Listen to the Mockingbird (24 page)

The village of Tortugas—or San Juan or whatever they called it—looked like an uneven honeycomb that had been shaped from mud then propped on its side in a field of cotton seedlings. A separate, squared-off triangular structure was flanked by a cross that gleamed brilliant white even in the shade of a cottonwood. An acequia, an irrigation canal, snaked off to the left toward the river.

The wagon lurched when I pulled the horse to a stop; and on the plank seat next to me, Winona raised her free hand to shade her eyes. In her other arm, a wide-awake Zia was blowing spit bubbles.

Now that we were here, I was getting nervy. “You think we’ll be safe?” My knowledge of Indians was limited. The women who worked with Herlinda were taciturn and cheerless, but they worked like oxen. And the occasional redskins I saw in town seemed harmless. But Tonio was not the only one with a tale of savagery. Since Winona had lived among them for a time, I was glad to have her along.

“One bunch of Injuns is as different from another as cow’s milk and rat poison,” she said, eyeing the cluster of buildings warily. “Even the good ones can go along nice and easy like for a time then of a sudden hit the warpath. I don’t know much about these here Injuns, but I hear tell they is Christian. And I see they got the cross to prove it.”

I had forgotten the Tortugas’ Christmas pilgrimage. “Yes. They’re very religious.” I released the breath I realized I’d been holding. “That’s comforting.”

“Might be. Then again, might not. I hear tell some of ’em take the faith so serious they crucify folk.”

I swallowed hard, wondering if it might be wiser to forget our notion about talking with them. An occasional Indian here and there was one thing, but a village of nothing but Indians was quite another. Nacho had said the people of San Juan de Dios were a peaceful sort and that they mostly kept to themselves. I fervently hoped he was right.

Naked children who were playing in the sun-baked area in front of the disorderly tiers of dwellings had vanished before our wagon stopped, and now the place seemed deserted. Hoping the adults would at least be wearing loincloths, I started to get down from the plank seat; but Winona’s hand stopped me.

“Somebody will come,” she said.

Sure enough, a figure appeared at one of the ground-level doorways. Ladders led to the upper tiers. The man who approached was neither naked nor did he wear a loincloth.

Bristling grey hair had been tied back and a sleeveless vest hung open on his hairless, shirtless chest. His legs were clad in the same sort of trousers you’d see on any ranch hand. He was built sturdy and close to the ground. His face looked like Adam’s must have looked when God was fashioning him from clay. The nose was like wax that has softened in the sun, the mouth seemed not quite finished. But the deep-set eyes were like sharp bits of glass. He stopped next to me and waited.

“Ingles?” Winona asked. He shook his head and she said something in halting Spanish. He nodded, turned and shouted in guttural tones toward the dwellings. A woman’s head poked from one of the upper doorways. He called more words I couldn’t understand. She nodded and descended a ladder as gracefully as a caterpillar.

She was small, dark and pretty, with black eyes set over high cheekbones. Her dress was simpler than ours—a single length of cloth sewn up at the sides with openings for the arms and tied at the waist with a sort of rope. Around the neck little figures had been made with thread, like embroidery. A zigzag design at the bottom of the skirt had been made the same way. Her feet were bare.

She stopped next to the man and looked up at me, shielding her eyes against the sun. “Yes?”

“I am seeking information,” I said slowly and clearly, “about a boy.”

“At fifteen, sixteen, Injuns be men,” Winona said in a low voice.

I corrected myself. “A man, then.”

“Yes.” Two rows of very white teeth flashed between the girl’s lips.

“He would have been here about a year ago.”

“Yes?”

“Pintura,” Winona piped up. “Show her the picture.”

“Ah,” the girl nodded, as though this made sense.

“Yes,” I said, “I have a picture of someone. And I wonder if…I would like to know if anyone here has seen him.”

The girl nodded profusely and waited. I reached into the bag near my feet, found Julio’s drawing, unrolled it and held it out.

The girl and the man both rose to their toes and peered intently at the sketch. Then they returned their weight to their heels and began to jabber at each other. The guttural tones sounded sharp and angry, and alarm began to creep across my shoulders. But the girl looked up and smiled again. “You are hungry?”

