When they’d surrounded him, Joaquin spoke to them in a simple version of their own language, which he’d picked up from a Cahuilla cowboy he’d worked with near what is now Palm Springs. He told them that he had come for his horses. If he did not return with them, his army would come back to the village by morning and shoot every man they could find. And, of course, claim his horses. He had come to get his animals, and to save the village.
He watched as six of the senior braves huddled and discussed. He urged his horse into a tightening circle around them, looking down impatiently, the long barrel of the Hawken gleaming in the afternoon sun, and as I picture the scene I see the buttons of his coat catching the sunlight, too, and I hear the heavy clomp of the horse on the ground and I can see the warriors glancing back at him up on that big black animal, thinking, Maybe we should give this fucker his horses back.
One of the braves turned and smiled and led him to the corral. Joaquin watched as two of the men entered and began cutting away the horses in question. Looking down on the warriors in the corral, Joaquin saw that they were having trouble separating the animals, then he saw that the other four men had drifted toward the big boulders where their weapons lay.
The men in the corral looked to the other braves, clearly waiting for them to act.
Joaquin watched more of the male Indians easing toward the rocks for their weapons. It was going to be thirty on one.
He spurred his mount into the corral, which sent the horses scattering and the two braves jumping out of the way. He raised his rifle in one hand.
“No! All of the horses! All of the horses or my army will slaughter you by morning!”
He raised his Hawken and fired into the air, which sent the quarter horses running and the Cahuilla horses fleeing in fear and the tribe scurrying for cover.
An arrow pierced his saddle as Jorge pressed the horses down the trail. Of course, that was the arrow in the box that Great-uncle Jack led me to in the storage area. The arrowhead isn’t very sharp because the Cahuilla didn’t have the best rock to work with, but it did penetrate a very tough saddle. I keep it hidden with Joaquin’s head down in Valley Center.
The trail leading through the thick madrone was narrow and the horses had no real choice but to follow it all the way down the mountain slope to the old stage road, and from there, tired but settling, they followed Joaquin and Jorge back to the camp beside the meadow.
The Cahuilla braves never came to claim their rightful horses. Joaquin broke camp late that night and followed the moonlight north toward the dusty town of Riverside.
Just after midnight a car comes up the road and turns into the Superior parking lot. It’s a big old black Lincoln Continental Town Car, the same year and model as the one that chased me out of the Residence Inn parking lot. The parking lot lights are good and strong, but all I get from the windshield is reflection. Then the driver bears right and begins to circle. When he comes at me, the lot lights blast the window straight on and I see the trim, dark face of Lupercio, up close to the steering wheel, peering over the top, scanning slowly left to right.
He looks toward the office lights and the Lincoln rolls forward and right, following his line of sight.
I glance at the shotgun.
I look at the push buttons and levers on the cab console before me and I remember Phillip’s voice: Use enough muscle… These things aren’t delicate, they do what you tell them just like a car or a horse… Remember to undershoot the hoist when you go to place it… it always looks on target because it’s so much smaller than the target… In daylight I use the end of the boom to line up the magnet and the car, but at night you can’t see the damned thing… Don’t push the servo with a load in the air or you’ll lose it… The guys here do that for fun sometimes, drop a Suburban or a Hummer from full up, like an earthquake when it hits…
I’ve bet that Lupercio will park in the darker third of the lot, which is underneath me, where Phillip has left the yard lights off. It’s a nice little pocket of darkness, an easy walk to the inviting lights of the office and away from the brightly lit part of the yard where the cars are stacked high and the cranes idle like snoring dinosaurs.
The Lincoln eases into the dark patch of the parking lot but goes right through it. The car hesitates as if Lupercio is going to park, then he slowly continues to the exit and turns onto the access road. I watch his taillights grow smaller and closer together. They vanish.
Ten minutes later he’s back. This time he cruises the parking lot in the opposite direction, brushing up close to my crane as he enters the dark patch. I look almost straight down on the roof of the Lincoln and I feel like a god up here in the dark sky, a patient and cunning god. But again he passes through. He stops in front of the office, and although I can’t see him through the glare of the lights on the Lincoln’s windows, I can imagine him squinting hard at the invitation before him, at the partially opened door and the play of light coming from the rear.
Suddenly the Lincoln reverses. I’m confused for just a second; then I understand: Lupercio doesn’t want to take his eyes off of the office. My lucky day. He backs into the darkness below me and swings parallel to the fence.
He stops.
The tranny clunks into park.
My moment.
… Use enough muscle…
The Lincoln idles. I can smell the exhaust up here. The headlights die. The second I hear the engine shut off I press forward hard on the control lever and the big electromagnetic hoist lowers through the sky, straight and true on its heavy cable. I hit the servomotor button and feel the massive charge as the generator comes to life, sending wave after wave of current to the magnet hoist.
The hoist crunches onto the Lincoln’s roof and I see the huge circular magnet clamp on. The car shudders. I watch for a door to fly open while I pull hard but steady on the lever to bring up the hoist.
This is my moment of truth. From fifteen or twenty feet off the ground Lupercio can still jump out-if he thinks fast enough and understands what’s happening. Which is a tall order in the dark, with your beautiful prized car suddenly taking flight with you inside it.
But over twenty feet it’s a leg-breaker and he’s trapped and he’s mine.
The Lincoln rises fast into the air. It swings left to right because the magnet isn’t quite centered and the sedan is heavier up front.
Fifteen feet and the door swings open.
Twenty and it’s still open but Lupercio is still inside.
Thirty and I’ve got him.
The car pivots into the faint light of the yard and I can see him through the windshield and he can see me. We’re eye to eye, forty feet apart. I expect him to look like he’s being chased by a bear but he looks calm and unexcited. His window and the window behind him go down.
Then he astonishes me. He slams the door shut and climbs halfway out the open window, clenching the Lincoln’s body pillar with his left arm.
He’s up forty feet now, ten feet above me, and he draws his machete from the darkness inside the Lincoln. What can he possibly do with a machete from a distance like this-throw it?
He drops the blade back and flat over his right shoulder and I think he is going to throw it.
I’m wrong.
There’s an orange flash and a loud crack above me then the close rip of something hitting my crane hard. The Plexiglas window splinters into snowy perforations, high and right of me. BB’s! He’s got shot shells in the big black handle of his machete, and a way to fire them.
But I’m not hit and he’s sixty feet up. I can see the bottom of the Lincoln as it twists slowly skyward. The struts relax and the wheels droop.