Maria's Trail (The Mule Tamer) (15 page)

Joe mounted up and she knew he was going to
leave. She regretted it as she enjoyed his company. “Adios, Joe.”

He was gone.

The posse finally made it to the river and
began to cross. They eventually all made it. When the last man was on the bank,
and they were all dripping and exhausted and taking inventory of their
progress, they heard a voice, way off on the Mexican side. The pretty bandit
was waving her sombrero. “Yoo hoo, boys.” She turned and began to ride away.
“What are you doing all the way over there?”

Some of the men drew their guns but the colonel
ordered them to stop. He raised a white flag and called back. “Please,
Señorita, don’t run away. We have something for you.”

With that, the youngest and fittest rider
crossed back. He handed Maria a parcel and she opened it. There was a note
which she read with difficulty. Handing it to the young gringo she said, “Read
this for me, please.”

“To the wild creature who we never caught. God
be with you. C. Gibbs, Esq.”

Maria held up a watch by the chain. She removed
her sombrero once again and gave a deep bow. Kicking her horse into a run, she
was gone.

Many years later, in his memoirs, Colonel
Charles Gibbs wrote that if he’d managed to capture the beautiful wild Mexican
who ran him through the hell of the northern Sonoran desert, he would have
proposed marriage on the spot. No one was certain whether it was an attempt to
make amends for all the Indians he’d slaughtered or to serve his own vanity.
Perhaps he was actually expressing his true feelings. No one would ever know.

Maria sat in a great field, cross-legged and
frustrated as she poked and pried and pulled on the fancy rifle. It was
beginning to make her very angry and she decided that she might just as well
smash it to pieces with a rock. The thing was nothing more than a fancy club.
She raised it over her head and prepared to dash it to pieces when a kindly old
voice startled her. “Temper, temper, little one.”

She looked up, astonished that such a big man
could sneak up on her so silently. She looked at him and realized he had her.
She’d never been caught unawares and it was very confounding.

“Who are you?” She demanded and gave him a
defiant look.

“Oh, that is my prerogative, little one. This
is my land. I get to find out who you are first.” He casually walked up to her
and took the rifle from her hand. He looked it over and at the silver plate
bearing the original owner’s name.

“Maria.” She stood up and wiped her trousers
clean, watched him as he manipulated the rifle. He casually unscrewed the caps
protecting the lenses on either end of the telescopic sight, looked through it
and grunted in satisfaction. It was a finely made instrument. He handed it to
Maria and now everything about the gun made sense.

“Ay, chingao. Look at that!” She pointed the
rifle at a distant rock and it appeared to be right on top of them. She loaded
the rifle with one of the big cartridges and fired. She missed.

“No, no, little one.” He plopped down on the
ground. “Give it to me, and a bullet.” Maria complied. “You shoot off the
bones, little one.” With that he sat like a great overgrown Buddha. With legs
crossed, he rested his elbows on his knees and looked through the telescopic
sight. He squeezed the trigger and dust flew from the rock.

“Bravo!” Maria applauded. She loved the new
rifle. It was thrilling. She could now kill bad men from a long way off.

He handed the rifle back and she tried it.
Mimicking his actions, another puff of dust flew up, right next to the old
man’s mark. She stood up and kissed him on the cheek.

He bowed as he removed his big beaver sombrero.
“Alejandro del Toro, at your service, Miss.” He shook her hand gently then
stood back, moved her around in the light so that the sun shone on her face. He
removed her sombrero and, gently taking her hand, once again turned her in a
circle. “Oh, you are magnificent, little one.”

Maria felt a little tingly. He was a kind old
man and did not intend to bed her. There was nothing provocative about him. He
just enjoyed her, as he would a fine work of art. “You come with me, little
one. I have a place, a lovely pedestal on which to put you.”

They rode for nearly an hour and Maria was
impressed with the rich man. He was obviously wealthy by his dress and by the
fact that they’d been riding for so long and the land was all his—if he had not
been lying to her.

Eventually, they made it to his hacienda and it
was the grandest she’d ever seen. Many men came out to attend to them and take
their horses. The big man took her by the arm and escorted her to his veranda.
A table had been laid with a white linen table cloth, silver utensils and
crystal. She’d not seen such opulence in her life.

