All the Pretty Horses(88)

He motioned them forward. Vámonos, he said.

As he turned a man stepped into the doorway behind them and stood in silhouette.

Quién está? he said.

John Grady moved behind the charro and put the gunbarrel in his ribs. Respóndele, he said.

Luis, said the charro.

Luis?

Sí.

Quién más?

Raúl. El capitán.

The man stood uncertainly. John Grady stepped behind the captain. Tenemos un preso, he said.

Tenemos un preso, called the captain.

Un ladrón, whispered John Grady.

Un ladrón.

Tenemos que ver un caballo.

Tenemos que ver un caballo, said the captain.

Cual caballo?

El caballo americano.

The man stood. Then he stepped out of the doorway light. No one spoke.

Que pasó, hombre? called the man.

No one answered. John Grady watched the sunlit ground beyond the stable door. He could see the shadow of the man where he stood to the side of the door. Then the shadow withdrew.

He listened. He pushed the two men toward the rear of the stable. Vámonos, he said.

He called his horse again and located the stall and opened the door and turned the horse out. The horse pushed his nose and forehead against John Grady’s chest and John Grady spoke to him and he whinnied and turned and went trotting toward the sunlight in the door without bridle or halter. As they were coming back up the bay two other horses put their heads out over the stall doors. The second one was the big bay horse of Blevins’.

He stopped and looked at the animal. He still had the spare bridle looped over his shoulder and he called the charro by name and shrugged the bridle off his shoulder and handed it to him and told him to bridle the horse and bring it out. He knew that the man who’d come to the stable door had seen the two horses standing in the corral, one saddled and bridled and the other bridled and bareback, and he reckoned he’d gone to the house for a rifle and that he would probably be back before the charro could even get the bridle on Blevins’ horse and in all of this he was correct. When the man called from outside the stable again he called for the captain. The captain looked at John Grady. The charro stood with the bridle in one hand and the horse’s nose in the crook of his arm.

Ándale, said John Grady.

Raúl, called the man.

The charro pushed the headstall over the horse’s ears and stood in the stall door holding the reins.

Vámonos, said John Grady.

There were ropes and rope halters and other bits of tack hanging from the hitchrail in the hall and he took a coil of rope and handed it to the charro and told him to tie one end to the bridle throatlatch of Blevins’ horse. He knew he didnt have to check anything that the man did because the charro could not have brought himself to do it wrong. His own horse stood in the doorway looking back. Then it turned and looked at the man standing outside against the wall of the stable.

Quién está contigo? the man called.

John Grady took the handcuffs from his pocket and told the captain to turn around and put his hands behind him. The captain hesitated and looked toward the door. John Grady raised the pistol and cocked it.

Bien, bien, the captain said. John Grady snapped the cuffs onto his wrists and pushed him forward and motioned to the charro to bring the horse. Rawlins’ horse had appeared in the stable door and stood nuzzling Redbo. He raised his head and he and Redbo looked at them as they came up the bay leading the other horse.

At the edge of the shadowline where the light fell into the stable John Grady took the lead rope from the charro.

Espera aquí, he said.

Sí.

He pushed the captain forward.

Quiero mis caballos, he called. Nada más.

No one answered.

He dropped the lead rope and slapped the horse on the rump and it went trotting out of the stable holding its head to one side so as not to step on the trailing rope. Outside it turned and nudged Rawlins’ horse with its forehead and then stood looking at the man crouching against the wall. The man must have made a hazing motion at it because it jerked its head and blinked but it did not move. John Grady picked up the end of the rope the horse was trailing and passed it between the captain’s handcuffed arms and stepped forward and halfhitched it to the stanchion the stable door was hung from. Then he stepped out through the door and put the barrel of the revolver between the eyes of the man crouched there.

The man had been holding the rifle at his waist and he dropped it in the dirt and held his hands up. Almost instantly John Grady’s legs were slammed from under him and he went down. He never even heard the crack of the rifle but Blevins’ horse did and it reared onto its hind legs above him and sprang and hit the end of the rope and was snatched sideways and fell with a great whump in the dust. A flock of pigeons burst flapping out of the gable end of the loft overhead into the morning sun. The other two horses went trotting and the grullo started to run along the fence. He held onto the pistol and tried to rise. He knew he’d been shot and he was trying to see where the man was hidden. The other man reached to retrieve the rifle lying on the ground but John Grady turned and threw down on him with the pistol and then reached and got hold of the rifle and rolled over and covered the head of the horse that was down and struggling so that it would not rise. Then he raised up cautiously to look.