MARQUEZ MOUNTAIN

From the R.M. Dolin novel, “An Unsustainable Life – The Book of Darwin.”
Initially written as a short story that became the basis for this novel. September 4, 2023

Chapter 1: Marquez Mountain

That Darwin dies in the afternoon is not in dispute any more than his final fade will be along the south slope of Marquez Mountain embraced by del Sol’s last lingering kiss. They’ll find him under that ancient aspen defiantly daring to dangle on the edge of Tender Top Mesa like a seductive dancer concealing charms in darting dashes that amplify life to the level of lore. That he’ll die alone is not open to negotiation; it’s not being dramatic, just acknowledging the consequential nature of how accounts get settled in the still untamed Northern New Mexico wilderness.

At least that’s how Darwin scripts it each time he journeys this dangerously rugged road winding its way up the mountain. Deep dips that bottom out his bumper, treacherous turns around busted piñon he constantly clears, long paralyzing pulls up the barely navigable grades before finishing in the open meadow looming large just below the tree line. Like the proudly possessive appaloosa stallion who greets him with aloof indifference each time he arrives, Darwin’s endured an equally strained struggle to find his place with peace, something he’s reminded of each time his rust-riddled pickup splashes through the elk bog before begrudgingly grinding up the last incline. Every bolt, every gear, every turn of the smoothly worn cam lumbers relentlessly over jagged cutouts and super tight switchbacks first carved into the mountain by Spanish settlers four centuries ago. Cleared by men who understood we’re all ethereally tied to a land that grants and takes life with callous causation. Men who appreciated the way each deeply worn rut and syncopated washboard provide poignant proof that in the struggle between man and nature, man seldom prevails.

The climb can’t be completed without dodging embedded boulders that drift like midsummer snow forcefully ushering Darwin from his primordial forest onto the isolated high mountain meadow that even after years escaping calendar counting, he doesn’t feel he’s earned the right to call home. The dense unmanaged forest begins on the valley floor as a mixture of Juniper and Piñon pine transitioning to tall Ponderosa part way up. As Marquez Mountain rises in ever increasing complexity, the Ponderosa yield to more enduring Douglas Fir and a scattering of Blue Spruce until all that remains to challenge the rugged tree line contours are the Sprue. At ninety-seven hundred feet, the mystic meadow slopes slightly east to west but relative to most mountain terrain, is remarkably flat.

An aspen grove in the meadow’s center contains a quasi-questionable base camp built by Darwin when he first arrived to establish his self-sustaining life. It’s a metaphor for his guiding philosophy, simple yet sustainable, nothing more than a large canvas tent open on three sides sitting atop a timber deck made from lumber harvested nearby. In the center of base camp, between two lodge poles holding up the tent, is a heavy wooden table containing carved inscriptions, mostly in Spanish, dating back hundreds of years. Accompanying the table is a single mission-style chair built by craftsmen without the benefit of glue or power tools. A satellite radio represents the only technology on the mountain. It runs off batteries powered by a solar array leaning against the south facing wall. Base camp’s location was strategically selected so Darwin can catch his all-important Chicago Cubs baseball games without interference from surrounding peaks.

The oval-shaped meadow has an east-west major axis about a half mile long and a north-south minor axis two-thirds as wide encasing 252 acres of the most pristine pastureland in all of Taos County. It’s little wonder one of the last remaining wild mustang herds have summered here for over three hundred years. Locals contend the herd contains Spanish and Arabian bloodlines introduced by the Marquez family before fate intervened. Facing east you’re awed by the grandeur of the Marquez Mountain peak rising another three thousand feet like an impenetrable fortress of jagged rock and year-round snow. To the south is Lost Luck Mountain; named by bankrupt miners during New Mexico’s brief but colorful gold rush era. Geologists still maintain Lost Luck has all the markings of a mineral rich mountain, yet veins remain elusive. Though ill-fated miners never find gold, Lost Luck isn’t without its charms, only now they’re measured in mountain goats, black bears, and hermit beaver. Focusing past the left edge of Lost Luck is the white perma-cap of Wheeler Peak, New Mexico’s only fourteener.

