Paradise Valley (24 page)
Rachel lay on her back with her hands behind her head, staring up at the stars. She could hear her father’s soft snores from under the wagon and she spoke in a hushed voice so as not to wake him.
“I thought we were going to die out there today,” she said.
“Me too,” Miriam answered. “It was horrible. Those men were savages.”
“And they smelled bad, too. Did you see the look in the eyes of that one who took my kapp? There is no telling what they would have done if Domingo hadn’t stopped them. We are helpless in this country. Only Gott can defend us against men like that.”
Miriam was silent for a moment, and then she raised up on an elbow to stare out into the dark landscape and said quietly, “Sometimes Gott sends a helper to guard His children.”
“Jah, sometimes,” she said, wondering at the odd, wistful tone in Miriam’s voice. “Miriam, why does he always call you ‘cualnezqui’?”
Miriam lay back down flat, staring at the stars beside her sister. “I suppose because I am his friend.”
“But he only calls
you
that. Never me, or Dat. We are his friends too, aren’t we?”
“Jah, I noticed. Maybe it’s just a pet name – his way of being nice to me. I think he feels sorry for me, his little friend.”
“Mmm. Maybe,” Rachel said sleepily.
As the moon rose above the mountains the music from the cantina stopped, leaving them with only the distant yipping and keening of coyotes.
When they rolled into Saltillo early the next morning Caleb drove straight to the market and unloaded the sweet corn. Miriam and Rachel had brought a few spare boards and adobe bricks to set up a makeshift table where they piled as many ears of corn as they could. They piled the rest on the ground, because Caleb and Domingo needed the empty wagon.
The open-air market was really nothing more than a great long wide street, made considerably narrower by the booths and tables and carts and barrows of peddlers lining both sides of it, hawking their wares. There were vegetables – tomatoes and squash and onions and all sorts of peppers – and fruits, from apples and oranges to melons and even bananas. There were live chickens and live goats, and hanging from hooks under a little awning, dead plucked chickens and dead skinned goats, fish and rabbits and beef and wheat. Almost anything could be found here. Domingo mingled with the people in the market for only a few minutes before he came back and told Rachel and Miriam what their corn was worth, by the ear or by the bushel.
“But don’t give them that price first,” he warned. “If someone asks how much, you double it, and let them talk you down to the real price.”
“But why not just give them the real price to start with, and stick to it?” Miriam wanted to know.
Domingo looked at her like she was crazy. “Because they want a bargain, and you must not cheat them out of it!” he said. “If they have to pay full price, where is the dignity in that?”
“But they
are
paying full price,” she said.
“No they’re not!” Domingo pointed a finger at her and raised his voice a little. “Only a
foreigner
pays full price. The local people know better, cualnezqui.”
He climbed up onto the wagon with Caleb, and then, as they were driving away through the crowd in the bustling market, Domingo turned, cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted, “Watch out for the
niño
s!”
Rachel turned to Miriam. “What did he mean by that?”
Miriam shrugged. “Maybe he meant for us to care for them. When the children come around, to look out for them and be kind to them.”
They did a brisk business in the morning. The toothless old woman in the long dress and colorful head scarf selling apples and summer squash from an oxcart right next to them said the morning was the busiest time. When the sun grew hot at midday most people would go to find shade, she said. In the afternoon it would be busy again, but not like the morning.
Women came in a steady parade of twos and threes with big hand-woven sacks on shoulder straps, buying what they would need for the day’s cooking.
At the busiest time, around nine o’clock, four little hatless barefoot kids came knocking down the street, laughing and hooting to each other, running here and there, peeking over edges and looking to see what was in the carts. The toothless old woman handled them roughly, squawking at them, calling them “gutter dogs” and chasing them off with a piece of kindling she’d been swishing over her apples and squash to keep the flies from loitering.
The children’s clothes were ragged and dirty, but they had the faces of angels – black eyes with long lashes, raven hair and impossibly white teeth.
One of them, the cutest little boy, ran over to Miriam.
“Beautiful señorita,” he said, flashing her a smile full of sunlight and mischief, “you have such a kind face, surely you must have brought candy in your pockets for the children.”
“No, I’m afraid I have no candy,” Miriam said, smiling, bending down to talk to the little boy. “What is your name?”
“Me llamo Maximilian de la Cholla,” he said, thumping his chest. The name was bigger than the boy. “But you may call me Pepé.”
One by one, the others saw Pepé talking to Miriam, and when they saw that Miriam was not squawking at him or calling him a gutter dog or swinging at him with a stick of kindling, they drifted over and crowded around her, tugging at her skirt, calling her “beautiful señorita” and asking for candy.
“Well, Pepé,” Miriam said, “if you’re hungry I will give you an ear of corn. It’s not so good raw, but you can take it home to Mama and she will boil it for you.”
A dark-eyed little girl peeked around Miriam’s skirts at Pepé. “Come on, let’s go,” she said impatiently. “Maybe the carnicerio will give us a
salchicha
.” She ran off, and then the others, laughing and slapping, ran after her.
