Soon after my birthday, the weather turned real warm, almost hot. Most Novembers aren't really cold but by the middle of October, it ain't hardly swimmin' weather no more. Us bigger boys had lost interest in swimmin' for the year, I reckon, so when Spike and them asked us did we want to go, we told them "no." Spike and Jorge and Ho Tau went anyway. They left soon after noonin'.
Us bigger boys was almost done with our chorin' and we was some mad at them younger ones. They was supposed to be helpin' us but we wasn't near as mad as their mamas. You can't always tell if a mama's mad or if she's worryin', but from what I was seein' in them mamas, them boys better be ridin' in with arrows stickin' out of them or somethin'. If they just didn't bother to come home for chorin' time, there was gonna be some world class ass-whippin' goin' on. I ain't sure what that means but them bunkhouse cowboys is always sayin' that. When somethin' is done real good, them cowboys is sayin' it's "world class". You even seen some mad in Aunt Jenny. She was mostly real quiet. Now she was actin' like she was gonna wear Spike out when he got home.
Juan and me was still chorin' in the other horse barn when we heard some horses comin' in real fast. Before we got outside, we heard a lot of yellin' and cryin'. By their voices you knew it was Spike and Ho Tau and you knew they was some upset. When we got out there, they was talkin' to them mamas and even Senor Pablo was there. You could hardly tell what they was sayin', they was so fussed. They finally got calmed down enough to tell us that some man had come to the swimmin' hole and held a gun on them most of the afternoon. He kept askin' Spike if he was the whore boy. He said that he knew that Jorge was Vox's greaser but it seemed to him that the whore boy had reddish hair. Spike had black hair.
That man must have decided that Spike wasn't me because he let Spike and Ho Tau go. He told them to get to the Bent-Y and tell Seamus Flynn that Jigger had Vox's greaser and if anybody ever seen that damn greaser again without no hole in his head, it would be after Seamus Flynn brought five thousand dollars to that low hill country between the Bent-Y and Claude. Them boys said that Jigger said not to worry about findin' him. Just ride into them hills. He'd be easy to find.
Them boys told Jigger that Uncle Shay was in Austin so Jigger said, "Just tell them to send someone with the five thousand dollars."
Just hearin' about Jigger put that Goodnight feelin' on me again. But I wasn't Sam Martin no more. I was used to bein' done good. I had learned the Flynn ways of thinkin' on folks. I had the Flynn mad at folks who done other folks wrong. I was some scared for Jorge, but mostly I was mad.
What the hell was Jigger doin' out of prison? Me and Paco asked what the man looked like and even though Spike and Ho Tau was real scared, they seen enough and told it good enough. We knew it was Jigger.
But why would he think Jorge was Paco? It come to me that Jigger didn't know nothin' anyway and probably what he didn't know the most was boys. Jorge was about the same size as Paco was when Jigger beat on us. I reckon it never come to him that boys grow some in two years. I reckon in Jigger's thinkin' one greaser looks like all the rest of them.
Jigger had to have run away from that prison. My mad was turnin' to scare. What the hell was we gonna do with Daddy off in Austin?
Senora Maria was cryin'. All the rest of them Dominguezs was cryin'. All but Juan. He was sittin' by his mama, tryin' to hug her. He didn't have no color in him. He didn't hardly have no expression on his face. He scared me. He was hurtin' so bad he couldn't cry. I thought he was gonna die.
Spike and Ho Tau was cryin'. Maureen and Rosie and Katy was cryin'. Danny was cryin'. Virgil was cryin'. All them other mamas was tryin' to comfort Senora Maria but they wasn't doin' no good. They was cryin' too. I couldn't tell if Senor Pablo was cryin' or not. He was sittin' on the edge of the porch with his face in his hands. He looked like he was thinkin', "I'm a horse wrangler, not a gun fighter. How am I gonna take my boy from a man with a gun?"
Everybody was so fussed that it was hard to tell what was really goin' on. I don't even know if I was cryin'. I know Paco wasn't but he had that dark room look in his eyes. Jigger was bringin' them bad times back to both of us. It ain't fair. It seems like a body just can't get from them.
There wasn't no man on the place. Uncle Brian and Uncle Kevin was off to the north herd. I don't know where Virgil's daddy and Clay Bronson was. I reckon they was off with them bunkhouse cowboys doin' what they was supposed to do. With all that cryin' and my scare and Paco's dark room look, it was some time before I noticed that my mama wasn't there.
All of a sudden everything got real quiet. Folks was lookin' past me, toward our house. I turned around and about jumped out of my britches. I seen Mama, all dressed in black, a gun strapped around her middle and lookin' like somebody I didn't know.
