Late in the afternoon Luis Cervantes rubbed his eyes and sat up. He had
been sleeping on the hard pavement, close to the trunk of a fruit tree.
Anastasio, Pancracio and Quail slept nearby, breathing heavily.
His lips were swollen, his nose dry and cold. There were bloodstains on
his hands and shirt. At once he recalled what had taken place. Soon he
rose to his feet and made for one of the bedrooms. He pushed at the
door several times without being able to force it open. For a few
minutes he stood there, hesitating.
No--he had not dreamed it. Everything had really occurred just as he
recalled it. He had left the table with his bride and taken her to the
bedroom, but just as he was closing the door, Demetrio staggered after
them and made one leap toward them. Then War Paint dashed in after
Demetrio and began to struggle with him. Demetrio, his eyes white-hot,
his lips covered with long blond hairs, looked for the bride, in
despair. But War Paint pushed him back vigorously.
"What the hell is the matter with you? What the hell are you trying to
do?" he demanded, furious.
War Paint put her leg between his, twisted it suddenly, and Demetrio
fell to the ground outside of the bedroom. He rose, raging.
"Help! Help! He's going to kill me!" she cried, seizing Demetrio's
wrist and turning the gun aside. The bullet hit the floor. War Paint
continued to shriek. Anastasio disarmed Demetrio from behind.
Demetrio, standing like a furious bull in the middle of the arena, cast
fierce glances at all the bystanders, Luis Cervantes, Anastasio,
Manteca, and the others.
"Goddamn you! You've taken my gun away! Christ! As if I needed any gun
to beat the hell out of you."
Flinging out his arms, beating and pummeling, he felled everyone within
reach. Down they rolled like tenpins. Then, after that, Luis Cervantes
could remember nothing more. Perhaps his bride, terrified by all these
brutes, had wisely vanished and hidden herself.
"Perhaps this bedroom communicates with the living room and I can go in
through there," he thought, standing at the threshold. At the sound of
his footsteps, War Paint woke up. She lay on the rug close to Demetrio
at the foot of a couch filled with alfalfa and corn where the black
horse had fed.
"What are you looking for? Oh, hell, I know what you want! Shame on
you! Why, I had to lock up your sweetheart because I couldn't struggle
any more against this damned Demetrio. Take the key, it's lying on that
table, there!"
Luis Cervantes searched in vain all over the house.
"Come on, tell me all about your girl."
Nervously, Luis Cervantes continued to look for the key.
"Come on, don't be in such a hurry, I'll give it to you. Come along,
tell me; I like to hear about these things, you know. That girl is your
kind, she's not a country person like us."
"I've nothing to say. She's my girl and we're going to get married,
that's all."
"Ho! Ho! Ho! You're going to marry her, eh? Trying to teach your
grandmother to suck eggs, eh? Why, you fool, any place you just manage
to get to for the first time in your life, I've left a hundred miles
behind me, see. I've cut my wisdom teeth. It was Meco and Manteca who
took the girl from her home: I knew that all the time. You just gave
them something so as to have her yourself, gave them a pair of cuff
links ... or a miraculous picture of some Virgin.... Am I right? Sure,
I am! There aren't so many people in the world who know what's what,
but I reckon you'll meet up with a few before you die!"
War Paint got up to give him the key but she could not find it either.
She was much surprised. Quickly, she ran to the bedroom door and peered
through the keyhole, standing motionless until her eye grew accustomed
to the darkness within. Without drawing away, she said: "You damned
Blondie. Son of a bitch! Come here a minute, look!"
She went away laughing.
"Didn't I tell them all I'd never seen a smarter fellow in all my life!"
The following morning, War Paint watched for the moment when Blondie
left the bedroom to feed his horses....
"Come on, Angel Face. Run home quick!"
The blue-eyed girl, with a face like a Madonna, stood naked save for
her chemise and stockings. War Paint covered her with Manteca's lousy
blanket, took her by the hand and led her to the street.
"God, I'm happy," War Paint cried. "I'm crazy ... about Blondie ...
now."
V
Like neighing colts, playful when the rainy season begins, Demetrio's
men galloped through the sierra.
"To Moyahua, boys. Let's go to Demetrio Macias' country!"
"To the country of Monico the cacique!"
The landscape grew clearer; the sun margined the diaphanous sky with a
fringe of crimson. Like the bony shoulders of immense sleeping
monsters, the chains of mountains rose in the distance. Crags there
were like heads of colossal native idols; others like giants' faces,
their grimaces awe-inspiring or grotesque, calling forth a smile or a
shudder at a presentment of mystery.
Demetrio Macias rode at the head of his men; behind him the members of
his staff: Colonel Anastasio Montanez, Lieutenant-Colonel Pancracio,
Majors Luis Cervantes and Blondie. Still further behind came War Paint
with Venancio, who paid her many compliments and recited the despairing
verses of Antonio Plaza. As the sun's rays began to slip from the
housetops, they made their entrance into Moyahua, four abreast, to the
sound of the bugle. The roosters' chorus was deafening, dogs barked
their alarm, but not a living soul stirred on the streets.
War Paint spurred her black horse and with one jump was abreast with
Demetrio. They rode forward, elbow to elbow. She wore a silk dress and
heavy gold earrings. Proudly her pale blue gown deepened her olive skin
and the coppery spots on her face and arms. Riding astride, she had
pulled her skirts up to her knees; her stockings showed, filthy and
full of runs. She wore a gun at her side, a cartridge belt hung over
the pommel of her saddle.
