The Underdogs Part 21

"Don't you think it advisable to go to Aguascalientes first, General?"

Luis Cervantes asked.

"What for?"

"Our funds are melting slowly."

"Nonsense ... forty thousand pesos in eight days!"

"Well, you see, just this week we recruited over five hundred new men; all the money's gone in advance loans and gratuities," Luis Cervantes answered in a low voice.

"No! We'll go straight to the sierra. We'll see later on."

"Yes, to the sierra!" many of the men shouted.

"To the sierra! To the sierra! Hurrah for the mountains!"

The plains seemed to torture them; they spoke with enthusiasm, almost with delirium, of the sierra. They thought of the mountains as of a most desirable mistress long since unvisited.

Dawn broke behind a cloud of fine reddish dust; the sun rose an immense curtain of fiery purple. Luis Cervantes pulled his reins and waited for Quail. "What's the last word on our deal, Quail?"

"I told you, Tenderfoot: two hundred for the watch alone."

"No! I'll buy the lot: watches, rings, everything else. How much?"

Quail hesitated, turned slightly pale; then he cried spiritedly:

"Two thousand in bills, for the whole business!"

Luis Cervantes gave himself away. His eyes shone with such an obvious greed that Quail recanted and said:

"Oh, I was just fooling you. I won't sell nothing! Just the watch, see?

And that's only because I owe Pancracio two hundred. He beat me at cards last night!"

Luis Cervantes pulled out four crisp "double-face" bills of Villa's issue and placed them in Quail's hands.

"I'd like to buy the lot.... Besides, n.o.body will offer you more than that!"

As the sun began to beat down upon them, Manteca suddenly shouted:

"Ho, Blondie, your orderly says he doesn't care to go on living. He says he's too d.a.m.ned tired to walk."

The prisoner had fallen in the middle of the road, utterly exhausted.

"Well, well!" Blondie shouted, retracing his steps. "So little mama's boy is tired, eh? Poor little fellow. I'll buy a gla.s.s case and keep you in a corner of my house just as if you were the Virgin Mary's own little son. You've got to reach home first, see? So I'll help you a little, sonny!"

He drew his sword out and struck the prisoner several times.

"Let's have a look at your rope, Pancracio," he said. There was a strange gleam in his eyes. Quail observed that the prisoner no longer moved arm or leg. Blondie burst into a loud guffaw: "The G.o.dd.a.m.ned fool. Just as I was learning him to do without food, too!"

"Well, mate, we're almost to Guadalajara," Venancio said, glancing over the smiling row of houses in Tepat.i.tlan nestling against the hillside.

They entered joyously. From every window rosy cheeks, dark luminous eyes observed them. The schools were quickly converted into barracks; Demetrio found lodging in the chapel of an abandoned church.

The soldiers scattered about as usual pretending to seek arms and horses, but in reality for the sole purpose of looting.

In the afternoon some of Demetrio's men lay stretched out on the church steps, scratching their bellies. Venancio, his chest and shoulders bare, was gravely occupied in killing the fleas in his s.h.i.+rt. A man drew near the wall and sought permission to speak to the commander. The soldiers raised their heads; but no one answered.

"I'm a widower, gentlemen. I've got nine children and I barely make a living with the sweat of my brow. Don't be hard on a poor widower!"

"Don't you worry about women, Uncle," said Meco, who was rubbing his feet with tallow, "we've got War Paint here with us; you can have her for nothing."

The man smiled bitterly.

"She's only got one fault," Pancracio observed, stretched out on the ground, staring at the blue sky, "she goes mad over any man she sees."

They laughed loudly; but Venancio with utmost gravity pointed to the chapel door. The stranger entered timidly and confided his troubles to Demetrio. The soldiers had cleaned him out; they had not left a single grain of corn.

"Why did you let them?" Demetrio asked indolently.

The man persisted, lamenting and weeping. Luis Cervantes was about to throw him out with an insult. But Camilla intervened.

"Come on, Demetrio, don't be harsh, give him an order to get his corn back."

Luis Cervantes was obliged to obey; he scrawled a few lines to which Demetrio appended an illegible scratch.

"May G.o.d repay you, my child! G.o.d will lead you to heaven that you may enjoy his glory. Ten bushels of corn are barely enough for this year's food!" the man cried, weeping for grat.i.tude. Then he took the paper, kissed everybody's hand, and withdrew.

XII

They had almost reached Cuquio, when Anastasio Montanez rode up to Demetrio: "Listen, Compadre, I almost forgot to tell you.... You ought to have seen the wonderful joke that man Blondie played. You know what he did with the old man who came to complain about the corn we'd taken away for horses? Well, the old man took the paper and went to the barracks. 'Right you are, brother, come in,' said Blondie, 'come in, come in here; to give you back what's yours is only the right thing to do. How many bushels did we steal? Ten? Sure it wasn't more than ten?

... That's right, about fifteen, eh? Or was it twenty, perhaps? ... Try and remember, friend.... Of course you're a poor man, aren't you, and you've a lot of kids to raise.... Yes, twenty it was. All right, now!

It's not ten or fifteen or twenty I'm going to give you. You're going to count for yourself.... One, two, three ... and when you've had enough you just tell me and I'll stop.' And Blondie pulled out his sword and beat him till he cried for mercy."

War Paint rocked in her saddle, convulsed with mirth. Camilla, unable to control herself, blurted out:

"The beast! His heart's rotten to the core! No wonder I loathe him!"

At once War Paint's expression changed.

"What the h.e.l.l is it to you!" she scowled. Camilla, frightened, spurred her horse forward. War Paint did likewise and, as she trotted past Camilla, suddenly she reached out, seized the other's hair and pulled with all her might. Camilla's horse s.h.i.+ed; Camilla, trying to brush her hair back from over her eyes, abandoned the reins. She hesitated, lost her balance and fell in the road, striking her forehead against the stones.

War Paint, weeping with laughter, pressed on with utmost skill and caught Camilla's horse.

"Come on, Tenderfoot; here's a job for you," Pancracio said as he saw Camilla on Demetrio's saddle, her face covered with blood.

Luis Cervantes hurried toward her with some cotton; but Camilla, choking down her sobs and wiping her eyes, said hoa.r.s.ely: