Scorpion (10 page)

The widow smiled and shook her head. Isabella had certainly tested her in those first few months. Then Josefina steeled herself and turned toward the massive desk. She slowly exhaled with relief, for she had half expected to see some ephemeral image seated at the desk, hard at work, laboring over the ledgers. But no, the chair was empty and waiting for Josefina Quintero to take her place.

Clouds of dust like smoke from a brushfire concealed the southern approach to Saltillo. Zion and Ben skirted a herd of cattle, about five hundred head in all, and rode on into town. With a southerly wind, the dust churned by the herd blanketed a corner of town, forcing the two men to eat grit until a few blocks into Saltillo.

Ben studied the town as he approached and noted how the cluster of white adobe businesses and haciendas that comprised it was surrounded by a dry, rolling landscape of thorny brush-choked ravines and eroded gullies. The spring that dominated the center of Market Square was the reason for the town’s existence. It provided a constant source of sweet, cool water for all the inhabitants. As Saltillo grew, other wells had been sunk to tap into the shallow water table, while Franciscan missionaries had guided Indian laborers into building an elaborate series of aqueducts which made water even more accessible.

Zion guided them through the town, taking care to use the less-traveled streets, choosing alleys when he could. Ben kept his head low, unable to shake the feeling that he was placing himself in the jaws of a trap. They rode past street vendors hawking hastily prepared food, frijoles, tamales wrapped in corn shucks, and links of chorizo. A group of brown-faced children burst from hiding like a covey of quail and raced directly into the street past the two men, who had to struggle to keep their horses from bolting. The gray reared and pawed the air as an eight-year-old boy darted beneath the animal’s flashing hooves. Seconds later the children had dashed out of sight, leaving the horsemen shaken, but eager to reach the blacksmith shop of Juan Medrano.

Ten minutes later Ben was relieved to hear the clang of a pounding hammer. The ring of metal on metal, the sound of a bellows pump, and the smell of red-hot iron struck a familiar chord, as if they were all pieces of a puzzle he had yet to put into place. Zion dismounted and tied his horse at the hitching post before Juan Medrano’s smithy, on the eastern side of town a few blocks from Market Square. The norteamericano, in disguise, followed suit. Ben recalled an earlier warning from Zion that the
mercado
was frequented by Najera’s dragoons and he did not intend to press his luck by going there.

The blacksmith seemed relieved to find an excuse to leave his forge. He left the horseshoe lying on a bed of coals, wiped his hands on a soot-streaked apron, and ambled up the aisle to greet his customers. Juan Medrano was a man of average height, dark brown, with a bushy black moustache concealing his upper lip. Perspiration glistened among the sparse strands of black hair matted to his skull. He was thick-chested and heavyset. His eyes were pouchy from lack of sleep, a common state of affairs in his household, which was located just across the alley behind his shop.

Zion quickly introduced Ben as a newly hired vaquero and explained that Najera had requisitioned all but two of Quintero’s horses from the ranch. Juan listened but continued to scrutinize Ben, who shifted uncomfortably beneath the blacksmith’s sleepy stare.

“Alacron … what sort of name is this for a man?” Medrano gruffly inquired.

“It is name enough for a blacksmith who is too curious for his own good,” Ben answered in passable Spanish.

“Bueno,”
Medrano replied with a chuckle. He was not afraid of this
Señor
Alacron, but the blacksmith had spent his entire life avoiding trouble whenever possible, and he saw no reason to alter his habits at this late date. Suddenly a woman’s brassy voice bellowed from the alley behind the shop.

“Juan … do not forget to go to the
mercado.
Nita has told me Old Bustamente has slaughtered a pair of goats. Tell him he can repay the money he owes you with one of his plump carcasses. We will have
cabrito
tonight, sí?” A buxom
mamacita
filled the doorway at the rear of the smithy. Two little dark-eyed twin girls, toddlers really, clung to their mother’s skirts.

“Now?” Juan asked.

“Of course now! Before he sells the goats or Valentin Najera takes them. Go!”

“Maria …”

“Vámonos!”
She ducked back and herded her unhappy urchins toward the house. The toddlers vociferously protested, loud enough for all the surrounding neighbors to hear. One of the girls had a particularly piercing squall.

“
Caramba.
The woman gives me five daughters. Five daughters and not one son. Who is she to order me about?” Medrano shook his head in disgust.

