The Last Ranch (37 page)

***

B
y the start of the Christmas holidays, the small horse barn and paddock Kevin had helped build was finished. Soon after the Las Cruces rodeo, Matt had driven to Mexico and purchased two stud stallions from Delfino Díaz, the owner of El Pajarito Ranch in the foothills outside the small Mormon community of Colonia Dublán. The Kerneys had done business with the Díaz family all the way back to the frontier days, when Patrick and Cal Doran
had pushed a herd of cows across the border to sell to Delfino's father, Emiliano.

El Pajarito Ranch raised some of the finest quarter horses in North America and their prize stallions were coveted by breeders on both sides of the border. After close inspection, Matt bought two horses and had been waiting impatiently for the government livestock import papers from the Department of Agriculture to arrive in the mail so he could go fetch them. The documents came two days before Christmas.

He'd brought back photographs of the horses. One was a five-year-old chestnut named Petreo and the other a six-year-old gray named Centavos. “Stony” and “Cents” had been named by Díaz's young granddaughters. Both stallions were fine-looking animals proven at stud. He was eager to have them service his mares and had already contracted with two ranchers to stand them at stud for their brood mares.

On the Monday after Christmas, Matt and Kevin left for El Pajarito towing a new two-stall horse trailer. Arriving in Las Cruces, they headed west to the town of Deming and south to the border town of Columbus. They stopped so Kevin could tour some of the few remaining buildings of old Camp Furlong, the US Customs House, and the remnants of the first combat airfield in the United States. During the Mexican Revolution, Pancho Villa and his raiders attacked the town, which later became the headquarters for General Pershing's punitive expedition into Mexico. Kevin knew about the battle from his JROTC class and planned to write about it to fulfill the military-history requirement in the spring term. For an hour, he took snapshots, made notes, poked around some adobe ruins on the outskirts of the tiny village, and made rough sketches. At a small general store he bought six postcards with neat photographs of the old camp and
airfield. Back at the truck, Matt, who was eager to collect his ponies, fired up the engine as soon as Kevin came into sight.

At the border crossing, they waited their turn to be questioned by a Mexican official who stood outside a small guard station with a sign on it warning that it was illegal to bring any kind of firearms into the country. When Matt reached the checkpoint, he presented his driver's license, proof of auto insurance, and the government papers needed to transport livestock into the United States. After inspecting the horse trailer carefully, the officer waved them through and they entered the dusty, dirt-poor town of Palomas, populated mostly by
braceros—
farm workers and their families who legally crossed into the United States at harvest time. With no one to stop them, the rest of the townspeople usually just sauntered across illegally at will. A few wealthy families in the town owned most of the businesses designed to snag US dollars from passing motorists, and they kept it all to themselves.

On the short main road through downtown they passed by a colorful array of brightly painted buildings that catered to tourists with large signs in English advertising discount prices on liquor, cigarettes, dental services, prescription drugs, handmade boots and saddles, and just about anything else you might need. Old men sat on the shady side of the street watching the traffic pass by. On dirt side streets, kids kicked soccer balls around or popped wheelies on bicycles. In front of the town grocery store, a hunchback beggar solicited change from customers. Matt told Kevin the several women loitering in front of a bar were probably in the flesh trade.

“The old-time cowboys on both sides of the border called them soiled doves,” he added.

“That sounds almost flattering,” Kevin mused.

“In a way, it was. For many of those old boys, the soiled doves
were just about the only women they knew, and they were often treated with respect.”

The houses on the outskirts of Palomas were mostly small, unfinished adobe structures or simple shacks with old tires on the roof to keep the tin sheeting from blowing away. Outside of town the land looked no different from southern New Mexico, except it was more expansive to the eye, with hints of distant mountains like vague violet specks tumbling westerly at the edge of a sea of desert grassland, dirty and pale yellow under a blue sky.

It was a good two-lane road with little traffic. About halfway to the rancho, Matt pulled off to the side of the road and they broke out the picnic lunch Mary had packed. They ate in the shade of the horse trailer under a cloudless, breezeless blue sky. The day had turned mildly hot, about ten degrees warmer than back home, and it was a welcome break from the confines of the truck. Only three vehicles passed them during the time they were stopped, all traveling south.

