“Last Hope on the High Sonoran” by Jack Kimball

When men’s hate reigns, and beckons you
to weep upon a trampled ground,
seek out a star that’s pointing to
a wayward place where hope is found.
It’s there the truth and dead have gone
to light the sky, to break the dawn.

Anonymous

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The body of the young man lay beneath a thorned ocotillo, red-tipped; his arms and legs spreadeagled. Staked out in the desert sun, his clothing was mostly stripped away and a lone wolf crouched on haunches nearby, a gray salt and pepper, guarding dinner. Ely reined up and pulled his Henry from the scabbard and raised the gunsight to cover the distance. He then sighted down on the animal and took a bead forward of the shoulder. The gun cracked sharp and the earth kicked up dust in front of the wolf, who sprinted off. A hunter, just like us, Ely thought to himself. Doing what’s natural is no killing offense.

Alone, Ely had been tracking for seven days on the 1870’s Arizona Sonoran Desert and he was dead tired of endless flat grasses, peyote cactus, and a merciless wind under a blistering sky. At the end of the seventh day, with the sun low in a dry, pink, cloudless sky, he had loped over a low rise and found the young man. So with the wolf chased off, he studied the broad caldera. His eyes touched each late-day shadow, prying. He listened to what the terrain told him;  a murmuring through the sagebrush, a movement in the rocks, his weathered sense of what lay waiting. After a while, he pushed up his brown sweat-stained Stetson, exposing a stark white forehead beneath a receding hairline. He leaned and spit, used his faded blue bandana to wipe his mouth, spurred the horse, and in a slow walk closed to where the dead man lay.

After dismounting, he squatted down, and with his hand shaking, he closed the man’s eyes. He sat there for a long time. Then, with eyes glistening, he reached into his leather vest pocket and took out two squares of white tobacco paper along with a cloth tobacco pouch. He sprinkled tobacco in one square, rolled it up, and struck a match to it. He exhaled; the smoke ran with the gusting wind. He then pulled a knife strapped to his side and cut off a piece of the young man’s blond hair. He folded the cut carefully into the other square and tucked it back in his vest. The white rock of the desert winced like a man breaking inside.

The rope stretching the arms and legs of the dead man twisted in a Yuma-style braid, the weave just right. Those Apache know rope. He checked the tracks. Three riders, one rode sidesaddle, the hoof marks deep on one side. Maybe wounded, he guessed. You winged one of them, didn’t you?

“Inconvenient? This is more than inconvenient,” he said out loud. “It’s a world a trouble, is what it is.”

The mare whinnied, then snorted and dragged a hoof into the hard chalk-white crust.

“You don’t need to press me.”

Never one to hurry without good cause, Ely pulled the saddle off his golden mare. Over fifty years, he’d known a lot of horseflesh, but Dammit was the best he’d known; not because the horse could go all day at a full trot, not hardly needing water; and not because the horse was steady in a skirmish; and not even because she was more steady in a full-on battle. No. None of those things, although he conceded they were all worthy skills on a long chase like now. It’s the advice, he smiled. The damn horse talks back. Not aloud, mind you, but you still hear it. And I hate to admit it, but the advice is dead-on, although mainly a pain in the ass. He then pulled his hat off and poured a little water into the crown. Dammit stuck her muzzle in and slurped it up. Ely leaned in and gave the horse a kiss on her forehead and then lay his own forehead against hers. “Hell, you’re the only friend I got left,” he whispered, his back bent and aching with the years, exhausted.

Later, and with the young dead man slung over the saddle, Ely slowly climbed a ravine. “So whudaya think?” he said to Dammit. “We bury him above that dry wash?” But where dirt is concerned, the Sonoran doesn’t give an inch, so he dragged the young man over to where there might be a break in the wind and covered him with rocks. After some words, he scanned the horizon; gray squall line way off to the south moving slowly to the east, the wrong direction, a misting sheet receding on the land. There will be no rain, he thought. So don’t think about the water. As if for comfort, he fingered the tin marshal’s badge on his chest. Besides, I’ve got a murder to deal with.

He made camp and once bedded down the stars were all out, clear as an honest decision, he remembered, from what his last wife, Hope, used to say. Maybe she’s up there, he thought. He’d had two wives, both gone. Susan from consumption, she was the youngest. Only lived three years after they were married. But it’s Hope I miss. Bad miss. She and her Eastern education. A man shouldn’t live beyond his own family’s horizon, and I feel you looking down. Mostly giving me grief about not re-marrying. But the badge is a marriage of sorts, isn’t it, Hope?

With no more sound than wind in the sage, and with the stars blazing, he had a dream. He had little recollection later, but Hope had grown more beautiful. The worry lines were gone, her face aglow, sparks from a crackling grand fire rose into the night. Standing next to her, he could just make out a face. An Apache.

Ely woke before light and he and Dammit lit out at a fast trot. The sun rose quick. It was going to be another scorcher.

