the Lonesome Gods (1983) Read online

  "But remember that men most go where water is, so despite all the vastness of the desert, it is really a very small place."

  "Papa? I have heard they could not find you and Mama." "They could not. Or perhaps their Indians did not try hard enough, for they knew me as a friend. But it was more than that, Johannes.

  "There are places in the desert called tanks, where water collects in natural rock basins. Sometimes it is a very large amount of water, sometimes only a little. "There are seeps where in a week or more a few quarts of water may collect. I would go to one of these places, drink a little, let my horse have what was left, and I would go on, leaving nothing for those who followed. The desert Indians who were guides for those who pursued me knew those places too. They knew I would be gone and there would be no water, and the pursuing parties were six, eight, often twenty men. Some of them would not listen to the Indians, and they died out there for their foolishness."

  We moved on into the vast desert, plodding slowly, wearily along behind the wagon and its tired horses. Finally we stopped. We had come to Piute Wash.

  Tired as we were, and as were the horses, Farley took them to the far side. "When you come to a stream or dry wash," he commented as he was removing the harness, "always cross to the far side. By morning it may be runnin' bank-full."

  My father told me to listen to such things, but I did not need to be told, for it was the way boys learned, and there was much I wished to know.

  Miss Nesselrode sat near me when we were eating, and she asked me if I had been to school. "I am six," I said. "You seem older." She looked at me thoughtfully. "Have you known many children?"

  "No, ma'am. We have moved very often."

  "Can you read?"

  "Yes, ma'am, and write, too. Mama and Papa taught me. And we read a lot together. Mama or Papa would read to each other or to me. I like to be read to, and sometimes we would look for places on the map that we had been reading about."

  In the night the coyotes came and howled near the wagon, and I heard Mr. Farley go out to his horses and walk among them so they would not be frightened. My father was lying near me under the wagon, and sometimes when he turned on his wounded shoulder he would cry out in his sleep, but only a little.

  The stars were very bright and there were no clouds. Once I got from under my blankets and sat on the wagon tongue, liking the night.

  Mr. Finney was on guard then, and he stopped beside me. "Can't sleep?"

  "I woke up, and it was so bright. I wanted to listen." "I know how that is. Get the feeling sometimes myself, but better sleep. We've got a long day ahead."

  "Will we stop at Piute Spring?"

  "Maybe even overnight. Doug Farley makes up his own mind, and somethin's botherin' him. I can read it in him."

  At daybreak we were moving again, heading due west to the low, rocky mountains, and by midmorning we were loading our barrels at the spring. Farley told Kelso to fix a good breakfast, with lots of coffee.

  It was a very rocky but pleasant place. From the spring a small stream ran over the rocks and disappeared in the sand some distance away. There was Indian writing on some of the rocks.

  With a cup of coffee in his hand, Farley walked over to Papa. "You know this trail?"

  "Somewhat. There are springs at intervals. It is used by both Mohaves and Piutes. I believe it is very old. Pueblo Indians used to come out here to work turquoise mines."

  "I'm uneasy about it."

  "Trust yourself. You know this country. If you're uneasy, there's a reason. Your senses have perceived something your brain hasn't."

  Farley glanced at him. "You believe that? I guess most of us do, when it comes to that. Some call it instinct." He sipped his coffee. "Kelso's feelin' it too. Maybe it's that pass when we get to the mountains or that spooky country off to the north, in the Tehachapis."

  Farley hesitated, then asked, "How're you doin', Verne? You bein' sick an' all, and then losin' blood."

  "I'll be all right. I'll make it." Then he added, "I have to, for the boy's sake."

  They did not see me sitting on a rock near the water, but the air was clear and I heard their voices, and I looked into the water and wished my father would live forever.

  Sometimes at night I dreamed of that fierce old man who awaited me. What would he do when he saw me? I dreamed of a sunlit ranch house where he would be but my father would not, and I was frightened. I did not know what to expect or what to think, only that I did not want to go to that old man, or even to see him.

