Текст книги "Dead Man's Walk"

Автор книги: Larry McMurtry

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Текущая страница: 23 (всего у книги 29 страниц)

Captain Salazar was not convinced. He didn’t share the Texans’ optimism, in regard to Gomez.

“If he stopped, it is because he has other business,” he told Bigfoot. “If he has no other business, he will follow us and try to kill us all. I don’t think he will attack—he will wait and take us, one by one.”

He posted as strong a guard as he could muster, knowing, even so, that half his soldiers would fall asleep on duty. But four nights passed, and no corpses were found in the morning.

“He wouldn’t wait four nights, if he was still after us,” Bigfoot said.

“He would wait forty nights,” Salazar told him. “He is Gomez.”

The wrapping on Call’s crutch had come loose—he stopped to rewrap it and, when he did, glanced back at the young Mexicans. It was then that he saw the Apache, a short, stumpy-legged man, with a bow in his hand, about to release an arrow. Before he could move, the arrow hit him in the right side. Call had no weapon—all he could do was yell, but he yelled loudly and the troop turned. Call gripped his crutch, prepared to defend himself if the Apache came closer, but the Apache had vanished, and so had the three Mexican soldiers who had been trailing behind. The plain to the north was completely empty.

Bigfoot came running up, and looked at the arrow in Call’s right side.

“Why, he nearly missed you,” he said. “The arrow’s barely hanging in you.”

Before Call could even look down, Bigfoot had ripped the arrow out—it had only creased his ribs. Blood flowed down his leg, but he didn’t feel it. The shock of seeing the Apache, only fifty yards behind him, left him dizzy for a minute.

Captain Salazar came running back to Call.

“Where did he go?” he asked.

Call, still dizzy, couldn’t tell him. He pointed to the spot where the short Indian had been, but when Bigfoot and Salazar and a few of the Mexican troops ran in that direction, they found no Indians.The three Mexican soldiers who had trailed Call were dead, each with two arrows in them. They lay face down, fully clothed.

“At least they didn’t get cut,” Long Bill said.

“No, he was in a hurry,” Salazar said. “He wanted Corporal Call —and he almost had him. You are a very lucky man, Corporal. I think it was Gomez, and Gomez rarely misses.”

“I saw him,” Call said. “He would have been on me in another few steps, if I hadn’t turned. I expect he would have put an arrow right through me.”

“If it was Gomez and you saw him, then you are the first white to see him and live,” Salazar said.

“He won’t like that,” Bigfoot said. “We’d best watch you close.”

“You don’t have to—I’ll watch myself,” Call said.

“Don’t be feisty, Woodrow,” Bigfoot said. “That old Apache might come back and try to finish the job.”

“I hate New Mexico,” Gus said. “If it ain’t bears, it’s Indians.”

That night Call was placed in the center of the company, for his own safety; even so, he slept badly, and was troubled by dreams in which Gomez was carrying Buffalo Hump’s great hump. One moment the Apache chief would be aiming an arrow at him, so real and so close that he would awaken. Then, the minute he dozed off again, it would be the Comanche chief that was aiming the arrow.

In the grey morning, cold but glad to be alive, Call remembered that a long time back Bigfoot had had a dream in which Buffalo Hump and Gomez rode together into Mexico, to take captives.

“Didn’t you dream about Buffalo Hump and Gomez fighting together?” he asked.

“Yes, I hope it don’t never come true,” Bigfoot said. “One of them at a time’s plenty to have to whip.”

“We ain’t whipping them,” Call pointed out. “We ain’t killed but two of them, and they’ve accounted for most of our troop.”

“I admit they’re wild,” Bigfoot said. “But they’re just men. If you put a bullet in them in the right place, they’ll die, just like you or me. Their skins ain’t the same colour as ours, but their blood’s just as red.”

Call knew that what Bigfoot said was true. The Indians were men; bullets could kill them. He himself had fired a bullet into Buffalo Hump’s son and the son had died, just as dead as the three Mexican boys who had fallen to Apache arrows.

“It’s hitting them that’s hard,” he said. “They’re too smart about the country.”

So far the Indians had won every encounter, and not because bullets couldn’t hurt them: they won because they were too quick, and too skilled. They moved fast, and silently. Both Kicking Wolf and Gomez had taken horses, night after night—horses that were within feet of the best guards they could post.

“The Corporal is right,” Salazar said. “We are strangers in this country, compared to them. We know a little about the animals, that’s all. The Apaches know which weeds to eat—they can smell out roots and dig them up and eat them. They can survive in this country, because they know it. When we learn how to smell out roots, and which weeds to eat, maybe we can fight them on even terms.”

