~Chapter 12~

Willy didn't seem to notice RoZita standing behind him with her arms around his fat little body, as he stared off after the retreating horse. She could see he wasn't a dumb kid, and that he was seeing his father for what he really was, the man who'd had the real Zorro abducted and tortured, planning to rape Elena right in front of him and then kill him....

It made her a little sick. She stroked back the cowlick on top of his head, not knowing what to say to him. She looked to Ahmed to see if there was any council he could give to the boy.

"We should take you home to your mother now," he said gently. "Do you know the way, Willy?"

"No," the boy said almost inaudibly. "I don't even know how I got here."

"I know the way," Nestrelda said. "I can take him there on my donkey."

Willy sniffled. "I want to stay with you all."

"It is too dangerous for you, Willy," Ahmed explained. "I believe your father is going off to find help, and may come looking for us. If he sees you with us, he may become furious and try to kill us all, and you may be hurt or killed too."

"But perhaps that is why we should keep him with us," Nestrelda said. "Perhaps if the boy is with us, Carnal will not harm us."

"I don't know about that," RoZita said. "He's unpredictable, and I've seen what he's capable of. Ahmed is right, we should send him home to his mother."

Willy said, "But he doesn't know where we are." He sounded just like a tired little boy now.

"But he may find us," RoZita said. "He saw the camel, so he knows we can't be far away. Maybe the thing for us to do would be to move again...perhaps back to the waterfall and the cave? I think maybe Alejandro could ride now?"

"Yes," Ahmed said. "That is what we should do. The trail to the stream is a little too easy to follow, and I do not think we can take Fezeek there anyway. He is too large and the trail is too narrow."

When they arrived back at the stream, they found Alejandro and Elena asleep together. He lay on his back with her on her side cuddled close with one arm thrown across his chest. RoZita blushed and looked aside, for his robe had fallen away leaving him totally naked in front. Ahmed reached down and covered Alejandro with the robe, and then nudged the lovers both awake and told them the plan. As he did so RoZ smiled to herself thinking the resemblance between the two men did not end with the face. Although, to be sure, there was one very small difference: one was circumcised and the other wasn't.

Alejandro said he thought he could ride now. He even helped get rid of all traces that they had been there, tossing the charred wood into the stream and rolling up the bedding.

RoZita went off by herself to erase something she had written in the sand.

Willy wanted to take the fish's skeleton with him as a souvenir. Nestrelda helped him wrap it up in a piece of cloth. Elena brushed away the footprints in the sand with a pine branch. Ahmed gathered up all the supplies and put them back in the bag. He wished he could give Willy something for a keepsake also. Then he found one of the empty bottles, made of pretty green glass, and held that out to the boy.

"Here, Willy," he said. "Would you like to have this?"

Willy took it silently, and held it up to the sunlight so that it gleamed like a large emerald. "Thanks," he said very softly, lowering his eyes and cradling the bottle in both hands.

"I will miss you, Willy," Ahmed said, then bent and kissed him on the forehead.

"Me too," RoZita said and she did likewise. "You're really cool, you know it?"

Willy stared back at them as Nestrelda led him to the donkey and helped him climb aboard the animal. He sat behind the gypsy and looked back mournfully at the others over his shoulder as they rode off into the woods together until they were out of sight.

Alejandro was a bit shaky on his feet, but he managed to change into a pair of trousers and mount Tornado without much assistance, and Elena rode with him. Ahmed and RoZita followed on foot carrying the supplies. Ahmed obliterated Tornado's hoof prints with a sharp branch and kicked away any droppings. They said very little. She glanced up at his perfect profile from time to time with a little ache inside and thought about her message to him in the sand. Soon she began humming a song to herself and he looked down at her then. But she kept her eyes to the ground, pretending great interest in the ferns and wild flowers on the forest floor. And presently they halted at the sound of a loud cry from Alejandro.

"Carnal, I believe that whack on the head has done scrambled your brains," Hawk laughed as he kicked out the fifth candle flame in a row. "Any fool knows there ain't no camels in California."

