Renegades (11 page)

When he commented on that, Don Felipe shook his head and said, “I mean no offense, Señor Morgan, but I put no faith in the word of the Texas Rangers, or in men like Cecil Tolliver.”

Since Don Felipe had been the one to bring up the owner of the Rocking T, Frank took advantage of the opening. “You know, everything I've heard about Tolliver tells me that he's a pretty good fella. Got a nice family and a successful ranch.”

“A ranch built on cattle stolen from me!”

“I hear he says the same about you,” Frank prodded.

“Lies! The man is incapable of telling the truth!” Don Felipe's hand clenched tightly around the neck of the pulque bottle. “Why, once he even dared to say—”

The words were choked off. Almanzar, muttered a savage oath and took another drink.

“What did he say?” Frank asked quietly.

For a moment he thought Don Felipe wasn't going to answer. But then, without looking at Frank but gazing out over the spectacular landscape instead, he said in hushed tones, “That the evidence I saw with my own eyes was wrong. That there was nothing—nothing!—between him and my wife!”

Well, now, thought Frank, that was interesting. Not totally unexpected, considering what Carmen had said the night before, but still mighty interesting.

“Don Felipe,” he said, “you don't really know me, but it sounds to me like you want to talk about this. I'd be glad to listen.”

“There are some things a man does not speak of.”

“And sometimes when he doesn't, they gnaw away at his insides until it feels like there's a hole all the way through to his soul.”

Again there was a moment of silence. Don Felipe handed the bottle to Frank and sat there stolidly, smoking his pipe. At last he said, “You saved my daughter from the mountain lion, proving your prowess and your courage. You stood up to the Rurale sergeant, proving your honor and my lack of same.”

“Not hardly on that last one,” Frank said. “I just happened to get to him before you did.”

“I would like to think this is true, but I doubt it. I would have let him strike poor Pablo again, to protect the rest of my people. If he had beaten Pablo to death . . .”

Don Felipe left the thought unfinished and stood up, pacing over to the edge of the creek. He gave the bowl of his pipe a sharp smack, knocking the dottle from it into the water. When he turned back toward Frank, he looked older than Frank had seen him so far. His face still resembled a wooden carving, but now it showed the ravages of time.

“You think me a man of honor, Señor Morgan, but I failed that test many years ago when I found my wife in the arms of Cecil Tolliver and did not kill him.”

Frank had figured that was what Don Felipe was leading up to, but he found it a little difficult to reconcile what he was hearing with what he had seen of Cecil Tolliver. The rancher was an impressive man, but he was hardly the type to sweep a doña off her feet and make love to her.

“I'm listening,” Frank said.

For a moment he thought Don Felipe wasn't going to say anything else, but then the words began to pour out of the man.

“It was not long after Tolliver came to Texas and established his rancho. A few years, perhaps. Long enough so that our families had met. The river stood between his land and mine, and cows . . . Well, cows stray.”

Frank nodded but didn't say anything. He didn't want to interrupt now that Don Felipe was talking.

“There was friction at first between his cowboys and my vaqueros, whenever men from either ranch would cross the Rio Bravo to round up the cattle that had gotten on the wrong side. Shots were fired, though no one was killed. I thought it best that Señor Tolliver and I should meet, so that we could discuss the situation peacefully and perhaps arrive at a solution.”

“You were a peacemaker,” Frank said, taking a chance and commenting. “That doesn't surprise me.”

Don Felipe nodded. “Yes. My people are a fierce race, a race of warriors, but I do not believe in fighting when it is not necessary. I sent word to Cecil Tolliver, promising him safe passage to my hacienda, and he agreed to meet me there. When he came to talk, he was well armed, as were the men with him. But they put away their guns, and Tolliver and I drank and talked and realized that we were ... much the same sort of man.”

That was the conclusion Frank had arrived at after meeting both of them. Despite the differences in nationality and language, they had a lot more in common.

