Valley of Fire (17 page)

She started at the beginning, which is where most stories begin, even though we knowed—or thought we knowed—all about how the gold was found in Mora, how it got to Gran Quivira, where it got rediscovered in 1848. Sister Rocío repeated all that, but I knowed a lot better than to interrupt her.

On the other hand, Sean Fenn didn't.

“We know all that!” he snapped. “Where the hell's the fornicating gold today?” Actually, that ain't exactly what he said. He used another word, one that caused the rest of us who'd gathered around Sister Rocío to hear her story to cringe. I mean, even nuns and priests swore a right healthy amount, but there's some words that you ain't supposed to say in polite society.

She just stopped, pursed her lips, and turned toward Fenn's voice. “Young man”—she spoke to him like she would a child—“using profanity simply shows one's ignorance. If you'd care to hear my story, I will tell it in my own way. If not, you may leave and go fornicate yourself.”

Nobody interrupted the old nun after that.

After about an hour and a half, she reached the part just before Geneviève had stopped when she was telling me about the gold and all. That's when the giant farmer from the Pecos River and that bastard of a horse trader from Anton Chico had interrupted our evening, and started us both on the road to Hell.

That ain't bad. If I had more time at this writing thing, I might could find me a job writing for the
Illustrated Police News
. I always loved to look at them pictures.

Anyway, Rocío and the gent from the Smithsonian had found the bodies of all them poor dead Indians and the ingots. They had sent for supplies, fetching burros and grub from Socorro. They brung back something else, a fact Geneviève had left out or forgotten.

The guide named Cortez returned with five nuns.

According to Sister Rocío this is what happened next.

 

That is right near El Paso. I know, on account that there's a jail there that I've spent some time in. It wasn't a bad place to be because it's right close to the mission. Those bells sounded mighty pretty, but not as pretty as when the choir or congregation started singing. It was some of the best music I've ever heard whilst in jail. Almost as pretty as that deputy sheriff who clawed the banjo so fine in Ouray, Colorado.

 

 

Well, maybe not that good, since he was soon to be dead, but there wasn't nothing wrong with his plans.

 

 

Sighing, Sister Rocío stopped her telling of the story to inform us, “I should have spoken out. I should have warned the five young nuns that they should have stayed in Socorro, followed El Camino Real to El Paso.” Her head dropped, and she crossed herself and fell to silent prayer.

Fenn got impatient, waiting for her to talk some more, but he didn't say nothing. He just tossed another piece of wood on the fire The Pockmarked Man had started.

Back to the Sister's story.

Right before they lit a shuck for El Paso, a norther blew in, dropping the temperature into the teens. It was a veritable blue norther—wet, mean, ugly.

They bundled up, the nuns sang songs, and they journeyed south through the Pinatosa, where there ain't nothing to block the wind. By the time they reached the Malpais on the edge of the Valley of Fire, ice covered them badlands.

That was where the bandits hit.

“Because one cannot keep such fortune a secret,” Rocío said to us. “One of the guides must have let a friend know.”

Once Rocío, Primrose, Cortez, them nuns and all was pinned down, bandits sent word that they would let everyone go if they left the gold. Nobody believed them. Cortez asked if they would at least spare the lives of the six nuns. The bandits said they would consider it, which meant, no. Primrose asked if they would spare him. Rocío slammed her fist into the back of his head; she had two good hands back in them days.

They didn't give up, and everybody tried to prepare for the long night ahead of 'em.

Night turned even more bitter. A priest had already been killed with a bullet through his temple, and two burros were lying in the ice, frozen stiff, shot full of holes. The nuns prayed for deliverance. Sister Rocío decided that the gold should go to the Indians, not to the Mexicans, not to the Smithsonian, but especially not to bandits. The menfolk decided to stay behind, sacrifice themselves, and send the nuns and the gold south with one man. Cortez drew the short straw, which meant he'd leave with the nuns—and the gold.

All of the men built up a big fire that night, made a show of their camp, then, with the wind howling and clouds blacking out the moon, Cortez and Rocío led the five other nuns, the burros, and the gold into the Valley of Fire.

A country full of lava rocks ain't easy to cross in daylight. But in bitter cold? With ice coating the ground? Being pursued by bandits with murderous intent?

It was a miracle they made it as far as they'd done.

As dawn broke, Sister Rocío couldn't feel her fingers no more. Hurt so bad, she couldn't even rub her rosary.

Dawn brung light, but no heat. A freezing fog swept across the rugged trail, coating giant lava boulders, turning the grass—what little there was—into fingers of icicles. Even the packs, the harness, the hides of her burro got frosted. She figured the other nuns and their burros ahead of her was suffering just as bad.

That's a crazy thing. Freezing fog. You wouldn't expect to find it in country like this, but it happened. Once, Big Tim Pruett and I was in eastern Colorado, and the fog got so thick, the two of us was lost for a whole day. It wasn't freezing, of course, on account that it was early August, but I imagine it could've been that White Death—that's what the Indians called freezing fog—had we been out in February.

Sister Rocío flexed her fingers, then began rubbing them furiously against her woolen habit. That, too, was coated with ice. So was a bandanna she'd tried to turn into a muffler.

Ahead of her, a burro snorted. She could barely see it through the thick fog.

Her own burro shook its head, sending particles of ice everywhere. At least they was moving, Rocío thought. Stop, and they'd all die.

As if God heard her thoughts, Cortez called out something far ahead of her in that killing fog. The mules stopped.

Instantly, she felt colder.

She removed the bandanna just long enough to shake out the ice, formed on the outside by the fog and on the inside by her freezing breath. After she had rubbed her cheeks, Sister Rocío checked her fingertips. No frostbite. Not yet.

It hurt to breathe. She had no idea how cold it was. Ten below zero? Colder?

Hard to believe it could get that cold in Hades.

I watched Sister Rocío flex her fingers as if she was still on that burro in the freezing fog. She took a deep breath, rubbed her cheeks, and looked down at the fingertips on her one hand. This here is more of her story.

 

 

Cold had muddled his memory, too, I reckon. It was his idea.

 

“¡Qué chinga!”
Cortez railed. “Forgive me, Sister. I do not even know. In this whiteness, I am not even sure where we are.”

 

Cortez got mighty forgetful. Primrose had stayed behind, dying for them freezing nuns.

 

“¡Maldita sea!”
Cortez shook his head, checking the rope, harnesses, and packs as he made his way forward, speaking to the young nuns.