Yellowthroat Read online

  Since the meadow's discovery, the men and Margarita had worked like mules to bring in supplies and materials, always under cover of darkness. From the cedars they had cut enough logs to construct two crude cabins and a horse shed. They had steered a stream down to the foot of the pasture, building a large rock cistern to capture the sweet water. Fences were not needed for there was no way to come or go except by the single trail leading into the meadow, and that way was blocked by a simple gate to prevent a grazing horse from wandering down the path.

  This permanent camp was a place to which they could flee during good weather and in which they could winter safely, and there had been few complaints during their heavy labors.

  In the darkness, the group dismounted stiffly before the horse shed, moaning and grumbling to themselves. Margarita lit a lantern as the others automatically began to unsaddle their tired mounts. She removed her own richly carved and heavily silvered saddle, and then silently she and the men rubbed down each animal before turning it loose to rejoin the rest of the herd to roll and scratch the thick dust from its hide.

  Their brief chores complete, they gathered together in the larger of the two cabins to divide their stolen goods.

  A crude table and three cots, each with a small chest at its foot, nearly filled the single-room dwelling. Several shelves nailed to the walls held metal plates and utensils, tins of food, lanterns, dry goods, and dark bottles of whiskey that gleamed in the cabin's frugal light. Against the back wall was a stone fireplace set into the packed dirt floor.

  In the gloom Margarita sank with a groan onto one of the cots as the men sat themselves down heavily around the table, on hand hewn, three-legged stools. By the light of a lantern placed near one edge of the table, the booty was spilled noisily from the sack. One by one, the men began to inspect each piece of jewelry.

  "Come on over, Margarita," invited Bert. "Count the money."

  Reluctantly she rose and joined them. With little enthusiasm, she split the bills and change equally, and in turn, was handed what was considered to be a fair share of the jewelry.

  "Sam, gimme that bottle." Bert Simson, the tallest of the men, spoke with quiet authority as the loot was passed around, his piercing brown eyes half hidden by a sombrero seldom removed. He was dirty and bearded, his mouth a mere slit beneath an overly large nose. Heavy dark clothes, smelling strongly of sweat and horses, hung on his scrawny frame. He was a man to be feared, but he was fair if those he dealt with were fair. If he believed they were not, he shot them dead with the well-oiled gun he wore on his hip.

  Sam Abelson reached for a bottle from the shelf behind his head and passed it across the table to Bert. Sam could have fooled the devil himself with his believable lies and angelic features. His full lips continuously played with a smile, and women read things in his deep blue eyes that he didn't mean at all. A slender man, ordinarily clean shaven, with rosy cheeks setting off wavy black hair, Sam was full of charm and impeccably clean in person. He was an expert rider and the group's bronc buster; his reflexes were lightning quick. The wanted posters throughout the territory verified it along with several men who had learned too late to be around to testify to the fact. He cared for only two people, he once told Margarita: her, and a wife waiting for him in Mexico, somewhere, whom Margarita resembled.

  "Time to get drunk," he muttered to no one in particular, and took a second bottle from the shelf, pulling long and hard on it and then belching with deep contentment.

  Margarita ignored his coarseness and turned to watch Bill Bleu take a long pull on yet another bottle, his Adam's apple rhythmically bobbing up and down beneath a thin and scraggly beard. His stringy hair was long and greasy, and his clothes stinking, not having been changed in months. A runt of a man, with exceptionally bowed legs which drew him even closer to the ground, Bill resented his body and had brawled throughout his younger life to prove he was as much boy as any of them. When he grew older, he proved he was as much man by robbing and killing. He was the meanest of the bandits, and Margarita had once seen him shoot a good horse just because the animal had stung his face with the swish of its tail as he had walked by.

  "Have a drink, Margarita," he offered generously.

  "No thanks," she answered curtly and stood to go. She wanted nothing on this earth from him.

