The Hummingbird's Daughter_ A Novel - Luis Alberto Urrea [59]
Segundo was staring into the distance.
“Crows,” he said. “Lots of crows circling around the smoke.”
“This is Cabora?” Tomás asked the Engineer.
“This valley ahead of us.” His companion nodded. “I believe we are home.”
Tomás turned in his saddle and peered into the distance behind them.
“We’ve gotten a bit ahead of the wagons,” he said. “I hate to ride into the ranch without them.”
“They’ll catch up,” Segundo said.
They could smell the smoke when the wind whipped a slender banner of it over the hill.
Aguirre spoke up: “Let’s just ride up there and look,” he said. “Let’s see the great Cabora. Investigate this conflagration.”
Tomás flicked his reins once, and his great dark steed bobbed its head and paced away.
“Let’s go,” he said.
“Jefe!” Segundo called. “Let me gather a few of the riflemen. This is Yaqui territory—we ought to be careful.”
“We don’t need any riflemen,” Tomás called back. “How many days have we been on the road? The only Indians we’ve seen have been beggars and children. There’s no danger here!” His horse seemed to engage some soft gear within itself, and it moved away smoothly, speeding up gradually as it approached the slopes.
Aguirre followed.
Segundo said: “We ought to have rifles.”
Teresita came upon a wagon pulled to the side of the road. A fat mule skinner sat up on the box, his floppy hat smashed on his head like a collapsed brown cake, portions of tattered brim melting down his face and sticking to his sweat. Six mules bobbed their heads and snorted, nipping at each other in their traces. Tarpaulins covered dusty hills of goods behind the skinner, and he bristled with weapons: he held a shotgun across his lap, and she could see crossed bandoliers of bullets on his chest, and a scabbard held a rifle near the big wooden brake lever beside his leg.
He leaned over the side and spit tobacco.
“Is that it?” he said.
“What?”
“That desgraciado cattle drive. Is that all there is?”
“Sí, señor. I’m the last.”
She sat on her donkey, peering up at him.
He drew a long knife from his belt and cut a chunk of tobacco off his plug and stuffed it in his mouth. Brown drool colored his lip and gray beard. He leaned over and spit: it barely missed Teresita. His right cheek was split by a red scar that went from his eyebrow to his chin. It vanished among the whiskers, and where it vanished, the whiskers were white.
He held the big knife up and said, “Boo!”
He laughed.
“I am not afraid,” Teresita said.
He laughed some more.
He shook the knife at her.
“Uy!” he said. “Uy! Uy!”
She thought he was acting foolish.
He put the knife away.
“Where you going?” he asked.
“Cabora.”
“Cabora? Never heard of no Cabora.”
“It is our new ranch.”
“You don’t have no Goddamned ranch, you little pinche Indian girl. What are you, an Indian?” He took his knife back out, held it up to his scalp, cried, “Eeee!”
He laughed again.
“Indian!” he said. “You’re an Indian, aren’t you?”
“Good-bye, sir,” she replied.
Adults should know how to behave.
“Hey,” he said. “See this? See it?” He pointed to his face. “What are you, Apache? Yaqui? See this face? Yaquis did this to my face. How you like it?”
He moved his knife up and down his face, making squishy noises with his mouth.
“Yaquis!” he said. “Wanted my eye!” He spit—it flew over her head and splattered on the ground. “What are you, Yaqui?”
“Good-bye, sir,” she repeated. She nudged little Panfilo in the ribs, and the donkey snorted to life and trotted away.
“Yaquis!” the skinner shouted after her. “They cut off men’s feet and make them walk until they bleed to death! You little savage! Come back here! Yaquis hang men upside down from branches, put their heads in fire. I seen it! Burned their brains out! Come back here, I’m not done yet!”
She shook the reins and made the burro break into a run.
The last thing she heard from the mule skinner was his laughter. She was happy once she caught up with Huila.
Tomás cleared the summit long before Aguirre