Elmore Leonard - Hombre

Russell used Spanish again, more this time, evidently explaining something.

“Maybe it would look different to you if you thought about it in English,” Mr. Mendez said and watched him closely. “Or if you spoke about it now in English.”

“It’s the same,” Russell said, all of a sudden in English. In good English that had only a speck of accent, just a faint edge that you would wonder every time you heard him if it really was some kind of accent.

“But it’s a big something to think about,” Mr. Mendez said. “Going to Contention. Going there to live among white men. To live as a white man on land a white man has given you. To have to speak English to people no matter what language you think in.”

“There it is,” Russell said. “I’m still thinking all the different ways.”

“Sure,” Mr. Mendez said. “You could sell the land. Buy a horse and a new gun with some of the money. Give the rest to the hungry ones at the San Carlos Indian agency. Then you got nothing.”

Russell shrugged. “Maybe so.”

“Or you sell only the herd and grow corn on the land and make tizwin, enough to keep you drunk for seven years.”

“Even that,” Russell said.

“Or you can work the herd and watch it grow,” Mr. Mendez said. “You can marry and raise a family. You can live there the rest of your life.” He waited a little. “You want some more ways to picture it?”

“I have too many ways now,” Russell said. But he didn’t sound worried about it.

That didn’t satisfy Mr. Mendez. He was trying to convince him of something and kept at it. He said then, “I hear it’s a good house.”

Russell nodded. “If living there is worth it to you.”

“Man,” Mendez said, like something good was staring at Russell and he didn’t know enough to take it. “What do you want?”

Russell looked down at him. In that unhurried easy way he said, “Maybe a mescal if there’s some inside, uh?”

Delgado laughed and said something in Spanish. Mr. Mendez shrugged and both of them turned to the adobe.

I was watching Russell though. He dismounted, still holding his carbine, which I now saw was an old.56-56 Spencer, and came right toward me looking at the ground, then looking up quick as he must have sensed me. For a second we were close and I saw his eyes. They had that same tell-nothing-but-know-everything expression as Henry Mendez’s eyes. That same Mexican, Indian look. Only John Russell’s eyes were blue, light-blue looking in his Indian-dark face. Maybe that doesn’t sound like anything, but I’ll tell you it gave me the strangest feeling.

The two Apaches carried Springfields, as I had guessed. They held them cradled across one arm and even with the bullet belts and all, they looked kind of funny. Mainly because of their vests and straw hats that were very narrow and turned up all around. They went inside too and I followed.

Only I didn’t stay long. Mr. Mendez sent me out to the equipment shed to start the inventory. Then over to see about the feed stores. So it was maybe a half hour before I got back to the main adobe. Five saddle horses along with the mud wagon were standing in front now instead of three.

Inside, I saw Mr. Mendez and John Russell at one end of the long table the stage passengers sat at. Russell’s carbine lay on the table, like he never went far without it; another thing that was just like an Apache.

At the bar along the right wall stood his two Apache riders. Down from them were two more men. I didn’t look at them good till I sat down next to Mr. Mendez. Right away then I got the feeling something was going on. It was too quiet. Mendez was looking over at the bar; Russell down at his drink, as if thinking or listening.

So I looked at the two men again. I recognized them as hands who rode for a Mr. Wolgast who supplied beef to the reservation up at San Carlos. I would see them in Sweetmary every once in a while and they would most always be drunk. But it was a minute or two before I remembered their names. One was Lamarr Dean, who was about my age, maybe a year older. The other one’s name was Early; he was said to have served time at Yuma Prison.

Delgado poured them a whisky like he’d rather be doing something else. Early, who wore his hat funneled down over his eyes and ordinarily didn’t talk much, said, “I guess anybody can come in here.”

“If they allow Indians,” this Lamarr Dean said. He was looking at the two Apaches. They heard him, you could tell, but didn’t pay any attention. Of course not, I realized; they didn’t know any English.

The one named Early asked Delgado, “When did they start letting Indians drink?” I didn’t hear what Delgado answered.

Lamarr Dean stood with his side against the bar so that he was facing the first Apache. “Maybe they have been drinking tizwin,” he said. “Maybe that’s where they bought the nerve to come in here.”

Early said, “It would take a week with tizwin.”

“They got time,” Dean said. “What else do they do?”

“That’s mescal,” Early said then.

Lamarr Dean went on staring. “I guess,” he said. He moved toward the first Apache, holding his drink, his elbow sliding along the edge of the bar until he was right next to the Apache. Early stayed where he was.

“Mescal,” Lamarr Dean said. “But it’s still not allowed. Not even sticky-sweet Mex drinks.”

The first Apache, not even knowing what was going on, raised his glass. It was right up to his mouth when Lamarr Dean nudged him, reaching out and pushing him a little, and the mescal spilled over the Apache’s chin and down the front of his vest. He looked at Lamarr Dean then, not understanding, I guess not sure if it was an accident or what.

“They just can’t hold it,” Lamarr Dean said. “Nobody knows why, but it’s a fact of nature.” He raised his whisky right in front of the Apache, as if daring the Apache to try the same thing on him.

That was when Russell stood up. His eyes never left Lamarr Dean, but his right hand closed on the Spencer and it was down at his side as he walked over the few steps to the bar.

Lamarr Dean was facing the Apache, starting to drink, sipping at the whisky to give the Apache all the chance he needed. Like saying come on, nudge my arm and see what happens. Then his chin raised as he started to down the whisky.

Russell was right there. But he didn’t nudge him. He didn’t ask or tell him to leave the Apache alone. Or say anything like, “If you want to pick on somebody, try me.” He didn’t give Lamarr a chance to know he was there.

He just swung the barrel of the Spencer up clean and quick and before you had a chance to believe it was happening the barrel shattered the glass right against Lamarr Dean’s mouth. Lamarr jumped back, dropping the broken pieces and with blood all over his hand and face.

I think he would have tore into Russell the next second, with his fists or his revolver, but now the Spencer was leveled at his belly, almost touching it. Early had his hand on his gun, but it had happened so fast even he couldn’t do anything.

Russell said, “No more, uh?”

Lamarr Dean didn’t say anything. I don’t think he could talk.

Russell said, “Before you leave, put money down for a mescal.”

That was John Russell, no older than I was at twenty-one and no more Apache than I was. Except he had lived with them-the wild free ones in the mountains and the wild caught ones up at San Carlos-about half his life and that made the difference. He was perhaps one-part Mexican, according to Mr. Mendez, and three-parts white. But I will go into more of that a little later. Right here I just wanted to tell about the first time I ever saw him.

Now, three weeks later, here is where I was advised to begin-with them bringing the McLaren girl over from Fort Thomas in an ambulance wagon and the lieutenant taking her right into the Alamosa Hotel.