Demetrio was also dressed in his best clothes. His broad-brimmed hat
was richly embroidered; his leather trousers were tight-fitting and
adorned with silver buttons; his coat was embroidered with gold thread.
There was a sound of doors being beaten down and forced open. The
soldiers had already scattered through the town, to gather together
ammunition and saddles from everywhere.
"We're going to bid Monico good morning," Demetrio said gravely,
dismounting and tossing his bridle to one of his men. "We're going to
have breakfast with Don Monico, who's a particular friend of mine ...."
The general's staff smiled ... a sinister, malign smile....
Making their spurs ring against the pavement, they walked toward a
large pretentious house, obviously that of a cacique.
"It's closed airtight," Anastasio Montanez said, pushing the door with
all his might.
"That's all right. I'll open it," Pancracio answered, lowering his
rifle and pointing it at the lock.
"No, no," Demetrio said, "knock first."
Three blows with the butt of the rifle. Three more. No answer.
Pancracio disobeys orders. He fires, smashing the lock. The door opens.
Behind, a confusion of skirts and children's bare legs rushing to and
fro, pell-mell.
"I want wine. Hey, there: wine!" Demetrio cries in an imperious voice,
pounding heavily on a table.
"Sit down, boys."
A lady peeps out, another, a third; from among black skirts, the heads
of frightened children. One of the women, trembling, walks toward a
cupboard and, taking out some glasses and a bottle, serves wine.
"What arms have you?" Demetrio demands harshly.
"Arms, arms...?" the lady answers, a taste of ashes on her tongue.
"What arms do you expect us to have! We are respectable, lonely old
ladies!"
"Lonely, eh! Where's Senor Monico?"
"Oh, he's not here, gentlemen, I assure you! We merely rent the house
from him, you see. We only know him by name!"
Demetrio orders his men to search the house.
"No, please don't. We'll bring you whatever we have ourselves, but
please for God's sake, don't do anything cruel. We're spinsters, lone
women ... perfectly respectable...."
"Spinsters, hell! What about these kids here?" Pancracio interrupts
brutally. "Did they spring from the earth?"
The women disappear hurriedly, to return with an old shotgun, covered
with dust and cobwebs, and a pistol with rusty broken springs.
Demetrio smiles.
"All right, then, let's see the money."
"Money? Money? But what money do you think a couple of spinsters have?
Spinsters alone in the world....?"
They glance up in supplication at the nearest soldier; but they are
seized with horror. For they have just seen the Roman soldier who
crucified Our Lord in the Via Crucis of the parish! They have seen
Pancracio!
Demetrio repeats his order to search.
Once again the women disappear to return this time with a moth-eaten
wallet containing a few Huerta bills.
Demetrio smiles and without further delay calls to his men to come in.
Like hungry dogs who have sniffed their meat, the mob bursts in,
trampling down the women who sought to bar the entrance with their
bodies. Several faint, fall to the ground; others flee in panic. The
children scream.
Pancracio is about to break the lock of a huge wardrobe when suddenly
the doors open and out comes a man with a rifle in his hands.
"Senor Don Monico!" they all exclaim in surprise.
"Demetrio, please, don't harm me! Please don't harm me! Please don't
hurt me! You know, Senor Don Demetrio, I'm your friend!"
Demetrio Macias smiles slyly. "Are friends," he asked, "usually
welcomed gun in hand?"
Don Monico, in consternation, throws himself at Demetrio's feet, clasps
his knees, kisses his shoes: "My wife! ... My children! ... Please,
Senor Don Demetrio, my friend!"
Demetrio with taut hand puts his gun back in the holster.
A painful silhouette crosses his mind. He sees a woman with a child in
her arms walking over the rocks of the sierra in the moonlight. A house
in flames....
"Clear out. Everybody outside!" he orders darkly.
His staff obeys. Monico and the ladies kiss his hands, weeping with
gratitude. The mob in the street, talking and laughing, stands waiting
for the general's permission to ransack the cacique's house.
"I know where they've buried their money but I won't tell," says a
youngster with a basket in his hands.
"Hm! I know the right place, mind you," says an old woman carrying a
burlap sack to hold whatever the good Lord will provide. "It's on top
of something ... there's a lot of trinkets nearby and then there's a
small bag with mother-of-pearl around it. That's the thing to look for!"
"You ain't talking sense, woman," puts in a man. "They ain't such fools
as to leave silver lying loose like that. I'm thinking they've got it
buried in the well, in a leather bag."
The mob moves slowly; some carry ropes to tie about their bundles,
others wooden trays. The women open out their aprons or shawls
calculating their capacity. All give thanks to Divine Providence as
they wait for their share of the booty.
When Demetrio announces that he will not allow looting and orders them
to disband, the mob, disconsolate, obeys him, and soon scatters; but
there is a dull rumor among the soldiers and no one moves from his
place.
Annoyed, Demetrio repeats this order.
A young man, a recent recruit, his head turned by drink, laughs and
walks boldly toward the door. But before he has reached the threshold,
a shot lays him low. He falls like a bull pierced in the neck by the
matador's sword. Motionless, his smoking gun in his hand, Demetrio
waits for the soldiers to withdraw.
"Set fire to the house!" he orders Luis Cervantes when they reach their
quarters.
With a curious eagerness Luis Cervantes does not transmit the order but
undertakes the task in person.
Two hours later when the city square was black with smoke and enormous
tongues of fire rose from Monico's house, no one could account for the
strange behavior of the general.