Jim Kane - J P S Brown (51 page)

"
He said for me to tell you to take the cattle
to Chihuahua. He said he made sure the whole state of Chihuahua is
clean. The cattle won't have to be quarantined and will be able to
cross the border after a few days' rest. You aren't going to like
another bit of news Garrett said to pass on to you."

"What other bad news?"

"Garrett said for you not to draft on him for
any more money for cattle. He said to tell you he was out of money
and that you had your quota for this bunch of cattle."

"Well, if he wants them in Chihuahua to
Chihuahua they will go. At least they will go as far as I have money
to take them," Kane said. He went back into the store and sat
down with Don Marcos.

"
Don Marcos, I am embarrassed to tell you I only
have enough money to pay you for twenty-one of the thirty-six cattle
you brought," Kane said in front of Arce, Vogel, Graf, and
Brennan and got it over with. `

"
So what is your greatest problem, young man?"
Don Marcos asked calmly.

"It means I can't pay you for all your cattle. I
barely have enough money left now to take the cattle on to Chihuahua.
My problem is that I'm going to back down from receiving fifteen head
of your cattle. If you want, I'll pay the expenses of your drive from
La Haciendita and back and you can take all the cattle back."

"
You bargained for fifteen head of my cattle,
did you not?"

"
Yes," Kane said. "But I should have
made it clearer to you that I didn't want any more cattle."

"
You made it clear enough. I also told you that
I was confident you would pay me sooner or later, did I not?"

"
Yes."

"
Do you like the cattle?"

"
Yes," Kane said. "They are the best
I've seen in the Sierra."

"
Then pay me for the cattle that you are able to
pay for and take the rest
fiado
,
on my good faith and confidence. You can pay me when your patron gets
the cattle. D you think they are the kind of cattle your patron will
like?"

"
He had better like them," Kane said. Juan
Vogel, Salvador Arce, Ezequiel Graf, and Santiago Brennan all
laughed, looking at Kane, when he said this. They did not turn away
from him to laugh.

"
Then the cattle themselves will assure me of
the money. Take them," Don Marcos said.
 

27
Creel

The smoke of hundreds of forest fires palled the
Sierra Madre on the flight Kane and Vogel made with Santiago Brennan
to Creel the next day. The fires were small. The weather was dry and
windy but Vogel told Kane that the country was so steep and broken
that canyons and gorges and rocky bluffs contained the fires in small
areas until they burned themselves out.

Creel, on its high, open, rocky plain on the eastern
slope of the Sierra, was windy. A headwind buffeted the
four-passenger plane while Brennan piloted it in the approach over
the sawmill of the town, then close above the town, to the landing
strip. The headwind changed just as Brennan leveled the plane on the
edge of the strip. The wheels met the gravel of the strip sooner and
faster than Kane and Vogel would have liked. The mountains seemed
very quiet and still to Kane when he got out of the plane with his
feet on the ground.

The strip was about three miles from town and
Santiago was in a hurry to get back off the ground before the winds
got worse so Kane started walking alone toward town. He walked a half
hour before a truck loaded with lime stopped and gave him a ride.

Creel was dry with a high-altitude, choking, windy
chilliness. Its streets were potholed and eroded by winter and heavy
lumber trucks. Its buildings were small, low, featureless, and
flimsy. Kane would have bet the natives didn't sing and dance much in
Creel. He watched a tall, thin Tarahumara Indian in white breachclout
on long-thighed, undernourished, bare legs wipe his runny nose as he
walked around the corner of a building in the windy brightness of the
town.

Kane got off the truck at the main store and went
inside. A tall blond storekeeper wearing a good Stetson hat and a
holstered automatic on a clip inside his belt was behind the counter.

Kane asked him if he knew of any trucks Kane could
hire to haul cattle. The man took Kane down the street and introduced
him to Elfigo Batista. Batista was a curly-headed, bright-faced,
polite young man. He was energetic in every movement and expression.

"
I have two hundred and sixty-five cattle coming
this way from Chinipas," Kane told him. "In two weeks they
will be as far as Cuiteco. The
vaqueros
tell me the road is passable for trucks from Cuiteco to
Creel. I need trucks to meet the cattle and haul them back here from
Cuiteco."

"
I have fifteen trucks with stock racks. What
kind of cattle are they?" Elfigo Batista asked.

"
Two-year-old
corrientes
,"
Kane said. "Fifteen trucks will be enough. How is the road
between here and Creel?"

"The road is good. The people who are building
the railroad across the Sierra have been using it to haul their
material and workers. The only bad feature of the road for the
hauling of cattle will be its
cuestas
,
its steep grades."

"
How far is it from Creel to Cuiteco?"

"One whole day's drive to Cuiteco and one day
and one night back up to Creel loaded with cattle."

"
I'll meet you in Cuiteco in about two weeks,"
Kane said.

"
How will I know when your cattle will be in
Cuiteco," Elfigo Batista asked.

"I'll send you the airplane or wire you when I
leave Chinipas," Kane said. "In the meantime I'll give you
a deposit to reserve the trucks. How much are you going to charge
me?"

"
Seven thousand five hundred pesos. Five hundred
pesos per truck, " Batista said without batting an eye.

