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CHAPTER IV
A RACE WITH A MULE

When Stephens arrived at the edge of the terrace on which the plough-lands lay, he looked down on the green expanse of meadow through which the river ran, and feeding in it half a mile below he saw some stock that he knew must be his. "There they are," said he to himself. "I reckon I'll take Jinks and go down to San Remo and get my mail, and see if those Winchester cartridges that I sent for from Santa Fé came last night."

He clambered down the abrupt bank of red clay to the meadow, and followed down the line of the stream till he came to where his stock were eagerly cropping the fresh green grass.

"Now how am I going to catch him?" said he to himself. "Let's see where Felipe and the lariats are"; and looking round, he presently perceived some clothes on the river bank, and going to them found Felipe, stripped to his waist-cloth, splashing about in the middle of a deep pool.

"Hullo, Felipe!" cried he playfully. "Trying to drown yourself there? You must go to the Rio Grande for that – there isn't water enough in the Santiago River."

Felipe heard him indistinctly, and came towards him, swimming in Indian style with an amazingly vigorous overhand stroke. Stephens picked up one of the lariats that were lying loose on the ground by the clothes, and swinging the noose round his head, jestingly tried to lasso the lad. Missing him, he turned it off with, "I don't want you yet. I want the big mule; I'm going to catch him and go down to San Remo"; and suiting the action to the word, he coiled the lariat as he spoke, and turned and started for the beasts.

Felipe came out and stood on the bank to watch him. "What a good humour he's in now," thought the boy. "I suppose he was lucky with the rock. Now is my time to ask him for the mare."

Stephens, holding the coil of rope behind him to conceal his intention from the mule he desired to catch, cautiously approached him. Jinks, the mule, however, was not to be deceived for a moment, and as his master came near, turned his heels to him and scuttled off. Horses and mules where they have frequently to wear hobbles become surprisingly active in them. They bound along for a short distance, in an up-and-down rocking-horse gallop, so fast that even a man on horseback has to make his mount put his best foot forward to get up to them. Stephens found himself outpaced, and gave it up, seeing that it was impossible for him to capture the truant single-handed.

Felipe flew to his side in a moment. "Let me try to catch him, Sooshiuamo," cried he, eagerly. "Let me!" and taking the lariat from the not unwilling hands of the American, he started off, coiling it rapidly as he ran. Before bathing he had undone his pigtail, and his long, glossy black hair hung in thick, wavy masses down to his waist. Among the Indians, the women cut their hair short – if it remained uncut the care of it would take too long, and would keep them from their household duties; but the men, having more leisure, allow theirs to grow, and are very proud of its luxuriance and beauty. As Felipe ran, his streaming locks floated out behind him on the air like the mane of a wild horse, and gave to his figure a wonderfully picturesque effect; his wet skin shone in the sun the colour of red bronze.

The Pueblo Indians are fine runners; they have inherited fleetness of foot and endurance from their forefathers, and keep up the standard by games and races among themselves. Felipe, young though he was, had no superior in swiftness in the village. He darted like a young stag across the meadow after the fugitive mule, and chased him at full speed down to the river brink, and over the dry shingle banks of its very bed. The pebbles rattled and flew back in showers from the hoof-prints of the mule. Round they wheeled, back into the meadow again; and here the Indian, putting on an astonishing burst of speed, fairly ran the quadruped down, lassoed him, and brought him to his master.

"Here he is, señor," said he modestly, handing Stephens the rope.

"Well done, Felipe," said Stephens. "You did that well. You do run like an antelope." He felt quite a glow of admiration for the athletic youth who stood panting before him, resting his hand on the mule's back.

"Now's my time," thought Felipe, "what luck! – oh, Don Estevan," he began, and then stopped with downcast eyes.

"Well, what is it?" said Stephens kindly.

"Oh, Don Estevan, if you would lend me your mare!" The murder was out, and Felipe looked up at his employer beseechingly. "I would take such care of her!" he continued; "I would indeed."

"Lend her for what?" said Stephens, a little taken aback. "What do you want with her?"

"I want her to go to Ensenada to-night," said the boy.

"Oh, but Felipe, I'm going to the sierra to-morrow to hunt, you know. It isn't possible. But," he continued, touched a little by the boy's evident distress, "what do you want to do there? Why don't you get your father's horse?"