“I doubt I’ll ever be in the mood to study up on weeds,” Gus said.

“This is gloomy talk, I guess I’ll walk by myself awhile, unless Matty wants to walk with me,” Bigfoot said. He didn’t like to hear Indians overpraised, just because the Rangers found them hard to kill. There were exceptional Indians, of course, but there were also plenty who were unexceptional, and no harder to kill than anyone else. He himself would have welcomed an encounter with Gomez, whom Call described as short and bowlegged.

“I expect I can outfight most bowlegged men,” he remarked to Long Bill Coleman, who found the remark eccentric.

“I wish I still had my harmonica,” Long Bill said. “It’s dreary at night, without no tunes.”

THE NEXT DAY THEY saw a distant outline to the west—the outline of mountains. Captain Salazar’s spirits improved at once.

“Those are the Caballo Mountains,” he said. “Once we cross them we will soon arrive at a place where there is food. Las Cruces is not far.”

“Not far?” Gus said. Even with his eyesight the distant mountains made only the faintest outline, and his stomach was growling from hunger.

“What does he think far is?” he asked Call. “We might walk another week before we come to them hills.”

Call’s shoulder had become so sensitive from the rough crutch that he had to grit his teeth every time he put his weight on it. His foot was better—he could put a little weight on it, if he moved cautiously—but he was afraid to discard the crutch entirely. The mountains might be another seventy-five miles away, and even then, they would have to be crossed.

That day, despite Captain Salazar’s optimism, the Mexican troops began to desert. They were hungry and weak. At noon the Captain called a rest, and when it was time to resume the march, six of the Mexican soldiers simply didn’t get up. Their eyes were dull, from too much suffering.

“You fools, you are in sight of safety,” Salazar said. “If you don’t keep walking, Gomez will come. He will kill you all, and you may not be so lucky as the three he killed with arrows. He may make sport of you—and Apache sport is not nice.”

None of the men changed expression, as he talked. After a glance, they did not look up.

“They’re finished,” Bigfoot said. “We’ve all got a finishing point. These boys have just come to theirs. The Captain can rant and rave all he wants to—they’re done.”

Captain Salazar quickly came to the same conclusion. He looked at the six men sternly, but gave up his efforts at persuasion. He took three of their muskets and turned away.

“I am leaving you your ammunition,” he said. “Three of you have rifles. Shoot at the Apaches with the rifles. If you do not win, drive them back, then use the pistols on yourselves. Adios.”

Leaving the six men was hard—harder than any of the Texans had expected it to be. In the time of their captivity, they had come to know most of the Mexicans by their first names—they had exchanged bits of language, sitting around the fires. Bigfoot learned to say his own name, in Spanish. Several of the Mexican boys had started calling him “Beegfeet,” in English. Gus had taught two of the boys to play mumblety-peg. Matilda and Long Bill had taught them simple card games. On some of the coldest nights they had all huddled together, moving cards around with their cold hands. As the weary miles passed, they had stopped feeling hostile to one another—they were all in the same desperate position. One of the Mexicans, who had some skill with woodwork had, the very night before, smoothed the crack in Woodrow Call’s crutch, so that it would not rub his underarm quite so badly.

Now they were leaving them—Salazar and the other Mexicans were already a hundred yards away, plodding on toward the far distant mountains.

“I’m much obliged,” Call said, to the boy who had smoothed his crutch.

Several of the Texans mumbled brief good-byes, but Matilda didn’t—she felt she couldn’t stand it: boys dying, day after day, one by one. She turned her back and walked away, crying.

“Oh Lord, I wish we’d get somewhere,” Long Bill said. “All this walking on an empty belly’s wore me just about out.”

That afternoon the company—what was left of it—stumbled on a patch of gourds. There were dozens of gourds, their vines curling over the sand.

“Can we eat these, Captain?” Bigfoot asked.

“They’re gourds,” Salazar said. “You can eat them if you want to eat gourds.”

“Captain, there’s nothing else,” Bigfoot pointed out. “Them mountains don’t look no closer. We better gather up a few and try them.”

“Do as you like,” Salazar said. “I will have to be hungrier than this before I eat gourds.”

That night, though, he was hungrier than he had been in the afternoon, and he ate a gourd. They made a little fire and put the gourds in it, as if they were potatoes. The gourds shriveled up, and the men nibbled at their ashy skins.

