John Cahill, the new blacksmith at Grant, went; but Joe had been appointed a scout, and stayed at home.
Tucson, only fifty-five miles south, was easily made in two days, for the loose horses and the Grant pack-mules traveled light. But Camp Bowie, at the Apache Pass in the Chiricahua Mountains, was one hundred and ten miles east from Tucson and Camp Lowell. That meant a real march with thirty loaded mules, and a hundred remount cavalry horses, and the cavalry escort commanded by Lieutenant Jacob Almy, and a riding-mule for each man of the pack-train.
The packs were chiefly ammunition. Each mule carried three hundred pounds.
“We’ll jest see what we can do, boys,” said Jack. “Regulations try to make us think that a hundred and seventy pounds is all a mule’ll stand; but the gin’ral knows more’n ary regulations issued by those folks at Washington. I wouldn’t insult a good sound mule by puttin’ only a hundred seventy on his back—not if he’s packed right. Pack him right, so the load slings even, an’ he’ll carry his two hundred fifty an’ three hundred pounds at five miles an hour for twenty-five an’ thirty miles a day, week in an’ week out.”
Old Jack was the pack-master or patron (pa-trone). Frank Monach was assistant pack-master, or cargador (car-ga-dore). “Slim Shorty” was cook or cencero (cen-say-ro). Frank Cahill was blacksmith. The packers or arrieros were Jim O’Neill, “Chileno John,” “Long Jim” Cook (six feet eight), Charley Hopkins, Sam Wisser the Pennsylvania German, and Lauriano Gomez who sang Spanish songs.
The pack-train was called an atajo (ah-tah-ho); the packs were “cargoes,” and the pack-saddles or aparejos, and such stuff, composed the “riggings.”
Pack-train service had a language all its own. Yes, and an army train as organized under General Crook had a discipline all its own, too, as Jimmie soon found out.
The trail from Tucson to Bowie was the main Southern overland stage road between the Rio Grande River in New Mexico and San Diego of the Pacific. Therefore the traveling up hill and down was good.
It was Jimmie’s business to help herd the mules, in the evening and the early morning, while the regular herders were eating; and to come in and rouse the cook, at daybreak, and get him wood and water, if needed.
In half an hour after the cook was up, the men were wakened. While they were folding their blankets (which were the pack-blankets) and taking the canvas coverings off the “riggings” and “cargoes,” Jimmie brought in the herd.
This was not difficult, because when he started the wise old bell leader, all the mules followed; and so well had they been trained that except for a few “shave tails” they took their own places, in a sort of company front, each facing his pile of “rigging.” Every mule had his own, individual “rigging,” adjusted to fit him perfectly.
The packers saddled their riding mules, and ate breakfast. After breakfast they put the “riggings” and “cargoes” on the pack-mules.
They worked in pairs, and each pair attended to ten mules. A full pack-train was composed of fifty mules; ten mules were assigned to a troop or company of soldiers. The thirty mules in this train of Patron Jack called for six packers.
Jimmie helped “Slim Shorty” the cook pack his kitchen stuff; and Jimmie and the cook and John Cahill the blacksmith watched the loaded mules, especially any “shave tails,” so that they should not ramble away or try to lie down.
The packers worked like lightning, uttering scarcely a word except signal words, for it was against regulations to talk much. The schedule of breaking camp or “unparking” a train was as follows: Twenty minutes for before-breakfast work, fifteen minutes for breakfast, twenty minutes for putting on the “riggings,” twenty minutes for putting on the “cargoes”; total, one hour and a quarter.
But “Chileno John” and Jim O’Neill, who were the prize pair of packers, in an exhibition feat loaded their ten mules complete (“riggings” and packs and all) in ten minutes!
The moment that the train was ready, Patron Jack, who had been eying closely, called “Bell!” and “Slim Shorty” the cook rode the white bell mare out upon the trail; in single file the pack-mules—“bell sharps” and “shave tails” and slow “drag tails”—stepped after, usually of their own accord.
The cavalry escort took the advance. Patron Jack and “Slim Shorty” led the pack-train. The packers rode, one beside every fifth mule. Frank Monach the assistant pack-master or “cargador” brought up the rear, with John Cahill the blacksmith, whose business it was to look out for dropped shoes and sore hoofs.
Jimmie rode behind, too. The long file of swaying, plodding mules, under the canvas-covered packs, made a fascinating sight. So did the sturdy packers or “arrieros,” in their broad hats and suspenders and flannel shirts, and trousers tucked into heavy boots.