"He's at the herd. My father doesn't let me," said Felipe despondently. Then he went on, "I thought perhaps you didn't go for a day or two. I will bring her back to-morrow in the night. And she shall not be tired – not a bit. Oh, do lend her to me! Please do!"

"I wonder what foolery he's up to now," said Stephens to himself; "I do hate to lend a horse anyhow – and to a harebrained Indian boy who'll just ride all the fat off her in no time. Cheek, I call it, of him to ask it."

"But," he continued in a not unfriendly tone, "why do you want her? Is it flour you have to fetch?" Wheat flour was rather scarce this spring in the pueblo, and some of the Indians were buying it over on the Rio Grande.

"No, sir, it's not that. Only I want her," he added. "Oh please, Don Estevan, please," said he with an imploring face; "do lend the mare or the mule, or anything to ride. Oh do!" and he threw all the entreaty he was capable of into his voice, till it trembled and almost broke into a sob.

"Why, what ails the boy?" said Stephens, surprised at his emotion. "If you want it so bad," he continued, "why don't you ask it from Tostado, or Miguel, or some of them? They'll let you have one. You know I never lend mine. If I did once, all the pueblo would be borrowing them every day. You know it yourself. You've always told me yourself that it would be like that." He was trying to harden his heart by going over his stock argument against lending. "You see I can't do it. I'm going off to the sierra to-morrow," and he turned away, leading the mule after him by the rope.

But before he had gone far he stopped and looked round as if an idea had struck him. "It might be a good notion to try and pump this boy a bit right now," he considered; "he's so desperate eager to borrow the mare he might be willing to let out a thing or two to please me." He beckoned with his hand to Felipe, who was gazing regretfully after his employer.

"See here, Felipe," said Stephens, as the boy eagerly ran to him; "there's something that I had in my mind to ask you, only I forgot. It's just simply this – did you ever kill a rattlesnake?"

"Never, oh, never in my life!" cried the young Indian, with a voice of horror.

"Well, and why not?" persisted the other. "What's your reason anyway? What is there to prevent you?"

"Oh, but, Sooshiuamo, why should I?" said the boy in an embarrassed manner, looking distractedly at the ground as he balanced himself uneasily on one bare foot, crossing the other over it, and twiddling his toes together. "I don't know," he added after a pause. "Why should I kill them?"

"Well, they're ugly, venomous things," said the American, "and that would be reason enough for anybody, I should think. But tell me another thing then. What do your folks do with them in the estufa? Can't you tell me that much?"

"What are you saying about things in the estufa?" cried the boy excitedly. "Have any of the Mexicans been telling you, then, that we keep a sacred snake in the pueblo? Don't you ever believe it, don't, don't!" and his voice rose to a passionate shrillness that betrayed the anxiety aroused in him by any intrusion on the mysteries of his people.

"The Mexicans be blowed!" said Stephens. "I'm talking to you now of what I've just been seeing with my own eyes. There was a big old rattler came out of the rock after I blasted it, and young Antonio went and caught it by the neck and let it twist itself around his arm, and another fellow went to playing with it with a bunch of feathers, and then they ran off with it to the pueblo, – the cacique told them to, – and half a dozen more chaps with them, as tight as they could go. Now I want to know what all that amounts to."

"I can tell you this much," said Felipe after a moment's hesitation; "Antonio is one of the Snakes; so were the others, of course, who went with him. The snake is their grandfather, and so they know all about snakes. But I'm a Turquoise, like you, Sooshiuamo. You are my uncle," he added insinuatingly, "and you should be kind to me and lend me a horse sometimes."

The American laughed aloud. "Oh, I know all about Grandfather Snake and Grandfather Turquoise and the rest of them," he said. "But I'm not an Indian, and I don't come into your family tree, even if you do call me Sooshiuamo and I live in a Turquoise house. I don't lay claim to be any particular sort of uncle to you. But I do want you should tell me something more about this snake-charming business. Can't you let it out?"

"But how can I let it out?" exclaimed Felipe in an irritated voice. "Haven't I told you already that the Snakes know all about it, and not me? You may be sure the Snakes keep their own affairs private, and don't show them to outsiders. How should I know anything about the Snakes' business?"

