because of the coffee smells and the comely woman. Her husband was a brute, that was clear. The brute had made it known that he did not like Lichtenberg sleeping in his house. The husband smelled of drink. But the woman was very comely. The husband might go away, and even if he didn't go away, Lichtenberg could always look.
For her part, Maria wished the old German would go. She saw him looking at her. There were many men who showed their lust in their eyes; she could not keep them all from looking at her.
Roberto, her husband, had a harelip. He had once worked across the river, for a big ranch, shoeing horses-- the cowboys teased him about his harelip, so much that he hated all whites, and the old German was very white. In the wrong mood, if he intercepted one of the old man's lu/l looks, Roberto might take a knife to him, or an axe, or a gun.
A more likely problem, though, was that Joey would rob him of something valuable. Joey was a quick and gifted thief. Although the old man's clothes were ragged, from neglect and hard wear, many of the things he owned were nice. There was the fine rifle, and, in another leather case, a set of mining instruments.
His belt had a silver buckle, and he wore a ring with a green stone in it. Maria had not touched his bags, but he had produced the gold coin from one of them and might have other gold coins in his valise.
Joey might steal any of it, Maria knew that. He might steal it out of curiosity. Joey liked to look at interesting things, particularly weapons. There was no telling what the old German might have that Joey would like to steal, but if he did steal something, trouble would come from across the river. The hard sheriff, Doniphan, liked nothing better than to beat Mexicans who stole things. The river meant nothing to Doniphan. The notion that Mexico was a nation with rights, like other nations, andwitha border that needed to be respected, made Joey laugh. Mexico was a nation of whores, lazy men, Indians, and bandits, in Doniphan's view. He crossed the border when it suited him, taking any prisoners he wanted to take. In Ojinaga there was no one to stand up to him.
If Joey stole from the old German, he would steal and go. When Doniphan arrived, with his rough deputies and their quirts, it would not be Joey who would suffer their vengeance. It would be Roberto Sanchez, or some man on the street that they just happened to notice--the shoemaker, perhaps.
They were not coming to do justice; they were coming to hurt Mexicans.
There would be less danger if the old German would just go, before Roberto lost his temper or Joey stole from him. But if Maria hoped for something, it seemed that that fact alone, the fact of her hope, made the something not occur. The old German didn't go. He drank tequila all day, smoked cigars, made water frequently, and wiped the sweat off his face with a fine silk handkerchief.
When he was not drinking or wiping sweat off his forehead, he looked at Maria, or talked to Joey.
'Are there many rifles like this in your country?' Joey asked him.
'Oh yes, many,' Lichtenberg replied.
'Would I find some in the City of Mexico, if I went there?' Joey asked.
'You would find beautiful guns, but what would you buy them with? You are just a poor boy!' Lichtenberg said, startled that this youth, living in a filthy village, would aspire to travel to the City of Mexico, in search of a rifle.
'I would buy them with money,' Joey said.
There was something a little frightening about the boy, Lichtenberg thought. A chill in his look, or in his tone. He reminded Lichtenberg of someone he had once known, long ago, an Austrian named Blier, a young count and assassin whose task it was to murder Hungarian rebels. There were many Hungarian rebels, and the Emperor wanted to avoid the expense of many trials. Young Blier killed forty rebels before they caught him and impaled him on a pole. Count Blier died hard, but he had done his job, saving the Emperor the expense of forty trials.
Lichtenberg had not known Count Blier well, but he had been with him a few times and remembered the look in his eyes. This boy, Joey, had the same eyes. Such eyes could look on a hundred deaths, or a thousand, without pity.
Lichtenberg had seen men executed, both in Mexico and in Europe. He had seen them shaking in front of firing squads, or crying and begging as the noose was put around their necks. Some lost their water, as they awaited death; some emptied their bowels as well. He could not, without pity, look upon men staining themselves as their deaths came near.
But Count Blier could see it without pity; and so, probably, could this boy Joey, a boy who could outshoot him with his own gun. Joey was very good-looking. He was a g@uero, as they said in Mexico; g@uero, almost white. In certain moods, Lichtenberg might have offered him a coin.
Boys were usually easier than women, but not this boy, this g@uero with eyes like the famous Count Blier's.
Maria saw Joey looking at the old German's things. His eyes turned again and again to the rifle case. She also saw that the old German looked at Joey as he looked at her. She wished the man would go; too much trouble would come, of his visit. But when you wished men to go they never did, and the old German was no exception. He stayed for four nights. Four times she had to persuade Roberto to sleep on the ground. He didn't like it. He cursed her and he cursed the German, but he only hit her once, and he didn't bother the German.
On the fifth morning, as Lichtenberg was leaving, Joey stole six coins from his valise.
Lichtenberg was drunk when he left, and didn't notice. Joey went down the river and bought a horse, a black gelding, three years old.
When he rode home with it, Maria knew he had robbed the German. Her best hope was that the old German wouldn't notice. Otherwise, Doniphan and his deputies would come.
'I didn't know you owned a horse,' Maria said to Joey. 'Yesterday you didn't own a horse.' 'I only stole six coins, Mother,' Joey said. 'If the old man comes back, I'll just kill him.' 'What if Doniphan comes?' Maria asked.
'Tell him to find me in the City of Mexico,' Joey said.
That night, he left. After four or five days, Maria relaxed a little. Lichtenberg was many miles away. Even if he missed the coins, he wouldn't come back. A year later, she learned that the old man had drowned in Sonora.
He had attempted to cross a wash, when the wash was running, and the water had swept him away. The vaquero who found his body took some silver ore from his saddlebags, but Lichtenberg was dead and could not tell where he had found the silver.