Marquez Mountain was briefly named ‘Te Amo de la Montaña’ by the renowned southwest surveyor, Craig Stevens. A territorial Governor commissioned Stevens to draw choreographed maps in a sinister plot to permanently erase legitimate links to Spanish Land Grants during a dark era of New Mexico colonization when Protestant settlers invading from the east claimed everything they saw as their manifest destiny. Stevens thought the name meant “the mountain that I love,” which he named for the inspiring way God shaped each wind-swept rock and carved out meadow, convinced they represented a parting of a pine tree sea. His misappropriated piety dictated the biblical reference to rationalize requisitioning land from current Catholic heretics. Locals didn’t care much for Stevens or his Anglo arrogance, so over time reasserted the mountain’s Land Grant name as a passive way to reclaim what they consider to this day as their birthright.

The view west from Darwin’s base camp details the spectacularly panoramic Rio Grande Valley. While hard to make out from here, millions of annual spring run-offs carved an eight-hundred-foot crevasse down the center of the flat valley floor. Today the gorge corrals predominately poor west bank Hispanics away from affluent east-siders; a demographic composed primarily of coastal retirees and ne’er-do-well trust-funders pretentiously pretending to be culturally elite.

Distant Taos lights bask the south end of the valley in a soft glow; on moonless nights the even farther embers of Santa Fe illuminate the back range of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains like a high school homecoming field. Not far to the north lies the Colorado border, it’s hard to tell precisely where the two states collide, but there’s no disputing it’s out there with rivals delineating varying demarcations on an as-needed basis. Questa is the only town on the expansive valley floor, a skeletal shell of its former prosperity since the molybdenum mine closed forcing valley residents to use Red River or Taos for employment and supplies.

Accentuating the meadow’s pine tree perimeter are aspen enclaves protruding like white pillars of a Greek Parthenon. Open and inviting, their trunks stretch upward before breaking out in branches replete with broad, multi-colored leaves presenting a mosaic canopy dancing daily in sunlight song orchestrated by gentle mountain wind. Dense evergreen branches interlock in a titan’s chain to form a prison wall around the meadow. Two steps into the forest and the carefree mood of aspen are sequestered by cold despondent darkness, as if each advance lowers you, layer by layer, through the morass of Dante’s hell. One moment the meadow is alive with birds chirping in a cacophony of mountain gossip. Squirrels chat excitedly as they jump from branch to branch in a happy hurry to go nowhere. The modulating breeze melodically moves aspen leaves in syncopated shadows dancing along the rich grass floor. Then, two steps into the barrier and the world becomes deftly devoid of spirit. Birds refuse to sing, squirrels inch along branches with stealth precision afraid of falling further into darkness, wind pries to penetrate but to no avail. Likewise for light attacking from constantly changing angles. It’s not just quiet in this labyrinth of darkness; it’s silence devoid of sound. An eeriness suggesting something foreboding lurks around every moss-encrusted tree trunk.

A large aspen grove anchors the center of the meadow perched atop a mostly flat knoll. The grove draws unabated sunlight from the moment dawn crests over Marquez Mountain peak until the last gasp of day is seductively extinguished below the Jemez Mountains on the opposite side of the valley. At the lower end of the knoll, Claim Jumper and Kismet Creeks intersect, supplementing the aspen with whatever moisture daily rain fails to provide. Kismet Creek is fed from the Marquez Mountain water shed. Initially Claim Jumper ran down the Lost Luck water shed but in the 1800’s miners rerouted it to snake along the mountain providing slurry water for mine tailings before cutting across to the meadow and uniting with Kismet Creek. Once united, Kismet Creek segues through the meadow before disappearing off the southeast edge in a waterfall-laced cascade of descent. Water here is more precious than food, gold, or even life, New Mexican’s like to say whiskey is for drinking and water’s for fighting and through the century’s numerous men, both religiously righteous and villainously scoundrel, have met diabolical ends in nefarious schemes to acquire the rights to Marquez Mountain water.