"Well, Felipe, if you won't, you won't, I suppose," said Stephens. "I know you can be an obstinate young pig when you choose." He did not more than half believe in the lad's professed ignorance. He hesitated a moment as if in doubt whether to try another tack. "Look here, young 'un," he began again in a friendlier tone, "I'll pass that. We'll play it you don't know anything about snakes. You're a full-blooded Turquoise boy, you are, and your business is to know all about turquoises, and turquoise mines, and so on. Very well." He was pleased to see a sort of conscious smile come over the lad's mouth almost involuntarily. "All right then. Let's play it that you are my nephew if you like. Now then, fire ahead, you, and tell your uncle all about where we go to get our turquoises from. You're bound to be posted up in these family matters. There's a lot of things your uncle wants to hear. The silver plates for the horse bridles, for instance, now; let's hear where they come from. Go on; tell me about our silver mines."

"No, no, no!" he cried desperately, and he sprang back as if the American had struck him with a whip. "It is impossible; there aren't any; there are no such things; the Mexicans have been telling you that, too, have they? but they're all liars, yes, liars; don't you ever believe one word that they say about us." He paused, his lips parted with excitement and his lithe frame passionately convulsed.

Regretfully Stephens looked at him and recognised that it was hopeless to get anything out of him, at least in his present condition. "Very well, Felipe," he said, "I think I understand your game. You just don't choose, and that's about the size of it"; and gathering up the coils of the lariat he turned abruptly away and led off the reluctant Captain Jinks in the direction of the pueblo in order to saddle him up. He felt decidedly cheap; as yet he had not scored a single trick in the game he was trying to play.

Felipe stood looking after him disconsolately; at last he gave a heavy sigh and walked back to where he had left his clothes, with drooping head and flagging step, a figure how unlike the elastic form that had burst full speed across the meadow five minutes before. "It's no use," said he to himself. "He doesn't care; he's a very hard man, is Don Estevan." He did up his glossy hair into its queue, put on his long buckskin leggings and his cotton shirt, worn outside in Indian fashion like a tunic and secured with a leather belt, bound his red handkerchief as a turban round his head – the universal pueblo head-dress – and with a very heavy heart went back to his weeding.

CHAPTER V
"OJOS AZULES NO MIRAN"

"Ojos azules no miran– Blue eyes don't see," said a soft voice to Stephens in gently rallying tones. He was sitting on Captain Jinks in the roadway, nearly opposite to the first house in San Remo, with his eyes shaded under his arched hands, and gazing fixedly back across the long levels of the Indian lands over which he had just ridden.

"Si, miran, – Yes, they do see," he answered coolly, without either looking at the speaker or removing his hands from his forehead, as he still continued his searching gaze. He was trying to make out whether the animals he had left in Felipe's charge were kept by him still grazing safely in the meadow, or if they had been allowed to wander off into the young wheat. The distance to where he had left them feeding was nearer two miles than one, but nature had gifted him with singularly keen vision, and the frontiersman's habit of being perpetually on the lookout had developed this power to the utmost. He was able to identify positively his own stock amongst the other animals at pasture, and to assure himself that, so far, they were all right.

He took his hands from his forehead, straightened himself in his saddle, and looked down at the person who had ventured to speak in so disrespectful a way of the quality of his eyesight. The speaker was a young Mexican woman, and he encountered the glance of a pair of eyes as soft as velvet and as black as night, set in a face of rich olive tint. At that pleasant sight his firm features relaxed into a smile, and he took up her bantering challenge.

"Si, miran," he repeated, – "Yes, they do see, señorita; they see a very pretty girl"; and with a ceremonious sweep of his arm he took off his broad sombrero, as the conventional way of emphasising the conventional gallantry.

The girl blushed with pleasure at the American's compliment. She had a dark scarf drawn over her head, and she now tossed the end of it coquettishly across her face, and kept up her bantering tone.

"Then," replied she, "as you had them directed straight towards the Indian pueblo, I suppose it was a pretty little Indian squaw they were gazing back at so earnestly."

"No," he returned bluntly, matter-of-fact Anglo-Saxon that he was; "I was looking back towards Santiago in order to make out whether my horses had got into the Indians' wheat. But they're all right. And how is your father, Don Nepomuceno?" he added civilly.

"He is very well, señor; he is now at home. Won't you come in and see him? He said he hoped you would be coming down this morning, as it was mail day."