Mama's eyes were flashin' and when she talked, it made your backbone hurt. Her voice was hard and sharp. It went through you like a knife. "Samuel, Francisco, saddle Viento and your horses!"
It come to me that Mama was goin' after Jorge. I reckon you should think that that was somethin' a mama shouldn't do. But the way she was, you didn't think nothin'. You just done what she said. Even Senor Pablo didn't say nothin'. He just got up and come to help us with Viento. When we brought them horses out, Mama told Senor Pablo to stay on the Bent-Y. She told him that if Kevin and Brian come back before she does, they was not to follow her.
Aunt Lydia was tryin' to tell Mama not to go but she seen by Mama's eyes things wasn't like they usually was. Mama wasn't gonna listen to Aunt Lydia's thinkin'. Aunt Lydia didn't say no more.
Mama got on Viento and told me and Paco to mount up. "You boys do exactly as I tell you. Now follow me."
When we got away from them buildings, Mama told me and Paco to take her to them low hills. She'd rode a lot of the Bent-Y but she wasn't sure how to get to them hills.
We rode quiet. Mama was scarin' us. She wasn't our soft, lovin', funnin' mama. 'Course, this wasn't no funnin' time, but this wasn't the same mama we was used to. We didn't know how to take her but somethin' told us she knew what she was doin'. We just done what she said. We headed for them hills.
It wasn't long before it come to me that she wasn't followin' us. We was followin' her. She was lookin' at the ground. She was on a trail.
It was comin' dark when we got to them hills. For the first time since she told us to take her to them hills, she said somethin'. "Now listen good, boys! They're in that arroyo right ahead of us. I'm sure that Jigger hasn't seen us but he wants us to see him. See that smoke?
"Sam, you ride to just below the crest of that hill on the south. Paco, you do the same on that hill on the north. DON'T TOP THE HILL. DON'T LET HIM SEE YOU. THIS IS VERY DANGEROUS.
"I brought you because I know you better than anyone else on the Bent-Y. I know you will do just as I say. You must! Do you understand? If you don't do just as I say, Jigger will hear you or see you. He will kill Jorge. If he sees you, he'll kill you.
"Stay just below the crest of the hill. When you hear me mention your daddy's name, move around. Make a noise but DO NOT LET JIGGER SEE YOU."
"Mama..." Paco wanted to tell her not to do it. He was going to tell her that if it was too dangerous for us it was too dangerous for her. He wanted to tell her he loved her and that he had been without her for too many years. He didn't want to be without her for the rest of his life.
But her voice and her eyes said, "Don't fuss with me." I reckon a boy ought to cry at a time like that but somehow we knew if we was gonna keep her for a mama and keep Jorge for a friend, there couldn't be no cryin' now. There had to just be doin' what she said.
We rode real quiet to where she told us to go. I got to a place where Hunter was below the crest of the hill but my head wasn't. I knew Jigger couldn't see me. There was too much scrub and tumbleweed. He'd of had to know exactly where to look.
I seen Jigger and Jorge. Jigger had a smoky fire goin'. He was sittin' on a rock, watchin' the mouth of that arroyo. He was holdin' a gun to Jorge's head, just sittin' there, waitin' for his money. Like always, you couldn't tell what Jorge was thinkin'. It come to me that maybe he was some like Juan. Too scared to cry - too scared to show nothin' but then, I didn't know for sure. Like I said, that boy never shows you nothin'.
I don't know what I was showin' but I know what I was feelin'. I was scared. I knew Mama didn't have no five thousand dollars and Jigger didn't look drunk. He wasn't just bein' mean like he done in Amarillo. He had thought this out. There was only one way out of this. There was goin' to be some shootin'.
Mama came ridin' into the arroyo. It didn't look like she was feelin' nothin'. She was sittin' Viento like she was out for a Sunday afternoon ride with Daddy and us. You couldn't tell nothin' from her eyes. She had a black mask over her face.
Jigger seen that mask too. I know he did because he kind of jumped when he seen her. Jorge's body stiffened but he didn't cry or call out. I don't know what I would have done if I didn't know that was my mama. If you didn't know that, you would swear you was lookin' at La Nube Negra.
You could tell Jigger was gettin' more and more nervous by how he was wigglin' around. Jorge's body was still tense but he just stood there, lookin'.
