Trail Hand

You can’t take the elements for granted, either. Even the driest areas can suddenly be hit by storms with lightning so bad it’ll spook a herd or send a flash flood roaring down a newly formed gorge, taking rider and cayuse along with it. I’ve seen some of the flattest driest spots in the Southwest suddenly turn into a solid sea of mud during such squalls.

Unfortunately that’s precisely what happened shortly after we turned west. It was mid-afternoon on a fairly level and open plain. I was scouting ahead. Armando was riding drag with Ricardo, and the rest of the men were scattered around, working the horses from their usual places.

Contrary to what some folks might believe, most herds, be they horses or cattle, are best driven at only a modest pace. The more experienced vaqueros usually ride point, keeping the herd on its course or veering the animals during directional changes. Swing riders work just behind them, but slightly off to the sides, and they are followed, farther on back, by flankers who try to stop the animals from straying and retrieve those that succeed. Following just behind them are drag riders, who constantly push the herd as well as dealing with any slow or injured animals.

Joaquin Gutierrez and Chango Lopez usually rode well behind the drag riders until mealtimes, at which point they drove up past the herd to set up for chow. Out of habit Joaquin would bed down every night up ahead of us, with the chuck wagon’s tongue pointed forward in the direction of the next day’s journey.

In that part of the country the average rainfall is only about five inches at most, so the arid, lime-heavy soil supports only sparse shortgrass. We all figured it was still too early in the season to expect much rain, but there was an unusually strong breeze blowing that day, and the bay was acting strangely.

At the time I was riding about a mile out when Francisco approached me at a gallop.

“El caporal me mando. Esta preocupado,” he said, indicating Chavez’s growing concern over the change in the weather. “Look at that sky.”

He really didn’t have to warn me, though. I’d already noticed the thickening cloud cover, surprised at how suddenly everything had darkened. Within a period of only a few minutes a bright and shiny day turned an ominous gray. A freak storm was brewing, and, from the look of things, it promised to be one nasty torrent.

We turned our horses around and started cantering back to the herd when the first lightning bolt hit. Almost simultaneously the sky opened up like a busted bucket, with rain pouring down in gallons.

“Circle the herd!” I yelled, temporarily forgetting my Spanish.

“?funtalos muchachos!” shouted Francisco almost simultaneously. We spurred our horses to a gallop, closing quickly with the herd, which was now headed straight toward us at a dead run.

With thunder as loud as cannon blasts spooking the herd, our whips and pistol fire didn’t have much affect, so we angled toward the lead stallions, trying physically to turn them with our own mounts. Almost immediately Francisco and I were joined by Chavez and several other vaqueros.

The ground around us was rapidly becoming a quagmire and it was increasingly harder for our ponies to maintain their footing. Suddenly Francisco’s horse slipped and stumbled, almost going down directly in front of the oncoming herd. My heart skipped a beat, dreading the inevitable, when Chavez flashed by me at a gallop.

The caporal practically came right out of his saddle, leaned sideways, down, and over, and grabbed Francisco’s bridle with his right hand. Chavez spurred his own mount on ahead, while at the same time jerking up on Francisco’s bridle in an effort to help keep the horse’s head up, thus allowing it to regain its balance. It was a move that could easily have cost Chavez his own life as well. Thankfully he pulled it off, and, as Francisco regained control, we all breathed a grateful sigh.

“?Bravo, caporal! ?Bien hecho! ?Andale, Francisco!” The men’s shouts grew as the stallions out in front began to circle, and with them the rest of the herd.

I shook my head at Francisco who merely looked back at me in relief and shrugged.

We were all soaked to the bone. The downpour and subsequent stampede happened so quickly most of us didn’t even have time to put on our ponchos. Water poured off our hats in streams. But at least the herd had turned and the horses were starting to calm down.

I looked over at Chavez as if to say that it had been much too close a call. We were tired, and sweating heavily in spite of the cold rain but, at the same time, were pleased at not having lost any of the horses.

Don Enrique rode toward us, his big gray gelding sliding in the mud as he reined in. “Good work, boys.”

Chavez nodded to his boss, and then suddenly looked back in response to hearing someone call his name.

About fifty yards away, one of the vaqueros was shouting at us through the rain. Don Enrique finally spotted him and pointed back at young Jorge Morales, one of the boys who had been riding flank prior to the storm.

Jorge was small with rather girlish features, but he was a doer and a tryer, often compensating for his age and size by working harder than need be. Armando was engaged to Jorge’s older sister, Eva, and the two vaqueros had grown very close of late. All of the men liked his jovial nature, and gladly shared their individual skills with him whenever time allowed.

Jorge was now sitting a ten-year-old piebald paint that he favored. The pony was very much suited to him, being short-coupled, spirited, and sure-footedly quick in a turn.

Chavez waved back at Jorge, motioning for him to ride on over to us.

“?Que aguacero! ?Verdad, muchachos?”

“What a drenching!” Jorge yelled back. He was wearing an old rifle slung across his back, and was reaching for a slicker I’d previously lent him. Shifting the rifle off his shoulder, he held it up in his left hand while at the same time turning around in his saddle to untie the slicker slung across the back of his saddle.

There was another crash of thunder when, for some reason, I suddenly had another one of those bad premonitions. While patting the Morgan’s neck to calm him down, I glanced around anxiously. All at once lightning struck so close the bay jumped a foot sideways in fright. I quickly looked over to my right and, to my horror, saw Jorge Morales frozen in a strange bluish light.

Apparently his musket was acting like a lightning rod, or maybe it was the metal conchos he’d tacked all over his saddle. Whatever the reason, that lightning bolt hit him square on.

Instinctively Chavez threw an arm up to his face to shield himself from the flash, as Don Enrique exclaimed: “?Madre de Dios!” All of us reacted out of shock and surprise.

Jorge sat there shaking like a rag doll, his arms flung up over his head, outstretched, the rifle still pointing upward in his left hand. His pony actually seemed to rise up onto the points of its hoofs, the hair on its mane and tail standing straight up. Several of the vaqueros around me gasped as the boy and his cayuse stopped shaking, and toppled over. They both landed flat on their sides, almost as one, like a statue being pushed over.

I spurred the bay and, together with Armando, Rogelio, and Chavez, rushed to Jorge’s aid. We jumped to the ground and ran only a step or two before stopping cold in our tracks. There was no use even checking him, since up close it was obvious Jorge was already dead. There were long black stripes of burnt flesh running down his neck and all across his back. His clothes were still smoking.

The pinto had similar stripes burned the length of its body, and everything smelled of singed hair. Rogelio pointed to a large hole under the horse’s belly from which its guts poured out.

We stood for a while in silence, staring at Jorge’s body, as the rain poured down on us. In spite of the continued flashes of lightning and accompanying thunderclaps, it seemed as though everything had suddenly grown very quiet, and everyone remained very still. I bent down slowly and, with Armando’s help, pulled Jorge off his horse, and rolled him over on his back. Armando crossed himself and his tears combined with the raindrops running down his face.

Jorge’s mouth was locked in an eerie expression of complete surprise. What bothered me most, however, was the strange look in his eyes. They were both still open, staring straight up at us as if searching for the answer to a question for which there was none. At least none that I knew of.

I felt a hand on my shoulder as the caporal stepped in between us and bent over. He ran his hand across the boy’s eyes, closing them gently. The rain stopped almost simultaneously.

“We’ll bury him here,” Don Enrique said quietly.

Armando and I looked up at the rest of the men whose horses now surrounded us.