“I hope you are hungry, little one. We dine in
an hour. But before we do,” he led her to a grand bedroom at the end of a
breezeway off the courtyard. It was lovelier than the lady fence’s garret
bedroom. “You can get cleaned up in here.”

She looked around as he left her alone and assumed
this was his bedroom; the grand bedroom of the hacienda’s Jefe and, in
preparation for his return home from his morning ride, his servants had
prepared a hot bath.

Maria wasted no time.  She stripped and stepped
into the hot tub and began to soak. It was heavenly. She reached for a cigar.
An old woman handed her one before taking her outfit off for a good cleaning.
She gave Maria a pretty dress to wear in the meantime.

After a wonderfully luxurious soak in the tub,
Maria dressed for dinner and joined Alejandro del Toro on the veranda. She sat
down and finished her cigar. The big man handed her a better one. “That thing
you are smoking, little one, I’ve smelled better steaming dung heaps. Try
this.”

She did and it was heavenly, too. She sat,
barefoot and cool and more beautiful than she’d ever been in her life.  She was
wearing the lovely dress and had just had a proper bath. She certainly was
enjoying this Jefe and his hospitality.

“Jefe?”

“Uncle.”

“Uncle?”

“Yes, you call me uncle. I am your uncle forever.”
They ate together and he began telling her the story of Alejandro del Toro but,
more importantly, he told her the famous story of the beautiful wild creature
who’d bested the gringos and Emilio Kosterlitzky, the most famous rurale
officer of the time.

Maria was pleased. She did not know that she
was famous and it tickled her to think that what she had done would make her
that way. She found it all a bit of a lark. It was the easiest thing she’d ever
done, evading and leading the posse on a wild goose chase, yet it seemed very
important to the Jefe. No wonder he was being so good to her.

“Jefe, eh, Uncle?”

“Yes?”

“How does such a big man move so quietly? You
are the first one to ever surprise me.”

“Hah! My little one, I was a bandit before your
mamma was born! I can sneak, run, shoot, and hide from anyone better than men
not nearly so fat as me.” He grabbed up a fistful of his paunch and shook it up
and down.

“So, you are not a rancher?” Maria looked
around and wondered if he’d slaughtered the real owners of the place.

“Oh, this is all mine. All mine. I built it
from nothing, from stealing cattle and horses from the gringos. Ha ha!”

She was pleased with how happy he was to show
off to her. He was remarkable as he did not take very much of it seriously.

He stood up abruptly. “Come with me little
one.” He held out his arm and she took it. He walked her to his stable. “This
might be someone you know.”

The vaquero from her village was there. He was
Uncle Alejandro’s chief groom. He nodded to Maria. “Hello, child.” He held out
his hand for her and she took it. “Remember me?”

“I do.” She smiled and then looked on at her
new uncle. “He told me to go after the bad men. He was the only one to tell me
the right thing to do.”

“We have something for you, Maria.” With that
he opened a paddock door and brought forth a wonderful surprise, a palomino
filly decked out in Chica’s tack. “Her name is Alanza.”

Alanza stood at just over 14 hands tall. She
had power radiating from her beautifully muscled body. It was obvious that she
was descended from fine Arabian stock. Her eyes were huge and very dark, her
ears tiny and tipped ever so slightly toward each other. Her muzzle was so
small that it could fit in the palm of Maria’s hand. Tipping her head as she
pranced up to Maria, her golden coat shone with dazzling highlights. Her mane,
tail and forelock were a soft ivory and flowed in rippling waves. Four white
socks reached halfway up her legs, almost to her knees, and her hooves were
large platters; feet designed to travel easily on desert sands.

He smiled as Maria took the horse’s soft muzzle
in her hands and pressed the animal’s face to her cheek. She looked her in the
eye. “Hello, my Alanza.”

“Alanza.” The vaquero looked on at Maria. “Do
you know the meaning of this name, Maria? It means ready for battle. She’s the
smartest animal I’ve ever known, Maria. She’ll be a good match for you.”