“Mine just tastes like ashes,” Gus said, in disappointment.

“It might taste better if it were served on a plate,” Long Bill said, a remark that amused Bigfoot considerably. Though he had strongly recommended gathering the gourds—after all, there was nothing else to gather—he had not yet got around to tasting one.

Several of the men were so hungry they ate the scorched gourds without hesitation.

“Tastes bitter as sin,” Gus observed, after chewing a bite.

“I wouldn’t know what you mean,” Bigfoot said. “I’m a stranger to sin.”

Matilda stuck a knife into her gourd, and a puff-of hot air came out. She sniffed at the gourd, and immediately started sneezing. Annoyed, she flipped the gourd away.

“If it makes me sneeze, it’s bad,” she said.

Later, though, she found the gourd and ate it. ‘

One of the Mexican soldiers had gathered up the gourd vines, as well as the gourds. He scorched a vine and ate it; others soon followed suit. Even Salazar nibbled at a vine.

“When will we hit the mountains, Captain?” Bigfoot asked. “There might be game, up there where it’s high.” Salazar sighed—his mood had darkened as the day wore on. He had scarcely any of his company left, and only a few of his prisoners. It would not sit well with his superiors.

“The Apaches may not let us cross,” he said. “There are many Apaches here. If there are too many, none of us will get through.”

“Now, Captain, don’t be worrying,” Bigfoot said. “We’ve walked too far to be stopped now.”

“You’ll be stopped if enough arrows hit you,” Salazar said.

The night was clear, with very bright stars. Salazar could not see the distant mountains, but he knew they were there, the last barrier they would have to cross before they reached the Rio Grande and safety. He knew he had done a hard thing—he had crossed the Jornada del Muerto with his prisoners. He had lost many soldiers and many prisoners, but he was across. In two days they could be eating goat, and corn, and perhaps the sweet melons that grew along the Rio Grande. None of his superiors could have done what he did, and yet he knew he would not be greeted as a hero, or even as a professional. He would be greeted as a failure. For that reason, he thought of Gomez—it would be worth dying, with what men he had left, if he could only kill the great Apache. Then, at least, he would die heroically, as befitted a soldier.

“I think the Captain’s lost his spunk,” Gus said, observing how silent and melancholy the man had been around the campfire. Even the amusing sight of his whole company attempting to eat the bitter gourds had not caused him to smile.

“It ain’t that,” Bigfoot said—then he fell silent. He had been around defeated officers before, in his years of scouting for the military. Some had met defeat unfairly, through caprice or bad luck; others had been beaten by such overwhelming numbers that survival itself would have brought them glory. And yet to military men, circumstances didn’t seem to matter—if they didn’t win, they lost, and no amount of reflection could take away the sting.

“It ain’t that,” he said, again. The young Rangers waited for him to explain, but Bigfoot didn’t explain. He drew circles in the ashes of the campfire with a stick.

The next morning the mountains looked closer, though not by much. The men were weak—some of them looked at the mountains and quailed. The thought that there was food on the other side of the mountains brought them no energy. They didn’t think they could cross such hills, even if the whole plain on the other side was covered with food. They marched on, dully and slowly, not thinking, just walking.

When the mountains were closer, no more than a few miles away, Call saw something white on the prairie ahead. At first he thought it was just another patch of sand—but then he looked closer, and saw that it was an antelope. He grabbed Gus’s arm and pointed.

“Tell the Captain,” he said. “Maybe Bigfoot can shoot it.”

When the antelope was pointed out to Captain Salazar, he immediately gave Bigfoot his rifle. Bigfoot was watching the antelope closely. He cautioned the troop to be quiet and still.

“That buck’s nervous,” he said. “We better just sit real still, for awhile. Maybe he’ll mistake us for a sage bush.”

All the men could see that the antelope was nervous, and a minute later they saw why: a brown form came streaking out of a patch of sage bush and leapt on the antelope’s neck, knocking it down.

“What’s that?” Gus said, startled. He had never seen an animal run so fast. All he could see was a ball of brown fur, curled over the antelope’s neck.

“That’s a lion,” Bigfoot said, standing up. “We’re in luck, boys. I doubt I could have got close enough to that buck to put a bullet in him. The cougar done my work for me.”

He started walking toward the spot where the cougar was finishing his kill. The rest of the troop didn’t move.

“He’s bold, ain’t he—that lion might get him next,” Gus said.

Before Bigfoot had gone more than a few yards, the cougar looked up and saw him. For a second the animal froze; then he bounded away. Bigfoot raised his rifle, as if to shoot, but then he lowered it. Soon they saw the spot of brown moving up the shoulder of the nearest mountain.