I just can't understand that boy. Jorge was the whole afternoon with a gun to his head, thinkin' Jigger was gonna kill him. Now he was thinkin' that La Nube was gonna get him, but he didn't show nothin'. You'd think a body would cry or do a Nate or pass out like that damn preacher man done. But he just stood there lookin' like he was darin' Jigger to shoot him or La Nube to take him.
Jorge was doin' better than Jigger. Things wasn't workin' out like Jigger'd planned them. I don't know what he was thinkin' but if I was him, I'd be thinkin', "Seamus Flynn's the fastest gun in Texas but he's at least human. With a human, I at least have a chance. But this ain't Seamus. If La Nube is a ghost like some folks say, I'm dead. Can't no man have no chance against no ghost."
But if this wasn't La Nube - just someone tryin' to scare him - or if La Nube wasn't no ghost, Jigger wasn't gonna be bluffed out of no five thousand dollars. If La Nube was a ghost, he was dead anyway. There wasn't nothin' to be lost from tryin'.
"Won't work - you tryin' to scare me with that La Nube stuff. You got the money?"
Jigger pulled the hammer back on the gun.
I knew my mama could shoot fast and straight but there was no way she could draw and shoot before Jigger could pull the trigger. I knew I couldn't but I never wanted to cry more in my life. Jorge was gonna be killed. I couldn't think what the hell my mama was doin'.
She started talkin'. "While I was riding here, I was praying to God that I would not have to kill you - that I would not want to kill you. I pleaded with the Virgin Mother to ask Her Son to take away this feeling of hate I have for you. I lived too long with hate. It's the most painful thing I have ever known. More painful even than losing people I loved. For almost nine years I lived with hate.
"My husband and my sons brought me love again. I had almost forgotten the pain of hate but you have brought it back to me again'. After having known love again, the pain of hate is worse and the hate is stronger. Because of my hate I have to kill you. I want to kill you. That is my punishment.
"Because of your hate you will be killed. That is your punishment. Which of us, Jigger, has been given the greater punishment to bear?
"You think you have my son. You mean to use him to hurt my husband. You mean to kill him if you have to, to fulfill your hate. It's weak, hateful people like you, Jigger, who use defenseless children as if they were only things. Somewhere, long ago, you lost your self-respect. You can only feel important when you can feel better or stronger than someone else. You are not strong enough to face your problems man to man. You can bully and frighten some adults and all children. Your sense of power makes you cruel. People like you are the reason for my anger, Jigger.
"The child you have is not my son, but I love him. I know how it feels to lose someone you love. It was that loss that taught me to hate. Now you know the reason for both my anger and my hate.
"It would be easy for me to see him as every mother's son. I would like to see him as a symbol of innocence. I would like my rage to be the rage of every mother who has had her child taken from her or was made to see her child bear pain. I would like to think that what I am going to do to you is somehow honorable and good. I would like not to be responsible. I would like to be doing this in the name of motherhood - or justice - or goodness. I would like to not be me but a symbol.
"I would like you to be evil. I would like you not to be a man but a symbol.
"But we know what we are, don't we, Jigger? We are not symbols. We are not instruments of good and evil. We are just two people who have been brought to this place by our hate.
"I know why I am here. I nurtured my hate. I made myself feel that it was righteous. I told you of the pain but the pain was like a narcotic. I did not know how much the pain of that hate had destroyed the vitality of my spirit until I tried to love again. I almost couldn't. I enjoyed the hate and the thought of revenge too much. I told myself I was being compelled by love and grief but in my heart, I knew it was hatred and vengeance. I tried to be like our Lord - to forgive my tormentors. I was not strong enough. I could not even understand that forgiveness. My weakness and my lack of understanding made my hatred stronger. I could not be strong. I could not be like our Lord. Hatred was all I had.
"It is not wrong to fight evil and attempt to right wrongs, but it must be done for the right reasons. One must love good and hate evil. Our Lord told us that. My sin was that I could not tell the difference between the evil and the person who committed the evil. I hated the wrong thing and for that, I must be punished.
"I don't know why it is there, but by what you are doing I see your hate. Because we both hate - because we are both too weak to solve our problems any other way, you must die. That is an awful punishment, Jigger, but perhaps it will free you from the hate that brought you to this place.
"I must kill you and I will always remember what I have done. Because I will remember, the grief and the rage - the hate - that brought me to this place will always be with me. That, too is an awful punishment. Which of us, Jigger, has been given the greater punishment?"
Jigger was quiet for a minute. You knew he was tryin' to think out what our mama had said but he was still Jigger. "Takes a lot more than a lot of talk to kill a man. All that talk about killin' me and I ain't dead yet. That talk don't mean nothin' to me. I reckon a lot of what you said is right but I stopped thinkin' on reasons a long time ago. I just do what I feel and take what I can. You don't know nothin' about me. I don't think I hate this greaser. I don't feel nothin' about him. He's just a way to get what I want."