  Sometimes I wanted to cry when I was alone in my blankets, but my father had troubles enough and might hear me and be unhappy. So I lay wide-eyed in the night, my eyes dry, but the tears were inside me.

  We left Piute Spring that day and suddenly, Miss Nesselrode was walking beside me. We were behind the others and alone. You are unhappy," she said abruptly. "Is it because your father is ill? Or is it something else, too?"

  For a moment I said nothing, for this was very private and I did not think I should speak of it to a stranger, but then I said, "Papa is taking me to my grandpa."

  "I see." After a minute she said, "Johannes, if it does not go well for you there, come to me. I shall be in Los Angeles. Will you remember that, Johannes?"

  I would remember, but then I would have to be afraid for her, too.

  As if she knew what I had thought, she said, "I am not afraid, Johannes. You will be safe with me."

  I looked up at her, and I believed her.

  Chapter 6

  My father was dying and must find a home for me: this I knew very well, and this I understood. This was why we had come on this journey, trusting ourselves to Mr. Farley and his lone wagon. But why had the others come?

  When we were walking alone once, I asked my father. "It is a guess, of course, for none of them have said very much, but I would say that Fraser hopes to write a book, and later to lecture.

  "He is not well-off, as you can see. He has taught school, I believe, but there is small future in that for a young man with no connections. I think he hopes to write a book that will give him some stature, and use it as a stepping-stone to the future.

  "Mrs. Weber? I do not know, of course, but I would suggest that she goes west to marry again. There are fewer women out there, and she feels she would not be lost in the crowd. She is not very bright, but in her own way she is shrewd, and I think she would make the right sort of man a good wife."

  "And Mr. Fletcher?" I wondered.

  "Ah, yes. Mr. Fletcher. Avoid him, Johannes, and avoid men of his kind. He is a surly brute, quick to temper, violent in expression. If he has not already done so, he will someday kill a man, or be killed. I would surmise that he is running away from something he has done or toward something he expects to do.

  "More likely," Papa added, "the former, judging by the way he kept from sight until we were far from Santa Fe."

  "Miss Nesselrode?"

  He stopped, watching the wagon ahead of us. It was almost a half-mile off now, and Fraser and Fletcher plodded along at least half that distance in front of us. "A handsome young woman. Not beautiful, but handsome. And she is intelligent. She is unmarried, and the reason is obvious. She is much brighter than most of the men she meets, and unless she becomes very lonely, she will settle for nothing less than the best.

  "Unhappily, she is a woman alone. Obviously she has no family, no position. The men she would be apt to meet are marrying to better themselves, marrying money or family or both, which leaves Miss Nesselrode a respected outsider. But I do not believe Miss Nesselrode is thinking of marriage."

  I told my father then what she had said to me. He stopped again, quite suddenly.

  "She said that, did she?" He swore softly. "I'll be damned! Well, son, I do not think she realizes what she is inviting, but you have my permission to go to her if you wish. And if you can."

  He put a hand on my shoulder. "At least you have made a friend, and that is important, Johannes. And she is your friend. You made her a friend with no hel
p from me."

  Sometime during that day the decision was made to go by a different route than the one planned. Mr. Farley decided, and he told as about it at supper.

  We would be longer in the desert. We would come to Los Angeles by a different way. We would avoid some mountains and perhaps some trouble with outlaws. We would be wending a way through the desert where wagons had not gone, and were likely to see some sights others had not seen.

  Mr. Fletcher immediately agreed, and Mr. Fraser also. Miss Nesselrode listened carefully and then agreed. "If you think it best," she said, but she turned to my father. "You have experience of the desert. Do you think it wise?" "I do," Papa said, "although the way is longer."

  Later, when we were moving again, she looked over at my father. "Mr. Verne, if you are feeling well enough, perhaps you could tell us something of Los Angeles?" "Of course," he agreed. "It is a very small town, and you must remember it is nearly eight years since I have been there, and it was changing even then. When I left, there were, I suppose, between two and three thousand people, mostly of Spanish extraction. There were a few blacks, most of them with Spanish blood and Spanish names, and a handful of Europeans and Anglos.