"I am much obliged to him," answered Stephens. "I am on my way now to the stage station, and I will look in as I return."

San Remo was the place where the weekly mail from Santa Fé to Fort Wingate crossed the Santiago River. It was a village of the Mexicans, and lay just outside the boundary of the four square leagues of the Indian grant.

"That is where we two were going," she answered, "my little sister and myself," and she laid her hand on a little brown maiden of ten years or so, who had come out of the house and now stood shyly behind the elder sister, holding on to her dress. "We have to buy some sugar," she continued, "and there is a new storekeeper at the stage station, and they say he sells cheap."

"Then with your permission, señorita, I'll walk along there with you," said the American. He suited the action to the word, throwing his right leg lightly over the neck of his mule and then dropping both feet together to the ground so as to alight facing the girl.

"Say, Chiquita," and he addressed the younger girl, "don't you want a ride? Let me put you up"; but the child only smiled, showing her ivory teeth and clinging more closely behind her sister.

"Don't be a silly, Altagracia," cried the latter, bringing her round to the front. "Why don't you say 'thank you' to the American señor for his kindness in giving you a ride on his mule?" and she pushed her, in spite of her affected reluctance, into the hands of Stephens, who raised her from the ground and placed her, sitting sideways, in the wide California saddle, and gave her the reins to hold. Then, resting his right hand on the mule's neck, he walked forward towards the store beside the elder girl.

"I heard a new man had moved in and taken charge of the stage station and post-office this week," he said. "Has he got a good stock? – many pretty things for the señoras?"

"They say he has beautiful things, – velvet dresses and splendid shawls," she replied; "but I haven't seen them yet. I've only been in with my aunt to buy things for the house, not to see his dress goods. But I hope my father will take us there soon, before all the best of them are gone. The wife of Ramon Garcia got a lovely pink muslin there. She showed it to me yesterday in her house. He's a very clever man, too, is the new storekeeper; he is a Texan, but he speaks Spanish beautifully, just like ourselves. He has a Mexican wife."

"Ah," remarked Stephens, "has he? What's his name, do you know?"

"Bah-koose," answered the girl, giving full value to the broad Spanish vowels which she imported into the somewhat commonplace name of "Backus." "Don Tomas Bah-koose is his name," she repeated. "He is not old, he appears to be about thirty, and he has three children. But perhaps you have met him; is he a friend of yours?"

"Backus," said Stephens reflectively; "Thomas Backus. No, I can't say that he is; I don't remember ever meeting anyone of that name."

"It sounds almost like our Spanish name, Baca," said she; "but he is not one of the Bacas, though he has been living at Peña Blanca, where so many of them live." The Bacas of New Mexico are a fine old family, sprung from the loins of Cabeza de Vaca, the comrade of Ponce de Leon, one of the heroes of the Spanish conquest.

"Well," said Stephens, "we'll soon see what he looks like, anyhow, for here we are at the store." He lifted the child down from the saddle, and the two girls at once went inside while he tied up his mule to a hitching-post that was set in front of the door.

After he had finished doing so, he followed them in; and stepping across the threshold he was instantly aware of a surprised glance of half-recognition darted at him by a man who stood behind the counter, where he was showing some cotton prints to three shawl-clad Mexican women. "Mornin', mister," said the storekeeper, in English. "Excuse me if I keep you waitin' a minute while I 'tend on these ladies."

"All right," answered Stephens briefly, and he leaned quietly back against the mud-plastered adobe wall till the other should be at leisure. He ran his eye over the shelves, which, like those of most Mexican country village shops, contained a varied assortment that ranged from tenpenny nails to the tin saints whose shrines decorate even the poorest hovel in New Mexico. His gaze reverted to the storekeeper, who was a tall, dark, spare man, with a clean-shaven face, a bilious complexion, and snaky black hair. This, then, was Mr. Thomas Backus, an American citizen married to a Mexican wife. She had certainly helped him to a fluent command of her mother tongue, and Stephens could not help envying the easy way in which he poured out lavish praises of his new goods to the customers whom he was serving. The purchases of these ladies were presently completed, but they still remained in the store carrying on an animated conversation with Don Nepomuceno's daughter, who had joined them in discussing the patterns they had chosen.

"And now what can I do for you?" inquired the storekeeper, looking Stephens in the face as he turned to him.