Locals say the aspen grove in the center of the meadow is where Calvin Kincaid’s homestead once stood and that now, aspen overgrowth honors what happened. If you know how to look, it’s possible to see remnants of his fireplace built from Lost Luck tailings and the less obvious corner stones that were cut from Marquez Mountain granite and hewed by a mysterious Anglo on his way to California who legend maintains was a Free Mason. The Mason spends more than a month at the Kincaid ranch and to this day many believe he carved a secret cave somewhere on the mountain that Calvin used to stash cash and gold he acquired trading Red River miners for meat and lumber. If you kick fallen leaves in the right way, random pieces of weathered wood that once composed the roof, or left-over chunks of unburned logs that once formed the walls of the Kincaid homestead can still be uncovered.

Calvin was a Colorado cowboy working for Mr. Rollins, a hard but fair man who never had children. His expansive ranch was along the foothills of the Rockies just south of Denver. Righteously religious, he encouraged his cowboys to build responsible lives and teaches Calvin to read after Calvin goes off one night about wanting to someday own his own place. Mr. Rollins understands the west is changing and to be successful Calvin must be both a cattleman and businessman. Calvin’s commitment to learning includes carrying a copy of ‘Tales from The Arabian Nights‘, that Mr. Rollins loans him. Each night Calvin painstakingly reads aloud stories of adventure, magic, love, and betrayal in either the bunkhouse or around campfires. The other cowboys tease Calvin about reading romance stories but before long they can’t finish evening chores fast enough to find out what happens next.

While working the range along with four other cowboys, Calvin reads a story about a woman betrayed by a prince. She naively thinks they’re in love only to later realize she’d been tricked into becoming part of the prince’s harem. The story talks about kismet in a way that assumes the reader understands, unfortunately Calvin doesn’t, and it drives him crazy trying to figure out what it means. It gets so bad that the cowboys take to calling him Kismet, but it doesn’t bother him a lick. Calvin’s a soft-spoken easy-going man with a lanky frame and wavy brown hair that never mats down from his hat, but he is not one to trifle with. He’s the son of an Irish father and Polish mother who were both immigrants in New York but had to flee to Kansas on account of their scandalous relationship. Calvin grew up a product of the west, he enjoys playing games, being alone, hunting, fishing, and is more than capable of handling himself in almost any precarious situation frontier life relentlessly presents.

Calvin “Kismet” Kincaid came to New Mexico in the spring of fifty-four to buy horses. Mr. Rollins wants to breed new lines into his herd and learned of a Spanish rancher near Taos producing impressive stock known for their size, strength, agility, and heart. He sends Calvin to acquire eight young mares along with their newly foaled colts. Anso Marquez works the ranch he inherited from his father and his father’s father before that going back three hundred years. Anso bred size into his herd using a thoroughbred stallion he bought from a Kentucky gambler who had a string of bad luck in Red River. Endurance he got from five Arabian mares a wealthy Spanish rancher sold him for next to nothing after realizing Arabians can’t compete with mustangs when it comes to cutting cattle. The Arabians came from Spain by way of Mexico and while valued for their endurance aren’t sure-footed enough for high desert ranching. For agility and heart, Anso has mustangs captured along Colorado’s southern foothills near Fort Garland.

