They had been riding for a couple of hours when Clint happened to glance over at Pepita and was startled to see tears pouring freely down her cheeks. This time it was not from gun smoke, since they’d left it far behind.
“What’s wrong?” he asked her, in Spanish.
She looked at him quickly, and then away. She suddenly looked very young and very vulnerable. She was no longer the regal, fearless, proud Señorita Pepita Griego who had uncompromising distain for those who had captured her. She was just another girl who’d been terrified half to death and who was so relieved she was safe she was crying.
Clint didn’t say anything more, and she didn’t say anything either.
They rode into town about nightfall, but Clint decided it might be safer to find some place out of the way to spend the night, in case any of Valenzuela’s men were still around.
He found a little hidden hollow back of town with a spring and only two ways in or out. Clint cooked some beans, leaving out the spices, and got a shot at a rabbit, and they feasted. Apparently Pepita’s taste wasn’t so far gone she couldn’t appreciate regular food, at least when she had starved herself for a while. He wondered if it was possible that she’d gone without food ever since being kidnapped. It seemed too long for anyone to possibly live without food. But she surely was hungry. She ate everything he didn’t, and didn’t seem full. He asked her if she wanted some more, and she said yes, with great dignity.
He wondered if feeding her too much all at once would be good for her. But she showed no illness yet, had kept everything down. He cooked up some more beans and a tortilla or two for her, and asked how long it had been since she’d eaten.
“I have eaten nothing for a week. Before that, I ate some of the time, but not all of the time. I wished to show Valenzuela that it was within my power to starve myself if I wished.”
“You really wanted to see him tortured?”
She looked at him with large steady dark eyes.
“He is an evil man. He deserves it.”
“Seems to me torture makes a man just as low as the one he’s torturing.”
She dropped her eyes to look into the fire, and they were deep and unfathomable. “The church says one should turn the other cheek,” she said. “But I do not see the good of this. It only allows the evil man to do more evil.”
“I’m for putting men like Valenzuela out of action,” Clint said. “But I don’t see any reason to torture them.”
“You do not wish to torture Dixon? You have said yourself that he has done horrible things to your wife.”
This was just what stuck in his craw about this business. He looked at Felipe and saw what a monster revenge had made out him, and he saw that he himself had been just as bad for having been so bloodthirsty for Dixon all these years. It was true that he had daydreamed many times about making Dixon hurt plenty before he died. But watching Felipe had set Clint to doing some thinking.
“If Felipe had been about to tear Dixon apart little piece by little piece, would you not have wished him to do so? Or wished to take the knife from him and do it yourself?”
Clint glanced at Pepita. She was gazing at him unblinkingly.
He looked into the fire.
“Probably,” he said. “But I’m glad it wasn’t Dixon.”
“Señor, revenge is a pleasure. You agree that evil doers should be destroyed. Why should not those who have been wronged enjoy the destruction?”
“All right. Suppose you do. What about that fellow’s friends and relatives? They will then feel as you have, and will come after you and enjoy torturing you. And then one of your relatives will become outraged and do the same thing, and it goes on and on. Everybody outraged at the lowdown honorless way the other side is acting, but saying treating them the same way is nothing more than they deserve. Think of all the pain and suffering that is caused this way. It might not stop until both sides are wiped out, and everybody ends up writhing under the knife one time or another. Revenge is a bad thing, far as I can see. It isn’t justice, it’s just anger and feeling you’re always right and the other fellow is wrong. It’s all in how you go at it. If I’m going to kill Dixon, I shouldn’t do it for pleasure or because I’m angry, but to stop him from doing any more terrible crimes. It’s a sad thing to have to kill a man.”
She shook her head in perplexity.
“I do not understand you norteamericanos. You deny your own joys when it is your right, and take your joy in ways that are not right and hide it. It is a big difference.”
“I guess there’s some truth in that. But it’s not the point.”
~*~
The next day they rode down the stream under the oaks and then turned into the desert. Clint was deep in thought about what he would do once he’d brought Pepita safely home. On the one hand he had no desire to have anything to do with Valenzuela or Felipe or Griego or Dixon or anything connected with this business. He was thoroughly soured on them all and on his own desire for revenge.