“We struck a truce, Señor Tolliver and I,” Almanzar went on. “When his cattle crossed the river onto my land, my vaqueros turned them back. His riders did the same when my cattle strayed. And if any of the other man's stock was rounded up and sold, the one who sold them paid the other man immediately. It was a satisfactory arrangement. It was more than that. Tolliver and I, we became amigos.”

Frank wasn't surprised by that at all. From the start, they had seemed the sort of men who would be friends.

“Not only that, but our families were friendly as well. We visited each other's rancho, and our children played together. My Antonio and Tolliver's son Benjamin raced horses like the wild young things they were. Tolliver's daughters were older than Carmen, but they took her under their wing and were kind to her. Twice a year, at least, the families gathered, and this went on for several years.”

“Sounds mighty fine,” Frank said. “There's always been trouble along the border, but you and Tolliver put that aside and forged your own peace.”

“Yes, a separate peace from the rest of the border country. We celebrated together when my son Matteo was born. . . .”

That was the first Frank had heard of another Almanzar son. A moment later, he knew why.

“And we mourned together when the fever took him, shortly before his second birthday,” Don Felipe said heavily. “This is a hot land, a land where such a fever can strike with no warning and tear a man's loved one from his bosom before he can do anything about it.”

“I'm sorry,” Frank said, and meant it.

Don Felipe looked at him. “Do you have sons, Señor Morgan?”

“One son,” Frank replied, thinking of Conrad.

“Are you close to him?”

“No. Never have been.”

“That is regrettable. Still, you know what it is like to look on the face of a child and be aware that he sprang from your loins. You know the mingled joy and pain such awareness can bring.”

“Yes.” Now Frank thought of Victoria. He knew what Don Felipe meant.

“Trust me, Señor Morgan, when I tell you that if you have never suffered the loss of a child, you have never known the very worst pain a man can endure.”

“I'll take your word for that, Don Felipe, and I wouldn't wish that on anybody.”

Don Felipe looked away “It is even worse for the mother. A man has his work, his responsibilities. There are always cattle to brand, to round up, and drive to market and ship. Things that must be done. While a woman has nothing but her grief. There is no knowing what she may do....” His face hardened even more, though Frank might have said that was impossible. “It was less than a year later when I caught them together, my Maria and Tolliver. He claimed she was merely upset by some memory of Matteo that had taken her by surprise, and he attempted to comfort her as a friend. But his arms were around her, and hers around him, and I knew better.”

Why, you stupid, stiff-necked son of a bitch, Frank thought, because it sounded to him as if the explanation offered by Cecil Tolliver was perfectly believable. But he didn't say anything, preferring to let Almanzar finish the story in his own way.

“Maria denied it, too, saying that there was nothing between them other than friendship. But I knew the truth and was outraged. I sent Tolliver and his family away. They were no longer welcome on my rancho. This upset the children, but it was unavoidable. Later, when Antonio was older and knew the truth, he shared my anger and knew that I had done the right thing. He quickly grew to hate the gringos as much or more than I did.”

A look of amazement came over Don Felipe's face then, as he turned to look at Frank.

“And yet now I spill all the pain in my heart to a gringo,” he said. “Why is this, Señor Morgan?”

“Maybe you can tell that you and I have shared some of the same sort of pain, Don Felipe, even though I never lost a child. Tell me,” Frank said, “what happened to your wife?”

“She died.” The words came out flat and hard, like a piece of granite. “I believe she mourned herself into the grave.”

“I've been married twice,” Frank said. “Both of my wives were killed by evil men.”

An indrawn breath hissed between Don Felipe's teeth. “You hunted down these men and took your vengeance on them? Surely you must have. I see it in your eyes.”

Frank nodded slowly. “I took my vengeance, all right. It had to be done. But it didn't bring back either of the women I loved.”

“No. There is no bringing back those who are gone from us.”

Again there was silence between the two men. Finally, Frank said, “What happened between you and Tolliver?”

Almanzar shrugged “Once I saw him for the sort of man he really was, I realized he had been stealing from me. My hatred for him grew, and I suppose his for me did as well.”

