The Crossing(127)

Un hombre, he said. No más.

Americano.

Claro. Americano.

Es vaquero?

Sí. Vaquero.

The drunk man did not move. His eyes did not move. He could have been speaking to himself.

Tome, Alfonso, said the younger man. He raised his own glass and looked around the table. The others raised their glasses. All drank.

Y usted? said Billy.

The drunk man did not answer. His wet red underlie hung loosely away from the perfect white teeth. He seemed not to have heard.

Es soldado? he said.

Soldado no.

The younger man said that the drunk man had been a soldier in the revolution and that he had fought at Torreón and at Zacatecas and that he had been wounded many times. Billy looked at the drunk man. The opaque black of his eyes. The younger man said that he had received three bullets in the chest at Zacatecas and lain in the dirt of the streets in darkness and cold while the dogs drank his blood. He said that the holes were there in the patriot’s chest for all to see.

Otra vez, said Billy. The barman leaned forward with the bottle and poured.

When all the glasses were filled the younger man raised his glass and offered a toast to the revolution. They drank. They set their glasses down and wiped their mouths with the backs of their hands and looked at the drunk man. Por que viene aquí? the drunk man said.

They looked at Billy.

Aquí? said Billy.

But the drunk man did not respond to questions, he only asked them. The younger man leaned slightly forward. En este país, he whispered.

En este país, said Billy. They waited. He leaned forward and reached across the table and took the drunk man’s glass of mescal and slung its contents out across the room and set the glass back on the table. No one moved. He gestured to the barman. Otra vez, he said.

The barman reached slowly for the bottle and slowly poured the glasses once again. He set the bottle down and wiped his hand on the knee of his trousers. Billy picked up his glass and held it before him. He said that he was in their country to find his brother. He said that his brother was a little crazy and he should not have abandoned him but he did.

They sat holding their glasses. They looked at the drunk man. Tome, Alfonso, said the younger man. He gestured with his glass. The barman raised his own glass and drank and set the empty glass on the table again and leaned back. Like a player who has moved his piece and sits back to await the results. He looked across the table at the youngest man who sat slightly apart with his hat down over his forehead and his full glass in both hands before him like an offering. Who’d so far said no word at all. The whole room had begun to hum very slightly.

The ends of all ceremony are but to avert bloodshed. But the drunk man by his condition inhabited a twilight state of responsibility and to this the man at his side made silent appeal. He smiled and shrugged and raised his glass to the norteamericano and drank. When he set his glass down again the drunk man stirred. He leaned slowly forward and reached for his glass and the younger man smiled and raised his glass again as if to welcome him back from his morbidities. But the drunk man clutched the glass and then slowly held it out to the side of the table and poured the whiskey on the floor and set the glass back upon the table once more. Then he reached unsteadily for the bottle of mescal and turned it up and poured the oily yellow fuel into his glass and set the bottle back on the table with the sediment and the worm coiling slowly clockwise in the glass floor of it. Then he leaned back as before.

The younger man looked at Billy. Outside in the darkened town a dog barked.

No le gusta el whiskey? Billy said.

The drunk man did not answer. The glass of mescal sat as it had sat when Billy first entered the bar.

Es el sello, said the younger man.

El sello?

Sí.

He said that he objected to the seal which was the seal of an oppressive government. He said that he would not drink from such a bottle. That it was a matter of honor.

Billy looked at the drunk man.

Es mentira, the drunk man said.

Mentira? said Billy.

Sí. Mentira.

Billy looked at the younger man. He asked him what it was that was a lie but the younger man told him not to preoccupy himself. Nada es mentira, he said.

No es cuest16n de ningún sello, the drunk man said.

He spoke slowly but not without facility. He had turned and addressed his statement to the younger man beside him. Then he turned back and continued to stare at Billy. Billy made a circle with his finger. Otra vez, he said. The barman reached and took up the bottle.

You want to drink that stinkin catpiss in favor of good american whiskey, Billy said, you be my guest.

Mánde? said the drunk man.

The barman sat uncertainly. Then he leaned and poured the empty glasses and picked up the cork and pushed it back into the bottle. Billy raised his glass. Salud, he said. He drank. All drank. Save for the drunk man. Out in the street the old spanish bells rang once, rang twice. The drunk leaned forward. He reached past the glass of mescal standing before him and seized the bottle of mescal again. He picked it up and poured Billy’s glass full with a slight circular movement of his hand. As if the small tumbler must be filled in some prescribed fashion. Then he tipped the bottle up and set it on the table and leaned back.