut eating corn or atole, feeling the child inside her and not knowing this was happening outside in the night. He would say to Tanner, “You see how it is? The woman doesn’t have a man, so she needs money. You have money, but you don’t have a woman. All right, you pay for the man and you get your woman.”

It seemed simple because in the beginning it was simple, with the Lipan woman sitting at her husband’s grave. But now there was more to it. The putting him against the wall and tying him to the cross had made it something else. Still, there was no reason to forget the Lipan woman. No matter if she didn’t have a face and no matter what she looked like. And no matter if it was not happening the way it was supposed to happen. The trouble now was, Tanner could stop him before he reached the narrow place, before he reached the good position to talk and make a trade.

No, the trouble was more than that. The trouble was also the woman herself, this woman sitting without speaking anymore, the person he would have to trade. He said in his mind, St. Francis, you were a simple man. Make this goddam thing that’s going on simple for me.

“You say you know where you’re going,” R. L. Davis said. “Tell us so we’ll all know.”

You don’t need him, Valdez thought. He said, “If we get there, you see it. If we don’t get there, it doesn’t matter, does it?”

“Listen, you know how many men he’s got?”

“Not so much anymore.”

“He’s still got enough,” R. L. Davis said. “They’re going to take you and string you up, if you aren’t shot dead before. But either way, it’s the end of old Bob Valdez.”

“How’s your head?”

“It still hurts.”

“Close your mouth or I make it hurt worse, all right?”

“I helped you,” R. L. Davis said. “You owe me something. I could have left you out there, but being a white man I went back and cut you loose.”

“What do you want?” Valdez asked.

“What do you think? I cut you loose, you cut me loose and let me go.”

Valdez nodded slowly. “All right. When we leave.”

Davis looked at him hard. “You mean it?”

Valdez felt the Erin woman looking at him also. “As you say, I owe it to you.”

“It’s not some kind of trick?”

“How could it be a trick?”

“I don’t know. I just don’t trust you.”

Valdez shrugged. “If you’re free, what difference does it make?”

“You’re cooking something up,” R. L. Davis said.

“No.” Valdez shook his head. “I only want you to do me a favor.”

“What’s that?”

“Give Mr. Tanner a message from me. Tell him he has to pay the Lipan, but now I’m not sure I give him back his woman.”

He felt her staring at him again, but he looked out into the darkness thinking about what he had said, realizing that it was all much simpler in his mind now.

It was two o’clock in the morning when Valdez and the Erin woman moved out leading Davis’s bareback sorrel horse. They left Davis tied to his saddle with his own bandana knotted around his mouth. As Valdez tied it behind his head, Davis twisted his neck, pushing out his jaw.

“You gag me I won’t be able to yell for help!”

“Very good,” Valdez said.

“They might not find me!”

“What’s certain in life?” Valdez asked. He got the bandana between Davis’s teeth and tightened it, making the knot. “There. When it’s light stand up and carry your saddle down the hill. They’ll find you.”

He would have liked to hit Davis once with his fist. Maybe twice. Two good ones in the mouth. But he’d let it go; he’d cut him fairly good with the Remington. Mr. R. L. Davis was lucky.

Now a little luck of your own, Valdez thought.

They walked the horses through the darkness with ridges and shadowed rock formations above them, Valdez leading the way and taking his time, moving with the clear sound of the horses on broken rock and stopping to listen in the night silence. Once, in the hours they traveled before dawn, they heard a single gunshot, a thin sound in the distance, somewhere to the east; then an answering shot far behind them. Tanner’s men firing at shadows, or locating one another. But they heard no sounds close to them that could have been Tanner’s riders. Maybe you’re having some more luck and you’ll get through, Valdez thought. Maybe St. Francis listened and he’s making it easier. Hey, Valdez said. Keep Sister Moon behind the clouds so they don’t see us. They moved through the night until a faint glow began to wash the sky and the ground shadows became diffused and the shapes of the rock formations and trees were more difficult to see. The moment before dawn when the Apache came through the brush with bear grass in his headband and you didn’t see him until he was on you. The time when it was no longer night, but not yet morning. A time to rest, Valdez thought.

They moved into a canyon, between walls that rose steeply and were darkly shadowed with brush. Valdez knew the place and the horses snorted and threw their heads when they smelled the water, the pool of it lying still, undercutting one side of the canyon.

