Spooky Texas Page 6

  We attacked that night. Under the cover of darkness the first line of soldiers approached the fortifications, planted scaling ladders against the walls, and climbed up. Many in that first wave were killed, but Santa Anna kept ordering us forward, again and again. Each new wave got further inside the fort, and the Texans were soon overwhelmed by sheer numbers.

  Some of my fellow soldiers were not kind to the Texans. I accompanied General Almonte into the chapel to retrieve the wife and daughter of one of the soldiers named Dickinson, and saw several men tormenting a poor unarmed Texan gunner who had retreated to the chapel once his ammunition was gone. The soldiers were tossing him into the air with their bayonets like a bundle of fodder and then shooting him. I spoke to them sharply as the general addressed the woman in English. Then I followed my general as he escorted the prisoners through the enclosed ground in front of the church, weaving through heaps of the dead and dying.

  At one point, I saw Colonel Davy Crockett, hacked to death by Mexican sabers on the order of Santa Anna after he and six of his men were fought to a standstill by our soldiers. His mutilated body lay between the church and the two-story barracks, his distinctive coonskin cap lying by his side. I hurried past the body in the wake of the general and Mrs. Dickinson, saddened and horrified, but in some terrible way relieved that I was not the one who had fought and killed the brave man.

  At one point, the woman and her child were separated from one another, and the child was handed to me, since it was known that I was the father of several small children. I was instructed to take little Angelina Dickinson—who was just over a year old—to Santa Anna. I cradled the frightened little girl and made funny faces until she giggled, before delivering her safely to the president. Then I rejoined my men to help gather the dead Mexican soldiers for burial in the churchyard. The evening of that fateful day, many of the soldiers brought wood from the neighboring forest and burnt the bodies of the Texans. I stood for a long time at the pyre that contained the body of Davy Crockett to pray for his soul and mourn silently.

  I was part of General Andrade’s battalion that was left in San Antonio when Santa Anna went in pursuit of Houston’s army. We held the city and kept the peace for many days. Then a message arrived telling us of our army’s defeat at San Jacinto and that Santa Anna had been captured. We were ordered to leave San Antonio and return to Mexico, but first we were to completely destroy the Alamo. I was upset by the order, for it seemed a further desecration of all that the dead heroes had stood for. But I was still a loyal Mexican, so I obeyed the high command and with the aid of my follow soldiers, helped carry the boxes of dynamite into the fort.

  The air within the Alamo seemed exceptionally cold that evening, and my hands grew so numb that I could barely hold the end of the box that I carried. I was completely unnerved as I entered through the broken walls that we had so recently breached in battle. My body started to shake, and goose bumps rose on my arms and neck. I knew . . . I knew something was in this fort with us. Something that did not approve of what we were doing. Eduardo, who was holding the other side of the box of dynamite, gasped suddenly and started praying aloud. “Something does not want us here,” he said through chattering teeth. “I can feel the spirits watching us.”

  As if summoned forth by his words, a glowing red light appeared before us, sparking and flashing like the flames of a fire. It swiftly became the light of a flaming torch, and it illuminated a tall, unearthly figure hovering over the ground. My end of the box slipped from my suddenly nerveless fingers, and I staggered back in alarm. Eduardo dropped his half of the box and turned tail and ran back the way we had come. But my legs felt like jelly, and I could not run. For a long, timeless moment I looked into the eyes of a tall man with a crooked grin and a coonskin hat. He held his flaming torch high, as if it were a symbol of freedom, and I thought I heard him say: “Remember.”

  From the corner of my eye, I saw that the spirit was not alone. There were other Alamo defenders with him, holding torches and guns, glaring at the intruders who dared threaten the fort in whose defense they had given their lives. Around me, the soldiers assigned to destroy the fort cried out in alarm when they saw the ghosts. I heard one of the ghosts cry: “Harm not these sacred walls.” All around me, soldiers dropped their boxes and cowered back in mortal dread of the glowing figures with their flaming torches and fiery eyes.

