Bred of the Desert - Charles Marcus Horton (best short novels .TXT) 📗

per day. Also, being what he was, Pedro had gained his pounds of flesh–was alarmingly fat, with short legs of giant circumference. Usually these legs were clothed in tight-fitting overalls, and his small feet incased in boots of high-grade leather wonderfully roweled. Yet many years had passed since Pedro had been seen in a saddle. Evidently he held to the rowels in fond memory of his days of slender youth and coltish gambolings. Pedro was seated in his customary place upon an empty keg on the porch, and Felipe, ignoring his grunted greeting, plunged at once into the purpose of his call.

He had come to borrow a horse, Felipe explained. One of his own was unfit for work, yet the cutting and drawing must go on. While the mare was recuperating, he carefully pointed out, he himself could continue to earn money to meet some of his pressing debts. Any kind of horse would do, he declared, so long as it had four legs and was able to carry on the work. The horse need not have a mouth, even, he added, jocosely, for reasons nobody need explain. After which he sat down on the porch and awaited the august decision.

Pedro remained silent a long time, the while he moistened his lips with fitful tongue, and gazed across the tiny settlement reflectively. At length he drew a deep breath, mixed of disgust and regret, and proceeded to make slow reply.

It was true, he began, that he had horses to rent. And it was further true, he went on, deliberately, that he kept them for just this purpose. But–and his pause was fraught with deep significance–it was no less true that Felipe Montoya bore a bad reputation as a driver of horses–was known, indeed, to kill horses through overwork and underfeed–and that, therefore, to lend him a horse was like kissing the horse good-by and hitching up another to the stone-boat. Nevertheless, he hastened to add, if Felipe was in urgent need of a horse, and was prepared to pay the customary small rate per day, and to pay in advance–cash–

Here Pedro paused and popped accusing eyes at Felipe, in one strong dramatic moment before continuing. But he did not continue. Felipe was the check. For Felipe had leaped to his feet, and now stood brandishing an ugly fist underneath the proprietor’s nose. Further–and infinitely worse–Felipe was saying something.

“Pedro Garcia,” he began, shrilly, “I must got a horse! And I have coom for a horse! And I have thee money to pay for a horse! And if I kill thot horse,” he went on, still brandishing his fist–“if thot horse he’s dropping dead in thee harness–I pay you for thot horse! I haf drive horses–”

“Si, si, si!” began Pedro, interrupting.

“I haf drive horses on thees trail ten years!” persisted Felipe, yelling, “and in all thot time, Pedro Garcia, I’m killin’ only seven horses, and all seven of thees horses is dyin’, Pedro Garcia, when I haf buy them, and I haf buy all seven horses from you, Pedro Garcia, thief and robber!” He paused to take a breath. “And not once, Pedro Garcia,” he went on, “do I keeck about thot-a horse is a horse! But I haf coom to you before! And I haf coom to you now! I must got a horse quick! And I bringin’ thot horse back joost thee same as I’m gettin’ thot horse–in good condition–better–because everybody is knowin.’ I feed a horse better than you feed a horse–and I’m cleanin’ the horse once in a while, too!” Which was a lie, both as to the feeding and the cleaning, as he well knew, and as, indeed, he well knew Pedro knew, who, nevertheless, nodded grave assent.

“Si,” admitted Pedro. “Pero ustede–”

“A horse!” thundered Felipe, interrupting, his neck cords dangerously distended. “You give me a horse–you hear? I want a horse–a horse! I don’ coom here for thee talk!”

Pedro rose hastily from the keg. Also, he grunted quick consent. Then he stepped inside the store, followed by Felipe, who made several needed purchases, and, since he had his enemy cowed, and was troubled with thirst created by the protracted harangue, to say nothing of the strong inclination within him to celebrate the coming of the colt, he made a purchase that was not needed–a bottle of vino, cool and dry from Pedro’s cellar. With these tucked securely under his arm, he then calmly informed Pedro of the true state of his finances, and left the store, returning across the settlement, which lay wrapped in pulsating noonday quiet. In the shade of his adobe he sat upon the ground, with his back comfortably against the wall. Directly the quiet was broken by two distinct sounds–the pop of a cork out of the neck of a bottle, and the gurgle of liquid into the mouth of a man.

Thus Felipe set out upon a protracted debauch. In this debauch he did nothing worth while. He used neither the borrowed horse nor his own sound one. Each day saw him redder of eye and more swollen of lip; each day saw him increasingly heedless of his debts; each day saw him more neglectful of his duties toward his animals. The one bottle became two bottles, the two bottles became three, each secured only after threatened assault upon the body of Pedro, each adding its store to the already deep conviviality and reckless freedom from all cares now Felipe’s. He forgot everything–forgot the stolen money, forgot the colt, forgot the needs of the mare–all in exhilarated pursuit of phantoms.

