The Adventurers (8 page)

Papa Grande started for me but my father pushed me behind him. "He is my son," he said in that same quiet voice. "I will not let him remain. He will be used as a hostage against me should the army come. It is safer for him in the mountains."

"Sangre negra!" my grandfather spit out at him. "Black blood! The son of the son of slaves! Lowest of the low! I thought you a man or I would not have permitted your marriage to my daughter. Now I see that I was wrong. There is no depth to which you would not sink to abase yourself before your conquerors, just as your parents did to their masters!"

Suddenly the general was out of his chair. "Enough, old man!" he shouted.

Papa Grande looked at him as if he were dirt. "Bandolero!" The way my grandfather said it made it sound like the most obscene word I had ever heard.

The general's face went red with anger. "Basta, viejo! Is it not enough that we spare you and your property? Or are you so old that you seek death to ease the ache in your bones?"

Papa Grande ignored him. He turned to my father as if the general were not even there. "If you have any love for your son give him to me before it is too late!"

My father shook his head.

"Go!" the general ordered. "Before I lose patience and rescind the favors your son-in-law obtained for you."

Papa Grande glared at him. "I need neither your patience nor his favors. I have seen many of your kind across the years. I will live to see your head impaled on a lance as I have the others!"

He turned and marched down the steps of the galena to his horse, his back stiff and proud, his suit white as the snow on top of the mountains. He mounted and wheeled his horse around. "The army will come, and then we shall see how brave you are!"

Then he looked at me and his voice softened. "Good-bye, my grandson," he said sadly. "Already I mourn for you."

He gave the horse its head and galloped away. I looked after him; the horse kicked up small clouds of dust from the hard-packed earth of the road until they were out of sight. I turned to Papa whose eyes had a hint of sadness in them, almost like that I had seen in Papa Grande's. Suddenly he lifted me into his arms and held me tight against him. "My son, my son," he whispered. "I pray to God that I do right for you!"

The general clapped his hands sharply, and a man came running across the road. He was a big man, the fattest I had ever seen, yet he ran with a peculiar grace and lightness and swiftness that reminded me of the big wild goats I had seen leaping from crag to crag in the mountains. His hat was already in his hand. "Si, excelencia?"

"Gato Gordo," the general said, "get your gear together and take this boy with you back into the mountains. I charge you with his care. I will hold you alone responsible if anything happens to him."

"Si, excelencia." The man bowed and turned to look at me. "The boy is ready to travel?" he asked politely.

My father looked at the general. "Must it be now?"

The general nodded. "The danger increases each day."

Slowly my father put me down. "Go inside and have Sarah pack your clothes."

"Yes, Father," I said dutifully. I started for the door.

"Make haste, nino," Gato Gordo called after me. "It is best we are in the mountains when night falls."

I was too shy to speak to him then, but later that night when a keening animal woke me from my sleep, I crawled, shivering, to him across the icy mountain ground. "Tengo miedo, Gato Gordo," I whispered.

He put his hand over mine. "Hold my hand, child," he said reassuringly, "and I will take you safely through the mountains."

Secure in the warmth of his touch, I closed my eyes and drifted right back into sleep.

But that was more than two years ago and now the sun was clear on the valley and I could see almost across it. I stood up in the stirrups, feeling a kind of excitement rise inside me. It had been a long time since I had been home. Papa Grande would be glad that he didn't have to mourn for me after all.

CHAPTER 9

We had been traveling the road down the mountain for only a few minutes when Manuelo suddenly held up his hand. We stopped as he leaped from his horse and placed his ear against the hard-packed road. He listened intently for a moment, then raised his head. "Gato Gordo," he called, "come listen."

Fat Cat joined him on the ground. Suddenly they were both up and back on their horses. "We must get off the road and hide," Manuelo said. "There is the sound of many horses coming up the road."

Fat Cat looked around. "The mountainside is naked."

"We must go back up then," Manuelo said quickly, turning his horse.

I had played in these hills since I had been a little boy. "Down the road just around the bend there is a small clump of trees. Behind it is a cave. We can hide there."

