Hiding her escopeta between the folds of her skirt, her finger on the trigger and ready to shoot if she had to, Ximena stood by the front door of her house and waited, her heart pounding to the beat of the horses’ hooves. It wasn’t the dreaded Texas Ranger s or the marauding Comanches, and yet she felt little relief once she identified the leader of the twelve riders. It was Joaquín’s childhood friend Cheno, or more officially, Corporal Juan N epomuceno Cortina of the Mexican militia, Los Defensores de la Pat ria. “Cheno, what a surprise,” she said, loosening her tight grip on her musket, though the worry in the pit of her stomach intensified. What was the militia doing here? Cortina pulled up to the house and dismounted quickly. “Ximena. Sorry to show up like this, but I need your help.” He looked toward Nana Hortencia, who stood behind Ximena, and said, “Por favor. He doesn’t have much time.” One of Cortina’s men was slumped over his horse, about to fall off, his blood dripping steadily onto the ground. “Bring him in,” Ximena said. “¡Pronto, por Dios!” She directed them to the rear room off the kitchen garden where she and her grandmother tended their patients. After clearing the wooden table of the medicinal roots Nana Hortencia had been grinding, they laid the man upon it. She ordered the servants to b oil water and bring clean rags. Her grandmother cut off the man’s bloodied shirt, revealing a hole where a musket shot had gone through his shoulder.
Ximena turned to Cortina and asked, “Who did this?” He took off his sombrero and wiped his sweaty face with the dirty handkerchief tied around his neck. “The Yanquis. We came upon Taylor and his cavalry and had a little skirmish. Took two of his dragoons prisoners.” “Taylor? You mean he’s no longer at El Frontón?” “No. He’s taking his entire force to set up an encampment on the north bank of the Río Bravo across from Matamoros. But he’s left behind some of his men in the village to build a supply d epot and a fort. Our port has fallen into the hands of the enemy, and they won’t be giving it up unless we force them to.” “Then let’s get those pinches Yanquis off our land, Cheno!” Joaquín said as he stood in the doorway. “Claro que sí, amigo.” Cortina grinned, and the two men embraced. Ximena knew that, like her, Joaquín couldn’t get the villagers’ frightful shrieks from the day before out of his mind. The men left the room, and Ximena followed behind them on her way to the kitchen garden to get the herbs she would need for the wounded man. While the rest of the militiamen made themselves comfortable on the patio, her husband sat at the table under the r amada and poured a shot of tequila for his friend. At twenty - two, Cortina was eight years younger than Joaquín, and his family owned the largest land grant in the region — forty - four thousand acres — as well as thousands of livestock. He had tried to recruit J oaquín into his detachment of irregular cavalry in the Mexican Army, composed of local volunteers who provided their own horses and equipment. But while several rancheros had joined him or the local guerrilla leaders, such as Antonio Canales, in patrolling the countryside and defending the northern frontier, Joaquín had politely declined and instead contributed several horses to the guerrilla bands. He was compelled to fight alongside them when Comanches and Lipán Apaches came to pillage the settlements alo ng the Río Bravo. Joaquín’s father and two uncles had been killed and most of their livestock stolen or slaughtered during a Comanche raid ten years earlier. But now Ximena could hear her husband eagerly discussing with Cortina the militia’s plans to pester the Yanqui general, plunder his supply wagons, and above all, do what the Mexican central government wasn’t yet pr epared to do — initiate hostilities. “The Yanquis have taken control of our port, and the Mexican military allowed it to happen!” Joaquín said. “That port is vital to trade.” Although Ximena wanted to hear the rest of their conversation, her grandmother needed help. She cut some hierba del pollo and hurried back to the healing room, its adobe walls permeated