"You hate or you couldn't treat other human beings the way you do. Your kind of cruelty can only come from hate."
"You're spooky, woman but you're just a woman. I reckon you got me some spooked but I'll either leave here rich or stay here dead. It don't make no difference if you're La Nube or if that's just La Nube get up. I come to far too back off now. Give me the money or I'll blow this greaser's head off.
"Goddam, woman, Seamus Flynn owes me. Because of him, I was more than two years locked away - every minute of it, lookin' for a chance to get away and come and get mine. I got my chance. I ain't losin' it to no spooky woman."
"This is between you and me, Jigger. This has nothing to do with Seamus Flynn."
She said Daddy's name. I kicked Hunter hard and she jumped. Paco must have done the same thing just before I done it. Jigger turned his head real fast to the north, and then, hearin' me, to the south.
Mama's gun sounded twice so fast that if you wasn't listenin' good, you'd of thought it was just one shot. The first one took Jigger's arm down by his elbow. It threw his arm back and pulled the gun away from Jorge's head.
With the second shot, Jiggers head jerked back and then - - he was lyin' on the ground. It didn't take much lookin' to see that he was dead.
Just that quick, I seen Mama's plan. Dressin' up like La Nube put Jigger some on edge. She knew before leavin' the house that somethin' was gonna have to take Jigger's attention from her. That's why she brought me and Paco with her - just to make Jigger turn his head. That head turnin' was all it took to give Mama the chance to draw and shoot, even did Jigger have that gun right to Jorge's head with the hammer back. Our mama was that fast.
After the shootin', Jorge just stood there. He didn't move. He didn't make a sound. He just stood there.
Mama was on the ground, her arms around Jorge before me and Paco got there. She had pulled the mask away and when Jorge seen who she was, he put his head on her shoulder and hugged her real tight. Then he let go and cried.
By the time me and Paco got to her, she was our mama again. Her voice was soft and sayin' soothin', comfortin' words to Jorge. The fire was gone from her eyes but them eyes were never quite the same again. They still had the lovin' and the funnin' but there was a sadness there too. I reckon that sadness was from the rememberin' she was tellin' Jigger about.
I took no comfort from lookin' at Jigger. You'd think I'd take pleasure from seein' him dead - him beatin' on me and Paco and doin' Jorge like he did. But it seemed to me like Daddy said. Killin' just to stop killin'. No sense on it come to me. No sense ever come to me from all them things Mama said to Jigger either. Paco and me tried but we got so we didn't talk on it no more. We just got no sense from the whole thing.
Nobody hardly ever talked about what happened in that arroyo. Mama said she was sorry we had to see that but she hoped we understood why she had to take us with her. That was all she ever said to us about it. The next day, Uncle Kevin went with Mama to Pampa to talk to the sheriff and I reckon somebody told my daddy, but nobody ever talked about the killin'. Paco and me talked some about what was said but never about what was done.
Jorge's a tough little shit. His mama said he wanted to sleep with her that first night and he snuggled up real close but he was soon sleepin'. The next day, he didn't say nothin' about it and that night, he was back sleepin' with Juan. Juan said if he was havin' bad dreams, they was quiet ones 'cause he didn't know nothin' about them. The only thing Jorge done different was: he didn't leave them buildings to go ridin' until way after Christmas and he come around to our mama and them aunts for more of that lady huggin' than his mama had time to give him. He never done that before.
I don't think he ever said nothin' about our mama dressin' up like La Nube. Could be he was like Paco and me. Could be he was thinkin' our mama really was La Nube. Me and Paco talked on it. We was thinkin' our mama really was La Nube. We was thinkin' all them stories about La Nube lookin' for children was our mama lookin' for Paco. I reckon our daddy and mama seen our thinkin'. It was soon after daddy come home that the two of them told us all about La Nube. We never said nothin' to nobody, though. Who's gonna believe you if you say somethin' like that?
Me and Paco like knowin' she was La Nube. Knowin' that, we know Paco had somebody lookin' to do him good just like I did. Paco says that when he thinks about how he was in them bad times, the boy he remembers seems like a different boy. It don't seem like it was him. He says when he thinks about that boy he gets all sad and it's a comfort to him to think that that poor, bare-assed boy had someone lovin' him and riskin' their life, tryin' to do him good. It still hurts Paco in his chest real bad when he thinks on younguns who don't have nobody to love them.