Read Online Duster (9781310020889) by Frank Roderus - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Frank Roderus
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stopped to show respect. Jesus
glanced at me like he expected me to say something, but I shook my
head just enough for Jesus to see, and the rider went by without
bothering to howdy us or even throw his nose in the air to snub us.
I wasn't used to something like that from a stranger and might of
said something if I'd been bigger.
After the fellow was gone on down the road
where he couldn't hear, you can bet I told Jesus something.
"Just what kind of dummy do you think I am?"
I asked him. "Looking at me like that. I may not be growed and
muscled yet, but there's more than bone between my ears."
"Well," he said, "I didn't know ..."
"Well you ought," I told him. "I know as
good as you that Juan Estrada may be a sneaky, thieving, no-account
Mex rustler. But he saved our hides back there an' it'd be pretty
poor of me to tell on him after a trick like that."
"I just thought you might of knowed that
fella going past and mighta told him or something."
"Now, just how do you figure I'd know a
fancy dude like that? Or want to know anyone'd pass without
speaking?"
Jesus sort of grinned a little. "I figured
if I knowed who he was you might be a speaking 'quaintance."
That got my curiosity up, but I sat quiet
for a while, not wanting to give in and ask him who it was had
passed us. Jesus just rode on looking straight ahead though he
tricked himself by letting a bit of a smile tickle the corners of
his mouth from time to time. He was busting to show off knowing who
that fellow was.
Now, if there is one thing I can say about
myself without bragging, it's that I can be just about as set-down
stubborn as anyone else once I take a notion to it. I was already
plenty riled about that uppity stranger going by us like he was
better than anyone else in the whole of South Texas, and then with
Jesus so smug about knowing something I didn't, well, it set me
off. I wasn't about to ask Jesus anything right then. I wasn't even
going to give him the satisfaction of looking his way. But then I
decided it would be better if Jesus knew I wasn't going to let him
get away with being so uppity, so I looked over at him and said,
"Well, I just don't care who that fella was, and you can set there
and keep it to yourself from now until the Frio freezes over, for
all I care."
Jesus grinned and said, "I'll do that." He
said something more in Mex, but I couldn't understand it.
That's a funny thing. Everybody figures just
because you grow up in a place where a bunch of Mexicans live you
can just naturally speak Mex, but it don't work that way. There's
been Mexican families living around this part of Texas since just
about forever, I guess. They was here before us and maybe they'll
be here after us too ... I don't know. But we never saw much of
them, since we 'most never got to town and sure never had money
that we could afford hired hands to work for us.
I guess things had been some different
before Pa left for the war, 'cause I can remember hearing about the
house raising just after Ma came out from East Texas carrying me
along in a wagon with her to join Pa at our new ranch near Dog
Town. Pa got along pretty good with just about everybody, and I
remember hearing that some of Jesus's own kin had helped raise our
house with cottonwood logs hauled all the way out from along the
Frio.
Later, when a lot of the men had gone off,
Mex bandits started coming all the way up into McMullen County
looking for something to steal, and the men that was left to home
for one reason or another started taking it out on the Mex families
that was their neighbors. I guess it was easier to beat up on
somebody close to home. It saved them a ride down to the border,
and I guess some figured one Mexican was about as guilty as the
next.
That didn't do a whole lot toward making a
spirit of neighborliness, and for a while there Mexicans and Texans
rode shy of each other.
There wasn't much of that
going on right around Dog Town, but
between everybody being just a little bit cautious
glanced at me like he expected me to say something, but I shook my
head just enough for Jesus to see, and the rider went by without
bothering to howdy us or even throw his nose in the air to snub us.
I wasn't used to something like that from a stranger and might of
said something if I'd been bigger.
After the fellow was gone on down the road
where he couldn't hear, you can bet I told Jesus something.
"Just what kind of dummy do you think I am?"
I asked him. "Looking at me like that. I may not be growed and
muscled yet, but there's more than bone between my ears."
"Well," he said, "I didn't know ..."
"Well you ought," I told him. "I know as
good as you that Juan Estrada may be a sneaky, thieving, no-account
Mex rustler. But he saved our hides back there an' it'd be pretty
poor of me to tell on him after a trick like that."
"I just thought you might of knowed that
fella going past and mighta told him or something."
"Now, just how do you figure I'd know a
fancy dude like that? Or want to know anyone'd pass without
speaking?"
Jesus sort of grinned a little. "I figured
if I knowed who he was you might be a speaking 'quaintance."
That got my curiosity up, but I sat quiet
for a while, not wanting to give in and ask him who it was had
passed us. Jesus just rode on looking straight ahead though he
tricked himself by letting a bit of a smile tickle the corners of
his mouth from time to time. He was busting to show off knowing who
that fellow was.
Now, if there is one thing I can say about
myself without bragging, it's that I can be just about as set-down
stubborn as anyone else once I take a notion to it. I was already
plenty riled about that uppity stranger going by us like he was
better than anyone else in the whole of South Texas, and then with
Jesus so smug about knowing something I didn't, well, it set me
off. I wasn't about to ask Jesus anything right then. I wasn't even
going to give him the satisfaction of looking his way. But then I
decided it would be better if Jesus knew I wasn't going to let him
get away with being so uppity, so I looked over at him and said,
"Well, I just don't care who that fella was, and you can set there
and keep it to yourself from now until the Frio freezes over, for
all I care."
Jesus grinned and said, "I'll do that." He
said something more in Mex, but I couldn't understand it.
That's a funny thing. Everybody figures just
because you grow up in a place where a bunch of Mexicans live you
can just naturally speak Mex, but it don't work that way. There's
been Mexican families living around this part of Texas since just
about forever, I guess. They was here before us and maybe they'll
be here after us too ... I don't know. But we never saw much of
them, since we 'most never got to town and sure never had money
that we could afford hired hands to work for us.
I guess things had been some different
before Pa left for the war, 'cause I can remember hearing about the
house raising just after Ma came out from East Texas carrying me
along in a wagon with her to join Pa at our new ranch near Dog
Town. Pa got along pretty good with just about everybody, and I
remember hearing that some of Jesus's own kin had helped raise our
house with cottonwood logs hauled all the way out from along the
Frio.
Later, when a lot of the men had gone off,
Mex bandits started coming all the way up into McMullen County
looking for something to steal, and the men that was left to home
for one reason or another started taking it out on the Mex families
that was their neighbors. I guess it was easier to beat up on
somebody close to home. It saved them a ride down to the border,
and I guess some figured one Mexican was about as guilty as the
next.
That didn't do a whole lot toward making a
spirit of neighborliness, and for a while there Mexicans and Texans
rode shy of each other.
There wasn't much of that
going on right around Dog Town, but
between everybody being just a little bit cautious
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