On the morrow, Maria Antonia, who, though she was pockmarked and
walleyed, nevertheless enjoyed a notorious reputation--indeed it was
confidently proclaimed that no man had failed to go with her behind the
river weeds at some time or other--shouted to Camilla:
"Hey there, you! What's the matter? What are you doing there skulking
in the corner with a shawl tied round your head! You're crying, I
wager. Look at her eyes; they look like a witch's. There's no sorrow
lasts more than three days!"
Agapita knitted her eyebrows and muttered indistinctly to herself.
The old crones felt uneasy and lonesome since Demetrio's men had left.
The men, too, in spite of their gossip and insults, lamented their
departure since now they would have no one to bring them fresh meat
every day. It is pleasant indeed to spend your time eating and
drinking, and sleeping all day long in the cool shade of the rocks,
while clouds ravel and unravel their fleecy threads on the blue shuttle
of the sky.
"Look at them again. There they go!" Maria Antonia yelled. "Why, they
look like toys."
Demetrio's men, riding their thin nags, could still be descried in the
distance against the sapphire translucence of the sky, where the broken
rocks and the chaparral melted into a single bluish smooth surface.
Across the air a gust of hot wind bore the broken, faltering strains of
"La Adelita," the revolutionary song, to the settlement. Camilla, who
had come out when Maria Antonia shouted, could no longer control
herself; she dived back into her hut, unable to restrain her tears and
moaning. Maria Antonia burst into laughter and moved off.
"They've cast the evil eye on my daughter," Agapita said in perplexity.
She pondered a while, then duly reached a decision. From a pole in the
hut she took down a piece of strong leather which her husband used to
hitch up the yoke. This pole stood between a picture of Christ and one
of the Virgin. Agapita promptly twisted the leather and proceeded to
administer a sound thrashing to Camilla in order to dispel the evil
spirits.
Riding proudly on his horse, Demetrio felt like a new man. His eyes
recovered their peculiar metallic brilliance, and the blood flowed, red
and warm, through his coppery, pure-blooded Aztec cheeks.
The men threw out their chests as if to breathe the widening horizon,
the immensity of the sky, the blue from the mountains and the fresh
air, redolent with the various odors of the sierra. They spurred their
horses to a gallop as if in that mad race they laid claims of
possession to the earth. What man among them now remembered the stern
chief of police, the growling policeman, or the conceited cacique? What
man remembered his pitiful hut where he slaved away, always under the
eyes of the owner or the ruthless and sullen foreman, always forced to
rise before dawn, and to take up his shovel, basket, or goad, wearing
himself out to earn a mere pitcher of atole and a handful of beans?
They laughed, they sang, they whistled, drunk with the sunlight, the
air of the open spaces, the wine of life.
Meco, prancing forward on his horse, bared his white glistening teeth,
joking and kicking up like a clown.
"Hey, Pancracio," he asked with utmost seriousness, "my wife writes me
I've got another kid. How in hell is that? I ain't seen her since
Madero was President."
"That's nothing," the other replied. "You just left her a lot of eggs
to hatch for you!"
They all laughed uproariously. Only Meco, grave and aloof, sang in a
voice horribly shrill:
"I gave her a penny
That wasn't enough.
I gave her a nickel
The wench wanted more.
We bargained. I asked
If a dime was enough
But she wanted a quarter.
By God! That was tough!
All wenches are fickle
And trumpery stuff!"
The sun, beating down upon them, dulled their minds and bodies and
presently they were silent. All day long they rode through the canyon,
up and down the steep, round hills, dirty and bald as a man's head,
hill after hill in endless succession. At last, late in the afternoon,
they descried several stone church towers in the heart of a bluish
ridge, and, beyond, the white road with its curling spirals of dust and
its gray telegraph poles.
They advanced toward the main road; in the distance they spied a figure
of an Indian sitting on the embankment. They drew up to him. He proved
to be an unfriendly looking old man, clad in rags; he was laboriously
attempting to mend his leather sandals with the help of a dull knife. A
burro loaded with fresh green grass stood by. Demetrio accosted him.
"What are you doing, Grandpa?"
"Gathering alfalfa for my cow."
"How many Federals are there around here?"
"Just a few: not more than a dozen, I reckon."
The old man grew communicative. He told them of many important rumors:
Obregon was besieging Guadalajara, Torres was in complete control of
the Potosi region, Natera ruled over Fresnillo.
"All right," said Demetrio, "you can go where you're headed for, see,
but you be damn careful not to tell anyone you saw us, because if you
do, I'll pump you full of lead. And I could track you down, even if you
tried to hide in the pit of hell, see?"
"What do you say, boys?" Demetrio asked them as soon as the old man had
disappeared.
"To hell with the mochos! We'll kill every blasted one of them!" they
cried in unison.
Then they set to counting their cartridges and the hand grenades the
Owl had made out of fragments of iron tubing and metal bed handles.
"Not much to brag about, but we'll soon trade them for rifles,"
Anastasio observed.
Anxiously they pressed forward, spurring the thin flanks of their nags
to a gallop. Demetrio's brisk, imperious tones of order brought them
abruptly to a halt.
They dismounted by the side of a hill, protected by thick huizache
trees. Without unsaddling their horses, each began to search for stones
to serve as pillows.