with the scent of lavender and sage, candle wax, and copal incense. Nana Hortencia was washing the man’s wound with an infusion of llantén. “Will he live?” Ximena asked. “He’s lost a lot of blood, but the lead ball went through his body whole and didn’t leave any fragments,” Nana Hortencia said, rinsing the bloody towel. “Although, I see bits of his shirt in the wound, which must be taken out.” Her grandmother was the best curandera in the area and had saved many lives, including Ximena’s. Nana Hortencia had been born with el don, the healing gift, and had been trained by her own grandmother, a medicine woman with de ep knowledge of herbal medicin e. A physician was a rare commodity in these parts, and so week after week, the locals, especially the poor, showed up at the rancho to seek her healing. Ximena turned the patient’s hand over, palm - side up, and placed two fingers over his wrist artery. “His pulse is weak but stable,” she said. She brushed the man’s dirty hair off his forehead and wiped the sweat and grime from his face. He was young, no mor e than eighteen, with a whole life yet to live. As she crushed the herbs with her mortar and pestle to make a poultice, she prayed for God’s mercy. After they finished tending to their patient, Ximena and Nana Hortencia transferred him to a cot. The day was waning, and Joaquín and Cortina were on the back patio with the others. From the looks of it, Cortina and his men would be spending the night at t he rancho. Chickens were broiling over the open fire, and two of the house servants, Inés and María, were busy making fresh tortillas on the comal and reheating a pot of beans while Rosita handed out mugs of café, which the men spiked with the bottle of ag uardiente being passed around. The men sat on pieces of a tree trunk, wrapped in their sarapes, smoking tobacco cigarettes rolled in corn husk as they talked about the Yanqui invasion. Some of them lay on the ground using their saddles as pillows. Ximena sighed, wrapped her rebozo around her shoulders, and went to sit with Joaquín. He put his arm around her. As she leaned her head against his shoulder, soaking up his warmth, she breathed in his musky smell of sweat and horse, vaqueta, and tobacco le aves. She closed her eyes, remembering the first time she’d met him four years earlier. Her horse had been bitten by a rattlesnake and died, and her father had brought her to Joaquín’s rancho to buy a new mount. They’d been told by everyone in Matamoros th at Joaquín Treviño’s horses were the best trained. When they arrived at the rancho, she saw him before he spotted her and her father outside the corral watching him. He was inside breaking a horse, a
beautiful blue roan about two years old. Ximena was captivated by the way he stroked and patted the filly with a firm but gentle hand to get it used to human touch. He was not only a patient trainer but also compassionate, for not once did she see him mist reat the animal even after it r epeatedly tried to bite him. By the time the drill ended, a change had come about in the filly. Instead of trying to hurt Joaquín, it gently put its head on him. From outside the corral, Ximena could sense the emotional bond forming between man and beast, and she found herself wanting to put her head on him too. Even before a word had passed between them, she’d trusted Joaquín. Loved him. With reluctance, she listened to Cortina, who was sitting across the fire from her, recount his expeditions spying on the Yanquis while they were encamped at Corpus Christi. As one of the dozens of scouts serving the Mexican Army, Cortina was one of the fi rst to learn of President Polk’s orders for Taylor to advance south to the Río Bravo. Most of the cannons had been sent by ship and the bulk of the troops on foot. “You know what infuriates me?” Cortina said to Joaquín. “That for a handful of lentils our very own compatriots — Mexican rancheros — provided the Yanqui general the pack animals he needed to transport his supplies.” Joaquín shook his head and cursed. “They’ve betrayed our country helping those land - grabbing Yanquis get down this far.” Ximena thought of the hundreds of mesteños, wild mustangs, Joaquín had captured and broken through the years. Unlike other rancheros who continued to illicitly trade and sell livestock to the norteamericanos, she and Joaquín had stopped shipping their sadd le horses, mules, and oxen to New Orleans as soon as Taylor’s army settled in Corpus Christi. They now sold only to Mexicans and exported to Havana. Since the survival of their rancho d epended on the profits their livestock fetched, it made life harder for them. Cortina recounted his face - to - face confrontation with Taylor’s forces at the Arroyo Colorado. Mexican scouts and the militia had read the Yanqui general a proclamation from the Mexican commander, warning him to advance no farther into Mexican territory and to turn back. Of course, Taylor would not be stopped and responded with a threat of his own, pointing his guns at Cortina and his men. Being no match for the Yanqui forces, the Mexican riders were forced to back down in disgrace and return to Matamoros to alert the inhabitants and their commander that the Yanquis were on their way. “It’s a shame General Mejía was just bluffing, because the arroyo was the perfect place to attack the Yanquis and r epel their invasion,” Cortina said. “We should have welcomed the invaders with arms ready and matches lighted. But Mejía insists he doesn’t h ave enough troops, and the reinforcements and supplies he was promised haven’t arrived.”