“Why didn’t you shoot it?” Call asked, when he came up to Bigfoot. He would have liked a closer look at the cougar.

“Because I might need the bullet for an Apache,” Bigfoot said. “We got a dead antelope—that’s better eating than a lion. When there’s food waiting to be et it’s foolish to be wasting bullets on cats you can’t hit anyway.”

They skinned the antelope, and soon had a fire going and meat cooking. The smell of the meat soon revived the men who had been ready to die. Next day, they jerkied the meat they hadn’t eaten,lingering in camp between the mountain and the plain. The more they ate the better their spirits rose; only Captain Salazar remained despondent. He ate only a little of the antelope meat, silent. Bigfoot, confident that what remained of the troop would now survive, tried to draw Salazar out about the future, but the Captain answered him only briefly.

“El Paso is not far,” Salazar said. “We are all about to end our journey.”

He said no more.

Bigfoot was allowed to leave and seek the best route through the mountains—in four hours he was back, having located an excellent low pass, not ten miles to the south. The troop marched all afternoon and camped in the deep shadow of the mountains, just at the lip of the pass.

That night, everybody felt restless. Long Bill Coleman, unable to abide the lack of tunes, cupped his hands and pretended he was playing the harmonica. Gus kept looking at the mountains—their looming presence made him a little apprehensive.

“Don’t bears live in mountains—I’ve heard they sleep in caves.”

“Why, bears live wherever they want to,” Bigfoot told him. “They go where they please.”

“I think most of them live in mountains,” Gus said. “I’d hate to be eaten by a damn bear when we’re so close to all them watermelons.”

No one slept much that night. Matilda rubbed Call’s sore foot with a little antelope fat she had saved. Call was walking better— his stride was almost normal again. He hadn’t abandoned the crutch, but mainly carried it in his hand, like a rifle.

A blue cloud, with a rainbow arched across it, was over them when the troop started through the pass. It snowed for an hour, when they were near the top, but the light flakes didn’t stick. Ahead, as they approached the crest, they could see brilliant sunlight, to the west beneath the clouds.

By noon the cloud was gone, and the bright sunlight shone on the mountains. The troop walked through a winding canyon for three hours and began to descend the west side of the mountains. Below them, they saw trees, on both sides of the river. To the south, Gus once again saw smoke, and this time he was not merely wishing. There was a village beside the river—they saw a little cornfield, and some goats.“Hurrah, boys—we’re safe,” Bigfoot said.

Everyone stopped, to survey the fertile valley below them. Some of the Mexican soldiers wept. There was even a little church in the village.

“Well, we made it, Matty,” Bigfoot said. “Maybe we’ll see a stagecoach, heading for California. Maybe you’ll get there yet.”

He had continued to carry Captain Salazar’s rifle, in case he encountered game. When they started down the hill, toward the Rio Grande, Captain Salazar quietly took it from him.

“Why, that’s right, Captain—it’s yours,” Bigfoot said.

The Captain didn’t speak. He looked back once, toward the Jornada del Muerto, and walked on down the hill.

WHEN THE TIRED TROOP made its way into the village of Las Palomas, the doves for which the village was named were whirling over the drying corn, its shuck now brittle from the frost. An old man milking a goat at the edge of the village jumped up when he saw the strangers coming. A priest came out of the little church, and immediately went back in. In a moment, a bell began to ring, not from the church, but from the center of the village, near the well. Some families came out of the little houses; men and women stopped what they were doing to watch the dirty, weary strangers walk into their village. To the village people they looked like ghosts —men so strange and haggard that at first no one dared approach them. The Mexicans’ uniforms were so dirty and torn that they scarcely seemed like uniforms.

Captain Salazar walked up to the old man who had been milking the goats, and bowed to him politely. “I am Captain Salazar,” he said. “Are you the jefe here?” The old man shook his head—he looked around the village, tosee if anyone would help him with the stranger. In all his years he had never left the village of Las Palomas, and he did not know how to speak properly to people who came from other places.

“We have no jefe,” he said, after awhile. “The Apaches came while he was in the cornfield.”

“Our jefe is dead,” one of the older women repeated.

The old man looked at her with mild reproach.

“We don’t know that he is dead,” he said. “We only know that the Apaches took him.”

“Well, if they took him, he’d be luckier to be dead,” Bigfoot said. “I wonder if it was Gomez?”