Jack aimed to start out by sun-up at the latest, so as to finish the twenty-five or thirty miles at one stretch before mid-day heat and dust. This was only a moderate march, in fairly level country. In rough mountain country, fifteen miles a day, at a go-as-you-can gait, would be enough.
To unload and make camp was called “parking.” The “riggings” and “cargoes” were laid out in two neat parallel lines, and covered. Jack and Frank Monach examined the mules, for sore backs caused by badly fitting aparejos. The “bell” was hobbled and turned to pasture and the mules followed.
“Riggings” were repaired, if necessary, and scraped clean of sweat and dirt. The pack-blankets were opened, to air for sleeping blankets; from their war-bags, or canvas clothing sacks, the men took out what stuff they required.
But the pack-mules were the main thought. Nothing in the way of petting and fancy trappings was too good for a pack-mule. Each mule had its name, and knew that name. Nobody was permitted to strike a mule or abuse it in any manner.
“You can abuse a dog an’ he’ll forgive you,” said old Jack. “But you mistreat a mule, an’ he’ll never forget. You can change yore clothes, but you can’t change yore smell—not to a mule!”
The bell horse or “cencero” (which is the Spanish for “bell”) had the easiest time of any of the pack-train animals. It wasn’t packed. All that the “bell” had to do was to tinkle along and set the pace, while carrying the cook. The “bell” ought to be white, because mules were supposed to be especially fond of white; the “bell” ought to be a horse, because mules respected a horse more than they did another mule; and if “he” was a white mare, as in this train, then so much the better, because mules loved white mares.
The cook rode the “bell,” and therefore was nicknamed “cencero,” himself.
Patron Jack expected to make Camp Bowie in five days easy, which would bring the pack-train and the cavalry through in good condition. The first two nights out, the mules were herded, to graze; but on the third day the road crossed the Dragoon Mountains by way of Dragoon Pass. This night the mules were tied along a stretched picket-rope, for the Dragoon Mountains were Chiricahua country, and contained Cochise’s Stronghold.
“He’s off yonder at this very minute, an’ mebbe lookin’ for us,” declared Cargador Frank Monach. “I’ll bet a cooky those hills south’ard are plumb full o’ Chiricahua.”
“That’s where they killed pore Bob Whitney, all right enough,” mused Jim O’Neill. “Down at Dragoon Springs, in the Stronghold. Yes, an’ many another man has left his scalp there. That range westward is the Whetstones, or Mustangs, where they got Cushing; and on west of the Whetstones is Davidson’s Canyon south of Tucson, where Lieutenant Stewart and Corporal Black went under. By ginger, a fellow doesn’t look out on a very pleasant view, from up here!”
From the open Dragoon Pass of the stage road the Dragoon Mountains, low and rolling but very rough, with much brush and stunted timber, extended southward to the Mexican line; and separated from them by yellow deserts, west and east and north rose other low ranges—all chosen hiding-places of the fierce Chiricahuas.
“Anyhow,” remarked Jack Long, with a sly wink, “we got a young chi-kis-n o’ theirs hyar—reg’lar member o’ the Cochise fam’ly—to talk for us; an’ if ary Chiricahua appear we’ll send him in to ’em.”
Jimmie grinned and scratched his head; whether Cochise and Geronimo would wait and listen to him, he wasn’t certain. But he’d rather like to see Nah-che and Nah-da-ste, and explain why he had run away.
The stage and the mail riders had been attacked in this very pass. However, nothing alarming happened, to-night. And the probable reason why, they learned the next day.
Dragoon Pass was about half-way between Tucson and Bowie, so that Bowie now lay some fifty miles east. The Chiricahua Mountains and their Apache Pass might be seen, in the eastern horizon.
The Chiricahuas had been so bad during the last two months that the stage road was being little traveled. And when, in the morning, on the way down from the pass a cloud of dust was sighted before, everybody stared, suspicious.
Horsemen! Injuns? No, cavalry! Good! A scouting detachment from Bowie, as like as not; or from Crittenden or Lowell, behind. Lieutenant Almy met them first, and both parties stopped, to talk. Patron Jack, at the head of the pack-train, spread his two arms as signal for “Halt!” and he trotted on, to join.
There was a lengthy confab.
“Wall, wonder what’s up?” drawled Frank Monach. “Reckon I’d better go an’ see.”