  REMEMBER

  At that moment, Eduardo came racing back and grabbed my arm urgently. At his touch, I found myself able to move. Tearing my eyes from the man in the coonskin hat, I ran from that haunted place, urged on by Eduardo. Then everyone was running for their lives. The sound of pounding feet and gasps of fear told me that the other soldiers were not far behind me and Eduardo.

  By the time we reached our commanding officer, no one could speak. As the highest ranking soldier in the outfit, it was up to me to gabble out a report. Fortunately for me, the colonel took one look at our terrified faces and believed us. Within a few hours, the story was all around the city, and there was not a soldier in the Mexican Army who would set foot in the Alamo to destroy it, even on threat of death. With Santa Anna captured and the Mexican Army in disarray, our superiors decided a fast retreat was better than lingering in the city, trying to obey orders against the wishes of the valiantly slain. So we packed up and headed back to Mexico, leaving behind the Alamo and her ghosts.

  One of the stories circulating through the ranks as we headed for home was that the Texans, in the battle of San Jacinto, had used the Alamo as a rallying cry: “Remember the Alamo!” This cry had spurred the Texans on to victory as nothing else ever could. When I heard this story, in my mind’s eye I once again saw a tall, glowing figure with a coonskin hat and a wry grin, and I heard him say: “Remember.” And I knew I always would.

  PART TWO

  Powers of Darkness and Light

  13

  White Wolf

  ELROY

  She snapped awake suddenly out of a deep sleep, every muscle tense, ears straining. What had she heard? Something was out of place, and the thought terrified her. She kept very still, barely breathing as she listened for the sound that had alarmed her. The house was silent. There was not even the soft sigh of the wind against the weathered boards of the farmhouse.

  Then it came again. Sniff, sniff, sniff. A quick snuffling sound down the hall, near the front staircase. Pad, pad—click, click. It sounded like the paws of a giant creature. Pant, pant, pant. Soft sounds. Menacing sounds. Some animal—a large animal—was in the house with her.

  Hide, hide. The instinct screamed at her to burrow under the covers, slide under the bed, tuck herself into her closet. Find somewhere safe to hide. Electricity screamed through every nerve, making her body sing with awareness and tense fear. But her mind ran quicker even then the lightning shafts tensing her body for action. If she stayed in this room she would be trapped with the creature. There was nothing to fight it with. Tennis rackets, baseball bats, old lengths of pipe—these were all out in the shed, not in her far-too-pristine bedroom with its pink ruffled femininity and display of stuffed animals still proudly sitting on a shelf over the desk.

  Pant, pant, pant. Click, click. The creature was getting closer now, stalking her. Its breath came faster as it approached, and instinct told her that when it found her, it would kill. It had smelled her. It knew she was here, alone in the large house while her parents lingered long over their anniversary dinner.

  Before her conscious mind connected with a thought, her body already had her slipping out of bed, nightdress fluttering around her as she sped through the connecting bathroom, out the door at the far end of the hall, and down the back staircase. She heard a soft growl and then the sound of animal feet pursuing her as she raced down the steps so fast she almost fell, leaping over the last four. She sank nearly to her knees at the impact with the kitchen floor, then terror led her past the cupboards with their too-dull butter knives to the back door. She fumbled with the handle, her straining eyes glancing
in the glass of the windows for a horrible, curious moment to see what it was that was stalking her. She caught a glimpse of maddened red eyes over a narrow white snout. Pricked ears. And white speed. A wolf. A giant wolf. The door swung open and she was through, but it was caught before it latched by the body of the beast.

