The Land of Dead Things
Forth to the land of dead things, through the cities that are
forgotten, fared Dick Lane. Tricked by his friend, with the woman he
loved lost to him, he wandered onward.
Automatically he took up again his quest for buried treasure. That
which in the flush of youthful enthusiasm and roseate prospects of life
and love had seized him as a passion was now a settled habit. And
fortunately so, for it kept him from going mad. He had no thought of
gain--only the achievement of a purpose, a monomania.
With this impulse was conjoined a more volitional motive--he wished to
revenge himself upon the Apaches, and chiefly upon the renegade McKee,
whom he supposed still to be with them. Somehow he blamed him, rather
than Jack Payson, as being the chief cause of his miseries. "If he had
not stolen the buried gold, I would have returned in time," he
muttered. "He is at the bottom of all this. As I walked away from Jack
in the garden, I felt as if it was McKee that was following me with his
black, snaky eyes."
Accordingly, Dick directed his way to a region reputed to be both rich
in buried treasure and infested by hostile Indians.
The fable of the Quivira, the golden city marked now by the ruins of
the Piro pueblo of Tabiri, south of the salt-deposits of the Manzano,
is still potent in Arizona and New Mexico to lure the treasure-seeker.
Three hundred and fifty years ago it inspired a march across the plains
that dwarfs the famous march of the Greeks to the sea. It led to the
exploration of the Southwest and California before the Anglo-Saxon
settlers had penetrated half a hundred miles from the Atlantic coast.
The cities are forgotten to-day. The tribe which gave it a name proved
to be utter barbarians, eaters of raw meat, clad only in skins, without
gold, knowing nothing of the arts; Teton nomads, wandering through
Kansas. Yet each decade since witnesses a revival of a wonderful story
of the buried treasures of the Grand Quivira.
The myth originated in New Mexico in 1540. Antonio de Mendoza was the
viceroy of New Spain. Having practically conquered the New World, the
adventurers who formed his court, having no fighting to do with common
enemies, began to hack each other. Opportunely for the viceroy, Fra
Marcos discovered New Mexico and Arizona. Gathering the doughty
swordsmen together, Mendoza turned them over to the brilliant soldier
and explorer, Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, with strict orders to get
them as far from the viceroy as he could, and then lose them.
Coronado and his band were the first to see the Grand Canon of the
Colorado. In the latter weeks of 1540 they were in the town of Tiguex.
As they were less welcome than the modern tourists, who are now preyed
upon where these preyed, the natives sent them on to the pueblo of the
Pecos. Mendoza had sent Coronado into New Mexico on the strength of
the trimmings of the myth of the "Seven Cities of Cibola." The fabled
cities of gold proved to be peaceful settlements. Coronado attempted
to lose his cut-throats by having them settle in the country. A plains
Indian, captive among the Pecos, changed his plans, and led him to
undertake his wonderful march. The Pecos wished to get rid of the
guests, so they concocted a marvelous story of buried treasures, and
made the poor captive father it. To the gold-chasers the captive was
known as "The Turk," his head being shaven and adorned only with a
scalp-lock, a custom noticeable because of its variance from that of
the long-haired Pueblos.
"The Turk" told of a tribe of plainsmen who had a great store of the
yellow substance. They were called the Quivira. He would lead them to
the ancient Rockefellers. Coronado put him at the head of his band,
and followed him eastward over the plains. For months they plodded
after him, the Indian trying to lose Coronado, and that valiant warrior
endeavoring to obey orders to "shake" his band. About the middle of
what is now the Indian Territory, Coronado began to suspect that "The
Turk" was selling him a gold brick instead of a bonanza. Landmarks
began to look strangely alike. "The Turk," as he afterward confessed,
was leading them in a circle. Coronado sent the most of his band back
to the Mexican border, retaining about thirty followers. With the help
of heated bayonets and sundry proddings, he then impressed upon "The
Turk" that it was about time for him to find the Quiviras, or prepare
to go to the happy hunting-grounds of his ancestors. After many
hardships, "The Turk" located the tribe they were seeking near the
present site of Kansas City. All that Coronado found in the way of
metal was a bit of copper worn by a war-chief. Not only was the bubble
burst, but the bursting was so feeble that Coronado was disgusted. He
beheaded the guide with his own hands as a small measure of vengeance.