“Send the boy, an’ save yore mule,” suggested Blacksmith John Cahill. “He’s fairly itchin’ to sit in.”
So Jimmie somewhat importantly trotted forward, too, up the long line of dozing, switching pack-mules, to bring back news if he heard any.
The party of riders from the east were several officers, and three or four booted, flannel-shirted, whiskered civilians, wearing heavy Colt’s six-shooters and carrying rifles. Yes, and somebody else—a young Mexican, dark enough to be an Apache, clad in broad-brimmed black hat, dirty cotton shirt, old trousers and moccasins.
Jimmie knew him in two looks. Maria Jilda Grijalba! That same Maria who had been a captive in the Cochise camp, and who, Micky Free had said, had escaped after Jimmie had escaped.
Jimmie gladly rode straight to him.
“Buenos dias, Maria (Good day, Maria).”
“Buenos dias, amigo (friend),” responded Maria, and they shook hands heartily.
“I heard you had escaped from the Apaches. What are you doing here?”
“I have come out from Camp Bowie with these officers,” answered Maria. “I work for the fort now. I am a scout and interpreter. We are going to talk with Cochise, at the Dragoon Springs.”
“What, amigo!”
“Yes,” nodded Maria. “General Howard, the great man with the one arm, is there, with Cochise, waiting. He has come from Washington again, and has found Cochise. He has been in the Cochise camp for six days. They have made peace. There will be a Chiricahua reservation, and now General Howard has sent for the comandante at Bowie, so that the comandante and Cochise shall know each other, and there will be no mistake.”
Maria spoke in Spanish except when an Apache word seemed handier. Jimmie understood. It was a great convenience to speak in two languages, at once. As for Jimmie, he knew three languages.
“Would you like to go?” asked Maria. “You come with me, and we will see Cochise, and Geronimo and Nah-che and all of them.”
“I’d like to go, but I don’t believe I can, Maria,” faltered Jimmie. “I’ve got to stay with the atajo.”
“Are you an arriero? Who is your patron?” inquired Maria. “I will ask him.”
But Patron Jack Long already had the matter on his tongue.
“Hyar’s a muchacho (boy) you can have, if you want him, cap’n,” Jack was saying to the cavalry captain. “He lived with old Cochise a while in these very diggin’s. Speaks ’Pache, an’ consider’ble Mex. Reckon we can spar’ him from the pack outfit, if you’ll fetch him back to Bowie ’fore we leave thar.”
“Does he speak English, though?” demanded the captain. “I’ve got a guide with me—Maria, there—who speaks Mexican and Apache.”
“Does he savvy Americano? Sure he does, bein’ that his name’s Jimmie Dunn, an’ his folks were both ’Mericans ’fore the ’Paches got ’em, an’ he’s been brung up by Joe Felmer at Grant. Speak American? Speaks it better’n I do, ’cause he had schoolin’ back East.”
“All right. I’ll take him, and much obliged to you,” said the captain. “Lived with Cochise, did he? How was that?”
“’Cause he couldn’t help it. Thar warn’t any ‘how’ to it, ’cept the ‘how’ o’ stayin’ close an’ playin’ possum till he had a chance to skip out. The Chiricahua jumped him an’ some o’ Pete Kitchen’s sheep south o’ Tucson a couple o’ year ago, an’ tuk him along same time they tuk yore Mexican. That Maria Jilda an’ him were captives together. He’s chi-kis-n to Nah-che, old Cochise’s son. But he’s plumb American ag’in, now. If you meet up with any ’Paches an’ want to talk with ’em, he’ll interpret for you.”
“Hah!” exclaimed the cavalry captain, eying Jimmie, as did the other men. “He’ll do finely, then. Come with us, boy. We’ll return you to your outfit to-morrow. Let’s go on, gentlemen.”
“Wall, I don’t wish you any hard luck—or that Gin’ral Howard, either,” called Jack, after—for Jack said whatever he chose. “But ’cordin’ to my notion the peacefulest kind o’ Chiricahua is a dead Chiricahua, an’ you can tell Cochise Jack Long says so. Hey, Jimmie!” continued Jack. “You tell yore chi-kis-n to tell his dad thar’s a gent in a canvas suit, up at Whipple, who’s comin’ down hyar pronto (quick) with a double-bar’l ‘peace policy’ guaranteed to turn wild ’Paches into tame ones.”
They left Lieutenant Almy’s little detachment starting onward, and old Jack grumbling as he signaled his pack train to “march.”