  He grabbed her by the wrist and yanked her onto his lap. "I insist." Smiling grotesquely, he thrust the bottle close to her face, almost gagging her with his breath and the sight of his teeth rotted nearly to the gums.

  She slapped him with a hard stinging blow. Harder than usual because she so frequently went through this rubbish with him and tonight she was just too tired to argue. Once again he was mauling her and none of the others would lift a finger to stop him. "You're an animal, Bill," she snarled as she wrestled from his grasp. "A pig!" She snatched up her share of the loot from the table and jammed it into her pants pockets.

  Bill threw back his head and laughed rakishly as she tossed a string of Spanish insults at him, and at the others who would not help her.

  "What the hell were you doing at that stagecoach?" Bill demanded belligerently. "Why didn't you ride when the rest of us were ready? You could'a got us all shot."

  So that was what was making him such a fiend tonight! It had been her delay as she paused to study the courageous lady with the blue eyes that was setting him off now. "I wanted to look at a brave Anglo for a change," she retorted with a saucy toss of her head. "I haven't seen one in years."

  Mimicking her heavy Mexican accent, Bill parroted, "I haven't seen one in years," then cursed her soundly in English.

  "Puerco!" she flashed at him over her shoulder and angrily left the hut. She went to her own cabin, a lodging as rough hewn as the men's, muttering obscenities at Bill all the way. She emptied her pockets onto a small table before lying down on the single narrow cot. Like the men’s' dwelling, this one's two small windows and open doorway were left uncovered during the summer months in spite of cool nights. She enjoyed watching the rising moon's bright light cast silvery shadows over the barren earth floor, across the table and its only stool, onto well-stocked shelves. Against one wall and built of stone was a cold fireplace. At the foot of her cot, she too had a chest in which she stored her personal effects and a few women's garments.

  She felt the soft rays of the lunar body calm her. She wanted food, but was too exhausted from the two days' mad dash back to the meadow to eat. A posse never failed to track them as soon as someone at the holdup site was able to ride like hell for help, and this most recent job had sapped her energy — as each one always did. But she didn't care. Her wealth was growing. In another couple of years she would recover all she had lost — if her luck held out. In two years at the most, she would leave this despicable lot of Anglos forever. Had she been able to find Mexicans, she would have ridden with them, but she was in northern New Mexico Territory, where there were fewer dishonest Mexicans than dishonest Anglos.

  Loma Parda, over on the Mora River crawled with gambling, "Taos Lightning," and loose women, and so she had ridden to the town to find those she needed and knew would be there. Fortunately, the nearby soldiers from Fort Union bothered no one except the Indians, and there were few of those wandering around anymore since the signing of the treaty in '68. She had given thanks on more than one occasion to Kit Carson, the man who had played a major role in getting the treaty signed, whenever she rode alone on her reconnaissance through New Mexico's expansive territory.

  Money talked very loudly at Loma Parda, and after some checking around the town she had been able to find a small but promising band from among its questionable citizens. The men had listened closely while she laid out her plan. She would be the 'point' and act as the group's scout. Who would ever be clever enough to suspect a beautiful senorita of espiar while strolling the streets of first this town and then that, as she cunningly gathered information for a possible holdup? The men had liked the bold idea and right away had begun their feloniou
s work.

  Occasionally Margarita found it necessary to use her charms to learn what she needed to know; but she had never failed at her task.

  Fearful they might one day drive her away, the men generally left her alone except for occasional harassment. And if things began to get out of hand, Sam came to her aid. The men had soon learned that a band with a woman, unusual though it was, worked well, and their pockets were kept relatively filled. No one really wanted to foul things up.

  Margarita rested on her cot for awhile, then rose and walked out into moonlight brilliant enough to reveal the trail that wound up the side of the cliff just behind her quarters. She took soap with her, and a towel and fresh clothing.

  She climbed the path through fragrant pine trees for fifteen minutes before coming to a stream which broke into a large, clear pool of water trapped by huge rocks and boulders. The pool was surrounded by trees and shrubbery, but Margarita had little doubt that she bathed without privacy, at least during daylight hours.