  Then she was running, running through the cool, dark autumn night. Get to the tool shed, her brain screamed. Get a baseball bat. A tennis racket. Something to hit it with. But her feet were already skidding to a halt, changing direction as soon as the shed came into view. It was padlocked. Her father had decided to lock it this night of all nights, since a rash of petty thievery had overtaken their neighborhood. Her legs were even faster than her conscious mind, which was so numb with terror that she couldn’t keep up. They had turned her body and she was racing away around the house, the terrifying almost-silent sound of the creature’s pounding feet and panting breath loud in her ears. The shivering of her spine told her that it was close behind. Almost, she could feel the hot, humid touch of its breath on her body as she ran.

  WHITE WOLF

  Faster, faster, she commanded her legs, gasping desperately against the fear choking her, against the stitch forming in her side. Run around the house and down the driveway. Over to the neighbor’s house. She turned the third corner of her house, and realized she’d never make it across the street in time. The wolf was too close. Perhaps she could run back inside and lock the creature out. But how could she keep it out when she had no idea how the white wolf had gotten inside? And the creature was gaining on her. She felt it snap at her back leg, felt the sting of teeth scraping calf muscle, and put on speed. Around one more corner to the front of the house. Then it veered away from her suddenly, and her heart pounded with hope. Maybe it had heard her parents’ car! She kept running, around the last corner to the front of the house, past the rickety old well house that her father always promised to tear down and never did.

  The wolf was there, springing upon her from the top of the well house, teeth ripping, tearing out her throat in a single brutal moment. Her mind screamed in shock, but she had no voice left to echo the horror drumming through every cell in her body as her brain functions dulled. She felt her body thud to the ground, borne down by the weight of the white wolf, but the impact did not register. Nor did the continuous tearing of its teeth against skin and muscle and bone. It was eating her, she thought dispassionately as the blackness fell across her vision. But she had no voice left to scream.

  She woke suddenly as her shoulder was shaken by trembling hands. She looked up into the frightened face of her mother, her father hovering just behind. “Celia, what’s wrong, honey? Did you have a bad dream?”

  Celia leapt into her mother’s arms, sobbing incoherently about a wolf and no throat and the old well house. Her mother couldn’t catch the whole story; nor did she try. She just soothed Celia, and her father got her a hot drink. Finally she went back to sleep, reassured because it had only been a dream after all, and her parents were sleeping in their bedroom down the hall.

  Everything was completely normal the next day, her parents’ anniversary. Breakfast was normal, school was normal—though her friends remarked upon her paleness and tendency to gasp and jump at the least little noise—and the ride home from school on her bike was normal. All was well, until the moment her mother reminded Celia over milk and cookies that she and Celia’s father would be going out that night again to celebrate their anniversary. Celia turned milk-white. In her dream, the white wolf had come to kill her while her parents were out celebrating their anniversary! She started shaking, and, to her own shame, heard herself begging almost hysterically for her mother not to go.

  Celia’s mother was impatient with this childish behavior. After all, Celia was sixteen, not a baby. She had her parents’ cell phone number, and the neighbors were nearby. She had been left alone many times before; had even babysat for the neighbor’s children. Celia allowed herself to be shamed into staying home that night, alone in the big house that had never frightened her before. But she had never had such a dream before, either. The thought of the coming of the white wolf terrified her.

  She locked herself into the house as soon as her parents left, checking every door, every window, carrying her father’s old baseball bat with her for protection. She knew it was silly, but she kept looking out the windows, trying to see if anything . . . if it was coming. Once she caught a glimpse of white, and her heart almost stopped in terror until she realized it was the reflection of her own face in the window. She laughed shakily then and went up to bed. Just before she turned off the light, she set the baseball bat carefully against the foot of her bed where she could easily reach it. Then she rolled over to sleep. As dark fog descended over her mind, she ignored the small thumping and bumping sounds the baseball bat made as it fell to the floor and rolled under her bed.