“No man in Saltillo has prettier daughters, and you know it, old friend,” said Zion with perfect timing. The compliment achieved the desired results. Medrano wiped a forearm across his features and nodded proudly.

“This is true, segundo. Nor louder. And I would not trade a one of them for all Ventana.” Medrano untied the apron, pulled it over his head and draped it across the gate of a nearby stall. The horse within, a chestnut gelding, tossed its head and whinnied.

“I had better find Bustamente.”

“But first, my friend,” Zion said, “tell me of your horses. We need at least four.” The black man blocked the entrance with his squat, wide frame. “Najera has made soldiers of our vaqueros and confiscated our horses. Alacron and I have nothing but the mounts we rode in on.”

“These two are not mine to sell. They are owned by Najera’s men. This gelding belongs to one of the gringos who ride for the general.” Medrano held up his hands in a gesture of helplessness. “I wish I could help …” Zion turned and exited the shop, returning a few moments later with Don Sebastien’s silver-inlaid saddle.

Zion placed the saddle on the singletree of a nearby freight wagon whose wheel rim the blacksmith had been ordered to repair by one of Najera’s lieutenants, the young gunhawk, Raúl Salcedo. Medrano knew he would not be reimbursed for his efforts, and intended to procrastinate as long as possible. But the blacksmith’s eyes lighted up with renewed interest as he beheld the saddle he had prized for many years.

Ben stood off to the side, allowing Zion to do the bargaining. He only hoped the segundo’s efforts would result in a good mount capable of carrying him back across the Río Grande. He paused near a pail of water in which Medrano had been cooling the iron he was working. Ben stared down and didn’t recognize his own reflection. His beard had grown in, completely altering his features. He had darkened his jaw growth with the same stain he had used on his hair. His eyes seemed haggard, the windows of his soul were closed and defying his desperate attempts to unravel his past. Despite his size, he appeared no different from any of the other townspeople. He kept his gaze lowered, like many of the cowed residents of Saltillo. It was not healthy to attract undue attention. Too tall, he cautioned himself, and bowed his shoulders to cut his size. A patched serape covered his homespun shirt and nankeen trousers. The Patterson Colt was tucked in his waistband and concealed against the small of his back beneath the serape. He surveyed the shop and experienced a sense of belonging that was almost painful.

“Alacron,” Zion called out. Ben turned and acknowledged him with a wave of his hand. “Señor Medrano has remembered the whereabouts of some horses he has hidden in another part of town. I will look at them, and if they are fitting, the saddle will be his.”

“All my horses are of excellent breeding, sold to me by comancheros who only stole from the best rancheros,” Juan said indignantly. He carried the saddle into a vacant stall and buried it under a mound of hay. “If Najera should ever discover I did not turn over all my stock as he ordered …”

“You will have to tell him yourself,” Zion said. “I owe the man neither my life nor my loyalty.” To Ben, Zion said, “Wait for us here.”

Ben nodded and turned away from the two men in the doorway. “Gladly,” he muttered beneath his breath. He heard the crunch of their boots on the gravel outside, the voices of Zion and the blacksmith fading until nothing remained but the crackle of the glowing coals and the hum of a mud dauber tending to its nest up where a splintery-looking wood pillar forked to join one of the roof beams. Sunlight filtered down through gaps in the roof. A flock of sparrows used one for both entrance and exit, darting among and through shimmering rods of golden light and swirling ribbons of faint gray smoke.

The forge chimney wasn’t drawing properly, Ben thought. He suspected one of the sparrows had at one time built a nest up past the damper. He began to pump the bellows. The wooden handle creaked and rasped as he exerted his strength. Flames danced above the coals as they throbbed with renewed life, fiery and crimson. He held up the horseshoe and examined Medrano’s handiwork and knew he could duplicate it. He replaced the horseshoe on its bed of fire, sauntered over to the gelding and, raising one of its forelegs, examined the hoof. The animal turned to nip at him, but Ben slapped the horse across the nose just hard enough to sting, giving the bellicose animal fair warning not to try anything funny. Returning to the forge, he removed the glowing red horseshoe from the flames, placed it on an anvil and began to pound the metal into shape. He could feel the heat on his face. Sparks flew from beneath his hammer and winked out in the shadows.

