Authors: Ysabeau S. Wilce
We piled up the soggy tack and covered it with a blanket, well weighed down with rocks. I wrote out a note identifying the gear as the property of the Army of Califa and pinned it to the blanket. When we got back to Sandy I’d send a wagon to collect it all.
Hooker’s farm had come through the storm. Madama Hooker gave us pumpkin soup and tortillas. When I told her what had happened to La Bruja and Captain Oset, she and the children were quite upset. I guess they’d been pretty neighborly with Oset, who’d often brought the kids candy.
“I can’t believe the water didn’t just throw La Bruja back up again,” Madama Hooker said. “They weren’t very friendly, water and her.”
“Shush, Mamma,” Sieur Hooker said. “It’s not nice to say.”
Madama Hooker said, “But at least we don’t have to worry about that cat anymore.”
I thought of that wall of water: brown with dirt, thick with debris. It would have been impossible for La Bruja or Espejo to survive the flood. But I would have liked to have seen the bodies, just to be sure.
Fort Sandy was a disaster. My first thought as we came up the hill, footsore and hungry, was that the entire post had been destroyed. The flagpole lay smashed on the parade ground. The roof of the QM depot had fallen in. The corral had blown away and the walls of one of the barracks had liquefied, turning the building into a melted muddy mess. Troopers should have been out cleaning up the mess, but there was no sign of industry. A private rushed across the parade ground and flung himself upon us in relief.
Apparently, Espejo’s impersonation of Captain Oset had been only skin deep; he had ridden off the post without designating who was in command. Major Rucker hadn’t yet returned from the treaty meeting with the Broncos. In the absence of obvious authority, discipline had broken down pretty quickly A couple of troopers had released themselves from duty—that is, they’d scarpered. Loud singing was coming from the sutler’s store. The dog pack had gotten into the QM stores and eaten twenty pounds of fresh beef.
“Your orders?” the private said imploringly.
“Has there been any word from Major Rucker?”
“No, sir.”
Corporal Tzinga said, “You’re in charge, Captain Romney.”
I was hard-pressed to swallow the almost hysterical laughter bubbling up in me. After all that had happened, now I was in command of Fort Sandy? The idea was ludicrous.
“Your orders, Captain?” the private asked anxiously.
“Organize some work squads, and get the colors flying.”
Before, authority and duty had felt crushing. Now I was glad to have something to throw myself into. Tzinga and I went down to the sutler’s store and found four drunken soldiers and several empty cases of beer. The guardhouse had made it through the storm just fine, and that’s where the drunken warblers soon found themselves, in irons. Corporal Tzinga took a patrol out after the deserters, and these actions motivated the other shirkers to fall into line. Soon squads of industrious soldiers were, under my orders, getting the post put back to rights. By late afternoon, the colors of Califa were flying from a makeshift flagpole, most of the mules had been rounded up and corralled, the forage had been salvaged, and the troopers were sitting down to a hot meal. There was a lot of work left to do, but at least the animals and troopers were taken care of.
Just after Retreat, Tzinga came back with another deserter; he had found her, he told me, at the hog ranch, where a celebration was going on.
“Celebrating what?” I asked. And when he told me, I put him in charge and headed that direction immediately.
I heard the noise long before I could see the tent; the raucous sound of laughter mixed with hooting and the occasional
yippee.
The storm, which had almost destroyed Fort Sandy, somehow hadn’t touched the hog ranch.
Inside, the tent was packed to its canvas walls with people: cowboys, miners, ranchers. Even the soldier dogs were there, weaving in and out of the standing-room-only crowd. Over the laughter, a voice was saying, “I had my knife in my teeth, and I was just waitin’ for the right moment. Oh, ya can imagine how foul his breath was—”
A tall cowboy blocked my way and wouldn’t move, even when I gave him a good push. He turned around, swearing, but when he saw the expression on my face, moved aside. There, sitting at a table covered with bottles, in all her grubby glory, was La Bruja. A dog was sprawled in her lap: a red dog with lovely caramel eyes and soft floppy ears.
“Flynn!” I shouted. Flynn’s ears perked up and his head swiveled. He flung himself out of La Bruja’s lap in a scrabble of paws that upset the table. I caught him midjump and fell back under the weight of his wiggly joy He licked my face, sprayed my boots, and I didn’t care; I just squeezed him and kissed him and squeezed him some more. The crowd was laughing, but I didn’t care about that, either. Oh, darling Flynnie, darling Flynnie.