"Surely I have met this man before, but where?" said Stephens to himself, while he answered Mr. Backus's question by remarking politely, "Oh, I'm not in any hurry, thank you. Won't you serve this young lady first?" and with a slight gesture he indicated Manuelita, who was still absorbed in the muslins of her friends. Rack his memory as he would, he could not recall the occasion when he and Backus had met previously, yet he felt almost certain it had occurred.

"Why certainly, certainly," returned the storekeeper cheerily; "so long as you don't mind waitin' a few minutes," and he turned to the girl. "Then what may I have the pleasure of being allowed to show you, señorita?"

"Two peloncillos, Don Tomas, if you will be so kind," answered the young lady; and two conical loaves of the brown Mexican sugar so popular in the Territory were accordingly wrapped in paper and handed over to her; but it was manifest that the pretty frocks were what were nearest to her heart, and she and her three friends still continued to discuss the subject with all the ardour of connoisseurs.

Meantime Stephens became more and more convinced in his own mind not only that this was not his first encounter with Backus, but that the latter was also engaged in watching him as closely as possible. He chose, however, not to call attention to this by any inquiry when at length the storekeeper announced himself ready to wait upon him, contenting himself with simply explaining the object of his visit to the store.

"I just wanted to see," he said quietly, "if you happened to have a parcel here for me by the stage to-day from Santa Fé. Stephens is my name, John Stephens. It's a parcel from Spiegelberg's," he added explanatorily, "that I'm looking for; a small, heavy parcel; it's Winchester cartridges."

"Oh yes, they're here; the stage driver left 'em for you all right," said Mr. Backus promptly, reaching down for them under the counter and handing them over. "And I think there's some mail matter too for you; I'll just see"; with which remark he disappeared into the little post-office that was boarded off at one end of the store, returning from there presently with some papers in his hand. "I reckon this letter's for you"; he read out the address with the laboured enunciation of a man of limited education. "To Mr. John Stephens, living among the Pueblo Indians, Santiago, N.M."

"Yes, that'll be for me," said Stephens, putting out his hand for it.

"I reckoned as how you must be the man as soon as I seed you come in," answered Backus, handing over the letter along with a newspaper and a postal packet, "'cos by what I hear thar' aint no other American living in this valley."

"Just so," assented the prospector; "I'm the only one there is anywhere around here. I've been playing a lone hand down in these parts all winter. For six months I haven't spoken to an American except the stage-driver."

It was a relief to him to talk English to anyone again after so long an interval, although he was not exactly prepossessed by Mr. Backus's looks, nor by the only thing he knew for certain about him, namely, that he had gone and married a Mexican wife, a decidedly eccentric thing for an American to do, in Stephens's eyes. But the mere sound of his native language again was music in his ears, even though it were spoken by a man as illiterate as the storekeeper. For, compared to the other, Backus was illiterate. And it was a thing worth noting about Stephens, who had had the advantage of a high-school education, that though he now freely made use of the rude, vigorous colloquialism of the West, – so much so, indeed, that he talked to himself in it, – yet he could drop it in a moment on occasion. Before a stranger for whom he felt an instinctive distaste, he at once became formal, and his language took on a precision and his tone a punctiliousness that were foreign to his more familiar discourse. As he would have said of himself, "If I don't cotton to a man at once, I always feel like putting on a lot of frills."

"You bin long in these parts?" inquired Mr. Backus carelessly.

"About a year now in New Mexico," replied Stephens; "but I've been in this Western country a good deal longer than that. I'm not a tenderfoot, exactly, if I may say so; I didn't come to this country for my health."

Many men whose lungs are affected have hoped to shake off their dread malady by breathing the pure, thin, dry air of Colorado and New Mexico. The hardy Western pioneer pities the consumptive patient; he succours him freely in distress; and, above all things, he hates to be mistaken for one himself. Stephens was determined that his fellow-countryman should be under no misapprehension on this point.

"No," laughed Mr. Backus lightly, "nor you don't look much like one of them pore health-seekers neither. Say, though," he continued, more warily, "you'll excuse my axin', but was you never in New Mexico before this last year?"