“It was Apaches,” the old man repeated. “We only found his hoe.”

“I see,” the Captain said. “You’re lucky they didn’t take the whole village.”

“They only take the young, Captain,” the bold old woman said. “They take the young to make them slaves and sell them.”

“That is why we are all old,” the old man with the goat said. “There are no young people in our village. When they are old enough to be slaves, the Apaches take them and sell them.”

“But there are soldiers in El Paso,” Salazar said. “You could go to the soldiers—they would fight the Apaches for you. That is their job.”

The old man shook his head.

“No soldiers ever come here,” he said. “Once when our jefe was alive he went to El Paso to see the soldiers and asked them to come, but they only laughed at him. They said they could not bother to come so far for such a poor village. They said we should learn to shoot guns so we could fight the Apache ourselves.”

“If the soldiers won’t help you, then I think you had better do what they suggested,” Captain Salazar said. “But we can talk of this later. We are tired and hungry. Have your women make us food.”

“We have many goats—we will make you food,” the old man said. “And you can stay in my house, if you like. It is small, but I have a warm fire.”

“Call the priest,” Salazar said. “These men are Texans—they are prisoners. I want the priest to lock them in the church tonight. They look tired, but they fight like savages when they fight.”

“Are we to give them food?” the old man asked.

“Yes, feed them,” Salazar said. “Do you have men who can shoot?”

“I can shoot,” the old man said. “Tomas can shoot. Who do you want us to shoot, Captain?”

“Anyone who tries to leave the village,” Salazar said.

Then he turned, and went into the little house the old man had offered him.

Despite Salazar’s warning, the people of Las Palomas had little fear of the Texans. They looked too tired and hungry to be the savage fighters the Captain claimed they were. Even as they were walking to the church, the women of the village began to press food on them—tortillas, mostly. The little church was cold, but not as cold as the great plain they had crossed. Several old men with muskets stood outside, as guards. When the night grew chill, they built a fire and stood around it, talking. Long Bill walked out to warm his hands, and the old men made way for him. Bigfoot joined him, and then a few others. Gus went out a few times, but Call did not. The women brought food—posole and goat meat, and a little corn. Call ate with the rest, but he didn’t mix with the crowd around the fire. He sat with Matilda, looking out of one of the small windows at the high stars.

“Why won’t you go get warm?” Matilda asked. He was a tense boy, Woodrow Call. All that was easy for Gus McCrae was hard for him. He didn’t mix well with people—any people. Though he had come to depend on her help, he was wary, even with her.

“I’m warm enough,” Call said.

“You ain’t, Woodrow—you’re shivering,” Matilda said. “What’s the harm in sitting by a fire on a cold night?”

“You ain’t sitting by it,” Call pointed out.

“Well, but I’m fleshy,” Matilda said. “I can warm myself. You’re just a skinny stick. Answer my question.”

“I don’t like being a prisoner,” Call said, finally. “I might have to fight those old men. I might have to kill some of them. I’d just as soon not get friendly.”

“Woodrow, those men ain’t bad,” Matilda said. “They sent their women to feed us—we ain’t been fed as well since we left the last village. Why would you want to kill them?”

“I might have to escape,” Call said. “I ain’t going to be a prisoner much longer. If I can’t be free I don’t mind being dead.”

“What about Salazar?” Matilda said. “He’s the one keeping you prisoner. We walked all this way with him. He ain’t so bad, if you ask me. I’ve met plenty of worse Mexicans—and worse whites, too.”

Call didn’t answer. He didn’t welcome the kind of questions Matilda asked. Thinking about such things was foolish. He could think about them all through the night, and be no less a prisoner when the sun came up. It was true that the old men of Las Palomas had been kindly, and that the women were generous with food. He didn’t wish them ill—but he didn’t intend to remain a prisoner much longer, either. If he saw a chance to escape, he meant to take it, and he didn’t mean to fail. Anyone who stood in his way would have to take the consequences; he didn’t want to feel friendly toward people he might have to fight.

Later, when the chill deepened, the women brought blankets to the church. Call wrapped up in his as tightly as he could. But he didn’t sleep. Out the church door he could see Gus McCrae, yarning with Long Bill Coleman and Bigfoot Wallace. No doubt, now that he was warm and full, Gus had gone back to telling lies about his adventures on the riverboat; or else he was telling them how he was going to marry the Forsythe girl, as soon as he got back to Austin. Matilda had gone to sleep, with her head bent forward on her chest. Call felt that he had been rude, a little, in not being able to answer her questions any better than he had. He didn’t understand why women had such a need to question. He himself preferred just to let life happen, and act when opportunity arose.

