Three-Ten to Yuma and Other Stories Read Online Free

too lazy to swing a pick and build a sluice box. Listening to the tale, Struggles’ rough-grained campaigner’s face would wrinkle like soft leather and a half smile would frame the cigar that was clamped between his teeth.
    But that was while he was still at Huachuca. That was before he met Juan Solo.
    In Soyopa, which is in the state of Sonora, there was another story related along with the one of Sangre del Santo. It concerned Juan Solo who made his home in Soyopa, and very simply, it told that Juan Solo, the Indian-Mexican, knew the exact location of the lost mine. And once a year, they said, he would bring to the tienda a half bar of solid silver weighing one thousand ounces, a weight not used since the departure of the Spanish. And the storekeeper, who was becoming very rich, would allow Juan to purchase whatever he pleased for the rest of the year.
    When questioned about the mine, Juan Solo would smile, just as Doctor Struggles was doing at that very time up at Fort Huachuca, and he would shake his head and walk away.
    They said that Juan Solo was one of Gokliya’s Apaches until Gokliya turned wild and the Mexicans began calling him Hieronymo. They said Juan was lazy by nature and became tired of running, sohe left the band and became Mexican. But changing his nationality did not erase from his memory the mine he had discovered hiding out in the Sierra Madre with Gokliya. And finally, after the Apache war chief was packed off to Florida, Juan Solo was free to visit his secret mine.
    They said he could have been the richest man in Mexico, but his only concern was for mescal and a full bean pot to answer the growl in his belly. Spending any more would have been wasteful. On one occasion, two men resentful of Juan’s niggardly attitude followed him into the range when he left for his annual collection. One came back a month later—with his mind still in the hills. The other never returned. It was a long time before anyone tried it again…but that was when Struggles entered the story….
    In 1638, the Sangre del Santo was mining more silver than any diggings in New Spain with free, Indian labor. But perhaps the Spanish overseers and their protecting garrison were somewhat more demanding than was ordinarily common. The story has it that a Franciscan friar, Tomas Maria, could stand the inhuman treatment of the Tarahumare laborers no longer and so caused them to revolt.
    It is said the Spanish killed Tomas Maria for putting thoughts into the heads of the Tarahumares; and after the uprising, in which the Spanish weretaken by surprise and annihilated, the Indians found the padre’s body and laid it away inside the entrance to the mine. Then they sealed it and defaced the mountainside so there would be no trace of the entrance. The adobe quarters of the Spanish were caved in and spread about until they again became part of the land. The country was restored, and the legend of Tomas Maria’s spirit protecting the mine was handed down from father to son.
    In Soyopa, the villagers crossed themselves when the name Tomas Maria was mentioned. Then someone would smile and say that the padre and Juan Solo must indeed be good friends, and then everyone would smile….
    On a morning in early summer, Juan Solo left Soyopa prodding his burro unhurriedly in the direction that pointed toward the wild, climbing Sierra Madre.
    A month before, Struggles had entered Sonora and started down the Bavispe. It had taken a long time to shake soldiering out of his life.
    He had been contract surgeon all through most of the campaigns, from before Apache Pass to Crook’s border expedition, and in those days he was too busy doctoring to give in completely to the urge that had been growing since his first year in the Southwest. Sometimes the troopers kidded him about it and accused him of knowing every rockwithin a five mile radius of Thomas, Bowie and Fort Huachuca. Struggles took it with a smile because there was