Kane gave him 750 pesos in cash and got a receipt
while the pistol-carrying storekeeper watched, calculating the value
of the bills in Kane's roll.

"
Why are you bringing cattle all the way across
those mountains from Chinipas when you could buy better cattle and
all the corriente you want right here?" Pistol asked Kane.

"
How much does a two-year-old corriente with
good horns cost in Creel?" Kane asked Pistol.

"You mean a rodeo?"

"A good-horned corriente."

"
You mean a rodeo. I have sold cattle here
before for American rodeo so I think I know what you want these
corrientes
for. Cattle
precisely good for rodeo are hard to find. Not all cattle are good
for rodeo."

"
How much are they worth here?" Kane asked
again. "Nine hundred to one thousand pesos for rodeos,"
Pistol answered.

"That is why I'm bringing mine all the way from
Chinipas. If they cost one thousand pesos here, they cost double what
the Chinipas cattle will cost laid in here."

"Who do you think you are trying to fool? I know
what they cost. Haven't I been selling rodeos here for ten years? No
one can lay rodeos in to Creel for five hundred pesos. If you think
you can do it I'll pay you seven hundred fifty pesos a head for every
rodeo you bring to Creel."

"
I'll keep your offer in mind," Kane said.

"When you get here with the cattle you bring all
the
facturas
and
guías
with you so that I can give you a new inspection and dip
the cattle in my vat before they go on. If you don't have all the
legal papers on the cattle I will not allow them to go on to
Chihuahua from here. We do everything in the strictest legal manner
here," Pistol said.

"
Sure. I didn't expect you would do it in any
other manner," Kane said. "Thank you for all your help and
information."

"
No reason to thank me. Remember what I said,"
Pistol said. His face was set against Kane. He walked away back down
the street to his store.

Elfigo Batista gave Kane a ride back to the airstrip.
On the way Kane asked him if he was going to have trouble getting his
cattle through Creel.

"
Only if you let someone give you trouble,"
Elfigo Batista said.
 

28
Rajón

Rajar
means
to crack. If I say of a person, "
se
raja
," it means he is incomplete and will
crack when his mettle is tried. "
Es muy
rajado"
means he is completely
untrustworthy, his word is no good, he is a coward, he will back down
on you and he will run to a higher authority to get out of any
predicament that a man would feel an obligation to face by himself. A
rajón
truly has
tremors in the faults of him.

Santiago Brennan took Kane and Vogel back to Rio
Alamos. At the airport Kane went to the phone and called the Lion.
The Lion came to the airport in Kane's car. Brennan flew on to
Frontera that evening, He would return to Rio Alamos in two days. "At
least you are never afoot. You left here horseback and now you come
back in an airplane," the Lion said. "What did you do with
your horse?"

''I left him in Chinipas with Ezequiel Graf. I'll
need him on the trail for the cattle drive. Did you receive the last
load of cattle, Lion?"

"
Oooooo, since when? I've been holding fifty
head for you at Chavarin's corrals for three weeks now," the
Lion said. "I had a good mind to sell them and make myself some
money and buy you a fresh bunch. I got tired of looking at them and
turning down buyers. You should have seen the buyers that were here
looking for rodeos and slobbering over your cattle. I was sad because
I could see a good profit for myself in your cattle and I had to turn
those fat buyers away."

They drove Juan Vogel to his house and he invited
them inside. Vogel's wife, Margarita, was in a good humor seeing her
husband. She was sister to Adelita. She gave the men cold beer while
she watched her stewpot full of boiling meat, potatoes, green
vegetables, and spices. Another pot of boiling beans was making flat
brown bubbles that sent out the odor of the beans to mix in the
kitchen with the smells of the stew and the Indian smell of the
cornmeal tortillas she turned on a flat iron next to the pots. She
kept the three men drinking beer while she set the kitchen table.
Then she ordered them to wash their hands for supper.

"
And where is my son?" Juan Vogel asked his
wife when they had settled down at their places for supper.

"
He spent the day at the ranch with my father,"
Margarita Vogel said. "He'll be home very soon now."

The back door slammed and they heard the little boy
running across the tile of the front room to the kitchen. He braked
in the doorway and his attitude changed from excitement to
belligerence when he saw his father. He puffed out his chest as much
as the little potbelly protruding over his belt would allow. He
doubled his fists and charged his father, showing the whites of his
eyes like a young bull.

"
¡Dame un peso, Papá!
Give me a peso!" he shouted, swinging his fists at
his father. Juan Vogel laughed and held him at arm's length with one
big hand. The boy straightened; his fists at his sides; his tiny,
striped,
charro
trousers
sagging over his boots; his
charro
hat showing a sweaty, mussed foretop; and gave his
father the ultimatum, "A peso or your life,
jodido!
"

"
¡Oigame!
Bad mouth.
Don't call your father that name," Margarita Vogel scolded,
spanking him on the seat of his pants. He gave his mother slight
notice and charged his father again and then Adelita Piedras came
into the room and pulled the boy off his father.

"
You can't hit your father. God will punish you
and your arm will fall off. Hit me if you are man enough,"
Adelita told him.