Once she heard the old man cry out, 'Let me up!' But the hard breathing continued. They did not let him up.
When the doctor finished, Call was unconscious and scarcely breathing. The doctor decided not to try for the bullet near the heart.
He knew that if he cut any more, the old man would probably die.
'He's lived this long, I reckon he'll keep on living,' the doctor said. 'If he does die, at least he killed the manburner first.' 'What's that?' Lorena said. 'Captain Call killed Mox Mox?' 'Yep, old Charlie Goodnight seen the corpse himself,' the doctor said. 'Didn't you know?' 'No,' Lorena said. 'I don't think the Captain knows, either. He told me he hit him, but I don't think he knows that the man died.' 'Oh, he died as dead as anybody. Old Charlie seen the corpse,' the doctor said.
'You keep the bandages fresh, and see that they're clean,' he told Maria sternly, before he left.
The doctor's unexpected news made Lorena feel such relief that she had to go to a chair and sit. Her legs felt weak. In her most terrible nightmares, Mox Mox had one of her boys and was piling brush on him. That danger had passed, for her and for all the parents in the West. Her husband might be in danger still, but he wouldn't be burned. She was glad she had worked so hard to save the Captain. He had not caught Maria's son, but he had stopped the manburner.
'We don't hear enough news over here,' Billy Williams said. 'We'll have to tell the Captain when he comes to.' 'I'll tell him,' Lorena said. 'He'll want to know--it might help him get better.' 'I wonder why a man would want to burn up people like that?' Billy Williams said.
Lorena remembered Mox Mox. She had seen the excitement in his eyes when he quirted someone, or prepared for a burning. She knew why he liked to burn people. But she didn't tell that to Billy Williams.
Lorena was sitting in the kitchen with Maria, watching Teresa play with a white chick, when an old Indian man she had met a time or two before came to Maria's door.
'That man will be hungry,' Maria said, when she saw Famous Shoes at her door. 'Whenever he comes to my house, he is hungry. I have to make him some food this time. He built me a fire when I was freezing on the Pecos.' 'Do you have any menudo?' Famous Shoes asked, as soon as he came to where the women sat.
'There is none today. The doctor has just been here,' Maria said. 'I will catch a chicken and cook it for you, if you want to wait.' Maria saw that Famous Shoes carried a blanket Joey had used on his horse the last time he was in Ojinaga.
'That looks like Joey's blanket,' Maria said. 'Have you seen him?' 'Yes, Pea Eye shot him,' Famous Shoes said. 'He shot him with the big shotgun.
Joey ran off. I don't know if he will live. He was shot pretty good.' 'Pea Eye shot him? Where's my husband?' Lorena asked, jumping up. It was a day of two miracles: Captain Call had killed Mox Mox, and Pea Eye had wounded Joey Garza.
Then it struck her that maybe there was only one miracle. Maybe Joey had killed Pea Eye before escaping.
'Your husband is wounded,' Famous Shoes told Lorena. 'On a horse it will take you a day to go to him. I don't think he is wounded too bad, but he was shot in the hip. He can't walk good. He has the big shotgun, though. I don't think Joey will go back and bother him.' 'I'm going now. I'll take him a horse,' Lorena said. 'I'll take the buckskin, and I'll lead Blackie. Pea Eye can ride Blackie back here.' 'Wait for daylight. I'll send Billy with you,' Maria told Lorena. 'He'll find your husband.' Lorena felt awkward--it was her own husband who had wounded and maybe even killed Maria's son. But before Lorena could even thank her for offering help, Maria had gone out the door to catch the chicken she had promised Famous Shoes.
Maria stood in the darkness for a while, feeling a mixture of fear, sorrow, and shame. She wondered where her son was and what condition he might be in. She had come to like Lorena, in large part because of the kind interest she had shown Teresa and Rafael. She had asked Lorena to wait and had offered Billy as a guide, because she knew Joey was out there somewhere. Shotgun wounds rarely killed, and if Joey was not mortally wounded, he would just be angry. He would make short work of Lorena. Even with Billy along, it would not be a very safe trip.
Only three mornings earlier, Maria had discovered from Teresa that Joey had been to their village. He had caught Teresa near the field and told her that he would return soon and take her and Rafael away. He told her he would take them to a high cliff in the mountains and throw them off.
Teresa had no fear of the world, nor of her brother. She thought Joey was telling her a scary story, merely to tease her. Maria knew that what Joey had told Teresa was not just a story. She had gone in and told Billy Williams not to let the children wander to the field again.
She told him not to drink whiskey, and to keep his weapons handy. She also told him why she was so concerned, for she knew her son meant what he had said. Joey had always been jealous of his brother and sister; once he had put spiders in Teresa's bed, and had also put a small rattlesnake in Rafael's blankets. But the spiders had not bitten Teresa, and the little snake had crawled away without biting anyone.
If Joey said he would throw Rafael and Teresa off a cliff, then he would try to do it.
Joey was clever, as evil people sometimes were.
Maria knew she would have to be very watchful to forestall her son. She didn't want to kill him; she could not bear the sorrow that would fill her if she had to kill her own child. But she meant to frighten him. Joey had seen her call up her rage, and he knew her rage was no small thing.
But she would have to be very watchful, always. Joey was sly. Only Teresa had known, when he was near the village. He had come and gone, undetected, and had only revealed his presence to his blind sister. But the message he had given to Teresa was for his mother, not his sister. He wanted Maria to know that he meant to harm his brother and sister.
When Maria heard that Joey had been wounded, she wondered why she could not wish him dead. Some lawman would kill him, sooner or later. Why not let it end? Why was the bond so strong that it was a kind of torture? Joey hated her, though she did not know why. She had done nothing to deserve her own child's hatred. Maria had given up trying to understand the hatreds Joey felt. His hate was just there, as fire is there, as blood is there, or desire, or sorrow, or sadness, or death. For her, the fact that Joey hated her was one more painful sorrow, like Teresa's blindness, or like Rafael's poor sheep's mind.