  She snapped awake suddenly out of a deep sleep, every muscle tense, ears straining. Then she heard the tinkling of falling glass from a broken window, and the snuffling sound of a snout pressed to the floor. Pad-pad-pad went large feet as they negotiated the stairs. It was the sound of a hunting wolf. Werewolf, her treacherous mind corrected her in a calm, clinical way. It was a werewolf. Real wolves did not break into houses when there was plenty of game outside for them to eat. She could hear the click-clicking of the creature’s claws on the wooden floor. The musky, foul smell of wet animal fur combined with the meaty breath of a carnivore drifted faintly into the room, making her gag.

  But she was ready this time. The dream of the previous night had warned her. Trying to stay calm, she reached for the baseball bat at the foot of her bed. Her fingers grasped empty air, and she felt the first seeds of panic grip her. For a moment, she felt the blood thundering in her veins, felt her skin go clammy with fear. Where was the baseball bat? She could hear the werewolf’s panting breath right outside her bedroom, dimly see the door handle turning as the clever creature pawed at it. The stench of meat-breath and animal sweat filled the room. She felt panic grip her, remembering suddenly the thud of the falling bat as she fell asleep. There was no time to search for it now. No time!

  Her body was already out of bed, nightdress fluttering around her as she sped once again through the bathroom and down the back stairs. She heard a soft growl and then the sound of animal feet pursuing her as she raced down the steps, nearly collapsing onto the kitchen floor as she tore open the back door. A glance at the window beside her showed a reflection of the werewolf leaping down the last few steps behind her.

  Then cool autumn air smacked against her face, her bare legs, her skin. Her feet screamed in protest as she ran painfully across the sharp gravel driveway toward the tool shed. And skidded to a halt a second time at the sight of the padlock. The huge, red-eyed wolf was between her and the driveway now, stalking toward her with every hair on its white coat standing erect, forming a great white ridge running the length of its back. The cold wind pierced her skin as she turned and fled around the side of the house. She gasped as the white wolf howled and took off after her. She could hear the terrifying sound of the creature’s pounding feet and feel its hot, panting breath against her thin legs, exposed by her short nightgown.

  Faster, faster, she commanded her legs, gasping desperately against the fear choking her, against the stitch forming in her side. Run around the house and back down the driveway. She felt the wolf snap at her back leg, felt the sting of teeth, felt hot blood pouring down. She put on speed. Around one more corner to the front of the house.

  The wolf veered away from her suddenly, and she felt a rush of hope. But then she remembered the trap at the well house from her dream and whirled around to run back the other way, away from the trap. She couldn’t hear the wolf now, couldn’t see it in the cloud-darkened night. She kept running, this time back toward the locked tool shed. To her intense relief, she saw headlights pulling in to the bottom of the long driveway.

  Then her heart stopped in panic as the headlights illuminated
the shape of the white wolf balanced on the porch railing right in front of her. It sprang upon her, huge teeth tearing, ripping into her throat as she fell to the ground under the weight of its body in the pool of light created by the approaching car.

  14

  Madstone

  SOCORRO

  It was one of them gorgeous sunsets you only get in Texas, with streamers of purple and pink clouds with golden edges and rays shooting out everywhere. I’d have stopped to admire it, but them doggone longhorns were acting as ornery as cattle could, going this-away and that-away, never staying on the trail for more than a minute or two. There were about twenty cowpokes riding in our outfit, and all of us had been having trouble with the devilish critters today.

  That evening, my pal Diego and I were at the back, and we were kept almighty busy rounding up the gol-durn strays while the others forged ahead. We knew there was water close, and I could tell the moment the cattle smelled it, ’cause they suddenly straightened out and put on some speed. None of them went astray once they felt the moisture in the air.

  Above us, the blazing sky slowly turned from golden to a deep saffron blue—that’s what my gal Nellie calls it when it gets dark and the first stars come out. We finally got the gol-durn herd down to the springs after some fancy riding and a lot of cussin’. Once they were watered and settled down for the night, we sort of collapsed around the campfire, ready for some grub. Billy, who was camp cook for the outfit, had gotten started straight away, and soon had us sipping coffee and eatin’ beans.