All the Pretty Horses

and they soaked it down with hotsauce and rolled it in the last of the tortillas. They chewed and watched one another.
    Well, said Rawlins. It aint all that bad.
    No it aint, said Blevins. Truth is, I didnt know you could eat one at all.
    John Grady stopped chewing and looked at them. Then he went on chewing again. You all been out here longer than me, he said. I thought we all started together.
    The following day on the track south they began to encounter small ragged caravans of migrant traders headed toward the northern border. Brown and weathered men with burros three or four in tandem atotter with loads of candelilla or furs or goathides or coils of handmade rope fashioned out of lechugilla or the fermented drink called sotol decanted into drums and cans and strapped onto packframes made from treelimbs. They carried water in the skins of hogs or in canvas bags made waterproof with candelilla wax and fitted with cowhorn spigots and some had women and children with them and they would shoulder the packanimals off into the brush and relinquish the roadto the caballeros and the riders would wish them a good day and they would smile and nod until they passed.
    They tried to buy water from the caravans but they had no coin among them small enough with which to do so. When Rawlins offered a man fifty centavos for the half pennysworth of water it would take to fill their canteens the man would have no part of it. By evening they’d bought a canteenful of sotol and were passing it back and forth among themselves as they rode and soon they were quite drunk. Rawlins drank and swung up the cap by its thong and screwed it down and took the canteen by its strap and turned to swing it to Blevins. Then he caught it back. Blevins’ horse was plodding along behind with an empty saddle. Rawlins eyed the animal stupidly and pulled his horse up and called to John Grady riding ahead.
    John Grady turned and sat looking.
    Where’s he at?
    Who knows? Lay in back yonder somewheres I reckon.
    They rode back, Rawlins leading the riderless horse by the bridlereins. Blevins was sitting in the middle of the road. He still had his hat on. Whoo, he said when he saw them. I’m drunkern shit.
    They sat their horses and looked down at him.
    Can you ride or not? said Rawlins.
    Does a bear shit in the woods? Hell yes I can ride. I was ridin when I fell off.
    He stood uncertainly and peered about. He reeled past them and felt his way among the horses. Flank and flew, Rawlins’ knee. Thought you all had done rode off and left me, he said.
    Next time we will leave your skinny ass.
    John Grady reached and took the reins and held the horse while Blevins lurched aboard. Let me have them reins, said Blevins. I’m a goddamned buckaroo is what I am.
    John Grady shook his head. Blevins dropped the reins and reached to get them and almost slid off down the horse’s shoulder. He saved himself and sat up with the reins and pulled thehorse around sharply. Certified goddamn broncpeeler, what I mean, he said.
    He dug his heels in under the horse and it squatted and went forward and Blevins fell backwards into the road. Rawlins spat in disgust. Just leave the son of a bitch lay there, he said.
    Get on the goddamned horse, said John Grady, and quit assin around.
    By early evening all the sky to the north had darkened and the spare terrain they trod had turned a neuter gray as far as eye could see. They grouped in the road at the top of a rise and looked back. The storm front towered above them and the wind was cool on their sweating faces. They slumped bleary-eyed in their saddles and looked at one another. Shrouded in the black thunderheads the distant lightning glowed mutely like welding seen through foundry smoke. As if repairs were under way at some flawed place in the iron dark of the world.
    It’s fixin to come a goodn, said Rawlins.
    I caint be out in this, said Blevins.
    Rawlins laughed and shook his head. Listen at this, he said.
    Where do you think you’re goin to go? said John Grady.
    I dont know. But I got to get somewheres.
    Why cant you be out in it?
    On account of the lightnin.
    Lightnin?
    Yeah.
    Damn if you dont look about halfway sober all of a sudden, said Rawlins.
    You afraid of lightnin? said John Grady.
    I’ll be struck sure as the world.
    Rawlins nodded at the canteen hung by its strap from the pommel of John Grady’s saddle. Dont give him no more of that shit. He’s comin down with the DT’s.
    It runs in the family, said Blevins.