El Paso: A Novel (43 page)

“We’re headed that way. He’ll come with us. Doc’ll see to him. He knows about these things.” Villa had his back to Bierce and there was a tone in the general’s voice that indicated he was not in a mood for discussion.

“What does the doctor say about it?” Bierce continued.

“Nothing,” Villa replied, walking off toward his tent.

Tom Mix had told the cook to make up some sort of beef broth and he brought a bowl of it to Katherine to give to Tim.

“I’m sorry about this,” he said. “It’s one of those things out here. He’ll be okay. Doc knows what he’s doing.”

“He’ll die, or lose his arm,” Katherine said icily. She had lifted Timmy’s head a bit and was able to force a little of the broth between his lips. She was exhausted and had only slept a few hours at a time since the incident. It seemed like years since their capture; she’d made a calendar and kept notes in it. It was just a few weeks till her thirteenth birthday. Her parents had promised her a big party. and now here she was, almost getting used to things, bad as they were.

“Look, the general isn’t going to let anything happen to your brother. I promise you,” Mix said.

“How do you know that? You said you just do what you’re told. If you were a real man, you would set us free.”

Mix had no answer for this. Something in him told him she was in the right. For the past several weeks Mix had begun to feel he had taken a wrong turn when he joined Villa, and had begun to think of getting away.

Reed and Bierce had been seated on a log by the fire, listening to the conversation. Bierce started to interrupt but decided against it. He understood that the girl was upset, and there was no good reason to make it worse. He got up and went to his place at another campfire. Reed followed him. This was a miserable situation and he thought the old man might have an idea.

“Here,” Katherine said, handing Mix back the bowl of broth. Timmy had gotten down all he could.

“Like I said, it’s going to be all right.”

Katherine lay down next to Timmy and pulled her blanket over herself, turning away from the fire, but not to sleep. With her eyes shut, she could hear the horses snorting, tethered in the woods. Her heart felt gripped and she wanted to cry but forced herself not to.

“YOU KNOW, ROBINSON, IF I WERE YOU,
I’d be a little careful how you speak with Villa. He’s known to have a temper,” Reed said when they were out of earshot of the camp.

“So I’ve heard,” Bierce replied.

“Well, sometimes you seem to be trying to provoke him,” Reed continued. They had sat down on some rocks in the darkness. The wind had come up again, a little chilly. Bierce adjusted his hat to keep his head warm. He knew from experience that when your head gets cold, everything in your body gets cold. He hadn’t expected cold in Mexico.

“How’s that?”

“Arguing with him. I think there’s a point when he might explode. He’s got a lot on his mind.”

“Obviously it’s not about that boy,” Bierce shot back. “That boy’s in trouble, and you damn well know it.”

“Sure I do, but there’s nothing we can do about it.”

“Not while Villa is holding him for ransom,” Bierce said.

“What makes you say that?” said Reed.

“You know good and well that’s what he’s doing. He doesn’t have those kids along for their safety—I don’t care what he says. He’s famous for kidnapping people, and from what I understand of it, their family’s got a hay load of money.”

“Yes, the Shaughnessys,” Reed said patronizingly, “they own railroads.”

“Exactly,” said Bierce.

“And from what the girl says,” Reed continued, “they own a huge chunk of Mexico, too, which I expect they got for practically nothing and enslave the peons on it.”

“There’s no slavery in Mexico,” Bierce reminded him.

“There’s about the same thing when you have an entire class of people dependent on one big landholder.”

“Why, Mr. Reed, you sound like a socialist.”

“I am,” Reed said proudly as he stood up and dusted the seat of his trousers.

Way back at the tail end of the caravan, Johnny Ollas and his people huddled around their fire, too. A cold wind was whipping in from the northeast and they were camped in an unsheltered meadow with the herd. Clouds had moved across the sky, blotting the tops of the mountain peaks, and gauzy mists began to descend. A pall of despondence had hung over them since the death of Rigaz, and Johnny knew the deeper they went into the Sierra Madre wastelands, the harder it would be to rescue Donita.

“I’ve got to make his ear twitch,” Johnny said glumly. Julio, Luis, and Rafael knew what he meant, but Gourd Woman didn’t.

“I bet his ears would twitch to hear you talking now,” she said.

“Just get him in his
querencia
,” Johnny continued. “I can’t kill him now, I know that. It would probably be too difficult. But I think I saw something that day when Rigaz died, when he came up and found out about that fighting bull. It was a look in his eyes; the way Villa was looking around at everything, talking about an old man on a horse, like deep down he’s scared of something.”

“Like he seen a ghost maybe,” Julio said.

“He ain’t expecting it from the inside,” Johnny said. “I imagine he’s always expecting it from the outside. And I sure don’t think he’s expecting it from us. So I think maybe we give it to him both ways. It has to be a perfect thing.”

“You got an idea, then, boss?” Rafael asked.

“Not exactly, but soon,” Johnny replied. “May be anytime.”