The Erin woman moved around the pool while Valdez stripped off the bridles and saddles to let the horses drink and graze freely. He watched her, looking past the horses, watched her kneel down at the edge of the water and drink from her cupped hands. Valdez took off his hat and slipped the heavy Sharps cartridge belt over his head. A time to rest at dawn, before the day brought whatever it would bring. He moved around the pool toward her.

“Are you hungry?”

She looked up at him, shaking her head, then brushing her hair from her face. “No, not really. Are you?”

“I can wait.”

“Are you going to sit down?”

“If you’re not going to stand up,” Valdez said. He went down next to her, touching her hair, feeling his finger brush her cheek and seeing her eyes on him.

He said, “Gay Erin. That’s your name, uh? What was it before?”

“Gay Byrnes.”

He took her face gently, his palm covering her chin, and kissed her on the mouth. “Gay Erin. That’s a good name. You like it?”

“It’s my name because I was married to him.”

“What do you want to talk about that for?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Then don’t. Do you know my name?”

“Valdez.”

“Roberto Valdez. How do you like Roberto?”

“I think it’s fine.”

“Or Bob. Which do you like better?”

“Roberto.”

“It’s Mexican.”

“I know it is.”

“Listen, I’ve been thinking about something.”

She waited.

“You heard me tell him I don’t know if I’m going to give you back or not.”

“I told you before,” the Erin woman said. “I don’t want to go back.”

“That’s what you told me.” Valdez nodded. “All right, I believe you. Do you know why? Because it’s easier if I believe you. If I think about you too much, then I don’t have time to think about other things.”

“What do you think about me?”

“I think I’d like to live with you and be married to you.”

She waited. “We’ve been together two days.”

“And two nights,” Valdez said. “How long does it take?” He could see her face more clearly now in the dawn light.

Her eyes did not leave his. “You’d marry me?”

“I think I know you well enough.”

“I killed my husband.”

“I believe you.”

“I’ve been living with Frank Tanner.”

“I know that.”

“But you want to marry me.”

“I think so, yes.”

“Tell me why.”

“Listen, I don’t like this. I don’t feel right, but I don’t know what else to say. I believe you because I want to believe you. I say to myself, You want her? I say, Yes. Then I say, What if she’s lying? And then I say, Goddam, believe her and don’t think anymore. Listen, I couldn’t do anything to you. I mean if he says, I won’t give you the money, shoot her, you think I’d shoot you?”

She shook her head. “No, I didn’t think you would.”

“So don’t worry about that.”

“I never have,” the Erin woman said. “I may have been feeling sorry for myself, but I didn’t lie down with you just because I wanted to be held.”

“Why did you then?”

She hesitated again. “I don’t know. I wanted to be with you. I still want to be with you. If I’m in love with you then I’m in love with you. I don’t know, I’ve never loved a man before.”

“I’ve never been married,” Valdez said.

She took his hand and brought it up to her face. “I haven’t either, really.”

“Maybe we can talk about it again. When there’s time, uh?”

“I hope so,” she said.

Believe that, Valdez thought, and don’t think about it. He gave her R. L. Davis’s Colt revolver and that sealed it. If she was lying to him she could shoot him in the back. She had already killed one man.

Still, it was easier in his mind now. Much easier.

They found R. L. Davis a little after sunup, a hunched-over figure on the brush slope, dragging a saddle and a thin trail of dust. The two men who found him cut him loose. One of them took the saddle and the other pulled R. L. Davis up behind him and they rode double over to where Mr. Tanner had spent the night. He was alone; all the others were still out on scout.

He looked different. Mr. Tanner had not shaved for two or three days, and the collar of his shirt was dirty and curled up. His moustache looked bigger and his face thinner.

R. L. Davis noticed this, though God Almighty, his back ached from dragging the goddam saddle all over the countryside.

“I wouldn’t mind a drink of water from somebody.”

The rider who’d brought him in was about to hand him a canteen, but Tanner stopped him.

“Wait’ll we’re through.”

“I haven’t had no water since last night.”

“You won’t die,” Tanner said. “Less I see I should kill you.”

“Mr. Tanner, look at me. He drew down with that scattergun, like to took my head off.”

“Where are they?”

“He let me go about four hours ago and headed south.”

“Mrs. Erin was with him?”

“Yes sir.”

“How is she?”

“She looks fine to me. I mean I don’t think he’s mistreated her any.”

“God help him,” Tanner said. “Did you speak to her?”