  She dropped her dusty clothing at her feet, too tired to give a damn if the whole world was watching right now, and slipped into the cold water to swim to the deeper area of the pool. She dove to the bottom, let her breath out slowly until she thought her lungs would burst, then swam quickly to the top, breaking through the water's black surface and gasping for breath. She ducked again and shook her head from side to side, letting her hair float like thick black molasses around her face. She spent a few more minutes diving and surfacing before soaping down and scrubbing her supple body until it hurt only from the rough cleansing being dealt it, and not from long hours in the saddle.

  She passed the soap sensuously over small firm breasts and down a flat belly and muscular thighs, and longed to be held and loved. It had been forever since she had been in anyone's arms. She did not count the sheriffs or deputies or bankers. She did not even think of them. That had been business — not love. They had been Anglos — not Mexicans.

  She set the soap down on a rock and swam slowly around the pool until all the suds had been washed from her hair and body. Floating on her back, she looked up at the stars and the moon suspended in the black night and thought back to four days ago. She remembered the brave blue-eyed lady angrily saying: "Do you want to kiss me too?" Margarita chuckled at the stars. What a joke to have played on the Americano. To have jumped quickly from her horse, grabbed the lady and, like a wild bandito with much macho, kissed her full red lips. Then to have ripped from her own face her bandanna to reveal to the Anglo how she had been tricked by her own words. Strangely, to think of her lips on the beautiful lady's almost made Margarita warm between her legs. It had been a long time since she had been loved.

  She closed her eyes against the moonlight and imagined what it would be like to kiss the lady. Such an unusual idea, one she would never have thought of but for the question from the woman herself. It annoyed her and her mind drifted to other things.

  Soon afterward, Margarita left the pool and returned to her cabin. She lit a lantern and sat at the table for a while, staring into its light. Although still hungry, she was rested and refreshed, and freshly clothed in a lighter, checkered blouse of cotton and pants of denim. She was content.

  Her thoughts drifted to the events of two years ago, and her decision to become a bandito. She had made the decision in no time at all as her house and barns full of cotton and horses burned to the ground while she stood watching Seth swinging from the tree and listened to the horses shriek in mortal terror and pain, stinking the air with their burning flesh. To be a Mexican married to an Americano was deeply resented by some. The cold-blooded act of killing her husband had proved it forevermore.

  She had immediately formulated a plan, carrying it forward that very day. She had first buried Seth, then dug up the money from beneath the stone hearth in the kitchen where they had always cached their ever growing profits, not trusting the banks. Lastly she had donned men's clothes, bought a horse, and headed for Loma Parda.

  She shook her head to clear it of these past memories, memories that made her burn with a vengeful fire. She did not want to feel furor now. She wanted to feel peace. She allowed previous restful sensation to return.

  She sat on the edge of the cot, taking off only her boots and outer pants, tossing them carelessly aside before dousing the lantern. Later she would deal with her plunder which still lay untouched on the table.

  She lay down without covers, letting sleep slowly overtake her, its healing gift gently loosening tense muscles around the perpetual downward pull of her mouth. Her eyes closed and she began to breathe quietly. Finally asleep, strong muscles became softly feminine now that the day had let go its tight hold on her. She rolled over on her side once and did not move again until morning.

  Chapter Three

  It had been three weeks since the stagecoach holdup. Margarita had been gratefully alone for almost the entire time. Two days after they returned to the meadow, the men had left, as they usually did after a job, moving out late at night.

  Margarita knew they had gone to Sourdough, an area the law normally stayed clear of, a mean and safe little town some forty miles east of the meadow. There they would squander or gamble away every last dollar they had stolen and give away the jewelry in exchange for favors from the ladies. The three would spend their time at a dirty little hole-in-the-wall saloon that didn't ask where payment for its bad whiskey and tired women came from.