“So you gonna fight him like in a bullring or something, then?” said Gourd Woman.

“Yeah, like I told you, it’s the only way I know how.” It would have to be a neat trick, Johnny knew, but if he could taunt Villa, drive him crazy, then the general might become so enraged that he would charge straight and blind like he was in traces. That’s when the chance would come.

FOR THE NEXT WEEK VILLA’S TROOPS CLIMBED UPWARD
until they were in the high sierras where the air was thin and the pines and firs sparser, and a few times it began to snow. Several times they spotted bear sign, and once someone reported a mountain lion. Surprisingly, Timmy’s arm began to improve. It might have been the clear, thin air, or the drugs and potions the doctor was administering, or perhaps the venom had simply run its course, but finally he was able to sit up and take food, and his spirits improved; and so, likewise, did Katherine’s. Villa had brought along with his caravan half a dozen of his fighting cocks, which rode in cages in the back of one of the ammunition wagons. He’d also brought along a cage of hens to keep the cocks happy, and each morning he made sure that eggs from these were sent to Mix so that Katherine, Timmy, and Donita could have them at breakfast.

In the evenings after they camped Villa paid visits to Timmy to check on his condition, and by the week’s end he and Timmy were playing checkers together. Villa was an excellent checkers player and never lost, which, considering he was a grown man playing against an injured nine-year-old boy, made Katherine angry. She’d watched Tom Mix also play checkers with Timmy and noted that he always managed to lose about half the time. Finally, one evening she said to the general:

“Anybody can play checkers, but chess takes real skill and brains.”

If this brazen declaration had any effect on Villa he did not show it, but merely replied, “Yes, I have seen them play chess. It looks interesting—perhaps you can teach me?”

Katherine was secretly glad, because her father had taught her to play chess from the age of seven and she was quite good at the game. Might be, she thought, that somehow she could get Villa to bet with her and, if she played her board right, maybe even win their freedom. At least it was something to hang on to.

Afterward, every evening Villa would appear at their fireside, reeking of perfume and often in clothes scrubbed fresh in a mountain stream, his face shiny and shaven clean except for the big bushy mustache. He’d had one of his crew make a chessboard and ordered him to carve out wooden chessmen based on drawings Katherine had made. But for the time being they played with tree leaves that Katherine had cut up for players. Villa was having trouble remembering all the moves of the different chessmen, so Katherine drew a board out on a piece of paper and drew the players in, writing notations on how they functioned. Villa glanced at it, folded it once, smiled embarrassedly, and put it in his pocket.

“I think I do better if you just show me,” he said.

Finally, after a few days of Katherine explaining the rules and moves, they were ready for the first match. Naturally, it was not much of a contest; Villa still didn’t understand the movement of the knights and often let his castles and bishops be taken. Katherine checkmated him five times both before and after supper. But Villa was good-natured about it all and, uncharacteristically to anyone who had known him for long, even seemed to delight in losing.

“Beautiful little señorita,” he would bellow, “you are too smart for me, I think!”

Despite herself, Katherine enjoyed the games, not only because she won, but because she sensed it somehow gave her leverage against Villa. But there was something else, too, that both agitated and startled her—she began to sense that Villa was overly interested in her, but she had no idea what to make of that.

But she did have an idea about the chess. One day she let herself be checkmated. Villa was happy as a child and whooped and hollered and called for all those within earshot to come and look at how he had beaten the smart, beautiful señorita. Shrewdly, Katherine won the next three games, but each time allowed Villa to take a few more pieces before losing.

Finally, she said, “General, why not place a bet on the game? My father and I would do that.”

Villa looked surprised. “And what would you and your father bet?”

“We started at five cents a game—up to a quarter a match.”

His eyes widened. “Why, señorita, that’s gambling!” he said with mock piety.

“It was only between Papa and me,” Katherine replied.

“Well, do you have a quarter?” Villa asked.

“No,” said Katherine, “but there are other things.”

Villa’s eyes widened further. “Yes?”

“Clothes,” she said. “I need a new set of riding breeches. And it’s cold now and Timmy and I both need clothes for that. Not just those castoffs you have given us.”

“What? A tailor is what you want?”

“Well, if I win—something like that.”

“And if
I
win?”

“I will sing and play for you, as soon as you can find a piano,” Katherine said slyly. She had thought the thing out for several days. The notion of a piano might bring them closer to civilization.

“A piano!” cried the general. “Now, where would I find such a thing in these mountains?”

“Well, can’t we go to a city? Or if not, I’ll sing anyway. People say I have a pleasing voice.”

Pancho Villa rose from the chessboard and dusted his pants. “You will sing for me, huh? Maybe I like that. It would be nice. Nobody sings for me much anymore. Do you know ‘La Cucaracha’?”

“No,” she said, “but I know some Victor Herbert tunes. Mama and Papa won’t let me sing them at home, but I learned them at school.”

“I don’t know this Victor,” said Pancho Villa, “but we will see.”

“Only if you win,” Katherine replied.