Esto hombre joven tied his bay in front of a shallow, adobe all-service store on the plaza.
It was one of the businesses — including several cantinas — sheltered under the portales (arcades). It faced across the plaza to the presidencia municipal. So few gringos showed up in Cerro Alto at that time that people stared.
At the store he bought a pack of crap Faro cigarettes, and a piece of newspaper daubed with grease for doctoring humans (cold-weather cracked hands and especially feet — the universal winter condition of huarche wearers), and usos externo veterinario. He led the bay across to the plaza to a hitching post in front of a cantina known for being friendly.
Easing against the well-chipped wall, he pulled out large one-peso coins and ordered a cabllito of Cuervo – still a gently priced tequila. He watched the bartender. The young man gave his wrist the faintest twist that disguised a bit extra. The gringo nodded, adding a tip to the one peso coins.
“Local folks touchy about livestock in the plaza,” the barkeep said. “Horse manure.”
The gringo nodded, squinting at the path he’d taken. “Let’s see. There’s cattle, sheep and dog manure, droppings of the flock of buzzards perched on the post office.” He took sip of Cuervo, smiling politely. The four men watching him seemed surprised at this summary.
“Not many coches out besides the ministerio publico and his friends.” he observed.
“Coches cost a lot to keep running,” the young cantinero said.
“I never see you driving. Your wife I see driving now and then. In Mexico, men drive ...”
“And women walk,” a man playing dominos nearby finished the old saying.
Clients of this cantina, El Pozo Surgente (The Flowing Well), had been shocked when the gringo’s wife and a male associate and his girl friend sat at one of the cantina’s outside portal tables and ordered beer. Then, only big-city women would think of doing that.
Pozo Surgente folks chalked up such behavior to wealthy city Mexicans, and North American tourists. Opinions such as arrogance and foreign egotism got in there, too. There were very few gringos in residence.
Though they weren’t sure, local folks generally decided this gringo horse-rider puzzled them. He seldom talked about himself. His tack (saddle, bridle, rope, machete, and such), like his boots, spurs, sombrero and gloves were well-used, well taken-care-of. Like it belonged to a cowman, a rancher. Though he had Mexican friends, they too were strangers. No one knew any ranch he was associated to.
For a gringo he was quiet-going, watchful about what went on around him. That puzzled local folks. The outsiders visiting Cerro Alto tended to be well-oiled Tapatios, or tequila-rinsed gringo tourists. North Americans tended to buy local “crafts” — handsome serapes that Sundays hung in the plaza. Many foreign customers patronizing the open-air portales ended up being serape customers. Unaccompanied males from both groups often visited at the pueblo’s six whore houses, whose post-Sunday Mass business irritated serious Catholics.
The gringo’s local friend was Tano (Sutano) Ibarra, a campesino. Some found that strange. Tano was illiterate; the gringo often came to the Pozo Surgente with a Mexican newspaper, or a book. Books, otherwise, tended to be absent among Cerro Alto’s laboring population.
Tano took the gringo on ”excursions,” currently to view various mountainside, boulder-strewn mesas. He was looking for a meseta that ran horizontally across a mountain. He was looking for a good price. Thus, mountain land littered somewhat with boulders.
But Tano was late. Someone had accused him and one of his brothers of killing an older neighbor of their barrio. He had already talked to Tano. A case of mistaken identity. But the police were slow in making the error official. The person who understood the official forms — and also knew how to type well — was out sick.
Tano and the gringo thought this was so typical of the local police that they found it impossible not to laugh. The ministerio publico people, who made their literacy a point of superiority when dealing with illiterate fellow citizens, were stymied by their own flawed literacy. They couldn’t make plain what had doomed their ability to do their job. Tano couldn’t keep from giggling. But he kept telling the gringo: “Don’t laugh in front of them. They’d love to put a gringo in jail.” When the gringo didn’t believe that, Tano said, “It’s true.”
That evening, the gringo wrote in his journal: “In the shadow of error, and undoubtedly more than a few lies, Tano — the almost murderer — found the mesa I had been seeking for four months. Room for horses, cattle and home. It’s where we will soon live.” Much later he added: “And we still do.”