  Margarita didn't mind being left alone for long periods of time. She preferred the solitude, and it gave her an opportunity to carefully hide her plunder. One day not long after the discovery of the meadow, and at a time when the men were away, she had decided to investigate the area above the pool. To her delight, she had spied a small cave, one that might have been inhabited during some ancient time. She scooted back to her cabin, returning quickly with a lantern. She had explored further, learning that the shelter had indeed been used by a people in some distant past. She had found scattered pieces of broken pottery, a circular carving that made no sense to her chiseled into the side of a wall, soot on the ceiling from long dead fires, and small bones, probably left by mountain lions or bear. She estimated that a family, perhaps two families, had shared this refuge. Disturbing nothing, she had wrapped her cache in an oil cloth and then stashed it behind a large rock deep in the back of the cavern. Since then, she was careful to first check the cave before entering, knowing it was an ideal place for animals to hide and rest.

  She rose leisurely this morning to a brilliant early morning sun. Clouds billowed in thick white piles reaching thousands of feet into the atmosphere, unidentifiable giants bumping into the distant purple mountains of the Sangre de Cristo range stretching to the south. Turkey vultures soared majestically in large, sweeping circles. Margarita stood motionless in the doorway, inhaling the scent of wild mint and sweet clover. Hummingbirds fed at the veins of scarlet beardtongue running through the high grasses of the meadow.

  Butterflies flitted everywhere, lighting briefly on a single blade or blossom only to take flight again. The horses at the far end of the spacious field grazed contentedly in the still, clear air.

  She climbed the path to the pool to take a quick dip in icy cold water not yet warmed by the day's sun. Finished, she vigorously rubbed down with a rough towel before climbing back into her warm clothes and then headed up to the cave to hide her stolen possessions.

  As a group, she and the men had done well in the time that they had ridden together. No one had been shot, and they had made at least fair hauls almost every time.

  She had not selected where to rebuild her life. Perhaps down in Lincoln County, where she and Seth had once lived. She wanted to raise horses and possibly try her hand at raising corn and beans. But this time there would be a certain difference on her farm. This time there would be heavily armed guards — with orders to shoot to kill should anyone ever again come near her or her land.

  As she exited the cave, a sensation of well-being filled
her. Suddenly and sharply her amiable mood was interrupted by a loud shout from below. With a dark surge of despair she realized that the men had returned from Sourdough. With a comforting caress across her scar, she glanced a final time at the dark and peaceful cave.

  As she headed down the path, her steps lagged and her heart felt heavy, the morning's brilliance seemingly gone in a flash. That time had come again — the time to start thinking about their next job. She did not look forward to it. She bolstered herself by thinking of the coming robbery as yet another step toward an end to outlawing and running with these men.

  She reached the bottom of the trail just as they finished turning their mounts out to pasture.

  "Margarita," Bill called out. "How're the hosses?"

  Inwardly Margarita cursed the man. She could be lying injured in his path and still Bill's first concern would be the welfare of the animals. It has always been hers, as well. He asked the question every time he returned from Sourdough, doubting her ability to take care of the horses. She was as capable as he, any day. "Everything is fine," she answered crossly.

  "We'll meet in an hour," Bert announced abruptly, and turned to follow the others walking silently toward the men's cabin.

  Margarita went to her own cabin, her mind totally focused on the coming discussion. She made breakfast over a small fire just outside the door. Straddling a large flat log which served both as table and chair, she prepared a tortilla, the flour made only yesterday from parboiled corn kernels soaked in lime water and then ground between a heavy stone roller and a slab of rock. Absently she added fresh water, then patted the mixture between her palms until it was thin and round. After frying it, she filled the tortilla with thick, crisp bacon and beans, and ate from a metal plate resting on the rough bark in front of her. She licked her fingers clean when she had finished and sat staring into space, idly chewing on a dried peach, rinsing down the last morsel of food with coffee, the grains having sufficiently boiled and settled to the bottom of the pot.