Finally, though, as Matilda slept, he did get up and go out of the church, not so much to warm himself—the old men kept the fire blazing—as to hear what lies Gus McCrae was telling. Long Bill was pretending his hands were a harmonica again; he was whistling through them. Bigfoot Wallace had gone to sleep, his back against the wall of the church. Several of the old men were watching Gus, as if he were a new kind of human, a kind their experience had not prepared them for. A few of the village women, wrapped in heavy shawls, stood back a little from the fire.

“Hello, Woodrow—did you freeze out, or did you want to listen to Long Bill whistle on his fingers?” Gus asked.

“I came out to whip you, if you don’t shut up,” Call said. “You’re talking so loud it’s keeping this whole town awake.”

“Why, stop your ears, if you think I’m loud,” Gus said. But he made way for his friend, and Call sat down. The blaze felt good on his sore feet. Soon he bent forward, and napped a little. Gus McCrae was still talking, and the yarn had something to do with a riverboat.

IN THE MORNING, WITH frost on the cornfields and on the needles of the chaparral, Salazar provisioned his few troops for the march south. There were no horses in the village, but there were two mules, one of which Salazar requisitioned to carry their provisions. The Texans emerged from the church blinking in the strong sunlight. They had been given coffee, and a little cheese made from goat’s milk, and were ready to march.

“I’m in a hurry to see El Paso,” Bigfoot said. “We couldn’t get to it coming the other way, but maybe we’ll make it coming from the north.”

“Yes, you will make it,” Salazar said. “Then, I expect, they will send you on to the City of Mexico. There is a lake with many islands, and all the fruit is sweet—that is what I have been told.”

The people of Las Palomas were anxious to see that none of the troop—Texans or Mexicans—went hungry on the march south to El Paso. Though they knew that the party would be following the river, where there were several villages that could supply them, theypiled so many provisions on the mule that the animal was scarcely visible, under the many sacks and bags. Several of the Texans even had blankets pressed on them, as protection against the chill nights.

Captain Salazar was just turning to lead the party out of the village, when they heard the sound of horses—the sound came from the south.

“Reckon it’s Indians?” Gus asked. Even though he was feeling more confident of his survival, thanks to a good meal and a night beside a warm fire, he knew that they were not yet beyond the Apache country. What the villagers had had to say about their stolen children was fresh in his mind.

Captain Salazar listened for a moment.

“No, it is not Indians,” he said. “It’s cavalry.”

“Lots of cavalry,” Bigfoot said. “Maybe it’s the American army, coming to rescue us.”

“I’m afraid not, Senor,” Salazar said. “It’s the Mexican army, coming to march you to El Paso.”

All the villagers were apprehensive—they were not used to being visited by soldiers, twice in two days. Some of the women crept back inside their little houses. The men, most of them elderly, stood where they were.

In a few minutes, the horses they had been hearing clipped into town, forty in all. The soldiers riding them were wearing clean uniforms; and all were armed with sabres, as well as rifles and pistols. At their head rode a small man in a smart uniform, with many ribbons on his breast.

The sun glinted on the forty sabres in their sheaths.

Beside the cavalry were several men on foot, so dark that Call couldn’t tell whether they were Mexican or Indian. They trotted beside the horses—none of them looked tired.

The Mexican soldiers who stood with Salazar looked embarrassed. Their own uniforms were torn and dirty—some had no coats at all, only the blankets that had been given them by the people of Las Palomas. Some of them remembered that when they had started out from Santa Fe to catch the Texans they had been as smartly dressed as the approaching cavalry. Now, in comparison to the soldiers from the south, they looked like beggars, and they knew it.

The small man with the ribbons rode right up to Captain Salazarand stopped. He had a thin mustache that curled at the ends to a fine point.

“You are Captain Salazar?” he asked.

“Yes, Major,” the Captain said. .

“I am Major Laroche,” the small man said. “Why are these men not tied?”

The Major looked at the Texans with cold contempt—the tone of his voice alone made Call bristle.

The thing that surprised Gus was that the Major was white. He did not look Mexican at all.

Captain Salazar looked discouraged.

“I have walked a long way with these men, Major,” he said. “Together we walked the dead man’s walk. The reason they are not tied is because they know I will shoot them if they try to escape.”

Major Laroche did not change expression.

“Perhaps you would shoot at them, but would you hit them?” he asked. “I think it would be easier to hit them if they were tied—but that is not my point.”