***

The Agujero was bone dry, and this was a surprise for the three riders. The Apache Jararaca dug with his hands into the streambed, but he knew it was useless. Rodriquez, a Mexican bandolero, bleeding from his stomach, fell off his horse and lay moaning on the rocky bank. The third rider was a boy, no older than twelve. He was a young Apache brave, and the Apache Jararaca was his father. He loved him, but his father had within him a hate that drove into the boy a great fear.

Jararaca hated everything. He hated the smallpox that had taken his family; his wife White Feather and son, Little Sparrow, dying in his arms, sweating, covered with pustules, their faces deformed. He hated San Carlos where his way of life was gone; no more hunting the buffalo, much less game; no more food other than bare survival, maggot rotten meat on the rez. And he hated losing what he missed most, what he grew up with as a boy, what he loved more than life. He could no longer ride free, his arms spread in the wind, the spirits of ancestors in his chest. But mostly, he had one big hate. He hated the white man, and this hate burned deep.

And now we’re in trouble about the water, he thought. Though he and the boy had more for themselves now that Rodriquez had got himself shot by the young white man, the one who wouldn’t beg. The bandolero was stupid, trying to steal the courage from the white man. But Rodriquez’s dying would give him and the boy more water. And Rodriquez, thank you. I’ve been eyeing your Winchester .45 cal.

Rodriquez lay on the ground. “Agua. Agua! Por favor!”

The Apache Jararaca strolled over and prodded Rodriquez with the toe of his laced moccasin. His face grimaced up and he slammed the butt of his rifle into the stomach wound. Rodriquez screamed in agony. Blood spurted out of the bullet hole, spilling onto the white sunbaked dirt, soaking the ground with a slow scarlet spread. Jararaca laughed. His once proud face, forty years old, looking like sixty, showed his white teeth. His high cheekbones were still handsome. But it was too late. His lips had a permanent sneer. “Too bad you couldn’t steal the courage from the one who wouldn’t beg,” he told his compadre. “You want agua. I give you some”, and then he relieved himself in the bandolero’s open wound. There will be no wasting of water. “Estaras muerto antes de la manana.” Maybe now you’ll understand.

By morning, the Apache Jararaca and the boy had ridden on.

***

Ely had to see past the blinding sun, but up ahead of him on the trail an Apache boy appeared on a cream-brown pony next to a dead mesquite tree. The boy sat with the late afternoon sun behind him, and he crossed his hands in front of him, just waiting. He had long black hair tied with a red cloth headband, a beige breech coat, loose, and leggings half up to his knees. What caught Ely’s attention more than anything was the boy’s face; it was the one with Hope in the dream.

But off to the left a hundred yards, a flicker of light. I must be dumb as dirt, deserve to die, coming up this grade. Sure enough, a flash from a muzzle, and then lead whistled by less than two feet above his head. He drew his Colt and snapped off three shots. “I know he’s too far, Dammit,” he said, and holstered the weapon. As he reached for his Henry, a slug slapped into Dammit just above the noseband and near her eye. The horse reared up, an awful wail, flailing her front hooves into the air, then went down and rolled on Ely, trapping his right leg under the horse. This is not a splendid position, he thought to himself. Worse, you’re slippin’ with some age on you. He’d dropped the revolver and couldn’t reach it, or the Henry. For a while, he struggled with the saddle. You’d appreciate a gun, keep one bullet and put it in your dumb-ass brain.

The ground tore up around him as the bullets played with him. Three shots punched into Dammit. Things got quiet, and Ely stroked Dammit’s neck as her breathing rasped. She choked on some pink froth, stirred, and tried to rise. She then laid back still. Ely was barely able to wrench his trapped body around to put his forehead against Dammit’s. Her eyes slowly glimmered out as he stroked her muzzle.  Ely felt a break from inside him rise up into his throat. You’re out of your misery now, girl.

It wasn’t long.

“No lo intentes, hombre blanco,” from close behind him.

And so it starts, Ely thought.

“Now we see what’s inside you.”

In no time, the Apache and the boy staked Ely out in the burning sun, naked above the waist. His legs and arms spread tight, just like what they did to the young man. The boy cut twigs and dead branches from the mesquites. He then crouched down on his heels, Apache style, and fed a small fire. Black buzzards fluttered around the branches of the dead mesquite trees, and Ely thought to himself a little joke and smiled. Instead of me shooting the buzzards, I’m the carrion, and it’s me they’ll be eating.

The Apache chugged from the canteen he’d stripped off Dammit and then pulled a whiskey bottle out of his saddlebag. He said something rough and threw the boy the water. The boy took some swigs, then began placing small rocks in the fire. Soon the flame sprouted up, and Ely could feel the heat begin to sear the naked skin of his bare side. He bore down in a tight clench.

For a while, the liquor kept the Apache busy. He’d take his time looking Ely over with his bloodshot eyes, hate glossed a runny yellow. The Apache thrust out his hand to the boy, offering the bottle, but the boy shook his head and swiped his hand away. The Apache laughed and the boy glared back at him, stubborn. Soon, the rocks had flames wrapped around them and the Apache placed a few sticks he’d whittled down with his knife to the edge of the fire. The ends of the sticks embered up red and as they did Ely tensed up thinking this new pain might outdo him, a white-hot place in his head seemed to be opening up, a place he didn’t think he’d be back from. But still, he thought, I got an idea what the rocks and sticks are for. You better be more worried about the knife.