Maria, in one motion was up on her back. She
grabbed the reins and leaned forward, her body pressed seductively against the
filly’s mane. She whispered in her ear and tapped her sides. Even with Maria’s
bare feet, Alanza knew what to do. Maria needed no spurs and they rocketed down
the paddock aisle and out into the late day sun. They rode hard into the
desert, she and the animal as one. Alanza was just as happy as her mistress.
Maria knew the horse and the horse knew and immediately trusted Maria. She was
light and balanced and knew how to sit in the saddle, knew how to hold on and
move with the creature. They both wished for something to jump.

They came back lathered and happy. Maria jumped
down and ran to the Jefe. She reached up and kissed him on the neck. “Thank
you, my uncle. Thank you.”

She turned to the groom and held out her hand.
“Thank you.” She pulled him in close and kissed him on the cheek. “You are a
good judge of horses. I will treasure her for the rest of our time together on
this earth.” She looked back at Alanza who was now being walked around by one
of the men, cooling off and shaking her head periodically from side to side.

She looked especially pretty in Maria’s tack.

Maria endeavored to make her first foray into
the United States. She was well equipped with her many gifts and supplies from
her new Uncle Alejandro and Alanza was the perfect companion. She decided to
speak only English to Alanza as practice for when she mixed with the gringos.
She was excited about the adventure into the new land and felt confident since
her meeting with Joe the Indian and the gringo posse and American colonel. They
surely couldn’t all be assholes en el Norte. But it was a rich land, according
to Uncle Alejandro, and Maria thought she could do some good marauding and
stealing up there. The gringos would not be likely to miss anything as,
according to the Jefe, they had so much.

She had time to think and did not even have to
do much with Alanza. She’d point her pony and the animal seemed, as if by
telepathy, to know what her mistress wanted and where she wanted to go. The
weather was good and the new land added to the adventure. Maria had never
traveled in this part of the country.

She had time to think about what had happened
to her over the past many months. She had encountered many new ideas and
people. All this gave her a renewed confidence, especially as it regarded her
war with God. Maybe she didn’t have to fight with God. Maybe the old padre did
have his set of beliefs, but so did the lady fence with her ideas of
reincarnation, and the prospector. Even Joe, the Indian, had his personal
philosophy, though Maria never did get to ask him much about it. But he did
have a faith and it wasn’t the padre’s. It was Apache faith.

So, perhaps they were all of the same purpose
and maybe it was not necessary now for her to fight with God. She could live
with God and God with her. She’d do and act as she saw fit, and not worry over
what Commandments she broke or didn’t break. She knew—was convinced—that she
had a pure heart and her intentions were always the best. She knew that
breaking the Commandments were not always necessarily bad.

Like killing, for instance. It was perfectly
acceptable to kill, she knew that. Some people just plain needed killing and
Maria would oblige. She knew that it was not a problem or a sin.

And then there was stealing. Again, if someone
had so much that they could get along without a few pesos or some cattle or a
fancy rifle, then it was not so terrible to steal from them. It was just
adjusting the imbalance, like in nature. When things start to get out of hand,
nature balanced them out.

And then there was this idea of being with men,
or women, really. She grinned about the lady fence kissing her and the whore
washing her a little too enthusiastically. What could be the sin in all that?
There was none. Of course, no one as yet had struck her fancy. The women were
out of the question, it just didn’t suit her to be with women, though the lady
fence’s kiss was the most tender Maria had ever known, it just did nothing for
her. And Joe the Indian asking her to bed down with him was nice, but she
didn’t fancy Joe, or the old prospector, she could tell he’d fallen in love
with her too. But all in all, what sin could there be in bedding down with
another when not married? She didn’t want to be married, but she certainly
wanted to do the act again. It was good when she did it with Crisanto, and she
knew she wanted to do it again, some day.

She thought more about all the hearts she’d
broken already. She hadn’t tried to do that, but she had. She was just simply
too beautiful, inside as well as out. She got a little flutter at that thought.
She was special. She knew she was special and she thought that she should be
thankful to God for all that. He had created her and He made her beautiful and
intelligent and a good rock thrower and she could shoot well and ride as if she
and Alanza were one creature. Now she had the fancy rifle from the colonel and
could kill bad men from a long distance.