An hour and a half later they entered a pretty valley of farmland and orchards bisected by the Casas Grandes River and dotted with tidy houses and barns no different from the Victorian homes in the Las Cruces neighborhood where Erma lived. Settled by Mormons, the village of Colonia Dublán looked like it had been picked up intact by a Midwestern tornado and dropped gently into the valley.

Before the Mexican Revolution, Rancho Pajarito had virtually surrounded Colonia Dublán and nearby Colonia Juárez, another Mormon settlement. At its height, it embraced almost three quarters of a million acres. Now confined to mountain foothills and high pasturelands west of the villages, the Díaz family still controlled more than two hundred thousand acres. Beyond Sierra el
Pajarito, the place name taken for the ranch, the high Sierra Madres lurked to the west.

The rough and rocky road to Colonia Juárez cut through some low barren hills that gave way to an idyllic view of prosperous farms gathered along a small river that flowed downstream into the Rio Casas Grandes. They crossed it on a wooden bridge, followed a farm road through fallow fields, and climbed above the valley to a hacienda at the end of a long boulevard of bordering trees. The hacienda was long with an ornate parapet; tall, narrow windows; and massive, wooden double doors. It sat apart from a cluster of barns, paddocks, staff quarters, bunkhouses, and outbuildings—all pristine and gleaming white. Handsome ponies lounged in a nearby large fenced pasture and beyond the fence a small herd of cattle clustered near a stock tank. On the other side of the hacienda was an airstrip with an empty hangar.

Matt stopped at the ranch manager's house and was met by Claudious Whetten, also known as Claude, a Mormon whose family had worked at the rancho since before the Mexican Revolution.

Blond and blue-eyed, he spoke English and Spanish flawlessly. “Señor Díaz sends his regrets that he cannot be here,” Claude said, shaking Matt's hand. “The family traveled to Mexico City for the holidays.”

“That's perfectly understandable,” Matt said, turning to Kevin. “This is my son, Kevin.”

“
Mucho gusto
,” Kevin said.

“You speak Spanish?” Claude asked in Spanish.

“I'm hoping to get pretty good at it,” Kevin replied.

“
Que bueno
.” He switched back to English, eyeing the afternoon winter sky. “You are welcome to spend the night.”

“I appreciate the hospitality, but it's best we get back home pronto.”

Claude nodded. “I understand. You'll be on the highway before nightfall and the traffic is always light, so there should be no problem reaching the border in a few hours.”

He stepped off in the direction of the barns. “Let's go get your ponies. I just put them in their stalls and gave them oats after letting them roam in the paddock so they would not be restless on the journey to their new home.”

“That's mighty thoughtful of you,” Matt said.

Claude shrugged. “They deserve only the best treatment, which I know you will provide.”

“You can count on it,” Matt said.

At the stallion barn, Matt and Kevin looked over Petreo and Centavos before carefully loading them in the trailer. They said goodbye to Claude, who invited them back anytime, and drove down the tree-lined boulevard. A bright-orange sunset was behind them as they passed through the two Mormon settlements, reached the paved, empty highway, and turned north. An hour into the drive under a night sky and no moon, the left rear tire on the truck suddenly went flat, rubber thumping on the pavement, the rear end rattling.

The horse trailer started to fishtail but Matt slowed in time to keep from losing control and eased the truck off the road. He could hear Petreo and Centavos snorting in displeasure as he gently braked to a stop.

“Get those ponies out and hobble them while I unhitch the trailer,” he ordered Kevin. “And stay with them.”

Kevin nodded and jumped out. Matt waited until Kevin had the last pony unloaded before unhitching the trailer and pushing it back from the truck. He got the spare, fired up the
Coleman lantern, and jacked up the rear end. He was loosening the lug nuts on the flat when the sound of an approaching vehicle and headlights appeared on the roadway. He stopped and stood.