“You think about it, compadre,” the Apache said, then moved off, choking and coughing up some kind of bile mixed with whiskey in a ditch. He passed out in the sunbaked dirt. Later, he rolled over and started snoring. The boy did not move, just fed the fire as night closed in.

The stars came out and Eli lay stretched out staring into the endless black. It won’t be long now and I’m ready, he thought. I’m sorry, Hope, for all those years of you staring into the prairie, worried to death, not knowing where I was, or if I was coming back. If you don’t want me, I’ll understand. But if you’ll have me, I’ll be holding you soon, so there’s that, ain’t there? Some of this is good?

He tried not to focus on the fear. He’d seen fear in many campaigns and he’d felt it often. And each time he tried to put it off with the action, but the fear was back now in his stomach, a bitter churn, an ache he knew could rise and take him over, a fear he could lose himself in.  It wasn’t the dying. It was the before the dying. He feared most he wouldn’t die proud, like a man, like a man should.

The boy came at him in the dark and his shadow moved with the yellow-white moon behind him. Now the fear climbed in Eli’s chest, ground sour inside, and rose in his throat. He bore down with his teeth knowing what was to come. The moonlight, jaundiced, flashed on the knife and the boy lay the edge against Eli’s wrist which tickled as it stroked up his arm.

But then the boy was pulling the rope and Ely pulled a hand free. Soon the knife cut his other arm loose, and then his legs were free. The boy handed him his holstered Colt and sat back in his crouch staring into the ground. He motioned a finger toward the horses.

Ely strapped on the gun. Shirtless, he made a sprint for the pony. As he approached, he spoke soft to the horse. “Hey boy, just me now,” and then slung his body over bareback.

I know guns, he thought. And that’s the sound of a lever action ’73 Winchester behind me, slip-clicking a round into a chamber. Ely flicked the rein on the pony, facing dead-on into the barrel of that Winchester. The Apache held the rifle hip high, so close if Ely spit hard he could hit him. Maybe hate delayed the Apache, maybe he wanted to relish the fear that was tearing through this white man, or maybe he was worried he might kill the white man and not have his revenge, but then Ely saw the hate spark in the Apache’s eyes. The Apache pulled the trigger. Ely kicked hard off the horse, and as he did a razored pain cut his temple. As he fell through the air, he pulled his Colt and fired three shots before hitting the ground. The sound of the gunshot blast broke the sky, a roar, no pause between each crack of the shot, flames firing out of the barrel, blinding the night. Ely slammed into the ground on his back, flat-out stunned, his head on fire. Laying there it became dead quiet like every living thing on earth had taken notice. Ely strained, raised up, and the Apache Jararaca lay dead, not ten feet away, his head near clean shot off.

***

At first sunlight, and for only one reason Ely could figure, the boy collected more dry wood. Then the boy dragged the dead Apache over the fire and built it up to a roaring blaze. The two of them stepped back away, the flames blue hot, cremating the dead Apache. The boy went into his crouch and began a death song. The mournful sound was steady and low, rhythmic, then pitched high in agony from a loss Ely couldn’t imagine. After a long time, the boy then pulled a small box from a satchel he carried. It looked like carved bone, white. As Ely looked on, the boy put personal items he’d collected from the Apache Jararaca into the box; beads, a feather, and Ely thought a small seashell. The boy hadn’t spoken a word, and Ely didn’t know if he knew English. He must have known some, living on the rez, but knowing English or not, he heard the boy in his head when he asked him what he was doing. He might have been talking, or maybe it was just his imagination.

“My father was full of hate,” the boy said. “My grandmother taught me; what I do now is the cleansing, so the hate won’t live in the world.” The boy then placed the box in the pyre and jumped back from the heat. The flames soon engulfed the box.

“How long does it take?”

“Hate takes a long time to burn out. My grandmother said 200 white-person years, or more.”

Ely kept his eyes on the flames. His breath caught in his throat. He whispered. “Does it work with grief, loneliness?”

“That’s a double,” the boy said. “You need powerful items.”

Ely took out the white tobacco paper he kept with a cut of the young man’s hair. “This was my son’s hair. My wife Hope and I only had the one.”

“Sure. It will work, I think. Why not?”

Ely dared not look at the boy. He placed the folded-up paper in the fire. As the flames took it, there was a flare, large enough to cause the two of them to step back. They stood together a long time as the fire died down.

Before the fire burned out, the boy mounted up on the Apache Jararaca’s horse. From the top of the horse, the boy dropped a canteen on the dirt in front of Ely, half the water. He left the other pony and was soon gone in the heat shimmering up in the morning sun.

_____

PostScript: This story and characters are fictional. One intent of the story is to honor the indigenous Yuma Apache. The San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation exists and is in southeastern Arizona. The Yuma Apache are the only Apache group that used cremation. Not only did they cremate the body, but they also cremated all the person’s possessions. The Colt six-shooter became renowned as the ‘gun that won the West’. The reasons for hating the white man are also true. In time, the hope is the hate will burn off.