With his followers he retraced his weary road to Tiguex. The lesson
lasted for half a century, when the myth, brighter, more alluring than
ever, arose and led others on to thirsty deaths in the bad lands and
deserts of the Southwest.
It was to the modern version that Lane had succumbed. From the
Sweetwater he roved to the south of Albuquerque, where the narrow
valley of the Rio Grande is rimmed on the east by an arid plateau
twenty miles wide; and this is, in turn, walled in by a long
cordillera. Through the passes, over the summit, Lane climbed,
descending through the pineries, park-like in their grandeur and
immensity, to the bare, brown plains which stretch eastward to the
rising sun. In the midst of the desert lies a chain of salines,
accursed lakes of Tigua folk-lore. Beyond them the plain melts and
rebuilds itself in the shimmering sun.
To the south and southeast spectral peaks tower to the clouds.
Northward the blue shadows of the Sante Fe fall upon the pine-clad
foot-hills.
Along the lower slopes of the Manzano are the ruins of the ancient
pueblos. Abo and Cuarac are mounds of fallen buildings and
desert-blown sand. Solemn in their grandeur, they dominate the lonely
landscape in a land of adobe shacks.
Thirty miles from Cuarac, to the southeast, lies Tabiri, the "Grand
Quivira." Huddled on the projecting slopes of the rounded ridges,
access to it is a weary, dreary march. The nearest water is forty
miles away. Toiling through sand ankle-deep, the traveler plods across
the edge of the plains, through troughlike valleys, and up the wooded
slope of the Mesa de los Jumanos. A mile to the south a whale-back
ridge springs from the valley, nosing northward.
No sound breaks the stillness of the day. From the higher ridges the
eye falls upon the pallid ghost of the city. Blotches of juniper
relieve the monotony of the brown, lifeless grass. Grays fade into
leaden hues, to be absorbed in the ashy, indeterminate colors of the
sun-soaked plains. No fitter setting for a superstition could be
found. Once a town of fifteen hundred inhabitants, the topography of
ridge gave it an unusual shape. Ruins of three four-story terrace
houses face one another across narrow alleys. Six circular cisterns
yawn amid mounds of fallen walls. At the center of the southerly
blocks towers a gray quadrangular wall, the last of a large building.
At the western terminus of the village, where the slope falls away to
the valley, is a gigantic ruin. Its walls are thirty feet high and six
feet thick. The roof has fallen, and the topmost layers of the
bluish-gray limestone are ragged and time-worn.
The building had a frontage of two hundred and two feet, and its
greatest depth was one hundred thirty-one feet. Flat-faced prisms,
firmly laid in adobe mortar, are placed at irregular intervals in the
walls.
The northern part of the ruin is one great cross-shaped room,
thirty-eight feet wide and one hundred and thirty-one feet long. A gate
fifteen feet wide and eleven feet high opens to the eastward. A mighty
timber forms an arch supporting fifteen feet of solid masonry.
South of this is a great chamber cut up into smaller rooms, with long
halls, with walls twenty feet in height. In one of the rooms is a
fireplace, and over the doorways are carved wood lintels. An entrance
from the south is given through a spacious antechamber. The rafters,
hauled fifteen miles, must have weighed a ton.
Here lies the Colchis of the modern Argonaut. At first the Mexican
pried through the debris-choked rooms, or feebly tunneled under the
walls. With the coming of the white races and the drill, holes have
been sunk into the original bed-rock. To the simple stories of the
natives, fable-bearers have added maps, dying confessions, and
discovered ciphers.
