Great River. Paul Horgan
and then, when the light was gone, and all was quiet, and the smokes of evening no longer dawdled in the still air above the pueblo near-by, an Indian here, and another there, would quietly appear among the soldiers in their camp. They looked to see where the sentries were, and if they were on guard. In their expressionless way the Indians would seek out soldiers and communicate a suggestion to them. Did they want to wrestle? And a soldier or two, off duty, would get up, and with every appearance of good will, take up the challenge. The wrestling pairs went at their game. Something about the way of the Indian wrestlers made the Spaniards think. It was almost as though the Indians with a buried idea were trying out the strength of the soldiers. The nights were cold. The soldiers shivered.
A hard winter was coming. One October night the snow fell on the soldiers in the open fields. What would the whole army do when it arrived to camp on the river?
Cárdenas presented himself to the chief of the near-by pueblo on the west bank, which was called Alcanfor, and asked him to move his people into other pueblos of the province, to leave the Spaniards a town to themselves, where not only the small advance guard but the main body of the army, when it arrived, could be given shelter. The Indian governor gazed upon him and finally agreed to do as he asked. Taking nothing but their clothes the Indians left their houses, and the soldiers moved in, settling themselves and making arrangements for the arrival of the General. The garrison—only fourteen cavalry soldiers and a handful of Indian infantry from the west and south—hoped for the early arrival of the General and the whole army. Amidst the pueblos they felt alien and uneasy.
One day an Indian from Arenal, a town a few miles up the river, came to Alcanfor accompanied by the elders of his pueblo. He asked to see Captain López de Cárdenas. He was received, and at once launched into a vigorous complaint, making eloquent signs and enactments with his hands, his arms, his body. The elders with him seemed to sustain his case. Cárdenas strained to understand, and gradually the story of the visitors began to come clear.
They said that a soldier came on a horse to Arenal and presently rode up to the walls and saw a woman on the terrace with her husband. The soldier dismounted and called up to the man if he would come down and hold his horse for him. The man went down the ladder to the ground to hold the horse, and watched as the soldier climbed up to the roof. Since all rooms were entered from the roof, the man was not surprised when the soldier like all visitors went there and vanished into a room from the top. The man patiently waited holding the horse. He heard a commotion somewhere in the pueblo, but thought nothing of it at the time. In a while, the soldier reappeared, came down the ladder, mounted his horse and rode away. The man then went to his part of the pueblo and found to his horror that his wife had been carnally assaulted by the soldier. When she resisted, there followed the commotion heard below and outside. The soldier seized at her garments as if to tear them from her. He had presented himself violently upon her, and if he had not actually ravished her, he had tried to. It was an outrage. The man who told the story, here with the elders, was the woman’s husband. He demanded punishment and redress. The elders supported him.
It was grave news for Cárdenas to hear. He agreed that if true, the outrage must be redressed. Did the husband believe he would know the soldier?
Yes, yes.
Cárdenas sent for the whole garrison of Spaniards, and when the fourteen were all present, he asked the Indian from Arenal to point to the guilty man.
The Indian searched the faces and examined the clothes of the soldiers, but could not recognize his man. He angrily told how impossible it would be to find him if the soldier had meantime changed his costume. But having held the horse, the Indian would never forget how it looked, and he now demanded to see all the horses of the garrison.
Cárdenas obliged him. The party moved to the horse stalls on the ground below, and the Indian went down the line until he came to a dappled gray covered with a blanket. That was the horse, he was certain of it.
It belonged to Juan de Villegas, who owned three horses, one coat of mail, one buckskin coat, and pieces of armor. What did Villegas have to say to the charge?
He denied it. He reminded the Captain that the Indian had not been able to recognize the man whom he accused, and asked if it was any more reasonable to think the Indian was any more certain about the horse?
The argument had weight. Captain López de Cárdenas was obliged in the face of no better evidence to drop the matter. The Indians went away with their story dishonored.
There was, somehow, a feeling of more trouble in the air. It was something of a relief when Captain de Alvarado returned to the river from the eastern cattle plains. He came dragging four people in iron collars and chains, and he had an animated story of his adventures to tell Cárdenas and the others at Alcanfor:
Eastward, through a mountain pass, beyond which were many other pueblos in ruins, and a turquoise mine, and another spine of mountains, there was the largest town yet to be seen by any of the explorers. It was Pecos, where Bigotes and Cacique had come from. There the chiefs and their Spanish friends were received with drums and flageolets, and gifts of clothing and turquoises. There the soldiers rested for a few days, feasting, and listening to stories of the kingdoms of the plains that lay beyond.
The stories were told by two captive Indian slaves who came from the plains and belonged to Bigotes and Cacique. One, a young man, was called Isopete. The other, because he looked like one, was named the Turk by Alvarado. These two must be the guides for a march to the cattle country. Bigotes decided to stay behind when the rest of them set out.
They went south by a river (the Pecos) with red rock and water and then left it to follow a smaller river, eastward. The Turk learned to speak a little Spanish. With that, and by gestures, he began to talk about a land of Quivira far to the east. Gold, silver, silks. Rich harvests. Great towns. Alvarado listened as they travelled. Soon they were in sight of endless herds of buffalo, and they hunted among them, bringing the big running bulls down with lances. Several horses were killed by the charging buffalo and. others were wounded. If the cattle stood and stared with their bulging eyes sidewise, the soldiers killed them with harquebuses.
Gold, continued the Turk, and for proof, there was a gold bracelet that he himself had brought from Quivira when captured by Bigotes.
Where was the bracelet then?
Bigotes had it, at home, in Pecos.
Was he sure?
Very sure, and he added other details of precious wealth in the far plains kingdom.
Alvarado’s commission of eighty days was then over half spent, and he decided to turn back to Pecos to take from Bigotes the Turk’s golden bracelet as proof of what lay waiting for the General in Quivira. He ordered his party back to Pecos. The Turk cautioned him. He must on no account mention the bracelet to Bigotes. But on arrival, after receiving new gifts of provisions, Alvarado demanded the bracelet.
Bigotes and Cacique were bewildered. What bracelet?
The bracelet of gold they had taken from the arm of the Turk, here.
They declared that the Turk was lying. There was no such bracelet.
With that, Alvarado retired to his tent, and sent for Bigotes and Cacique. When they appeared, he had them clapped into chains for denying him what he asked for, and ordered the Turk to be kept in arrest as a witness. Trouble followed. The people of Pecos hearing what had happened to their chiefs came to Alvarado’s camp crying bad faith, and discharging arrows. Presently the Turk escaped. A parley followed. Alvarado agreed to release the captive Cacique if he and his men would bring back the Turk. When they did so, Alvarado put them back in chains again, and again there was an outcry from the Indians. And then the land of Pecos was threatened by enemy Indians from another province. Alvarado and his men helped the Indian war party to go and defeat the enemy. The captive chiefs were released for the campaign, but in the course of it, the Turk once again escaped, taking Isopete with him. Once again Bigotes and Cacique were sent to recapture the slaves, and returning without them, were still again put in chains.
“I will keep you so until the Turk is delivered to me,” declared Alvarado, whereupon the fugitives were brought