Longarm snorted. "Like hell, I invaded Mexico! You act like I'm a whole damn army! I was chasing crooks that I guess broke Mexican laws, just like they did ours!"
"Mexico needs no help to enforce our laws from the gringos.'"
"Well, are you arresting me, or what?" Longarm demanded.
"Quien sabe? " The commander shrugged. "We see what Capitan Ramos want to do with you."
A cry from Sanchez drew the attention of both Longarm and the rurale. The man who was putting the handcuffs on the injured man was lifting Sanchez to his feet. When the rurale let go, Sanchez gave another cry and dropped to the ground.
"Madre de Dios!" he groaned. "No puedo andar, no puedo cabalagar!"
"Otra vez!" the leader ordered.
Again Sanchez was helped to his feet, and again he collapsed with a loud moan.
"Creo que es verdad, no puede andar," the rurale said.
"Pues, 'sta bien. Matale, " the commander ordered.
Without changing his expression, the rurale who'd been helping Sanchez picked up the rifle he'd laid aside while putting on the handcuffs and shot Sanchez through the head.
Longarm stared unbelieving. "You didn't have to do that," he told the commander. "Where I come from, we don't execute people until a court finds they're guilty."
"In Mexico, we are not so soft," the rurale replied calmly. "We don' waste the time of a judge on a pelado like that one." He turned back to the executioner, who was taking off Sanchez's cartridge belt, and called, "A ndale, hombre!" Then, to Longarm, "We go now."
"Ain't you even going to bury him?"
"Porque? Los zopilotes, they got to eat, too."
"What about them other rustlers? The ones that's supposed to come get the steers? Seems to me you'd wait and take them in, too."
"Hombre, you say they come. How I know you don' lie? So, we ride now. I take you to el capitan"
There was no chance for Longarm to talk to Lefty during the ride to the rurales' headquarters; the leader kept them separated. Nor did Longarm have a chance to talk further with the commander himself. The patrol leader rode ahead of his men, and Longarm was kept between two of the rurales who ignored or did not understand what he said when he made an effort to talk with them.
Longarm used his eyes instead of his mouth. He watched the route they took, which was not a road, but a narrow horse trail that led them southwest, across the low humps of the Burro Mountains foothills. He was pretty sure he could find his way back from the rurales' headquarters, a ride of almost two hours. The headquarters was not an imposing sight. The patrol pulled rein in front of a small cluster of buildings, low-walled adobe structures with vigas protruding little more than head-high. The vigas, beams made of free trunks, supported roofs that were built up from layers of brush covered with packed layers of dirt. There were three large buildings in the cluster. A corral stood a little distance away, and still farther off, apart from the larger structures, was a straggle of shanties much like those that made up Los Perros.
Neither Longarm nor Lefty were allowed to dismount at once. The patrol's commander disappeared into the building by which they'd stopped while his men stayed on their horses, silently watching the prisoners. After what seemed a long wait, the commander came out. He pointed at Lefty.
"Tomelo al carcel, " he ordered. "El capitan quiere hablar con el otro gringo. " To Longarm, he said, "You come talk to el capitan."
Longarm had to duck his head to get through the doorway as he followed the rurale inside. The interior of the building was no more imposing than the outside. Small, narrow windows were set high in the end walls of the big room that stretched across the entire width of the structure. In the wall opposite the entrance, doors led into other rooms, but they were closed, and Longarm could only guess that they might be a kitchen, a bedroom, a private office, perhaps. The inner walls, like the outer, were unpainted, covered with a thin coat of adobe plaster through which the outlines of the adobe bricks showed clearly. The place might have been a fort; indeed, Longarm guessed that it had been at one time, during one of Mexico's wars or revolutions, some kind of minor stronghold or outpost.
When he was shoved by the patrol commander into the front sala, Longarm's eyes were almost useless until they adjusted from the harsh outdoor sunlight to the room's dimness. The man sitting behind the wide, imposing table at one end of the room was a formless blob for a few moments. As Longarm's eyes adjusted, he saw the table first. It was an imposing piece of furniture, eight feet long and half as wide, with massive carved legs at ends and center. Its once glossy mahogany top still bore traces of a fine varnished finish, though now it was scratched and scarred to expose bare wood in places. He wondered how the table had found its way into such surroundings, and decided it must have been looted from some rich family's hacienda.
His voice a deep rumble in the quiet room, the man behind the table said, "Sergento Molina have tell me you say you are a federalista officer from the United States. Is true, what you tell him?"
"Sure it's true." Longarm blinked to speed the clearing of his vision. For the first time he could now see the captain clearly.
He saw a man who was grossly fat. Ramos's belly pushed out the cloth of the waist-length charro jacket he wore; his was even more ornately embroidered with gold than that of the patrol leader's. Tufts of black hair stuck through the gaps between his shirt buttons, and the shirt itself was grease-stained. His face was moon-round, his eyes encased in pouches of fat that squeezed them thin. Under a wide, scarred nose he sported the narrow, waxed mustache of a dandy. Above a round chin that was almost buried by two other chins beneath it, his mouth was like that of a frog.
Longarm's Colt and Winchester lay on the table in front of the captain. Longarm was tempted to grab for the Colt, but saw Molina watching him closely, and resisted the temptation. He realized that they were probably hoping for him to make just such a move. That, he thought, might be why they put the guns so handy — after they took all the shells out. He looked on the table for the wallet, but it was not there.
He told the captain, "My name's Custis Long, Deputy U.S. Marshal outa Denver, Colorado. Who in hell are you?"
"I am Capitan Ernando Ramos, of the Policia Federal Rural de Mexico. And you will speak respectfully to me, gringo!"
"No disrespect intended, Captain. I just like to know who's talking to me when I'm on official business."
"There is no such thing as a federalista of your country having official business in mine, unless he has the permit from my government. Do you have such permission?"
"Can't say I have. Didn't know I'd have to chase a bunch of cattle rustlers into your country, Captain. They started out in mine, and I just followed along. One of them thieves was Mexican, you see, and I don't expect he had official permission to be in my country."
"You can prove you are what you claim to be? You can prove what you say about the rustlers?"
"Well, I showed your sergeant the steers. They all had U.S. brands on 'em. They're still back in the canyon where your men jumped us."
Captain Ramos looked at the sergeant. "Es verdad, Vicente? "
Molina shrugged. "Quien sabe, mi Capitan? Eran ganados, si. No conozco que sera estolada. "
"You didn't let me finish," Longarm said. "This sergeant told one of your men to kill the rustier who could've told you where his gang hangs out. He was the Mexican I was telling you about, if you're interested."