Calvin finds Anso’s modest hacienda at the base of Marquez Mountain by following the Rio Grande from its headwaters in Alamosa to the upper edge of the Sangre de Cristo’s near Taos. Anso and his wife Anna are generously hospitable, they not only feed and house Calvin, but invite him to a Quinceanera at a neighboring ranch. It’s there Calvin meets Anso’s oldest son Carmelo who’s just returned from mustang wrangling along the Colorado border. Carmelo’s strong, handsome, with an easy smile and quick handshake who captures the hopeful admiration of every eligible lady at the party. Women up and down the Rio Grande swoon whenever Carmelo rides by on his powerful roan stallion adorned with a beautiful black leather saddle awash with intricately tooled silver conchos.

Carmelo prefers work to parties but came to the Quinceanera at Anso’s insistence. Feminist today disregard men possessing attributes that make them men, but times were different back then and the softness of Carmelo’s voice coupled with the dignified way he carries himself, causes women to overlook inconsequential flaws. Wealthy fathers of marriage-minded girls admire Carmelo for his work ethic, his integrity, and his ability to recognize good breeding stock; many have already approached Anso with offers. While not as charismatic as his younger brother Jorge, there’s little doubt Carmelo’s destined for a fabulous future.

On the return buggy ride home from the Quinceanera, Anso boasts at length about how the owner of the largest Land Grant, Roberto Garcia, talked to him about Carmelo marrying his youngest daughter, Maria. Roberto has three daughters but no sons. Maria is by far the most radiant and Roberto’s up front about his predicament; his eldest daughter married a man who seemed to hold much promise but turned out to be a worthless lazy drunk lacking character and integrity. His second daughter married well, but at only twenty, became a childless widow. Maria is Roberto’s last hope at finding an heir worthy of taking over his ranch. Even though Maria’s only seventeen, Roberto feels she’s ready to become the wife of the valley’s most promising bachelor.

To certify Carmelo’s worthiness, Anso regals Calvin with his feats of skill and bravery. He tells how Carmelo single-handedly captured a herd of wild mustangs on the Colorado plains and culled out the very best mares, driving them all the way up to the high mountain meadow where he breaks and trains them. Carmelo’s bravery and integrity are above reproach, especially after the incident last summer when four drunken Red River miners take way too many liberties with Victor Ortiz’s teenage daughters who are in town for supplies. Just as things are about to get ugly, Carmelo swoops in and rescues the frightened girls and in the process, kills one miner who comes at him with a knife, and beats the other three so severely they never fully recover. He then ties his stallion to the back of the girl’s wagon and drives them home to the safety of their grateful parents.

Roberto needs a man like Carmelo, Anso argues, to give him strong heirs that can keep his ranch in the family. Anso explains how this exciting outcome creates an unexpected opportunity, with Carmelo on track to take over Roberto’s ranch, Jorge is now in line to inherit Anso’s. Of course he’ll have to talk to Carmelo about this, but why would he object? Jorge though is a different matter, as the second son, he’s organized his life to make his own way with many successful ventures, his latest is selling gold mine claims on Lost Luck to naive Anglos in search of quick wealth. The claims don’t transfer ownership of the land, just the right to mine, which allows Jorge to offer a lower entry price for cash strapped seekers. He stipulates that as the landowner, he’ll receive a ten percent royalty for all gold or silver found, so far none’s been discovered, but Jorge’s wins either way. Anso worries Jorge may not want the ranch, but if Jorge protests, he’ll remind him of his family obligations.

It isn’t in Jorge’s nature to run a ranch, maybe because he grew up a second son, or perhaps after tasting easy money it makes little logic to labor all day for far less. In contrast to Carmelo, who spends his evenings at home or in the meadow tending horses, Jorge prefers the unbridled excitement of nearby Red River, between the bars and cat houses there’s always something to keep him occupied. Anso doesn’t approve of Jorge spending time with the Anglos but he’s making money and since he must find his own way, Anso feels he can’t object.

