Maria's Trail (The Mule Tamer) (13 page)

Maria rode back east. She was getting good at
crisscrossing the desert now and she liked it. She had enjoyed the lady’s
company and the woman had been good to her. She had a lot of money to give to
anyone she pleased. She had to get to the nice woman with the mean husband back
at her little village first. After that, she had no real plans.

This made her fairly giddy. No plan for the
future. She had a purpose and she had a way to make money. It was all very
exciting because she didn’t have any obligations to anyone: no home, no man or
family or children. It was not actually so bad to be all alone in the world.

The whore and the lady fence and the man at the
saloon where she shot the two bad men all flattered her, too. She knew she
could get a man whenever she wanted one. There was no hurry in any of that,
either. She was a free agent and a free spirit and she had a purpose. It was
good to be alive.

She thought a lot about being angry at God,
especially in light of what the lady fence had to say about faith and this made
her think of all those years growing up at the church. She smiled at the memory
of her time with the padre. He used to become so frustrated with her. One time,
and it was really the only time he’d ever been cross with her, was when she
kept asking about all the preposterous things he told her about the miracle of
transubstantiation, and the Virgin Mary’s Immaculate Conception, and all the
miracles Jesus performed. None of it really made much sense to Maria. She was
very practical; a sensible and logically thinking person.

“Child!” He fairly shouted at her. “Some
things, some things must be taken on faith. There’s no explanation for them,
you just have to believe!” And with that, she dropped it. She knew he didn’t
know and she knew she’d never get to the bottom of it. It just made the padre
angry and sad and she didn’t like him to be that way, so she just stopped
asking.

But now, with the lady fence’s take on it, it
all started to come together for Maria. Maybe no one really knew any of it.
Maybe no one ever would. Maybe all this about Jesus and priests performing
miracles and the Virgin and even the crucifixion and the dying for our sins was
just a lot of stories that people told and retold until they got muddled and no
one really knew any of it.

She stopped at one of her favorite spots,
settled her horse and made a good camp. The lady fence gave her a couple of
bottles of the delicious French wine. She drank one and ate some jerky and
beans. She missed the lady fence. She thought about the woman seducing her and
it made her feel good and also, sad, because she thought the lady must be very
lonely. Maria could not do or be for the woman and it must have been very
frustrating as Maria knew how beautiful she was to the woman. She was more
beautiful than almost anyone in all the places she’d ever been.

She pulled out her page from the Bible and
looked the Commandments over again. They were good rules and necessary for a
good society. Maybe there was something to them. Certainly people could not
live against them. Was she really living against them? She did steal, but from
people who needed to be stolen from. She lied but only with the best
intentions. She’d take a man if she wanted one, but not a married one. That
would be unkind to the man’s wife and she would never hurt a woman or a child.

She killed, but again, it was right to kill the
two bandits. She did curse, but was saying God’s name in vain really all that
bad? She thought about the lady fence again. Was God just a spirit and not an
old man with a big white beard floating around on clouds up in the sky, in
heaven? If he was just a spirit, or even just a great force, how could you
offend Him?

She got sleepy and let the fire die down. She
finished the bottle of wine and felt very dizzy. She closed her eyes and slept
for a long time until a pine knot flared up and made the fire very bright. She
sat up to find Juana across the way, chewing on a piece of jerky. Maria got up
and sat across from her.

“You could have left a swallow of wine.”

“I have another bottle. Do you want me to open
it?” She was pleased to see her little friend.

“No, save it for tomorrow. That woman’s right,
you know.”

“About what?”

“God and heaven and such.”

“Really?” Maria was intrigued as she thought
that Juana must know, she was dead and in that world. “What of this
reincarnation? Is that right?”

Juana shrugged her shoulders and Maria became a
little annoyed.

“What sort of answer is that?”

“I don’t know, Maria. I don’t know.” She
grinned at Maria. “Look, I’m sorry. I don’t know, but she’s right, and you
don’t have to be mad at God so much.”

“Oh, so you think I should stop?”

“No. I didn’t say stop. By the way, you did
good by those bandits. My goodness, you were a wildcat.”