This ruin, which has caused so many heart-breaks and disappointments,
are but the fragments of an old mission founded by Francisco de Atevedo
in 1628. Tabiri was to be the central mission of Abo and Cuarac. The
absence of water leads the modern explorer to believe that when the
town was deserted the spring was killed. The gentle fathers who built
the church supervised the construction of a water-works. On a higher
ride are three crudely made reservoirs, with ditches leading to the
village. The Piros had no animals save a few sheep, and the water
supply was needed only for domestic uses, as the precipitation
furnished moisture for small crops of beans and corn.
All these towns were wiped out by the Apaches, the red plague of the
desert. First they attacked the outlying forts of the Salines, once
supposed to be well-watered, teeming with game, and fruitful.
Tradition again takes the place of unrecorded history, and tells that
the sweet waters were turned to salt, in punishment of the wife of one
of the dwellers in the city, who proved faithless. In 1675 the last
vestige of aboriginal life was wiped out. For a century the Apaches
held undisputed control of the country; then the Mexican pioneer crept
in. His children are now scattered over the border. The American
ranchman and gold-seeker followed, twisting the stories of a Christian
conquest into strange tales of the seekers of buried treasures.
Through this land Dick had wandered, finding his search but a rainbow
quest. But he kept on by dull inertia, wandering westward to Tularosa,
then down to Fort Grant, and toward the Lava Beds of southwestern
Arizona. In all that arid land there was nothing so withered as his
soul.
Jack, well mounted, with a pack-mule carrying supplies, had picked up
Dick's trail, after it left Tularosa, from a scout out of Fort Grant.
Slim Hoover headed for Fort Grant in his search for Jack. Although the
ranchman had only a brief start of him, Slim lost the track at the
river ford. Knowing Dick had gone into the desert, Jack headed
eastward, while Slim, supposing that Jack was breaking for the border
to escape into a foreign country turned southward.
From the scout who had met Jack and Dick, the Sheriff learned that the
two men were headed for the Lava Beds, which were occupied by hostile
Apaches.
Detachments of the 3d Cavalry were stationed at the fort, with Colonel
Hardie in command of the famous F troop, a band of Indian fighters
never equaled. In turn, they chased Cochise, Victoria, and Geronimo
with their Apache warriors up and down and across the Rio Grande. Hard
pressed, each chieftain, in turn, would flee with his band first to the
Lava Beds, and then across the border into Mexico, where the United
States soldiers could not follow. Hardie fooled Victoria, however.
Texas rangers had met the Apache chief in an engagement on the banks of
the Rio Grande. Only eight Americans returned from the encounter.
Hardie took up his pursuit, and followed Victoria across the river.
The Indians had relaxed their vigilance, not expecting pursuit and
despising the Mexican Rurales. Troop F caught them off guard in the
mountains. The fight was one to extermination. Victoria and his
entire band were slain.
This was the troop which was awaiting orders to go after the Apaches.
Colonel Hardie told Slim that the Indians were bound to head for the
Lava Beds. If the men for whom he was looking were in the desert, the
troops would find them more quickly than Slim and his posse.
Slim waited at Fort Grant for orders, writing back to Sage-brush,
telling him of his plans.
Fort Grant followed the usual plan of all frontier posts. A row of
officers' houses faced the parade-grounds. Directly opposite were the
cavalry barracks fort. On one side of the quadrangle were the stables,
and the fourth line consisted of the quartermaster's buildings and the
post-trader's store. Small ranchmen had gathered near the fort for
protection, and because of the desire of the white man for company. In
days of peace garrison life was monotonous. But the Apaches needed
constant watching.
As a soldier, the Apache was cruel and cowardly. He always fought
dismounted, never making an attack unless at his own advantage. As
infantryman he was unequalled. Veteran army officers adopted the
Apache tactics, and installed in the army the plan of mounted infantry;
soldiers who move on horseback but fight on foot detailing one man of
every four to guard the horses. Methods similar to those used by the
Apaches were put into use by the Boers in the South African War.