"Is it big enough for the horses?"

"I heard Papa say once that it was big enough for an army."

"Make haste then," Manuelo said. "We follow."

I let loose the rein on my pony, and we galloped on toward the bend in the road. The clump of trees was there just as I had remembered. I turned my pony off the road and up through the trees to the mouth of the cave. "Estamos aqui," I said.

Manuelo was off his horse in a second. "You and Roberto take the horses back into the cave!" he ordered. "The others come with me. We must cover our tracks from the road!"

They slid out of their saddles as Roberto and I gathered up the reins and led the horses into the cave. At first they whinnied and shied from the darkness but we talked soothingly to them and after a few moments they quieted. Roberto put a loop through their reins and tied them to a boulder, and we ran back to the entrance.

Fat Cat and Santiago the Older were backing toward us through the trees, sweeping the ground with branches. Manuelo and the younger Santiago were setting up one of the tommy guns on its tripod. When it was assembled they picked it up and ran back to the mouth of the cave.

When Fat Cat and the older Santiago were finished, they nodded with satisfaction at the gun. Fat Cat plumped himself down behind it and squinted along the sights with approval.

Manuelo gestured to the younger Santiago. "Up into the trees. Cover us with your rifle if there is trouble."

Santiago was settled among the branches almost before the order was completed. The leaves quivered for a moment as he disappeared from sight.

Manuelo looked at us two boys. "You, back into the cave."

Before we could protest Fat Cat held up his hand. We stood very still, listening. The heavy drum of hoofbeats was clear now. "There are more than twenty," he said, his hand gesturing for us to lie down.

Manuelo went to his hands and knees and crept out toward the road. At the edge of the clump of trees I could see the back of his head as he raised himself to peer down. I tried to look past him to the road but it was hidden by the dipping curve of the mountainside.

The hoofbeats grew louder and Manuelo's head disappeared. The sound rose from the road directly in front of us, then it passed and began to grow fainter.

Manuelo came running back. "Cavalry," he said. "A whole troop! I counted thirty-four."

Fat Cat's lips pursed. "What are they doing here? El militar was not reported in Bandaya."

Manuelo shrugged. "They are here."

There was the distant sound of a bugle, then silence. Manuelo listened for a moment more, then sat down behind the machine gun and lit a cigarrillo. His eyes were thoughtful.

"Hola, Younger!" he called in a low penetrating voice. "What do you see?"

The voice came back muffled by the leaves. "Nothing. The road it is clear."

"Not the road, you fool! The valley."

There was a silence, then the voice came again. "There is smoke rising into the air but it is too far to tell what is burning."

"Can you see anything else?"

"No. Shall I come down now?"

"Stay there!"

"My cojones are sore from straddling this branch."

Fat Cat laughed. "It isn't the branch that your cojones are sore from." He turned to Manuelo. "What do you think?"

"I don't know," Manuelo answered thoughtfully. "It could have been a raiding party passing through the valley."

"What now?" Fat Cat asked. "Do we go home?"

"Guns are a poor substitute for meat."

"But if there are soldiers in the valley—"

Manuelo interrupted. "We do not know that there are. The only ones we saw were riding away."

Fat Cat was silent. Santiago the Older came over and sat down opposite him. They sat there silently staring at one another.

I felt a pressure in my kidneys. "I have to pee." I went over to a tree to relieve myself. A moment later Roberto joined me. We stood there side by side, the two yellow streams arcing golden in the sunlight. I looked at his with satisfaction. Maybe he was older but I could pee farther. He didn't seem to notice. I was just about to call his attention to it when the stream trickled off. I buttoned my fly and returned to the mouth of the cave.

The three men were still sitting silently around the machine gun. Manuelo pinched out his cigarrillo and carefully stored the butt in his pocket. "There is only one way to find out. One of us must go down into the valley."

"If there are more militares it will be dangerous."

"It will be more dangerous if we return home without meat, or without making sure we could obtain none," Manuelo replied.

