The Vanquished (24 page)

Lorenzo Rodriguez sat in the dim corner of the cantina and admired the whore who sat at the table with him, a flower in her hair. The
alcalde
came in and went immediately to Rodriguez's table and, ignoring the woman, said, “I have organized the noncombatants in their houses with provisions.”

“Good,” Rodriguez said. The
alcalde
stood hesitantly until Rodriguez waved his hand. “You had better get to a safe place, amigo. The filibusters are not far from town.”

“Then why do you sit here?”

“It does not pay to hurry,” Rodriguez said mildly. “They will be along presently. My scouts keep me informed. Go, now.”

The
alcalde
said, “Is there nothing else I can do? I used to be a good shot.”

“Post yourself on the square, then, with a musket.”

“I will.” The
alcalde
left. Rodriguez met the
puta's
yellow-toothed smile and touched the flower in her hair. He was thinking of his wife in Hermosillo and wondering with what wealthy
don
she had slept the night past. He thought of his genteel life there and of the sordid dimness of this little cantina, smelling of stale beer and tequila and mescal and tobacco smoke, but mostly of beer. He said, “Marguerita.”

“
Sí, patrón?
”

“I hope we are able to defeat the filibusters promptly. It would be unfortunate if Gabilondo arrived in time to take over. I want the credit for this victory to myself. It will make them look up to me in Hermosillo and in Ures. I will earn a promotion. No longer will they think of me as a ydung playboy using the sword as his toy. I do not play at being a soldier, Marguerita.”

“No.”

“I am a good soldier. I shall prove it to them.”

“Of course,” she said. He ignored the brittle calculated quality of her smile.

The
comisario
came in wheezing. “Is it true? Are they advancing on us, the filibusters?”

“Of course it is true,” Rodriguez said, looking on the man with cool contempt.

The
comisario
looked flabbergasted. “And yet you sit here sipping beer and entertaining this whore?”

“She needs no entertainment,” Rodriguez said imperturbably. “On the contrary, good
comisario
, she entertains me, you see.” He smiled.

“Fool,” shouted the
comisario
. “Do something!”

“What would you have me do?”

The
comisario
pounded his fist into his palm. His cheeks seemed about to explode. It was quite comical, Rodriguez-thought. The
comisario
was just like an actor out of the opera at Hermosillo, playing a comic part. Rodriguez slipped his fingers along the soft round heaviness of the woman's arm and said, “Perhaps you would have me go out on the plaza and make great speeches to my men, telling them how it is their patriotic duty to fight and die for their country. Is that it,
comisario?
”

The
comisario
seemed to be purpling. Rodriguez chuckled. “Calm yourself,” he said. “Go home and lock your door.”

The
comisario
looked away and wrung his hands and slowly shuffled away. Rodriguez laughed. He squeezed the
puta's
arm and drank the last of his beer and said to her, “I shall return presently, Marguerita,” and left the cantina.

Sunlight made him squint. Lieutenant Corella, who was a stocky man from the mines of the Arizpe district and currently Rodriguez's second-in-command, trotted across the square on his horse and saluted lazily. “They are still six miles out,” he said. “There is no cover out there to surround them from. When they come a couple of miles closer, perhaps we can set up an ambuscade in the thickets.”

“I will think on it,” Rodriguez said. “Put your horse up. Whatever we do, it will be an infantry operation. We haven't enough horses to mount the men.”

Corella saluted again and went away. Rodriguez looked around. All seemed satisfactory. Armed men were posted all along the plaza—in doorways, in windows, on roofs, at corners. Rodriguez smiled, knowing that his smile of confidence would give them heart. Throwing his chest out, he took a deep breath and patted the revolver at his side. He decided to set up an ambush where the road came up to the outskirts of town, between two wheat fields.

During the brief rest halt, Crabb spoke to the men. Charley sat on a rock and listened. Crabb was talking of the provisions to be had in Caborca and of the prospects of soon meeting up with General Cosby's army somewhere on the river below. The men listened with polite interest. The fiery spirit that had blazed in them on the night of Crabb's speech at Sonoyta was reduced by now to an ill-fed flicker; once again they were footsore and weary and resentful of the unfriendly treatment they had been accorded at the hands of the few Mexicans they had met along the way. Charley sensed a feeling of uncertainty that grew and growled among the men. They were here now; this was the promised land. But threats of violence lay around them in the barren open stretches of the land and in the uncompromising hatred they met everywhere in the faces of Mexican people. Gringo travelers had instilled in them that hostility; it had not been uncommon for Americans, traveling through this country on their way west, to raid farms, rape daughters, steal, and burn.

All around, at varying distances, lifted round ridges and barren mountains. Vegetation here was only slightly more rich than it had been in the border country to the north. Creosote remained the principal ground-cover; the soil was still tan and powdery. But ahead of them to the left of a low hill was a dense pattern of dark green that marked the irrigated fields and tree-tops of Caborca town. Yucca stalks, maguey, ocotillo, manza-nita—the various shrubs and strange cacti of the desert dotted everything in sight. Lizards and gophers were plentiful, the latter chiefly evident by the holes they left treacherously in the ground.

John Edmonson said, when Crabb had finished his speech-making, “I'd hoped for more than this.”

Charley nodded his agreement. It seemed a spare, poor place after all the promises they had heard. “This isn't the mining country,” Charley said. “The mines are up in the mountains, I hear, where there's a lot of timber.”

