“That’s about it,” echoed another. “The Yaquis hold us up, but it’s the Greasers they’ve got it in for. We get off light—usually. They just rob us. When they catch a Mex, they rip his clothes off and chuck him into the cactus, or cut the soles off his feet and make him dance on the hot sand.”
But the others disagreed. It was merely border tradition that the Yaquis treated Americans better than Mexicans. There was the case of Otto, the draft-dodger, who came to La Colorada to avoid the war, only to be caught by the Indians and tortured to death. There was the story of One-Legged Joe, who went prospecting just outside of town, and of whom nothing was found except the wooden leg, charred with fire. And there was the tragedy of Pedro Lehr, who left his ranch near Hermosillo for a few hours, and returned to find his entire family slain, with the exception of a sixteen-year-old daughter whom the Yaquis had carried away with them.
Pleased at our eager interest, the truck-drivers warmed toward us. Only Dugan remained aloof, grinning a trifle contemptuously. Eustace turned to him:
“What can you tell us?”
“What do you want to know?”
“Well, for a starter, how do you feel when you ride through hostile Indian country on a truckload of dynamite?”
Dugan spat eloquently upon the ground. Then he pointed toward two loaded trucks that stood in the road before us.
“MacFarlane over there is going out to a mine to-morrow. If you want to know how it feels, go along with him. He’s carrying six hundred pounds of dynamite.”
III
Since he put it that way, we sought out MacFarlane.