"Now you don't know that," Love insisted. "There's all kinds o' crazy stuff here. And it couldn't possibly of been Murieta, I'm tellin' ya, he was tied to a goddamn tree. And if he'd a been there when I seen that damn camel, he'd of laid in ambush and blowed my silly head off. Probably the man ridin' him just looked kinda like Murieta or something."

"Rube swore up and down it was him. Said there was no mistaking, he knows the feller. Not that Rube's the brightest candle on the tree, but--"

"Did he say who the girl was?"

"Nope, said he never seen her before, just that she wasn't Señorita Montero. Said she had on men's clothes and he took her for a boy at first, till he seen her from the side. She weren't no boy with them titties, he said."

Hawk winked lewdly and kicked out the sixth flame. Love walked up to the chandelier and blew all out the remaining candles with one puff as though they were on a birthday cake.

"There, I just saved you the trouble. So are ya with me or not? If you are, then let's not waste no more time dilly-dallyin' around here. My boy's life may be at stake."

"Now just a minute, Carnal, are you forgettin' I'm with the Cavalry unit? I can't just go runnin' off without reportin' in or nothin', you think I want my ass throwed in the stockade for goin' absent without leave? Tell ya what, I betcha I can enlist a whole troop to go with us if I tell 'em it's to rescue your boy. Just leave it to me. I'm sure El Capitan will be very understandin'."

Carnal's face lit into a slow grin. What chance would even Elena's posse stand against a whole cavalry troop?

"What...what is that?" Alejandro looked nearly as white as Fezeek, which was what he was staring at.

"It is a camel, darling," Elena said as Ahmed and RoZita came running up behind them at the sound of his cry. "That's right, you have never seen one be -- why do you look so? You look as though it were a ghost."

"I...I have seen this one before..." stammered Alejandro. "I FEEL as if seeing a ghost…I have seen it in dreams. I never knew what it was, and I forgot the dreams later on. But I swear, this...this white camel appeared in them. I did not know that dreams could be an omen of one's future."

"Strange indeed," Ahmed said. He came up next to Alejandro on the horse and looked up intently at him. "Do you remember anything else about the dreams?"

"No, hermanito...except for a great deal of sand."

Fifteen minutes later they were traveling up the road from whence they had come. They rode at a moderate pace. RoZita once more rode behind Ahmed on the camel. It was even lovelier to sit so close to him now with her body pressed to his, her arms encircling his waist. She longed to run her hands over him, stroke his arms, his chest, his shoulders, his head. The feel of his tush against her thighs was bliss. The oriental costume she wore, though a bit torn and dirty now, linked her all the more to him now.

And she wished to know more about him.

"Are you...alone?" she asked him finally. "You have no other family?" She thought of her own family, stuck forward in 1980. Why, they do not exist now, she thought with a little shock. They have never been born. I am alone in the world also. Only my ancestors exist now, and I don't know who or where they are...

"I have brothers," Ahmed replied with a sigh. "Once we were close, when I was a boy. But I have become estranged from them. They have become high officials in the court, and have been hopelessly corrupted by power. They cannot or will not see that the things they do are cruel and unfair. I believe they hate me now for refusing to participate in their plots and intrigues, that they might even have had me killed if I had not been their brother. I have become a celebrity in Baghdad through my travels and adventures, yet there is no more joy in it for me. Since my wife and child died, I have felt utterly alone and cast off from all humanity, I lost my religious faith, and my fame only brought me misery and weariness. And then...I began to have these dreams. I do not believe they were dreams, after all. I believe they were visions."

He told her about the dreams, and about the visit to the magician.

"And the woman was me?" RoZita said in wonder.

"Yes...although in the vision you were older, since according to the old man it was the year two-thousand in which you appeared."

"Two THOUSAND? Holy cow, I'd be in my FORties, I can't even begin to imagine being so ancient! How did I look? Grey hair and wrinkles and stuff? I must have looked like a hag--and you still sought me out?"

