El Paso: A Novel by Winston Groom

fearful when she watched him in the ring. But neither did she like being left alone for such long periods. She felt it would be better if he stayed on at the ranch and she was certain that if he did, one day the Colonel would make him ranch manager. That was a good, solid job. Being outspoken, Donita and Johnny could be heard arguing on many occasions, and it was generally agreed around the hacienda that she usually had the better of it.
    That morning, lying in bed, he had wanted to make love, but, still angry over one of their arguments the night before, Donita had pushed him away. In any case, Johnny had gone to skin his cow in the courtyard of Valle del Sol when the warning sounded that rustlers were on the premises.
    Johnny Ollas the matador was no pistolero and so did not respond to Callahan’s call for arms to rout the cattle thieves. Nobody, especially not Callahan, thought less of him for this. Matadors, even aspiring ones, were considered to be above rough gunplay.
    When Callahan’s party saddled up and rode out to drive off the rustlers, they had no notion of encountering anything but ordinary bandits. Even while the revolution raged up and down Chihuahua, there were always some outlaws who conducted depredations in either Villa’s name or one of his generals’, but nobody much believed them because Villa was a certified hero to much of the population.
    From time to time Callahan had to ride out against cattle thieves and his policy was to go in force and with unmistakable determination. Usually, when they saw Callahan’s men coming straight at them, the thieves ran off. But this time, when Callahan saw the second party of men—Mix’s—emerge from the fold of ground, he became wary, which was why he split up his posse. He had not, of course, counted on the machine guns.
    By the time Callahan got everybody back to the ranch it was nearly sundown. The machine gunners had hit seven horses and three men. The horses had to be destroyed; the men were injured but not badly. Women were tending the men’s wounds and the conversation was heated in the plaza of Valle del Sol when word came that more trouble was on the way.
    Callahan climbed to the bell tower and his heart began to pound. Spread out across the plains, coming toward him, were hundreds of horsemen, in large formations, carrying flags and banners. He knew the hacienda was about to be paid a visit by some part of Pancho Villa’s army, a very sobering thought, and it made him wish he’d stayed in Oklahoma.
    Callahan’s apprehension was well founded. Johnny Ollas was among those standing in the courtyard when Villa’s vanguard rode in through the walled gate. Fierro rode in first, just behind two guidons with red and white serpent flags on lances. Next came Pancho Villa himself with half a dozen bodyguards and staff, their horse’s hooves clattering on the brick pavings. The women of the hacienda gathered nervously on the balconies and beneath the columned porticos that surrounded the courtyard. Among them was Johnny’s wife, Donita.
    No one was quite sure what to do with the arrival of the famous Pancho Villa.
    Callahan, the manager, stood in the courtyard with the rest, waiting for somebody else to make the first move. The Villistas’ horses clopped around on the paving stones while the general surveyed the hacendados for a leader. Finally Señora Parnadas stepped forward, twisting a handkerchief in her fingers. She was the house manager of Valle del Sol, a sort of mother figure to everyone, who arranged the meals and housekeeping duties, and she had been there longer than anyone could remember.
    “May I get you something, General?” Señora Parnadas asked.
    “Do you have any lemonade?” Villa answered.
    “I can make some,” she said, turning with instruction to one of the women to start squeezing lemons.
    “So who was it led those cabrones against my men?” Villa said loudly.
    Everyone knew. No one wanted to say. No one dared meet Villa’s