So, even if the prospector was correct, that
God kind of kicked this all into motion, but then left us alone, gave us free
will—which made good sense to her—it was still God who’d given her the basic
materials for her magnificence. This made her very happy and she resolved to be
a good steward of this perfect being. She was magnificent and would not
squander what she had been given. She would still do her marauding and stealing
as she planned. Still make things right in the world that were wrong and still
redistribute the wealth as she saw fit, but she’d do it in an honorable way.

She stopped to light a cigar and smoke. In the
distance, to the east, something caught her eye. It was a queer sight as there
did not seem to be any form of human life in the area. Certainly this was not a
campfire, it was too big. It was also too big to come from a homestead and it
was too concentrated to be a brush fire.

She decided to investigate and Alanza quickly
obliged. They were upon it in short order and Maria was sad to see another
bandit attack. Bodies were strewn about and the men who’d killed them made
certain to add to the carnage by defacing and defiling most of the poor
victims. They were all men except for three old women and Maria could see by
the path left behind that the bandits had taken hostages. This is why the
homesteader’s corpses did not include young women or children. Maria surmised
that it was likely the work of Sombrero del Oro or at least some of his men, as
he was a famous slave trader from way back.

She surveyed the site and resolved to drag the
victims to the burning wagon. The bandits, in their blood orgy, killed the
horses pulling the wagon, so it could not be taken as booty and the black
hearts ruined it instead of leaving anything of value behind. Maria lacked the
ability or inclination to dig so many graves but thought burning the corpses
preferable to having them picked apart by scavengers.

As she moved amongst them, she saw a corpse
appear to be moving. She investigated and saw an infant, barely alive, under an
old woman’s body. She apparently died trying to shield the babe. Maria grabbed
the infant up and held her and the child awoke and began a terrible loud cry.
She was dehydrated and hungry and would likely not have lived another hour had
Maria not discovered the terrible site.

She made a camp upwind of her makeshift pyre
and thought hard about how to get something into the infant’s body, as the
child was yet too young to do anything but suckle. Maria soaked her scarf and
placed it into the babe’s mouth and the child sucked it with abandon. This
worked and she continued this way for more than an hour. At least now she was
hydrated a little, but Maria knew the child needed milk. She needed to get her
to someone who was nursing or at least to someone with goat or cow’s milk.

She looked up at the sky and figured she still
had a few hours of daylight. She thought hard about what to do. She’d seen no
one in the past full day. Uncle Alejandro’s ranch was too far. She looked at
the little one who was so exhausted from all the work at extracting the water
from the scarf that she had fallen back to sleep.

There was nothing for it and Maria soon
realized that the bandits were the only hope, the only salvation for this
little one. She walked Alanza down the trail, after the bad men. Judging from
the fire and how much it had consumed of the wagon, she figured they were not
more than ten miles or so away. The captives were likely traveling on foot and
this would slow them significantly.

Maria pulled a rebozo from her pack and
fashioned a sling. The babe rode across her chest, her tiny face pressed
against Maria’s breast. She could feel the baby breathing; it was a good
feeling. She could not help but remember her own dear Rosario who’d not made it
so far. She wondered at that. Wondered if this is what it would have felt like,
what it would have been like if her own little one had lived.

The babe awoke crying and Maria was impressed
with how loud such a little package could scream. This would not do. It would
not be possible to sneak up on the bandits with a crying baby and she thought
hard about what to do. Maria had nothing for a baby. She had water and mescal
to drink. She had beans and jerky and a few tortillas to eat. She had many good
cigars from Uncle Alejandro, but she had no milk or nipples or nursing bottles.

She had a thought and offered her a breast. The
child took it and worked at it like a ravenous little beast and Maria
immediately had her doubts. It was as if a rattler had taken hold of her nipple
and she was not certain any of this was good for either one of them. But
eventually the poor child settled down and resolved to suckle for comfort
rather than sustenance, as if the little one knew this was the best her savior
could offer for now. They both were able to relax, Maria riding a little more
quickly and the babe quietly falling into a world somewhere between slumber and
wakefulness.

Maria leaned forward a little in the saddle to
ensure that her sombrero shaded the child in the late day sun. She, too, became
a little dreamy, drifting off as she let Alanza take them to the bad men. She
was now in a world with her little Rosario, the suckling babe triggering the
primordial bond, the longing and the ache deep in the pit of Maria’s womb, the
instinctive happiness only known by a mother with her suckling babe.