Miriam watched them chase each other down the street, and the smile lingered on her face right up until she reached into the deep pocket in a fold of her dress where she’d been keeping the money from the corn she’d sold. She pinched the bottom of the pocket, turned it inside out and shook it to make sure. The pocket was empty.
She was still standing there with her arms folded on her chest glaring down the street when the toothless old woman shuffled up from behind, slapped a stick of kindling into her hand and shuffled back to her apples and squash, muttering to herself. Miriam hefted the kindling and swung it a time or two to hear the
whoosh
it made in the air, then looked over her shoulder and said, “Muchas gracias, señora.”
Rachel, who had been busy with a customer, watched the whole episode unfold without saying a word. She walked up behind Miriam, who was still staring down the long street smacking the kindling against her palm, and whispered over her shoulder, “Miriam. Watch out for the niños.”
After they left the girls behind at the market, Caleb and Domingo threaded their wagon through the crowded streets of Saltillo toward the industrial corner of town, stopping twice to ask directions to the foundry. Once they found the place and determined that they could indeed buy the windmill they needed, Domingo took over and haggled with the merchant for ten minutes, driving the price down by almost half. Caleb paid, and then they waited, sitting in the shade of a tin awning while the parts were located in the warehouse and brought to the wagon.
Caleb opened his pocketknife and slowly curled off shavings from a stick to pass the time. “I keep thinking about that El Pantera fella,” he said idly. “Something about him felt . . .
evil
. He never harmed us, yet I was still very afraid of him and I don’t know why.”
“Your instincts are good,” Domingo said. “There are bandits who will take your food and your horse, and others who will take your life, but there are a few who will do worse things. El Pantera is one of those. I would have told you this yesterday, but the girls were there, listening.”
“What do you mean, Domingo? What could be worse than taking my life?”
Domingo took his hat off and fanned his face with it – the morning had grown warm.
“They say El Pantera takes young women.”
Caleb stared at him, his pocketknife paused mid-stroke. “What do you mean,
takes
them?”
“I mean he steals them. Kidnaps them. Always the young ones. The stories are all about Mexican girls, but I think it is only because there are not many white girls. I’m pretty sure a white girl will bring a higher price.”
“Price. You mean a ransom?”
Domingo laughed softly. “No, Herr Bender. If El Pantera takes a girl, he will not ask for ransom. Not from her family anyway.”
“What then? Does he take them for his . . .
pleasure
?”
Domingo shook his head. “He takes them to sell. Have you never heard of the white slave trade?”
Caleb shook his head. “Slaves? There
are
no more slaves. You cannot buy – ”
“If a man is rich enough, he can buy whatever he wants,” Domingo said. “And we are not talking about the kind of slave who picks his crops or scrubs his floors.”
Caleb stared at him for a long time before it began to sink in.
“You mean to say there are men who will buy young women and keep them for their pleasure?”
Domingo nodded. “Jah. My father told me about this. There are men in Europe, Herr Bender, and even some in the East, who have so much money they can buy anything.
Anything
. It is said that some of these men, if you know how to find them, will pay a king’s ransom for a young girl. It is also said that El Pantera
knows
such men.”
Caleb’s pulse quickened, thinking of Rachel and Miriam, alone in the street market. The world had grown colder and darker. Suddenly there was more evil in the world than he had ever imagined. He stirred, and started to rise.
“We must go,” he said. “We must get to my daughters.”
Domingo shook his head, put a steadying hand on Caleb’s arm. “They are safe, for now. El Pantera always stays in the hills, where he cannot be caught. Your daughters are safe in Saltillo, and he will not bother you on the road as long as he knows I am with you.”
“Are you sure?”
Domingo shrugged. “This is Mexico. Nothing is sure.”
Caleb sat back down, thinly reassured. He stared straight ahead, his jaw working.
“I am curious, Herr Bender,” Domingo said, his eyes narrowing. “Would you fight
now
?”
Caleb’s brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, you say your people do not fight. You told me before that you would not fight even to save your own life. But after what I have told you, Herr Bender, would you not kill El Pantera to save your daughters from such a fate?”
Caleb pondered this for a long moment, staring at his hands. This young man had risked his life to protect Caleb and his daughters. He had earned an honest answer.
Finally, he took a deep breath and shook his head. “No, I would not. Though it cost me an unthinkable price, I could not defy Gott. I would not risk hell.”
“Never?”
He shook his head sadly. “We do not live by power or might, but by the Spirit of the Lord of hosts. It is better to suffer in this brief life than for all eternity. If it is sin to kill, who do I serve by killing? I will accept whatever Gott allows.” Caleb meant what he said, and he would live by it, but such thoughts crushed him with the weight of the sea.
Domingo flashed him a curious sideways smile.
“But you did not mind when
I
stood against El Pantera. Is it not hypocrisy to approve of this?”
“I didn’t say I approved, I only said ‘thank you.’ Anyway, the law I cling to is for my own instruction. I do not judge you by it.”
Domingo smiled, shaking his head. “Herr Bender, you are either the most honorable man I have ever met or the most foolish. I have not decided which.”
Caleb pondered this for a second and shrugged.
“Neither have I.”