"A few grey hairs maybe -- not enough to notice." She could hear a smile in his voice. "And absolutely no wrinkles. Your hair was darker. But not grey. And you were, ah, a bit plumper...."

"Shoot, I might have known I'd get fat...oh rats!" she groaned.

"Not SO fat." She heard the smile again. "And you were no hag. To me you were lovely. It was not merely your physical features as your, your aspect. Your face was all wistful, dreaming, as though you saw what others could not. As though you saw beyond the greyness of reality and perceived the colors behind the wall. You saw gardens where others saw only waste, or did not bother to look at all. It gave me hope. And so I determined to find you. I do not know why I found you in the year 1980 instead of 2000, but I did."

"Do you think I look better now...Oh nuts, I shouldn't have asked. That was stupid. Don't even answer. I must really sound like a kid." She was glad he couldn't see her blush.

He laughed gently. "I am sure there is a reason I reached you in that year, and for us ending up in this time. There are reasons for everything. My Northman friend Herger once told me, 'You Arabs wish to have reasons for everything. Your hearts are a great bursting bag of reasons.' Yes. I decided there was a reason for my having this vision, and there is a reason for it happening as it did. So I will question it no longer, but let things take their course."

When they finally reached the waterfall and the cave, the women changed back into the men's clothing they had worn before coming out. The oriental costumes were really not very practical.

"I can sense his presence," Alejandro said with a shudder as he stood under the tree where Love had tethered his horse. "I see no signs of him but I can tell he has been here and violated the sanctity of this spot."

"How do you feel now?" Elena asked him.

"A little weak still...but better. I can think more clearly. It is so strange about the camel. I cannot get it out of my mind."

"Do you believe in former lives?" Elena said suddenly.

"No, I think not. Do you think that can account for..."

"The resemblance, and the dreams? I suppose it is possible. If a man can travel through time, who is to say that he cannot have more than one life?"

"Then--Ahmed is myself and I am Ahmed? No, that is impossible. WE are two very different men. I cannot believe it. No, no, no, no, no. That could never be." He shook his head in pitiable confusion, looking off at Ahmed and RoZita who had found the tent where they left it in the meadow.

"You are right. There must be some other reason." But Elena was not so sure.

Nestrelda told Willy about her own father as they rode along on the donkey. She said he was a bandit and a very mean man and when he was drunk he used to beat her and her mother and sisters and brothers. His idea of fun was to pour turpentine on a dog's or a cat's tail, and once he skinned a chained bear alive right in front of his family, and let it stagger about till it fell over dead. When he got killed in a barroom fight her mother threw a party to celebrate.

Willy listened in numb silence. He didn't know why she was telling him all this. He supposed she was trying to entertain him. But it was all pretty scary to him. At least, though, he was not the only one in the world with a bad father...

Nestrelda was a little frightened herself, as she rode in sight of the Love ranch.

"If you come to the house," Willy told her, "my mother might give you some money for returning me."

"I don't need no money," she said. "And I don't think she be happy to see me somehow." She could just imagine what Señora Love would have to say to her husband's former mistress.

She dropped the boy off at the front gate, which she had never been past. He looked up at her as she remounted the donkey for a moment.

"Goodbye, Nestrelda," he said. "I'm sorry I was so mean to you."

"Adios, Willy," she said softly.

"You're cool," he said, then ran through the gate without looking back, the bag he held over his shoulder flapping up and down on his back.

She sighed and rode off, wondering what would become of her now. All her old band dead, her lover gone, and what respectable people would want anything to do with her? None of them were Ahmed. They would never show her kindness or respect, nor would they ever forgive her and take her into their fold no matter what. She would always be an outcast.

Ahmed.... Her eyes filled with tears. He would never be hers either, he wanted that pale Anglo girl RoZita, who was prettier and smarter, and obviously came from better people...wherever the hell she HAD come from.

Through a crystal web of tears Nestrelda saw his unbelievably beautiful face, his jewel-like eyes, his trim, graceful body.... She would go where he was. At least she could be near him. To look at him, hear his voice. To guard and defend him if necessary. What else could she do?