It would be dark soon and Maria looked a little
odd, a scout peering from the scrub in her vaquero outfit, wrapped in her red
rebozo with a babe latched to her bosom.

She hauled out her fancy rifle and looked
through the telescopic sight. She could see them all well enough. There were
four women and three girls. There were four bandits. She moved and the baby
became unlatched and began to cry. Maria ran back to Alanza. This would not do.
She could not kill all the bad men in this state and she could not leave the
infant alone. Something would have to be done.

When it was fully dark she snuck up on the
camp. The bandits had the hostages tied together in a group. They tied them
with rope at the neck and had kept them without food or water. This was done to
make them more easily controllable.

Maria picked out the infant’s mother
immediately. The poor woman was in a daze. She stared at nothing. Her dress
front was wet, her leaking breasts adding to her discomfort and pain.

Maria looked at the bandits having a good time.
They were getting drunk now and paid no attention to the hostages at all. They
knew that the desert was a perfect prison. Escape was futile.

Maria moved fast. She snuck in and cut the rope
from the woman’s neck. She held her finger to her lips and commanded all of
them to be quiet and they complied. She grabbed the woman by the hand and
pulled her along. Once they were a hundred feet away, she pulled the baby from
her breast and handed her to her mother.

“Here, lady. Take your baby. She’s a little
beast!” She smiled and tucked herself back into her blouse. “Ay chingao, she
has eaten them, I think.”

The woman looked at Maria and then at her baby.
She was convinced that the child was gone into the Great Beyond, and seemed
unable to fully grasp what was happening. She pressed the infant to her breast
and the child went to work. They made it to Alanza and sat down.

The woman looked at Maria, who did not look
much different from the bandits. She was afraid of her and did not speak.

Maria lit a cigar and gave the woman her water
gourd. She handed her some jerky and the woman ate. “Danke.” The woman bowed
her head then regarded the baby. She switched breasts and was feeling better as
the pressure was finally relieved.

Maria looked the woman over. She did not
understand her strange words. She resolved to ask her questions in English.
“You are not an American?”

“Deutsch.” The woman hesitated. “German. I,
German.”

Maria considered her. She was a big woman with
pale skin and brown hair. She did not look like any person Maria had ever seen.
Maria smoked and watched the woman with her baby and thought it a good idea to
give her a little mescal. The German took it and drank, coughed a little and
smiled. “Gut. Danke, eh…thank you.”

And now Maria had a chance to try her English
some more. “Lady. Tomorrow, we will get the rest. You sleep now. It will be all
good tomorrow. I promise.”

The German understood and settled down to rest,
the infant cradled in her arms. The baby was content and quiet and, as Maria
drifted off, she could hear the woman softly crying. Maria was happy. She
shifted a little and reached inside her shirt. She held her hand up, certain it
would be full of blood. Her nipples were sore, but intact. She smiled and
muttered to herself as she shook her head, “Little beast.”

The first bandit’s head came apart and even
Maria was impressed with the rifle’s awesome power. She quickly worked the next
bullet into the chamber and hit the next man a little low, tearing a hole
through his throat at the Adam’s apple, shattering the vertebrae and making the
man’s head tip as if he’d fallen asleep. He dropped down next to his mount.

The other two finally realized they were under
attack and took up defensive positions. The shooter was too far away to see and
they did not know where to hide. She hit the next man in the back and his
breastbone exploded, but the shot did not kill him outright. Great gouts of
blood squirted with every beat of his heart. He sat and watched it until he
died.

The last one had had enough. He threw himself
on his horse and rode as hard as he could into the desert. Maria was right
behind him on Alanza. She’d put the big rifle away. She quickly caught up with
the man, who was completely panicked and firing his six shooter wildly over his
shoulder. He just wanted to get away.

Maria was amused by this and equally angry.
There was no sin worse, to her, than to abuse a baby or a child and she
resolved to make the bad man pay. She galloped up alongside him and he pointed
his six shooter at her. She was so close that even a scared bandit couldn’t
miss and he pulled the trigger as Maria smiled at him.