Maria blushed. “Oh, that wasn’t so hard. They
were drunk.”

“Doesn’t matter. You don’t need to have a fair
fight with a pair like that. Just rub ‘em out.”

“Do you know what happened to them?”

“Oh sure.” She became distracted and was looking
for something else to eat. “How ‘bout a cigar, Maria?”

Maria handed her one and lit one for herself
and they smoked together.

“So, what happened to them?”

“Who?”

“The bandits I killed.”

Juana shrugged.

“Damn it, Juana, stop shrugging. What happened to
them? Did they go to hell?”

“I don’t remember.” She stood up and threw her
cigar into the fire. “I’ve gotta have a pee.” She got up and Maria became
tired. She closed her eyes while she waited for Juana to come back and soon
fell into a deep sleep.

She made it to the little village where she had
lived for the first ten years of her life. It was pathetic and very poor and it
looked even worse than she remembered. She rode over to where her hovel was. It
was all grown over and she couldn’t even tell where it had been. She thought
about the old woman with the terrible treatment painted on her chest and the
old woman telling her to wash it off as it stunk of shit. She smiled and was
not so sad now at the memory of the old woman. She was always good to the old
woman and she made her happy and the woman lived a long time, so she had a
pretty good run of it. No one could ask for more than that.

She remembered how to get to the nice woman’s
shack and was about to dismount when she thought better of it. She was proud of
her traps. Her horse was splendid. She had traded her stuff for a really fancy
saddle that the lady fence had. It once belonged to a vaquero who was very fond
of tooled leather and conchos. The saddle was very bright and gaudy and it
looked better with a woman sitting on it than it did with a man. She wanted to
show it to the mean man and watch him look at her. She wanted to see if he’d be
a little humble and not so quick to call her a whore’s spawn.

She stopped outside their door and called out. Soon
a skinny man emerged and bowed respectfully to Maria. She was afraid that the
nice lady and mean man had perhaps moved away. Suddenly the nice lady emerged
and she squinted up at Maria. The sun was to Maria’s back and she quickly
dismounted so the woman didn’t have to squint.

“Do you remember me, lady?”

“No.”

Maria dug in her saddle bag and pulled out the
flint and steel and the knife the woman had given her many years ago. “You gave
me this.”

“You are Maria.”

“Yes.” She grinned. “The whore’s spawn.”

Maria looked behind the woman, into the dark
hovel. “Is he here?”

“Dead.” The woman spoke automatically. She
looked at the skinny man who bowed again and smiled, baring rotten teeth. He
extended his hand and Maria took it. “This is my new husband.”

They welcomed her into their home and the woman
prepared a meal while the skinny man sat silently and smiled at Maria. They ate
and chatted about the village and what had happened over the past ten years.
They asked Maria no questions about her life.

“I need to give you something, lady.” She stood
up and pulled out a wad of money, rolled into a neat cylinder. She handed the
woman the money and could see the confusion in her eyes. “This is a gift. You
were good to me and I want to repay you. I want you to have this money, lady.”

She looked at the skinny man and they looked at
the money in the woman’s hand. It was more money than they could make in a
year. Enough money to buy ten times the goats they owned. It was money an aging
couple could use.

“This… this is too much.” She looked at Maria
and her eyes were tearing. She looked at the skinny man who stood a little
stupidly, not knowing what to do.

“I will not take it back, lady.” She smiled and
looked around. “How ‘bout a little celebration?”

With that, the man found his voice and ran to a
shelf. He grabbed a clay jug and poured for them all. They drank and smiled and
Maria sat back, enjoying the happiness she brought to them; enjoying the
realization that she had the power to do this again and again and she would.

Their celebration was interrupted by a
neighbor. He poked his head in, scared and nervous. He was shaking nearly
uncontrollably.

“They found her.”

The woman began to cry and Maria followed the
man out. “What is this, Mister?”

“A bandit.” He tipped his head to the south.
“He’s been here for a week. He won’t go away and he took a girl. A little girl.
We didn’t know what had become of her, but they found her. He, he…” the man
began to cry. Maria had heard enough. She knew what to do and she instructed the
man to wait with the nice lady and the skinny man.