Yet the colt did not suffer. Becoming ever more confident of himself as the days passed, he soon revealed pronounced curiosity and an aptitude for play. He would stare at strutting roosters, gaze after straddling hens, blink quizzically at the burro, frown upon the grunting pigs, all as if cataloguing these specimens, listing them in his thoughts, some day to make good use of the knowledge. But most of all he showed interest in and playfulness toward his mother and her doings. He would follow her about untiringly, pausing whenever she paused, starting off again whenever she started off–seemingly bent upon acquiring the how and why of her every movement.

But it was his playfulness finally that brought him first needless suffering. The mare was standing with her nose in the feed-box. She had stood thus many times during the past week; but usually, before, the box had been empty, whereas now it contained a generous quantity of alfalfa. But this the colt did not know. He only knew that he was interested in this thing, and so went there to attempt, as many times before, to reach his nose into the mysterious box. Finding that he could not, he began, as never before, to frisk about the mare, tossing up his little heels and throwing down his head with all the reckless abandon of a seasoned “outlaw.” He could do these things because he was a rare colt, stronger than ever colt before was at his age, and for a time the mare suffered his antics with a look of pleased toleration. But as he kept it up, and as she was getting her first real sustenance since the day of his coming, she at length became fretful and sounded a low warning. But this the colt did not heed. Instead he wheeled suddenly and plunged directly toward her, bunting her sharply. Nor did the single bunt satisfy him. Again and again he attacked her, plunging in and darting away each time with remarkable celerity, until, her patience evidently exhausted, she whisked her head around and nipped him sharply. Screaming with pain and fright, he plunged from her, sought the opposite side of the inclosure, and turned upon her a pair of very hurt and troubled eyes.

Yet all the world over mothers are mothers. After a time–a long time, as if to let her punishment sink in–the mare made her way slowly to the colt, and there fell to licking him, seeming to tell him of her lasting forgiveness. Under this lavish caressing the colt, as if to reveal his own forgiveness for the dreadful hurt, bestowed similar attention upon her–in this attention, though he did not know it, softening flesh that had experienced no such consideration in years. Thus they stood, side by side, mother and son, long into the day, laying the foundation of a love that never dies–that strengthens, in fact, with the years, though all else fail–love between mother and her offspring.

Other things, things of minor consequence, added their mite to his early development. One morning, while the mare was asleep, the colt, alert and standing, was startled by the sudden movement of a large rooster. The rooster had left the ground with loud flapping of wings, and now stood perched upon the corral fence, like a grim and mighty conqueror, ruffling his neck feathers and twisting his head in pre-eminent satisfaction. But the colt did not understand this. Transfixed, he turned frightened eyes upon the cause of the unearthly commotion. Then suddenly, with another loud flapping of wings, the rooster uttered a defiant crow, a challenge that echoed far through the canyon. Whereat the colt, eyes wide with terror, whirled to his mother, whimpering babyishly. But with the mare standing beside him and caressing him reassuringly, all his nervousness left him, and he again turned his eyes upon the rooster and watched him till the cock, unable to stir combat among his neighbors, left the fence with another loud flapping of wings, and returned to earth, physically and spiritually, there to set up his customary feigned quest for worms for the ladies. But the point was this–with this last flapping of wings the colt remained in a state of perfect calm.

Thus he learned, and thus he continued to learn, in nervous fear one moment, in perfect calm the next. And though his hours of life were few indeed, he nevertheless revealed an intelligence far above the average of his kind. He learned to avoid the mare’s whisking tail, to shun or remove molesting flies, to keep away from the mare when she was at the feed-box. All of which told of his uncommon strain, as did the rapidity with which he gained strength, which last told of his tremendous vitality, and which some day would serve him well against trouble.

Yet in it all lurked the great mystery, and Felipe, blustering to occasional natives outside the fence during his week of debauch, while pointing out with pride the colt’s very evident blooded lineage, yet could tell nothing of that descent. All he could point out was that the mare was chestnut-brown, and when not in harness was kept close within the confines of the corral, while here was a colt of a dark-fawn color which would develop with maturity into coal-black. And there was not a single black horse in the mountains for miles and miles around. Nor was the colt a “throw-back,” because–

“Oh, well,” he would conclude, casting bleared eyes in the direction of the house, wearily, “I got soom vino inside. You coom along now. We go gettin’ a drink.” Which would close the monologue.

One morning early, Felipe, asleep on a bed that never was made up, heard suspicious sounds in the corral outside. He sprang up and, clad only in a fiery-red undershirt, hurried to a window. Cautiously letting down the bars, with a rope already tied around the colt’s neck, was the mountain Shylock, Pedro Garcia, intent upon leading off the innocent new-comer. Pedro no doubt had perceived an opportunity either to force Felipe to meet some of his debts, or else hold the colt as a very acceptable chattel. Also, he evidently had calculated upon early dawn as the time best suited to