On the other hand, in spite of himself he was seething like a boiling pot of lead at Dixon. The way Clint saw it, Dixon was the cause of all the trouble. If not for Dixon, Valenzuela wouldn’t have gotten where he had, and if Valenzuela hadn’t gotten rich and arrogant as a bandit, he probably wouldn’t have had the nerve to try kidnapping Pepita. And if Dixon hadn’t touched Margaret, Clint wouldn’t have ever come to these parts and gotten mixed up with Mexicans at all, and wouldn’t have cared what they did to each other anyway. The idea of Dixon getting away with that irritated Clint no end.
“Señor Evans,” Pepita said, “you do not look happy. You appear disgusted.”
“I am disgusted,” Clint said, and startled his horse into a short bound ahead by digging in his spurs unconsciously. Clint got more disgusted, because there was no good reason to treat a horse that way.
A week and half later, not too much the worse for their long trip across the desert—still no Indians—they pulled up in the yard of the Griego hacienda. Crossing the range they had collected an excited bunch of vaqueros. A few had ridden on ahead to bring the news that Pepita was safe and so that a welcome could be prepared for her. She had, for the first time Clint had seen, begun to smile. It was quite a smile, and almost enough to make him glad he’d gone through everything.
The old man’s bed had been carried outside and an awning set over it. He was sitting up, and his eyes were moist as he watched them come to him through the beds of flowers.
“Hola,” Clint said, feeling awkward. “Brought your daughter back.”
“Pepita ...”
“Papa ...”
Clint watched them hugging each other and crying on each other’s shoulders and felt even more uncomfortable. But he was glad for them.
“Señor Evans!” Griego’s voice, much stronger now, rang out. “You have succeeded! You have made me the happiest man who exists! You have given rest to my soul. Please, come here, señor, let me begin to thank you by shaking your hand.” Clint shook. “Now, señor, we must celebrate, and then we must discuss what will give you happiness, eh?” The old man’s eyes shone. Clint had a strong notion that it wouldn’t be long now before Griego got out of bed.
To do what? Would he send more men out after Valenzuela and torture him to death the way Felipe wanted to? Or was Griego different? Would he be satisfied to merely shoot Valenzuela? Or what?
Clint was sure Valenzuela deserved to die, but the thought of how Griego might be apt to do it tasted sour. The next thing would be some friend or relative of Valenzuela would go after Griego, and so on and so on as he had explained it to Pepita. But then, he hadn’t any right to get high and mighty, not with the anger he felt at Dixon, and the overpowering desire that came over him off and on to see Dixon squirm for his crimes.
Griego clapped his hands and a servant came up. Griego had him bring fruit and tequila and told him to bring on the musicians. Clint hung around drinking and dancing and listening to the songs and joyous yelling of Griego’s hands. Everything became a blur and he got to feeling that he didn’t really have any problems after all. He had a chance to dance with Pepita and with some other pretty señoritas and to drink tequila and he was having a good time, and the world looked just fine and everything seemed where it ought to be, so what could be wrong?
He stayed around for three days, while the festivities went on, and was drunk most of the time. But then he woke up early in the morning of some day he couldn’t place, and it felt like he had awakened under a rock slide, his head was being pounded so hard.
It took him four hours to recover enough to get out of bed, and another two to get up enough nerve to leave the room. Things were quiet around the place, everybody sleeping it off. Clint wished he could have slept longer and wondered vaguely why he hadn’t.
He hunted up his horse and saddle with considerable effort and packed some supplies aboard a burro, and then, gingerly, got into the saddle and set off north, leaving the whole hacienda still sleeping, though it was nearly noon by now.
He had decided to leave the hacienda, but he had not decided what he would do next. He wanted to go take care of Dixon, but the whole business of killing and treachery had left him with such a confused mixture of fury and disgust at his own uncontrolled anger that he didn’t trust himself to walk into a showdown. He was afraid he’d go nuts and cut Dixon up with his knife and make him hurt for what he’d done, and then regret it afterwards and have to live with it for the rest of his life.
He decided he wouldn’t do anything for a while, but just drift along. He knew where to look for Dixon now, if he wanted him. He patted his pocket with the sketch of how to get there, and then his mind drifted off onto other things.
What had happened to the war that gone on? Who was left alive, and did anybody figure one side or the other had won? And had Felipe caught up with Valenzuela?
Clint was curious, and like a moth flying into a candle, he rode north for Oak Creek.