He knew this work. He stopped and stared down at his hands. Yes, here was something from his past. The forge and iron were somehow a part of his life. The sensation of being in touch with a part of himself he had thought lost gave him hope. Perhaps it began like this, the revelation of his life, first a feeling, then a brief memory, then another, and finally the rediscovery of who he was and what had precipitated his loss of self.

“Hey Medrano, you seen to my horse yet?” a voice said from the aisle behind Ben. “What—you ain’t Medrano. Where’s your boss, Mex?”

Ben McQueen froze. He had been so engrossed in his work, he hadn’t heard the man enter. He considered bolting toward the door but dismissed the idea immediately. Now was not the time to panic. He turned to face the man. He kept his head lowered and eyes hooded as he studied Medrano’s gringo customer. The moment Ben set eyes on Ned Tolliver, he recognized the man as one of the haunters of his sleep. The same stringy shoulder-length hair, the scarred nose, and the round lenses in the man’s wire-rimmed spectacles. There was no mistaking him. Ben shifted his gaze to Lucker Dobbs, standing just inside the entrance. The paunchy, grizzled turncoat hooked his thumbs in his gun belt and kicked a clod of dried dung across the floor. Ben recognized him as quickly as he had Tolliver.

“I don’t reckon he speaks American,” said Dobbs.

“Where’s Medrano, eh, hombre? Medrano!” Tolliver said. Clearly he hoped that if he increased his volume he might somehow be able to make the fool understand. He repeated the question in halting Spanish.

Ben shrugged, although it was only with a superhuman effort that he managed to conceal the emotions raging in his breast. The men were linked to him, but how and why? An innate sense of caution warned him to remain quiet and to continue his charade. He understood none of this, yet he believed with all his heart that if these men so much as suspected the truth, they would kill him where he stood.

So he endured Tolliver’s insults and more of Dobbs’s broken Spanish. As if he were deaf and dumb, Ben ignored the gringos and concentrated on his work. Out of exasperation Tolliver took it upon himself to inspect his own horse.

“Looks like he’s got one shoe to go,” the former Ranger growled. He emerged from the stall. “Let’s have another drink. Ain’t no telling how long this dumb sum’bitch is gonna take.” Despite his own command, Tolliver remained by the stall, his shrewd eyes focused on the tall silent Mexican.

“What is it?” Dobbs asked.

“Funny. For a moment I thought I seen this greaser before,” Tolliver remarked.

Ben, laboring over the coals, felt a tightness between his shoulder blades, the same feeling a man gets when he thinks he’s about to be shot. He forced himself to continue to work. He dunked the horseshoe into the water bucket. The submerged metal sizzled and sent a column of steam rising up into the disguised man’s face. A bead of sweat rolled down the tip of his nose and dropped onto the back of his hand. With horror, Ben realized he had worked up enough sweat to cause his disguise to streak. He concentrated on keeping his back to the two men and maneuvered himself deeper into the shadowy recesses of the stable.

“Seen him before?” Dobbs chuckled. “Hell, how could you tell? All these chili eaters look alike to me.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Tolliver admitted, softly laughing. “C’mon. I’ll send a kid over later to fetch the gelding.” The two men vanished into the afternoon sunlight. Dobbs paused by the olla outside, quenched his thirst, then dropped the gourd dipper back into the water and sauntered off after his companion. Alone at last, Ben headed for the nearest three-legged stool and slumped onto the seat before his legs completely gave out. The encounter had left its mark upon him. He lifted his hands and found them trembling, as if he were standing in a north wind in the dead of winter.

Bodies falling, tumbling from horseback. Gunshots from all sides. Men and animals screaming, but there is no place to run. Run, yes. Run! It’s a trap! Damn your black hearts!

Ben leaned forward, elbows on his knees, his head drooping. The vision lasted but a few brief seconds. But that it came at all spoke volumes. These men had played a part in whatever had happened to him. They might even be the key to unlocking a past he just might wish had stayed buried. He sat there, head bowed, staring at the dirt. He lost all track of time. A wasp hovered in front of him and alighted on the toe of his boot then sailed off on a blur of wings, circled the silent man and rose upward to join its sisters in the nest above his head. Eventually the tremors subsided and Ben sought solace in the work at hand. He finished the horseshoe and left it on the anvil, then returned to the stool, where he awaited the arrival of the segundo.