“Timber,” Edmonson said. “I'd like to see that. I wonder how far it is?”

Norval Douglas came trotting back from his advance position and stepped down to confer with Crabb. Then McCoun gave the order to form up, and they began to march forward. Douglas rode with Crabb and McCoun. Presently they came upon a dusty rutted road and turned toward town. The sun seemed particularly savage. In front of Charley walked Samuel Kimmel and Bill Randolph. Jim Woods was behind Charley and now and then Charley could hear the ex-saloonkeeper's caustic commentary on the country they passed through. “Give me hell,” Woods said drily. Up front on horseback, Captain McDowell's beard showed livid red when he turned to look back. Walls of palm trees closed down on the road and then, ahead, the trees stopped and the road traveled between two fields high with uncut wheat. Beyond that were the first buildings of the town's edge. Walking down this path between the orderly rows of palms, Charley was reminded of boyhood and shady lanes among the willows in the bayou country.

The front of the column left the palm-bordered area and moved up between the wheat fields, and in that instant a man in uniform stepped out of the wheat into the leaders' path and held up his hand. The man carried a carbine in his fist.

The column halted. Charley stood looking ahead with curiosity, craning his neck to look around Bill Randolph's big shape. The Mexican was talking insistently, gesturing emphatically with his hands. Crabb was shaking his head. Norval Douglas was with them, apparently-translating back and forth from English to Spanish. The Mexican waved threateningly with his rifle; in answer, Crabb drew his revolver and pointed it at the Mexican. Charley heard Edmonson voicing what was in everyone's mind: “I wonder what the devil they're talking about.”

“Looks like a Mex officer to me,” someone said.

“Maybe they're afraid we're going to loot the town or something.”

“That might not be too bad an idea,” Jim Woods said. “I've had just about enough of their sneers.”

At that moment the Mexican drew back, evidently rebuffed by something Crabb had said; his back stiff, the Mexican turned toward the silent wheat fields and shouted what sounded like a command.

The sound of a single gunshot cut off the Mexican's shout directly in its middle. The Mexican collapsed on the ground. Crabb was standing over him; Crabb's gun was smoking. Charley stared at the form of the Mexican, crumpled and small in the road. “Holy Jesus,” someone muttered in an awed tone of voice. “What the hell did he do that for?”

Then gunfire erupted from the wheat fields.

Up front, men wheeled and broke in confusion. Charley saw Crabb running back toward the palms, McCoun at his heels. For a brief span of time, Norval Douglas and Captain McDowell held their ground, firing revolvers into the swaying stalks of wheat; then they too whirled back toward the protection of the thick-trunked palms. Stunned men stood frozen by the abruptness of it. Muzzle flashes bloomed from the wheat fields; as if from a distance, Charley heard the boom of musket shots. All around him men swung in turmoil. He snapped his jaw shut and made an awkward dive toward the side of the road, and rolled behind the cover of a tree trunk. The dive took the wind out of him. When he caught his breath he looked around him and saw that no one remained on the road.

A swarm of men issued from the wheat fields on both sides of the road and ran forward shooting. In the confusion Charley was mainly aware of the rising stink of powdersmoke and the wild shouts of men and the improbable loudness of the massed gunfire. Then he realized that men all about him were shooting back. He groped for the rifle, swung it off his shoulder and yanked the big hammer back to full cock. He pointed it into the approaching mass of arms and legs and guns, and pulled the trigger.

It was inhumanly stupid, the way the Mexicans advanced in a tight-packed body along the twin ruts of the road. “Stupid—stupid—stupid,” the words kept echoing in his mind and he realized he was shouting aloud. Men to either side of him had settled down coolly, picking targets. Charley fumbled with the ramrod and then flung it down in disgust, picking up his revolver and firing six shots at the Mexicans, each shot on the heels of the last. He heard men cursing at the tops of their voices. Mexicans were dropping in unbelievable numbers; and in a very short time the cluster of men broke, weaved, and tumbled back. Stupidly, they did not get out of the road; they ran straight down the ruts. A few of them dived aside into the concealment of the wheat fields, but until they ran beyond rifle range there was a mass of targets for the gringos' percussion guns.

A sudden stillness settled down. Something was hissing in his ears—the ringing aftermath of gunfire. The town ahead was quiet. The body of the Mexican officer lay not far away where Crabb had shot him; beyond that on the road were the sprawled corpses of men. One of them was crawling very slowly toward the wheat fields. Charley saw Bill Randolph lift his gun and shoot that man. After that there were no more shots. The bodies in the road were riddled with bullets. Charley looked around and saw no dead men among the Americans; he did not even see any wounds.

Someone said, “My God—My God.” It was old John Edmonson, lying behind a palm. His gun had not been fired.

Acrid sulphur fumes filled Charley's nostrils. Mechanically, because he saw others doing it, he reloaded his rifle and revolver. There was the sound of retching somewhere behind him. He did not turn to look. Ahead, General Crabb stepped out into the road and lifted both arms over his head. “Gather round me,” he shouted.

Men crawled out of the ditches and out from behind trees and walked warily down the road, eyes and guns trained on the wheat fields. Nothing stirred there; it was evident the Mexicans had broken and retreated to town. Charley got up and found his legs unsteady. He took an uncertain step forward and saw Edmonson still lying behind the tree, not moving, staring at the earth under his face. Charley walked to him and stooped. “Are you hurt?”