Indeed, the scouting of these Dutch farmers possessed many of the
characteristics of the Apaches. So, too, the Japanese soldiers hid
from the Russians with the aid of artificial foliage in the same way
that an Indian would creep up on his victim by tying a bush to the
upper part of his body and crawling toward him on his knees and elbows.
Mounted on wiry ponies inured to hardships, to picking up a living on
the scanty herbage of the plains, riding without saddles, and carrying
no equipment, the Indians had little trouble in avoiding the soldiers.
Leaving the reservation, the Apaches would commit some outrage, and
then, swinging on the arc of a great circle, would be back to camp and
settled long before the soldiers could overtake them. Hampered by
orders from the War Department, which, in turn, was molested by the
sentimental friends of the Indians, soldiers never succeeded in taming
the Apache Crook cut off communications and thrashed them so thoroughly
in these same Lava Beds that they never recovered.
In Slim's absence, Buck McKee and his gang had taken possession of
Pinal County. Rustlers and bad men were coming in from Texas and the
Strip. Slim's election for another term was by no means certain. He
did not know this, but if he had, it would not have made any difference
to him. He was after Jack, and, at any cost, would bring him back to
face trial. The rogues of Pinal County seized upon the flight of Jack
as a good excuse to down Slim. The Sheriff was more eager to find Jack
and learn from him that Buck's charge was false than to take him
prisoner. He knew the accusation would not stand full investigation.
Slowly the hours passed until the order for "boots and saddles" was
sounded, and the troops trotted out of the fort gate. Scouts soon
picked up their trail, but that was different from finding the Indians.
Oft-times the troopers would ride into a hastily abandoned camp with
the ashes still warm, but never a sight of a warrior could be had.
Over broad mesas, down narrow mountain trails, and up canons so deep
that the sun never fully penetrated them, the soldiers followed the
renegades.
For a day the trail was lost. Then it was picked up by the print of a
pony's hoof beside a water-hole. But always the line of flight led
toward an Apache spring in the Lava Beds.
Slim and his posse took their commands from the officers of the
pursuers. The cow-punchers gave them much assistance as scouts,
knowing the country, through which the Indians fled. Keeping in touch
with the main command, they rode ahead to protect it from any surprise.
The chief Indian scout got so far ahead at one time in the chase that
he was not seen for two days. Once, by lying flat on his belly,
shading his eyes with his hands, and gazing intently at a mountainside
so far ahead that the soldiers could scarcely discern it, he declared
he had seen the fugitives climb the trail. The feat seemed impossible,
until the second morning after, when the scout pointed out to the
colonel the pony-tracks up the mountainside. The Apache scouts kept
track of the soldiers' movements, communicating with the main body with
blanket-signals and smoke columns.
The sign-language of the Indians of the South is an interesting field
of study. On the occasion of a raid like the one described, the
warriors who were to participate would gather at one point and
construct a mound, with as many stones in it as there were warriors.
Then they would scatter into small bands. When any band returned to the
mound, after losing a fight and the others were not there, the leader
would take from the mound as many stones as he had lost warriors.
Thus, the other bands, on returning, could tell just how many men had
fallen.
In the arid regions of the West, water-signs are quite frequent. They
usually consist of a grouping of stones, with a longer triangular stone
in the center, its apex pointing in the direction where the water is to
be found. In some cases the water is so far from the trail that four
or five of these signs must be followed up before the water is found.
Only the Indian and the mule can smell water. This accomplishment
enabled the fleeing Apaches to take every advantage of the pursuing
troopers, who must travel from spring to spring along known trails.
In the long, weary chase men and horses began to fail rapidly. Short
rations quickly became slow starvation fare. Hardie fed his men and
horses on mesquit bean, a plant heretofore considered poisonous. For
water he was forced to depend upon the cactus, draining the fluid
secreted at the heart of the plant.
With faces blistered by the sun and caked with alkali, blue shirts
faded to a purple tinge, and trousers and accouterments covered with a
gray, powdery dust, the soldiers rode on silently and determinedly.
Hour after hour the troop flung itself across the plains and into the
heart of the Lava Beds, each day cutting down the Apache lead.