"True." Fat Cat nodded. "They would not like that."

"Not at all," Santiago the Older added. "They will be hungry-"

Both men stared at him in surprise. It was rare for the Indian to speak.

Manuelo turned back to Fat Cat. "You will go." "Me?" Fat Cat exclaimed. "Why me?"

"You have been in this valley before. None of the rest of us has. So it is logical that you should go."

"But I was there only one day," Fat Cat protested. He gestured toward me. "Then the general sent me back with him."

Manuelo looked at me. "Do you remember the valley?"

"Si."

"How far is it from here to your hacienda?"

"One and a half hours by horse."

"On foot?" he asked. "A horse would attract too much attention."

"Three, maybe four hours."

Manuelo made up his mind. "You will take the boy with you. He can serve as your guide."

Fat Cat grumbled. "At least we should take the horses. You know how difficult it is for me to walk. Besides, I have a feeling it is too dangerous. We shall be killed."

Manuelo got to his feet. "In that case you will not need the horses," he said with finality. "Vaya!"

Fat Cat got to his feet and reached for his rifle.

"Leave it!" Manuelo said sharply. "And hide your pistol under your shirt. Then if you pass anyone on the road you are nothing but a poor campesino and his son on your way to Bandaya. If they see you with a rifle they will shoot first and ask questions afterward."

Fat Cat didn't look happy. "How long will you wait for us?"

Manuelo looked at him. I watched him calculating. He glanced up at the sun, then back at Fat Cat. "It is now roughly eight o'clock. If the boy is right you should reach the hacienda by noon. We will wait until nightfall. If you are not back by then, we start for home."

Fat Cat stared at him without complaint. Each knew what the other was thinking. Had the situation been reversed Manuelo would have reacted the same way. It was one of the conditions of life.

Fat Cat turned to me. "Come on, boy. Apparently it has also become my duty to return you home."

"My cojones are killing me!" The younger Santiago's voice was almost a wail from the tree.

Fat Cat looked up, smiling wickedly. "Too bad," he called.

"Perhaps you would like it better if you could join us for this little walk?"

The sun stood almost at the center of the heavens as we hid in the cane field and stared across the road. The barn and the kitchen had been burned to the ground. I could feel the heat from the charred timbers against my face. There was a sickness clutching in my stomach.

I got to my feet. Fat Cat's hand pulled me down. "Be still! There still may be some of them around!"

I stared at him as if he were someone I had never seen before. "They tried to burn my house."

He didn't answer. His eyes squinted up and down the deserted road. Then he looked at me. "That's why your father sent you to the mountains," he said gruffly.

"If he knew, he should have let me stay," I cried. "I wouldn't have let them burn the hacienda!"

"They would have burned it and you too," Fat Cat said matter-of-factly. He got to his feet. "Come. Maybe we learn something."

I followed him across the road. Halfway between the road and the house we came upon a body. It was lying face down in the dirt. Fat Cat turned it over. He looked down and spat. "Campesino!" he said contemptuously.

I recognized him. It was old man Sordes, who did the gardening and tended the flowers around the house. I told Fat Cat.

He spat again. "Just as well," he said noncommittally. "He would have been out of a job anyway."

We walked on toward the house. The galeria was gone too. It seemed to have collapsed into the cellar. I could feel the heat more intensely now.

Fat Cat reached out with his foot and kicked a timber. It fell away from the frame and down into the cellar. Almost instantly a sheet of flame licked up from below.

We walked around the house toward the back.

"Maybe someone is still down in the cellar," I said to Fat Cat.

"If they are, they're well cooked."

It wasn't until we came to the clump of trees that stood between the house and the barn that we saw the two women. They had been lashed to a tree trunk, back to back, and they

stared back at us with sightless eyes. One of them I recognized. It was Sarah, the cook. The other I had never seen before.

They had been stripped naked and their bodies were covered with countless tiny cuts in which the blood had dried and caked. Already the ants had climbed up.

"This one is Sarah," I said, "the one who packed my bag."

Fat Cat stared at her. "La India?"