I started to shake my head, but Winona jabbed me in the ribs with her elbow. “They ask you to eat,” she grunted, “you got to do it. That be a big thing with them.”

So, I put on the most gracious face I could muster and thanked both man and girl.

The man strode away toward the dwellings. A barefoot and quite naked boy of about nine appeared and took the horse’s reins. Winona and I stepped down from the wagon and followed the girl around the bank of dwellings to what seemed to be a small, rudely made castle of adobe bricks. There were even eight narrow towers, like little turrets. The entrance was low and perfectly square.

“La Casa del Pueblo,” the girl said, smiling solemnly.

I hesitated, hoping it wasn’t where they boiled their enemies in oil or some such thing.

Winona nudged me. “Town hall.”

We entered the low doorway and found ourselves in complete darkness. Another naked child entered behind us carrying a torch. Now we could see the many vigas that crossed the ceiling and, below them, the rows of mud benches. The girl led us to seats. I cast about for something to say.

“Your English is good.”

“Thank you,” she smiled. “I learn at the missionary school.”

“What is your name?”

“Catarina Torres.” She held out her hand. “I take the picture, yes?”

I glanced at Winona, who shrugged; so I handed it over, and the girl disappeared. The boy with the torch still stood just inside the doorway.

I whispered to Winona, “Can’t they just say they have seen him or they haven’t seen him?”

“They got to do things exact, like they always done it for maybe a million years,” Winona said in a normal voice. “Things happen quicker and easier if you just go along with them. Might be this will take some extra time. I do believe they is flummoxed because we is women and we is black and white.”

Zia was becoming restless, and I took her to bounce on my knee. “Think what you can tell your grandchildren,” I told her. “You visited with wild Indians. You’ll be in Philadelphia by then, of course, and everyone will think you very brave and bold.”

Zia laughed. Winona said, “I hope you’re not countin’ on that.”

“On what?” I asked, but the girl returned and Winona didn’t answer.

The girl brought two clay plates that held what looked like small chicken legs, little balls of meat and corncakes. She handed us the plates, sat down across from us and ducked her head twice, urging us to eat. The meat was not warm, but the flavor was quite good.

“The legs are a mite small, but the chicken is right tasty,” I said.

Winona was placidly chewing. She swallowed and shook her head. “Ain’t chicken. It’s lizard.”

It was all I could do not to spit out what was in my mouth. She had given Zia one of the hard corncakes and the baby was happily gumming it.

The man appeared in the doorway, muttered something to the girl, handed her my cloth sketch and left.

When we finished, the girl stood. “Now I will tell you about the picture,” she said. “We know of that man.” She paused as if that was the full answer to the question I had asked.

I leaned forward. “Please tell me everything you know about him.”

The girl nodded, as though she understood perfectly, but then she moved gracefully toward the doorway and disappeared again.

I looked at Winona. “What…?”

Winona shrugged. “She answer your first question, now you done asked another. She got to get leave from the headman. He can’t come in here ’cause we is two women. But she can only say what he says is okay.”

We sat for some time with only the boy with the torch for company. He kept shifting his weight from one foot to the other and the torch smoke was beginning to fill the room.

Zia, past her nursing time, was getting cranky. I took the baby from Winona and tickled her. When she gurgled with laughter a sadness shot through me. This child was probably the closest I would come to being a mother.

Finally, the girl appeared again and, standing straight in front of us but looking over our heads, began to recite, “The man in the pintura, he come to us eleven month ago. He was in bad fight and was hurted from a knife.” She pointed to her left side. “We put him in a bed and make him well again. Then he pay us and leave us and we never see him again.” With the last sentence, she brought her eyes down to my face.

“Did he say who had hurt him with the knife?”

“He say it was friend. Friend who now bad. Man he come from Texas with. He was happy to stay here because he say the man would get tired looking for him and go away.”

“Did he say why they had the fight?”

She shook her head.

I thanked her, praised her people’s hospitality; and we joined the man, who had remained outside near the doorway. They escorted us back to our wagon. We mounted to the seats, and I took the reins from the naked boy, who had apparently stood there in the dust the whole time.