"No," replied Stephens – "that is – yes, I should have said," correcting himself, "I was once, but only for a short time, and that was some years ago, and not in this part of the Territory." He shifted his position against the adobe wall a little, and laid down on the counter in a casual sort of way the parcel and the mail matter which he was holding, as if to indicate that he was ready for a long chat. In reality he was setting his hands free in case he might possibly need to use them. To be at all closely questioned about one's past life by an absolute stranger acts on the experienced Western man as a danger signal. He noted the intense glow in Backus's eyes, and as he did so he grew conscious of a strange sense of doubleness in his own brain, as if all this scene had been enacted once before, and he ought to know what was coming next. He shifted his waist-belt and left his thumbs resting lightly on the buckle in front; it was a perfectly natural thing to do, and yet it left his right hand within six inches of the trusty Colt's revolver at his hip. Assuredly Stephens was no tenderfoot; he was watching every motion of Backus out of the corner of his eye.

"Say, stranger," began the latter, leaning forward over the counter, and speaking low and clear, "no offence, but I want to ax you a certain question. It's a little sudden-like, but I have a reason for it; allers no offence, you understand?"

"You can ask me any question you have a mind to, Mr. Backus," said Stephens coolly. "Of course, whether I answer it or not is my choice."

Mr. Backus might be his fellow-countryman, but he must learn not to be presuming. Almost unconsciously to himself his tone hardened. Stephens could stand the easy familiarity of races that were not his own, and treat the Indians of Santiago with a friendliness that was all the more kindly for his own underlying sense of superiority, but for an American to treat him lightly was another matter. The pride and reserve that had grown up in solitude revolted at this man's inquisitiveness.

"Wal' then, stranger," continued Backus, with an apologetic manner that was due to the other's change of voice, "allers, as I said before, meanin' no offence, did you ever happen to kill a man?"

Manuelita, though apparently absorbed in a rose-sprigged muslin, caught a note in the Texan's tone that aroused her vigilance. She knew no English, but her quick brain divined that when he asked, "Did you ever kill a man?" he was putting no common question.

Stephens started at the abrupt query, and his face flushed. He paused a moment, looking hard at the other; then he slowly answered, "I don't know that I have ever killed anyone."

"Meanin', I take it," rejoined the other, "that you don't know for certain, neither, that you haven't. I ax yer pardon again, stranger, but as sure as God made little apples I've got a reason for what I'm saying. That ar' time you was in New Mexico years ago that you spoke of just now, was you, by any chance, at the battle of Apache Cañon?"

The words "Apache Cañon" sent a thrill through Manuelita; she knew well that there had been a bloody fight there.

"Yes," answered Stephens, a strange new light beginning to dawn upon him; "I fought at Apache Cañon, if you must know."

"You was on the Northern side, warn't you?" queried the storekeeper again.

"Yes," said the prospector quietly; "I was a volunteer in the Second Colorado Regiment."

"By gum, then, I knowed it!" cried the Texan excitedly; "you was one of the Pet Lambs."

At the beginning of the Civil War the Colorado troops, a pretty tough lot, were sometimes sportively alluded to as the "Pet Lambs."

A dry smile came to Stephens's lips at the sound of the old name. "I was a Lamb," said he.

"And I was one of Baylor's Babes," returned the other.

"Baylor's Babes" was the nickname bestowed upon a force of Texas rangers who invaded New Mexico, and had the audacity to propose to conquer the whole Rocky Mountain country for Jefferson Davis off their own bats.

"Yes, you bet I was a Babe," he repeated, "and a whale of a Babe at that, and hurrahed for Jeff Davis as long as I could stand. But that's all over and done with now, and we've buried the war hatchet. But say, stranger, do you happen to recollect what kind of a wepping you was carrying at Apache Cañon? There warn't no Winchesters in them days," he added, patting the parcel of cartridges that lay on the counter.

"I was armed with a muzzle-loading Springfield U.S. rifle, altered in Denver to fire with a tape cap," replied Stephens. His nerves grew tense, and he braced himself for a possible struggle to the death, for he thought the Texan was about to spring on him; but he only asked with quaint earnestness:

"Du tell; what's a tape cap, mister?"

"Why, did you never see one?" said Stephens. "But of course they're out of date now. It was a dodge for capping a gun automatically. There was a tape fitted with caps that was fed forward on top of the tube in front of the hammer. It worked like a charm. You bet there was no time lost fumbling around in your pouch for a cap with your fingers if you had one of them fixed on your gun."