“I guess that’s yer dog.” La Bruja joined the laughter. “Found him wandering around out in the scrub and then he followed me home. Hungry little bugger.”
I covered Flynnie with kisses; I was never, ever going to let him go. But how the fike was La Bruja not dead? And ... did that mean that Espejo wasn’t dead, either? A cold wind blew through me.
La Bruja, still laughing, was saying, “Sorry about the roughhousing, Captain, but I knew ya could take it. Come on, now. Don’t glare. I know I played it pretty strong, but I was on yer side all along.”
“How are you still alive?” I demanded.
“Oh, the
agua
took one taste of me and spat me right back up! And that cat—pigface, he weren’t nothing but a little kitten. No trouble ’tall!” She waved her bottle in the air and the crowd roared and clapped.
“He’s dead, then.”
La Bruja grinned. “Oh, I don’t believe he’ll be sneaking around anymore.”
“Are you sure?”
“Oh, ayah, I’m sure.” She pulled a buckskin pouch out of her shirt and upended it over her open palm: two long white things fell out. It took me a second to realize they were fangs. Jaguar fangs.
La Bruja threw her head back and let out a long, yipping ululation, and the crowd joined her, screaming and shouting and stamping their feet. The barkeep shouted, “Free rounds!” and that got an even bigger cheer.
“Well, now, no hard feelings, Captain.” La Bruja smiled a mossy green smile. “I know I had ya goin’ there for a bit, but I was only tryin’ to get in a good hot moment. Here, I think you deserve these as much as I do. More, maybe!”
She tossed the pouch at me, and I awkwardly caught it. Someone pushed a glass toward me, and I felt hands pounding my back, congratulating me. I had no idea what La Bruja had told them I had done, but clearly she had made me look heroic, which was about as far from the truth as you can get. I drank the contents of the glass. It was shrub, so cold that it drove a spike of delicious pain between my eyes.
Suddenly the smell of the hog ranch was overwhelming: bug juice, hair oil, sweat, dirty leather, blood. I couldn’t breathe; I was going to puke. Flynn at my heels, I made it out of the hog ranch just in time, and then goodbye shrub, goodbye.
I stood up, wiping my mouth on my sleeve, listening to the sound of revelry Flynn nudged my knee and I bent down to clutch him.
“Come on, Flynnie. Let’s get the fike out of here.”
Dusk was coming down, and the trail back to the post was growing indistinct. I stumbled into a teddy bear cholla and swore. Just because there was no jaguar waiting to pounce didn’t mean that Arivaipa was safe. Next to me, Flynn alerted, quivering, back and tail stiff. I put my hand on the butt of Oset’s revolver; something big was coming down the trail. Something too big to be a man.
I smelled apple pipeweed and musty fur. I ran toward him, and he caught me up, almost smothering me in a furry embrace. I clutched him, and felt him change in my arms, fur turning slick, muscles and bones shrinking until.
I held a sweaty bare man.
“How did you get here?” I asked. The satchel hanging over his shoulder knocked me in the hip painfully, but I didn’t care.
“I ran all the way!” he said breathlessly That was the last thing he said for a long time. I didn’t care now that I was grubby and tired; I didn’t care that he was dusty and tired. All I cared about was that, at last, I wasn’t alone.
A
LL I WANTED TO DO WAS
lie down next to Tharyn and tell him everything. Instead, as soon as we were back on the post, I was sucked back into duty. I sent Tharyn and Flynn back to the UOQ to clean up and rest, hoping to join them as soon as Retreat was over. But after Retreat came the posting of the night guard, and then Tattoo; then I had damage reports to write. It was almost midnight before I could finally escape to Tharyn. Telling him everything took until dawn, and then, while he and Flynn could sleep the day away, I had to answer the Reveille bugle call. After that came roll call, then changing of the guard, then sick call, then inspection, then water call, and thus ran duty on and on and on, through the hot blue day.
There was no sign of Tiny Doom, but then I hardly expected that there would be. I was pretty sure I knew her game now. She’d scarpered, gotten as far away from Sandy, Espejo, and me as she could. Well, this time I would not go looking for her.
