Elmore Leonard - The Bounty Hunters

Lew Embree looked at him a long moment and then glanced at the girl. "Come on, honey."

"I like it where I am."

"You be nice now."

"Go stick your head in it!"

"Honey, Warren's back there at the table cryin' his eyes out for you."

The girl did not say anything now.

Shaking his head Lew Embree looked at Bowers. "Don't these biddy-bitches get uppity though. She suspects you got more money than Warren, which could be a case." He was standing next to her chair. His hand moved to the cane back rest then idly up to the girl's neck, and suddenly, his fingers gripping the white cotton, he jerked his hand down, ripping the loose-fitting blouse away from her back. She was up out of the chair, screaming, holding the front of the blouse to her breasts, running toward the rear of the mescal shop, past the table where Warren and the others were, trying to dodge an arm that reached for her and caught a shred of material. It pulled her off balance, jerking the front of the blouse from her hands and now she made no attempt to cover herself, standing, cursing Embree with every indecent word she knew before running crying through the rear door.

Warren called to Lew, "She looks like she can't hardly wait!"

Still grinning, Lew Embree looked from Santana to Bowers then turned his back to them indifferently and started for the other table. "For a girl that throws it around like she does," Lew was saying, "she acts awful kittenish."

Bowers watched Embree until he reached the other table, then he looked toward Santana.

"Will you sit here?"

The rurale sergeant pushed back his straw Chihuahua hat, shaking his head faintly. "I will be here only a moment."

Bowers stood and moved to the bar carrying the mescal bottle. "Let me buy you a drink." He said then, "I was wondering what that man's name was."

Santana accepted the bottle that Bowers extended and poured a glass half full. "I've never listened for his name."

"That was something he did to the girl, eh?"

"She had her clothes off in his presence before."

"I had the feeling he did it for my benefit," Bowers said, watching the rurale.

Santana shrugged, then drank. He wiped his mouth and said, "He misses no opportunity to show they have bought these women well. But it makes little difference since the women are bought; it's hardly a winning of their affection."

Bowers said idly, "But it would seem to me to be a matter of principle. I don't know if I could just let these men come in and take over all the women. That's if it was up to me."

Santana was watching the ones at the table. "This is not something that will go on always."

"I should think you'd have enough men that you wouldn't have to stand for such nonsense going on. Those are Lazair's men, aren't they?"

Santana nodded.

"Then you must have about three to one on him."

"We have been instructed to treat him with courtesy."

Bowers half smiled. "Where do you draw the line? If a guest at your home made advances to your wife, would courtesy hold you back from dealing with him?"

"There is a difference."

"You live in Soyopa. The women are yours, of your land. Then these come and take whatever they like and make themselves comfortable. Was it your lieutenant who said this about courtesy?"

Santana nodded. "That one."

"He hasn't been to Lazair's camp, has he?"

"No."

"I'm told there were some women there. Not like the ones that work here, but good girls, from another pueblo. Alaejos, somewhere like that. What they were doing to them I've heard called many things…but courtesy wasn't one of them."

"Where did you hear this?"

"From one of the men of the village. Now I'm not sure, that might have been a time ago and now they are gone."

Santana sipped his mescal; he was thinking, and it was even something physical, tightening his swarthy face. His eyes were small in his face and now they did not show as he squinted to make things plainer in his mind.

"When I heard that," Bowers said, "I couldn't help but be angry myself; but one man cannot do anything against all of them."

"What of your companion?"

"That would make two of us."

"No, I meant where is he?"

Bowers shrugged. "Probably at the house of the alcalde, or visiting others. He also cannot understand this immunity that seems to have been granted them."

"Lieutenant Duro-"

"Yes, Lieutenant Duro…who is forced to associate with them only when paying the scalp bounty. The rest of the time he is alone in his comfortable house with little to do-"

"Not always alone."

"But while you perform his work. I have heard that," Bowers said.

"What?"

"Everyone speaks of it. You're modest. It's said about that Duro would accomplish nothing if it were not for Sergeant Santana."

"That is said?"

"You are modest; for you know this better than I. How often does he come from his house into the sun?"

"Little."

"Perhaps for pleasure, but never for work, eh?"

Santana nodded, thoughtfully.

"It seems such a waste. Yet he is the one who insists that you be courteous to the men of Lazair. Has he led you against the Apaches?"

"That one? That son of the great whore would sooner cut his arm off."

Bowers said, sympathetically, "You can find little respect for a man like that."

"None. Just the sight of him is an abuse."

Bowers said nothing, watching him.

Santana said, "In the army it isn't uncommon to find men such as he. I know that for I have served. As a boy I was present at the battle of Cinco de Mayo, where at Puebla, under Zaragoza and this same Diaz we now have, we defeated the army of France."

"That was a long time ago."

"Fifteen years," Santana answered. "But with the clearness of yesterday in my mind."

"And you have served all of this time?"

"Most of it."

"I didn't know you were a veteran of such long service."

"But this is not the army," Santana said.

"More a police force?"

"More an association of bandits. Listen…almost every one of my men has lived his entire life outside of the law. These you meet in all armies, but not in such proportion as here. To organize this, Diaz must have thrown open the jails."

"Then there is a problem making them obey orders."

"Listen." Santana looked at Bowers intently. "There is no problem. These that were conceived in stables and have seasoned in prisons…there is not one of them I cannot handle. If it were not for that pimp of a lieutenant, much more would be accomplished here. Lieutenant Duro sometimes believes he is much man, but it is only his rank that tells him so. Inside of him live worms."

Bowers shook his head. "That's too bad. Here you are, a military man, years of experience and with a force you could probably turn into a fine fighting corps…and they saddle you with an officer who has no feeling for service. I would venture that you could have taken your men even against this Soldado Viejo long before this if it were not for Duro."

"With certainty, even though they are not trained properly for the fighting of Indians; that is, as a body, which is the only way to defeat them."

"Taking them into the hills after Soldado would not be wise then."

"No. We have not been given trackers. How would we find them? And if we did, how would we assault them? Firing, puffs of the powder smoke high up, but when you climb to the place, nothing. Then you carry down your dead. It is always thus with the Apaches."

"But to get them in the open, eh?" Bowers prompted. He pushed the mescal bottle toward Santana, watching the sergeant light a cigar, puff hard, hurrying to light it.

"Aiii-to get them in the open. Listen, when that day comes we will flood them; we will sweep through their ranks and you will see riding you thought was not possible. There are many vaqueros among us; these will sweep them, firing, stinging like a thousand ants, then roping them to be dragged behind the horses. Then, instead of scalps, we will take the entire heads and secure them to poles and place each pole a certain distance apart, all the way to Hermosillo."