“Stay where you are,” he called to Kevin. “And only speak English if you have to speak at all.”

The vehicle pulled off the pavement, the headlights on high beam. From the outline of the vehicle, Matt could see it was a pickup truck.

“You got a flat, hombre?” a voice asked in Spanish as a truck door slammed shut.

“What's that you say?” Matt replied.

“Norte Americano?”

“Yes,” Matt replied, trying to see in the glare. Another truck door closed. Two men at least.

“You speak Spanish?”

“No.”

“Okay, I talk in English.” The man reached through the open truck window, switched the headlights to low beam, and in Spanish quickly told his partner to look into the trailer. “You got horses with you?” he asked.

A shadowy figure passed on the far side of Matt's truck. “Yes, two. They're nearby.”

“Okay, that's good. My amigo will look after them while you change the tire.”

“My son is with them.”

“
Bueno
.” In Spanish he told his partner to bring the boy to him and then switched back to English. “Nice truck.”

“Thanks.” As the man drew near, Matt knelt and tried to remain composed as he removed the lug nuts.

The man stood over him. “I think once you've changed the
tire, we're going to take your nice truck, the trailer, and your horses too.”

In the light of the Coleman lantern, the man smiled down at him with a pistol in his hand.

“Take whatever you want,” Matt replied. Footsteps made him turn to see Kevin come into view behind the horse trailer accompanied by the second man, who was apparently unarmed. He had Kevin's arm twisted behind his back. “Are you all right?” Matt asked.

Tight-lipped, Kevin nodded.

“Tell me about the
caballos
,” the
pistolero
said to his partner.

“Primo, two fine stallions from El Pajarito Rancho.”

Matt removed the last nut, pulled the tire off, and let it clatter to the ground at the
pistolero
's feet.

The man's smile widened as he poked Matt's shoulder with the barrel of his six-shooter. “Drop the tire iron.”

Matt let it go.

“Give me your wallet.”

Matt stood and handed it over.

The
pistolero
put the wallet in his shirt pocket.

“How much money?” he asked.

“About forty dollars.”

“That's good. You got papers for your horses,
jefe
?”

Matt nodded, stood, and brushed dirt off his hands. “I'll get them.”

“Send the boy.”

“He doesn't know where they are. He can put the spare on while I get the papers.”

The
pistolero
considered it, shrugged, and said in Spanish to his pal, “I'm going to kill them both anyway, so let the boy be helpful.”

Kevin's captor pushed him toward Matt. White-faced, Kevin stumbled forward.

Matt smiled reassuringly. “Put the spare on, son. It's going to be all right.”

The
pistolero
nodded. “Sure, everything is going to be okay, boy.” He waved his gun at Matt. “Okay, I follow you.”

Matt stepped to the open driver's door, reached under the bench seat, quickly unsnapped the holster to the horse pistol, turned, and shot the
pistolero
twice in the chest. Before he hit the ground, Matt fired a round in front of his amigo's feet.

“Don't move,” he said in Spanish.

The hombre raised his hands and froze. Kevin stood motionless, staring at the dead man.

“Get some rope and hog-tie him,” Matt ordered, waving the horse pistol at the startled Mexican.

Dazed, Kevin blinked. “What?”

“Hog-tie him, dammit!” Matt snapped. “Get on the ground facedown,” he ordered the man.

The man dropped to the pavement and Kevin trussed him up as tight as he could.

Matt retrieved his wallet, searched both men for identification, and found police badges on both of them.

“They're Mexican cops,” he told Kevin.

“What are we going to do?”

“Clean this mess up and go home,” Matt replied.

They worked quickly. While Kevin changed the tire, hitched the trailer, and got the ponies loaded, Matt threw the body of the dead cop and his hog-tied partner into the back of the Mexican's truck, drove a half mile into the desert, and parked behind a thicket of agave plants that partially obscured the vehicle from the highway. He dropped the police badges and the cop's pistol
on the floorboard, grabbed the Coleman lantern, rolled up the windows, got out, locked the cab, and threw the keys away.

“You're gonna leave me here?” the cop asked in Spanish.