Major Rucker returned from his parley with the Broncos late in the afternoon, alone. I guess Lieutenant Sabre had headed straight back to Califa as soon as the meeting was over. By then, Fort Sandy was in the best order I could make it. Actually, I rather thought it might have been in better shape than before; in some ways, the storm was almost an improvement. The major looked surprised to see me standing on the porch of the COQ; I told him that Captain Oset had been killed hunting the jaguar and that I had broken arrest to take command in the aftermath of the storm. Major Rucker ordered me back to my arrest, saying he would send for me later.
The UOQ was empty; Tharyn had left a note saying he’d gone to the hog ranch and taken Flynn with him. I lay down on the settee and tried to figure out what the fike I was going to tell Major Rucker. If I made a full and truthful report, I would be giving Tiny Doom away. My report would be sent up the chain of command and everyone along the way—officers, clerks,
everyone
—would know everything. A lie wouldn’t work; there were too many witnesses. I was sick of lying, anyway. But I did not dare chance the truth.
Keep yer yip shut,
said Nini Mo. So there was my plan. They could court-martial me, cashier me, whatever. I would keep my yip shut.
After Retreat, a private came and told me that Major Rucker was waiting for me in his office. I tramped across the parade ground—almost back to normal now—and found Major Rucker by his sideboard, fiddling with a bottle.
“Sit down, Lieutenant. Would you like a drink?”
“No, sir. I mean, yes, sir.”
He handed me a glass of lemonade. Today, Major Rucker looked round-cheeked and bright-eyed—a vast difference from the desiccated man I had met on my initial arrival at Sandy. I decided I didn’t want to know the reason why he was now so plump and fresh.
Sometimes it’s better to be stupid but happy,
Nini Mo said.
“How did the meeting go, sir?” I asked.
“It was quite successful, I am happy to say. Lieutenant Sabre has already resumed his journey back to the City carrying the good news.”
“That’s wonderful.”
“It is good news.” Major Rucker finished his lemonade and poured himself another. He sat down behind his desk, lit a cigarillo, and said, “The Goddess gives with one hand and takes away with another. Poor Bea. What a terrible tragedy But it can happen to any of us at any time. I told her often to be more careful, to shake out her boots before she put them on. But she could be so impetuous, poor Bea, and sometimes she just didn’t listen. I’ve already spoken to La Bruja, you see.”
What the fike had La Bruja told him?
“When I first came out here, years back, one of the quartermaster sergeants got stung by a sangyn-backed scorpion. He picked up his hat and put it on without shaking it, and the scorpion stung him on the ear. The poison goes straight to the brain, you know, and there was nothing we could do but confine him to the guardhouse and watch him go mad. It was awful. He was convinced that his own hand was trying to strangle him. He died of blood loss when he tried to chew it off. Poor Oset. At least the madness did not take her that way.”
Major Rucker leaned back in his chair, blew a little smoke ring. He stared at me, as though daring me to contradict him.
I was suddenly sure that he knew full well that Captain Oset hadn’t been stung by a scorpion. I was suddenly sure that Major Rucker knew exactly what had happened at the cave, and why. He said he’d been stationed with Buck in Arivaipa, back in the day Tiny Doom had been stationed there at the same time; he had to have known her, then. He knew her now, I was sure of it. But I wasn’t quite sure enough to challenge him.
I said, “It was a tragedy. Poor Captain Oset. She was not herself at all.”
“No,” he agreed. “She was not. And this I will say in my official report. Captain Oset was a good officer and a fine woman. She didn’t deserve such a death. But rarely do we get what we deserve, no?”
“Ayah.” I was certain that I was about to get what I deserved, and welcomed that reckoning, too. Maybe it would help me feel better.
Major Rucker raised his glass in a toast. “A cup for the dead already and hurrah for the next to die.” I echoed his toast and drank the last of the icy-cold lemonade.
Major Rucker said, “Now, about those other charges against you. In light of your actions in taking over Bea’s command, I’m inclined to dismiss them. In fact, I’m inclined to forget about everything. Bea was the acting adjutant general, you know, and she was very way behind on her returns. I don’t think she’d managed to complete the post returns for the last month or so...”
The post returns list every person present on a post, and their duties. Major Rucker was telling me that there was no official record I had ever been at Sandy.
“...But we’re getting caught up with the paperwork, and so I think, Lieutenant, perhaps you should be on your way as soon as possible? Get back on track; put this entire episode behind you. La Bruja’s report is so thorough, I think it can stand for yours, as well. There’s no need for you to add unnecessary details.”