  "Water comes to the town from zanjas, or ditches. There are wells, also. Several of the Anglos have married Spanish girls from the old families. These Anglos are mostly former mountain men, trappers, and traders who came west when the fur trade ceased to be profitable. They are very shrewd men, alive to opportunity and quick to move.

  "The town is twenty miles from the sea, the climate is superb, and the town has room in which to grow." "There is gold there?" Fletcher asked. "I heard gold had been discovered."

  "There is some mining. I knew the man who first discovered it. He was sitting on a hillside and pulled some wild onions and found bits of gold in the earth clinging to the roots."

  "There is a harbor?" Miss Nesselrode asked.

  "A quite good one, that will be made better. There's some coast-wise trade, and trade with the Sandwich Islands as well as Mexico."

  "And China?"

  "A little. They buy furs, mostly the sea otter. The business has fallen into the hands of the Russians, I hear." As we moved, the conversation ceased, then started up again.

  Often I slept, awakening to find everybody else asleep, and once when we were walking to ease the load on the horses, my father said, "Your Miss Nesselrode is a very bright young woman. I wonder what her plans are?"

  Papa was not the only one who was curious. One morning by the fire, when only Mr. Farley and Mr. Kelso were there, I heard Mr. Farley saying, "There isn't much out there for a single woman except to get married."

  "She might teach school."

  "She'd have to speak Spanish. Unless maybe she started a private school for the Anglos and foreigners."

  Fletcher came over and extended his hands to the fire. He had overheard the comments, just as I had. "She's got money," he said. "I figure she's well-off."

  "She has relatives out there, I suspect," Kelso said, a shade of irritation in his tone. I knew he did not like Fletcher.

  Fletcher knew he was not liked, but cared not at all. There was amusement in his eyes when he replied. "Maybe, but I am betting she doesn't know anybody out there. She's just got herself a notion. She's one of them romantic females with a notion of finding some Spanish don with a big hacienda. She's got herself a little, and she's figuring to marry rich."

  Nobody replied to that, and Farley walked away to harness the team. Kelso glanced at me. "Stay in the wagon today, Johannes. We will be ehangin' direction pretty soon."

  We took a trail that led between a black conelike mountain of cinders and a dry lake. Papa was the guide now, and he often rode Mr. Kelso's horse so he could scout out the trail ahead of us.

  On the third day I was walking behind the wagon with Miss Nesselrode, and we had stopped to look at a lizard with some brown bands around him, and we fell behind. "Miss Nesselrode? What are you going to do in California?"

  Her eyes laughed at me. "Have they been wondering about that? I could see they are curious." She smiled again. "Johannes, if they ask you, you can tell them I really do not know. I will make up my mind when I get there."

  "Mr. Kelso said you might start a school for the foreigners."

  "It is a thought, Johannes, but I am afraid I am simply not the type. It is a bit tame for me, and will not accomplish what I wish."

  "Mr. Fletcher says you have money. And you are looking for a Spanish don."

  "He would think that." She walked on a few steps. "What does your father say?"

  "That you are a very bright young woman."

  She smiled again. "I like that. Most men do not give a woman credit for intelligence." And then she added, "And that may be an advantage."

  We camped one night where there were many palm trees, and the following day we were among the Joshua trees again, those weird-looking trees with the twisted arms, although I did not think they looked much like trees.

  In the far distance there were mountains, and my father pointed to them. "That is where we will go, Hannes, and beyond them."

  "Papa? Is the ocean out there?"

  "Beyond the mountains? Yes, it is."

  "Mama loved the desert, didn't she?"

  "She came to love it, Hannes. She was born within sight of the sea, and not many women of her class ever went into the desert, or even the mountains. It was very dangerous, you know. There are outlaws, and also grizzly bears."

  "In the town?"

  "No, in the mountains a few miles from town. Sometimes we rode there, several of as in a group, but your mother did not see the desert until we eloped. But you are right. She came to love it."

  "You ran away into the desert?"