“No, he was right there all the time. There wasn’t nothing I could say he wouldn’t’ve heard.”

“Then she didn’t say anything to you.”

“No sir. He said something he wanted me to tell you, though.”

Tanner waited. “Well, goddam it, go ahead.”

“He said, ‘Tell him he still has to pay the Indin, but I’m not sure now I’m giving him his woman back.’ ”

Frank Tanner hit him. He clubbed Davis in the face with his right fist and the man sprawled on his back in the dust.

“I didn’t say it – he said it! Them are his words.”

“Tell it again.”

“I swear it’s what he said.”

“Tell it!”

“He said you’re to pay the Indin, but he wasn’t so sure he was going to give you your woman back. Them words exactly.”

“Did she say anything?”

“No sir, not a word, the whole time I was there.”

“He keep her tied?”

“When she was in the draw, but not when he’s around. I mean riding or when he’s made camp.”

“Why’d he let you go?” Davis hesitated and Tanner said, “I asked you a question.”

“Well, I reckon to tell you what he said. There’s no other reason I know of.”

“God help you if there is,” Tanner said.

He was mounting his bay horse, when two riders came in with a string of fresh horses. They had walked all night back to Mimbreno from the place where they had left their dead mounts on the slope.

Tanner looked at R. L. Davis. “Put your saddle on one of them,” he said. “I want you present when we run him down.”

During the early morning the segundo, whose name was Emilio Avilar but who had been called only segundo for the past six years, found three of his men in the mountain wilderness and signaled them, gathering them in. The men were tired and their horses were worn and needed water. They were ready to head back, and Frank Almighty Tanner could whistle out his ass if he didn’t like it. They were paid to drive cattle and freight wagons and shoot rurales; they had not signed on to chase a man who’d run off with Tanner’s woman. That was his lookout if he couldn’t keep her home. After all night in the saddle, it was time to unroll the blankets.

The segundo said, “You think he doesn’t want to sleep? Man, he has to stay awake, doesn’t he? He got to watch the woman, he got to watch for us. Man, ask him what it’s like to be tired.”

Two of the riders were American and one Mexican, the Mexican a young man who had been hired only a few months before by the segundo.

One of the Americans said it was none of their business. And the segundo said maybe not, but look, the sooner they caught this crazy man the sooner they could ride to Mexico and have a good time.

“You want some fresh water, uh?” the segundo said. “Don’t you think he want some fresh water?”

“If he know where it was,” one of the Americans said.

“Listen, when are you going to understand what kind of man he is?” the segundo said. “Sure he’s crazy, but he knows what he’s doing. You think he come down this way if he don’t know there’s water? Where it is? He’s not that crazy.”

“Well, him knowing doesn’t help us,” the other American said.

The segundo took his hat off and wiped his forehead with his sleeve and set the Sonora hat over his eyes again. He shook his head and said to the man, “Where do I get people like you? You think I work around here six years I don’t know where the goddam water is? What kind of segundo doesn’t know where the water is?”

“Well, let’s go get it,” the rider said.

Emilio Avilar, the segundo, smiled. “Sure, I thought that was what you want.”

A little later that morning, watering their horses at the pool, the cliffs and sloping canyon walls reflected in the still water, the three riders looked at the segundo and the segundo smiled again. God, there were fresh tracks all over the place close to the bank, two horses and two people: no doubt about it, a man and a woman. They filled their canteens and wiped down their horses and at this moment were willing to follow the segundo anyplace he wanted to go. Hell, let’s get him!

“Which way would you go?” the segundo asked.

“Follow their tracks.”

“But that take too long,” the segundo said. “What if we know where they going?”

“How could you figure that?”

“Two days ago,” the segundo said, “he told Senor Tanner to approach the two peaks. You remember?” He lifted his gaze. “We come from a different way now, but there are the two peaks. Why should he change his mind and not go there? The only difference is now he don’t have so much time.”

The two American riders thought about it and nodded and one of them said, “What’s up there?”

The segundo answered, “We find out.”

This is all, he thought, watching the three men move out, slouched in their saddles, heads bobbing, sweat staining a column down their spines. No more. He watched them another moment before calling out, “Hey, Tomas!” The riders looked around and the young Mexican he had hired a few months before reined in to wait for him.

In Spanish the segundo said, “You have a ride the other way. Bring Senor Tanner.”

The young Mexican picked up his reins, getting ready. “How will I know where to bring him?”

“You’ll hear us,” the segundo said.