Frank knew that was true. Feeling betrayed by his friend, Cecil Tolliver had looked for any excuse to hate Don Felipe Almanzar, and he had found them. The spirit of cooperation between the two ranches had disintegrated, and over the years the friction had grown into outright hostility. It might even turn into open warfare if it went on long enough. And all because of a probable misunderstanding born only of compassion and sympathy.

Mighty oaks from little acorns grow, the old saying went. And trouble and hate were often the same way, Frank mused.

“Now, Señor Morgan, you know my story,” Don Felipe went on. “I would ask that we say nothing more about it, and that you do not discuss it with anyone else. A man's pride is a private thing, and so are his wounds.”

“Of course,” Frank murmured. “I won't say anything.”

Don Felipe stepped over to his horse and gathered up the reins, getting ready to ride again. But he paused long enough to say to Frank, “You are an uncommon man, Señor Morgan. I have not spoken of these things in years. I thought I would never speak of them again.”

Frank took hold of Stormy's reins and gestured with his other hand, calling Dog to him. He thought for a moment and then said, “You're a cattleman, so you must have seen sore places that you have to take a hot knife to, places you have to cut open no matter how much it hurts, so that all the festering can come out.”

Don Felipe nodded. “
Sí
, of course.”

“Sometimes I think the human heart is the same way.”

Don Felipe didn't say anything to that. He mounted the black stallion, and Frank swung up onto Stormy's back. The two men rode toward the hacienda in a companionable silence. For the moment, there was nothing left for them to say.

Even though Frank knew he ought to get back north of the Rio Grande, he allowed inertia to overtake him and spent the next three days at the Almanzar hacienda, resting his injured ankle and letting the sore lump on his head go away completely. Life was pleasant here, and the slow-paced way of life was seductive. He ate well, drank fine wine, and grew fond of the afternoon siesta. After all, there was nothing that absolutely
had
to be done during that time each day.

He grew friendly with the vaqueros, too, and sometimes sat with them of an evening, listening to their guitar music and the soft, liquid sounds of their songs that flowed like water in a peaceful stream. These bold riders were puzzled at first, knowing the animosity their
patrón
felt toward all gringos. All but this quiet-spoken but deadly man Frank Morgan, who seemed the sort who was able to make himself at home wherever he went. If Don Felipe accepted him, then so did Don Felipe's vaqueros.

Frank's ankle was healed and he could wear his boots again, though Don Felipe insisted that he keep the fine moccasins of soft leather. His head no longer ached. The injuries suffered in his fight with the Black Scorpion were gone. And so his thoughts turned at last toward returning to the Rocking T, so that he could let his friends north of the border know that he was all right. He found himself wanting to see Roanne Williamson again, as well.

On the third night, he left the bunkhouse where he had been visiting with the vaqueros, telling them stories of his life. Even down here below the Rio Grande they had heard of Frank Morgan, and they wanted to know if, es
verdad,
he had killed a thousand men in his long career as a gunfighter. Frank had tried to set them straight without disappointing them too much. He had learned over the years that most folks preferred the legend to the truth.

As he strolled across the courtyard toward the hacienda with Dog at his heels, the big cur suddenly growled deep in his throat. Frank stopped and looked down at the animal, asking quietly, “What is it, fella?”

Dog was gazing intently at the hacienda, and as Frank looked in the same direction, he saw a shadowy shape dart around a corner of the sprawling adobe building. He didn't get a good enough look to tell if the lurker was male or female, but he remembered how Carmen had snuck out to meet someone a few nights earlier. Maybe this was Carmen again trying to make some clandestine rendezvous.

Or maybe whoever she had been meeting had grown bolder and come all the way down to the hacienda tonight.

Either way, Frank was curious enough to investigate. For that matter, he told himself as he started toward the spot where he had glimpsed the mysterious figure, the Black Scorpion might be around somewhere, too. There was no telling what mischief that elusive
bandido
might be up to.