“Well, that’s that,” I muttered to Winona. “It’s not a deal of help, but they were very civil. Should I offer them some money?”

“Don’t know. Maybe.”

I found a coin in my bag and held it out to the girl. She peered at it then shook her head. “No, señora, I cannot take money for words.”

I smiled then realized she had not asked me for my name. “I am Matilda Summerhayes. I own a ranch near the cuevas, by the springs.”

“Si, I know.”

I looked at her in surprise, but she offered nothing more. “If I can ever be of help to you or your people, please let me know.”

“Gracias, señora.” She darted a look at the man, who gave the barest nod.

When both only continued to gaze at me, I thanked them again and turned the horse in a tight circle, trying not to trample the cotton plants. Looking back over my shoulder I could see the girl still standing there, shielding her eyes from the sun. I handed Winona the reins, stood up and called, “Catarina?”

The girl came trotting to the wagon, lithe as an antelope.

“You said he paid?”

She nodded.

“What did he pay you with?”

“Gold.”

“Coins?” I asked. “Like this?” I held out the one in my hand.

She shook her head. “No.” She pantomimed with her hands. “A…stone of gold.”

Diego had been a mere infant when Tonio had blown up the mine, too young to remember its location. Either he had found it again, or he had kept a nugget all these many years.

Chapter Twenty-eight

Franklin was not at all as I expected. Texas was a full-fledged state, whereas New Mexico—or Arizona, as we were called now—was merely a territory; so I had thought to find a good-size town, if not a city. Certainly I reckoned it bigger than Mesilla. I hesitated to alight from the Butterfield Trail stage, thinking this could not be the right place; but the driver assured me it was and that another coach would be departing northward the following morning.

It had been helpful to learn from the Tortugas that Diego Ramirez spent some time with them; but when it came down to it, that really didn’t tell us much. It wasn’t Diego I was pursuing. I knew where he was: under a pile of earth and rocks on my land. It was his killer I had to find.

Winona had pointed out again that a strange lot of folks seemed real interested in my land. I understood now why poor Diego had that map. The boy’s killer might be another. And two unknown men had sought to purchase the ranch. Did they know about the map? Did one—or both of them—kill Diego? I could learn nothing more about the man whose offer Jamie had brought me, but the letter from the attorney had borne an address in Franklin.

The sudden brightness made me squint after the dark of the stagecoach. The public square was not a square at all, just an L-shaped line of dusty, disheveled, low mud buildings baking in the sun. Only the huge wooden platform in the heel of the L hinted that the public ever gathered here. No huge, graceful cottonwoods shaded this plaza as in Mesilla. Here the sun owned all.

The mountains that rose behind the buildings were handsome, but they had none of the heart-stopping beauty of my own organ-piped ridge. A few shrubs labored to grow in the unyielding clay of the vast open space. Shading my eyes, I made my way quickly toward the line of shops. As in Mesilla, a roof extended almost to the hitching posts to ward off the sun.

In the dry goods store I inquired about V.B. Peticolas, attorney at law. The clerk, a short, spindly fellow with a deep gouge along one cheek, nodded and pointed. Then he touched his face with his pointing finger. “Bobcat,” he said. “When I was a young ’un.”

“Imagine that,” I said in shocked tones that seemed to please him.

The lawyer’s office was behind a sort of ironmonger’s shop, sandwiched between the smithy and a boarding house. I tried the door and found it open. Inside, the room was tiny, sterile and dark. It smelled of vanilla. I had imagined books and papers, but there was only a barren desk and three empty chairs. On the desk was what appeared to be a jar of very long, very black snap beans.

I cleared my throat, coughed and finally called, thinking there must be a back room where the normal disarray of work was kept. No one responded, so I returned to the heat outside. I had just closed the door behind me when a dapper little man in a round, small-brimmed hat, white shirt and suspenders with shiny brass fastenings came toward me on feet as light and careful as a cat’s. The hat looked something like an inverted chamber pot.

He nodded to me so formally it was almost a bow.

“Mr. Peticolas?” I could see the dust on his hat brim but not his face.