Without even thinking how dangerous it could be, she started off in the direction of the waterfall. She didn't know exactly where it was, but she figured if she stayed on this road long enough she would find it. She passed the lair where she had made her home for so long, wondering what the others would say when they saw her returning. They would not welcome her with open arms, she was sure…

And then she heard the sound of horses once more. Many horses.

It sounded like a whole platoon of them.

She dug her heels into the donkey's flanks to make him run. He trotted down the rutted road a piece, then stumbled and refused to run any more. She tried to steer him off the road into the woods, but the underbrush was too thick, he wouldn't go into it. She looked up at the sky as though pleading with the sun to tell her what to do now. But the sun was very low, almost setting. It would be dark soon. It was like a bad dream. She couldn't seem to go anywhere but straight ahead.

I must warn them, she thought aloud. I must ride on and tell him he is in danger. Carnal probably rode into town to round up some friends to help him. But what will I do...that may be them now, and a donkey cannot hope to outrun a horse?

She wasn't even sure how far she was from the cutthroats' lair. That was the first place they would go. He had seen the camel and he would lead the others there. Then what? When they found the camel gone, might they not follow its hoof prints to the waterfall?

Perhaps if she could get there and brush away the prints they would not be able to follow. Once again she dug her small dirty bare feet into the donkey's flanks but he would not run. She swore at him, then promised him nice treats, then sang him a little song that he liked, then threatened to swap him for a pony, but still he would plod on, as though he could not even hear her.

Finally she dismounted and abandoned him there, calling him a filthy name as she did so, then ran as fast as she could up the road. It was hard on her bare feet but she did not stop until she stepped in a big hole and twisted her ankle painfully, and fell into the road with a cry. She crouched there clutching her ankle, moaning and cursing. The stupid little donkey did not even come to see about her, he seemed in a bad mood and just ambled along. Nothing left to do but mount him again and ride, she couldn't walk now.

Whimpering a little, she limped over to him, seized his saddle and put her good foot into the stirrup and swung her badly hurting left leg over. But he still wouldn't run. Now she could hear the hoof beats, louder and closer. Many of them. More than just two horses, maybe five or six. Or more! It had to be him!

Desperately she grabbed at a limb from a low-hanging tree to use as a switch, but she couldn't break it off and she couldn't dismount because of her sprained ankle. She had a momentary image of Alejandro bound and helpless to the tree and wondered if God were punishing her for her part in that by keeping her donkey from running. It was a just punishment, what some would call poetic justice, she knew. But could He not see she had changed, that she was trying to do good, to try to save the man He had sent to save Zorro? Why did He not help her now?

"I did not mean to be so bad," she cried out, then stilled herself. Someone might hear her. It was not even true, she had meant to be bad much of the time. It was much easier to be bad than good when you were with bad people, and when good ones did not want you around. And being bad could be fun. She remembered this, that she had often enjoyed being mean, took pleasure in hurting others, in snitching things she didn't even need, in outwitting simple peasants and preening herself over stealing another woman's man from her. She would never enjoy such things again. She was not sure what had come over her. But her evil ways were behind her, and now God should show her the way to escape so she could save Alejandro and his twin brother once more...

Now she could hear men's voices and the horses were galloping now, their hoof beats were thunder from the pit of hell. And they were gaining on her, closer...

Finally the donkey became frightened and broke into a trot. But of course it was no match for even one horse, let alone several of them....suddenly she remembered the little pistol in her sash and she pulled that out with trembling fingers. Then hid it. If it were Carnal, she could use his son against him. Tell him she knew where Willy was. Perhaps she could control him that way...yes...

The horses rumbled closer. Looking over her shoulder, she could see them now. Nearly a dozen, and yes, there was Carnal on his brown and white horse leading, and alongside him on a fine bay stallion was a man she recognized as a cavalry officer, Lucas Hawkins, whom she knew by sight. Perhaps he wouldn't harm her, he seemed pretty friendly on the whole. But if Carnal blamed her for Alejandro's escape...