  "There was no place else to go, Hannes. We loved each other, and they would have killed me for even daring to speak to her.

  "I was a man of the sea, but I went into the desert to look for gold. I thought if I were rich her father would accept me."

  "You did not become rich."

  "No, I did not find the gold I looked for. I found some, only a very little, but I found the desert. I came to love it. I rode far and wide, sometimes with Indian friends, often alone. I learned how to find water in the desert, and the plants that could be eaten and those that were poisonous. "Learn from the Indians, Hannes, but with them one must always be strong. They respect truth, and they respect strength."

  Yet always he watched the desert, and I saw him walk out to examine the trail, looking for tracks. Mr. Farley noticed it, too. "Keep your eyes open, Jacob," he said to Finney. "Verne's expectin' trouble."

  "Injuns?"

  "I don't think so. I think this here's somethin' worse." That night when the stars were large in the sky I went out into the coolness and stood there, feeling it all, loving the night and the stillness. Papa came out too, and stood beside me.

  "Papa? Is someone coming?"

  "I hope not, but this is Peg-Leg country. He's a bad man, Hannes, and a very dangerous one. Twice I have seen the marks left by his wooden leg, and it is unlikely he would be afoot out here unless he was planning something."

  "Would he rob us?"

  "Of course. He would if he could, but he is cunning. He will not take a chance on getting killed."

  We walked back to the others, and Papa said, "Stay away from the fire." He advised Farley, "Let one man cook. The rest of you stay in the dark. Peg-Leg is out there, and he's watching. He already knows how many men are with you, and he won't attempt anything unless he can make a clean sweep."

  We had camped in a thick stand of Joshuas. "The trail is down there," Papa said. "It's the Yuma trail. Agua Caliente is over yonder, at the foot of the mountains." Later he said to me, "Sleep in the wagon tonight, with the women. If there's any shooting, you'll be safer."

  I did not like that very much, but I knew better than to protest. My father was a kind man, but he did not like disobedience or argument.

  It was warmer in the wagon. Miss
Nesselrode was surprised when I climbed in. "Your father is expecting trouble," she said.

  "Peg-Leg Smith is here," I told her. "My father has seen his tracks. He is a robber."

  My father came to the back of the wagon. "Miss Nesselrode? Have your weapons ready. This is more serious than the Indians."

  "I have heard of him. There was some talk in Santa Fe."

  "He's known everywhere, ma'am. He's a very hard man."

  "You know him?"

  "Oh, yes. We traveled across the desert together once. Yes, I know him. He can be very affable, very pleasant. And he is not to be trusted for one minute."

  The fire was down to coals before he came. We had the wagon at one side of a rough circle of rocks and ocotillo, a kind of sticklike cactus with very ugly thorns. He came riding up outside the circle and stopped in the glow of the fire.

  He was a big, burly man in a greasy homespun shirt, wearing a belt gun and carrying a rifle. He rode a mean-looking roan horse.

  "Hello, the camp! All right if I come in?"

  My father answered. "As long as you come alone, Peg. If even one other man raises a head, I'll put a bullet into you."

  "Verne! By the Lord Harry, Zachary Verne! Hell, I thought you went back East!"

  "I came back, Peg. My son's with me. I'm taking him home."

  "Then you're crazier than I thought. They'll kill you, an' him too."

  "Peg, these people are my friends. We want no trouble, but we're ready for it."

  He stood in his stirrup. "All right!" he bellowed over his shoulder. "Go have a drink! All off for tonight!"

  He swung down. "Hell, Verne, it would have to be you. I was fixin' to kill the lot of you an' steal your goods!- He bellowed a laugh. "An' maybe I'll do it yet!"

  Chapter 7

  His eyes twinkled, and he looked down at me. "I'm just a-funnin', youngster. Why, old Peg-Leg wouldn't kill nobody, 'less he was a-shootin' at me!

  "Hey? You're a likely-lookin' youngster. You Verne's boy?"

  "I am."

  He looked at me again, then sat down by the fire, which was smoldering. He added a few sticks, then reached for the coffeepot. "Mind if I do?"