“Surely our government will send them soon,” Joaquín said. Cortina scoffed, turning the chickens on the spits so they could roast evenly. The grease dripped onto the fire, and it crackled and shot up flames that glinted on his angry face. “We norteños are of little concern to the caudillos in Mexico City, my frien d. They are too busy with their political intrigues. Instead of using national troops for border defense, they use them for their never - ending insurrections and will abandon us to our luck, as they always have. It falls to us to defend our homes from the p erverse intentions of the Yanquis. So, what do you say, Joaquín? Will you join us in driving back our enemies to the Nueces? Will you do your sacred duty to protect our frontier?” As the questions hung in the air, Ximena wished Juan Cortina hadn’t come to the rancho. She wanted her husband home where she knew he was safe, or at least safer than sneaking around in the chaparral, spying, plundering, and killing. Waging guerrilla warfa re on the Yanquis would only invite trouble. And where would that lead? Would he come home one day bleeding and barely holding on to his horse? Or worse? She shuddered at the mere thought. She had already lost so many loved ones. She couldn’t lose her husb and too. Ximena took Joaquín’s hand and interlaced her fingers with his, hiding their locked hands in the folds of her skirt. The thought of you out there risking your life terrifies me , she wanted to say. And you becoming a murdering guerrillero, what would it do to your soul, to your gentle spirit? Will it lead you down a path I cannot follow, Joaquín? But Ximena couldn’t say those words aloud. She didn’t want to shame him by speaking her mind in front of the men. She imagined them alone. She could speak to him then, saying what she wanted to express freely. She knew Joaquín would at least hear her out, even if he didn’t heed her counsel. But now, as he avoided her eyes and gently tried to pull his hand away from hers while she refused to surrender it, she knew that neither her advice nor her blessing would be sought tonight. So she loosened her grip and let him go. Joaquín rose and reaffirmed what he’d said earlier. “What are we waiting for, Cheno? Vamos. Let’s get those pinches Yanquis off our land.” April 1846 Fort Texas, Río Grande Long before the bugles sounded reveille at the break of day, John Riley was already buttoning his private’s uniform. His tentmate, Franky Sullivan, barely turned over on the makeshift bed Riley had built to protect him from rattlesnakes. Riley shook him, a nd still, the snoring continued. The night previous, Sullivan took a drop too many despite Riley’s warnings to leave liquor alone. In the seven months since he’d enlisted, he’d seen too many of his countrymen
suffer all manner of punishments at the hands of the Yankee officers. Drunkards always fared the worst, but that didn’t stop Sullivan — like so many others — from sneaking off at night in search of the liquor peddlers among the horde of camp followers. Riley never indulged in the drink. It would mean fewer wages to send back to his wife and son in Ireland. God knew there was never enough for them to eat. Even before the rotten potato crop, life had been harsh. Besides, he liked being in control of his se nses, his body. Irishmen needed their wits about them, always. Especially in this country. Especially in this army. Riley shoved his tentmate clear off the bed, and Sullivan fell with a thud on the ground. Even that didn’t rouse him. With no other choice, Riley slapped him hard across the face. Sullivan finally bolted awake. “You got five minutes, lad,” Riley said. “And right well you know what will happen if you tarry.” He shook out Sullivan’s sky - blue fatigue jacket and trousers to check for scorpions and tarantulas and tossed the uniform to his tentmate, who stumbled to his feet.