The bandit had taken up residence in the
nervous man’s shack and he sat, cooling off and drinking mescal. He was fairly
drunk and continuously called out for more food. A frightened, frail old woman
was working diligently to bring him more beans and Maria intercepted her. She
took the pot from the woman and indicated, with a finger to her lips, to be
quiet. She told the woman to go away.

Maria ducked down through the low doorway and
regarded the man. He was a fancy bandit, with a frilly embroidered shirt and
tight trousers, a big beaver sombrero and he wore his long moustaches in a deep
frown. He was a tremendous man, tall and fat and he looked like a bloated pig
sitting on a mat on the floor by the fire.

“What’s this?” He looked up at Maria and then
slowly looked her over. He’d not seen this one before. He liked abusing
children above all others, but a good looking woman would do.

Maria moved a little too quickly and pretended
to trip. She fell toward him then caught herself, but not before dumping the
pot’s hot contents into the man’s lap. He howled in anger and pain and looked
at her with hate in his eyes.

Before he could say or do another thing, Maria
was on him, the little gun she kept in a sleeve pointed at the man’s head. She
fired and the lead ball slowly did its work on his brain.

He looked up, pondering what had just happened,
tried to talk, tried to move, but nothing would work. Maria casually sat down
beside him and watched him die. She leaned in close and regarded him. He
mouthed words and she could see gold teeth. This one would bring some good
cash.

They sat this way for a long time. The man
still looking about, ponderously, stupidly, mouthing words that had no sound,
wondering what was happening. Maria lit a cigar and smoked and blew smoke at
his face. His nose wrinkled and he leaned his head back and sneezed. A great
gout of blood flew out of his nose and blood and clear fluid ran from his
nostrils and soaked his long moustaches, dripping onto his bean covered lap. He
still said nothing.

And then, when Maria could tell he was about to
die, she regarded him. “Hey, Mister.” He looked up at her, into her eyes,
trying to figure it all out. “I’m going to cut your goddamned head off when you
die. You know why?”

The man didn’t respond and she continued.

“So, when you go to hell, your body will wander
around and you won’t be able to see anything. You won’t be able to hurt little
girls again, pig. How do you like that?”

He seemed to comprehend, but Maria could not be
sure. She was growing tired of all this and it was getting late. She wanted to
move on and the bandit was not dying fast enough. She put the little gun behind
his ear. She fired again and he flopped over. He was finally dead.

Maria had made inquiries about the man with the
ugly growth on his face who she was certain had murdered Juana and decided to
stay in the region a little longer. People did remember the man, but they’d not
seen him for many years. The trail was cold. But, as she had plenty of money
now, she felt compelled to stay around. Perhaps something would turn up and
she’d have the opportunity to kill him.

She rode to the caves and wandered there all
day then decided to camp a while. It made her feel very strange as many of her
improvements remained. No one seemed to ever come to the caves and things would
stay the same there from one year to the next.

She found her old bedroom. The mice had torn it
up a bit, but it was livable. She put her horse in the box canyon corral and
untied her prize. It was leaking a lot and she resolved to soak the head in the
nearby stream for an hour or two. It would not damage the head and it would
drain all the blood and brain fluid out and make it easier to transport. She
was not really sure what she was going to do with the head, but this bandit
made her especially angry and she wanted to heap as much shame on the corpse,
the memory of the man, as she could. She would, from here on out be especially
brutal and merciless to anyone who harmed a child.

She took the head out of the sack and looked it
over. She was able to get one of the gold teeth out quite easily as the tooth
was dead and could be pulled without much effort, but the other one was a
different story and she didn’t want to damage the head by bashing the tooth out
with the handle of her six shooter. So, it remained and looked odd, reflecting
sunlight because the head now had a slack jaw and the mouth hung open as if it
were catching flies. She breathed in deeply and spit a great gob onto the face,
then tethered it and held it under water with a big rock. This had the desired
effect, and when Maria came back several hours later, the head was as pale as
porcelain and no longer drained blood or other fluids.