Calvin stays with Anso a week longer than planned because two of the colts aren’t ready for the long journey back to Rollins ranch. Anso takes Calvin fishing along the Rio and then to Red River for a beer. One day Carmelo takes Calvin up to his high mountain meadow to show off his private herd. While the mares Anso sells Calvin are adequate, Carmelo’s personal stock is clearly superior. He shows Calvin a mouse-gray appaloosa he’s grooming either for himself or for someone committed to starting their own herd. Usually, cowboys aren’t interested in stallions because they’re too hard to handle but when Calvin sees this appaloosa, he must have him. At first Carmelo says no but relents once Calvin promises to someday return to start a ranch of his own. Anso vows to help Calvin find a suitable place even though he never really expects to see him again.

Mr. Rollins, pleased with the additions to his herd, dispatches Calvin to Jenkins’ place to retrieve a group of cows who’ve commingled. It’s a full day’s ride to the Jenkins’ ranch and three hard days trailing cows back. Since trailing cows take so much out of a horse, Calvin brings two others along with his prized appaloosa. On the first night of the return trip two drifters approach Calvin’s camp just as he’s starting supper. Calvin has an uneasy feeling on account of their horses being so stressed and them being out of food but per code-of-the-west protocol he’s obliged to share his campfire and food.

In late night darkness the drifters stealthily start gathering everything in camp when the older thief accidentally kicks the coffee pot startling the still dead quiet. As Calvin stirs awake the younger thief panics shooting Calvin twice in the chest. By most accounts Calvin clearly would have had died if not for kismet’s intervention. Turns out Calvin had fallen asleep with the book Mr. Rollins had loaned him on his chest. The drifter’s bullets slam into the book, stopping just short of the back cover but nonetheless knocking Calvin out. The robbers are long gone by the time Calvin comes to, but bent on revenge and restitution, he tracks them for three grueling days, winding up at a box canyon where the thieves are holed up. Three days of walking, not eating, sleeping in the cold has left Calvin in a foul mood, and all that time stewing over the theft of his beloved stallion doesn’t land him in a place where negotiations are likely. He doesn’t give the thieves a chance to surrender, just rushes camp guns blazing. He shoots the younger thief last shouting something about the ironic nature of kismet. While gathering gear and loading bodies Calvin discovers the thieves’ saddlebags stuffed with money, which leaves him in something of a quandary.

Mr. Rollins helps Calvin deliver the cash and corpses to the Denver Marshal uncertain what his fate will be; he did after all deservedly shoot the defenseless bastards. To justify his actions, Calvin shows the Marshal the bullet riddled book of Arabian adventure. As it turns out the thieves had robbed a bank in Ten Sleep, Wyoming, and not only was a sizable reward offered but the thieves were wanted dead or alive, which means no inquiry into the circumstances of their demise was forthcoming. A local reporter who recently arrived in Denver from Boston asks Calvin why he didn’t secretly keep the cash, after all, no one would ever know. On most accounts, Calvin can’t believe he’s being asked such an absurd question but after staring down this east coaster he simply answers, “it wouldn’t be right.”

Between the bounty Calvin collected and what little he already saved thanks to Mr. Rollin’s stewardship, Calvin’s amassed enough to realize his New Mexico dream. He accepts Mr. Rollins’ offer to remain at the ranch until spring undergoing a crash course on livestock management and bookkeeping.

Back in New Mexico, Carmelo’s falling in love with Maria, who’s hopelessly lost to emotions long before plans are made for their late spring wedding. Anso and Carmelo agreed that after the marriage, Carmelo will move to Roberto’s ranch and have no time to help at home. Anso is of course proud and wants only the best for his son, but he’s also deeply saddened their incredibly close bond will diminish. Carmelo struggles with the guilt of leaving Anso and Anna along with the sadness of saying goodbye to his cherished high mountain meadow. He decides as a parting gesture to round up a large herd of mustangs to provide his parents with cash flow for years to come.

Carmelo ventures into Colorado, finding great success. He’s two days from home and two weeks from his wedding to the beautiful Maria when attacked on the flat valley floor by Texas Comancheros. The marauders wait until sunset, attacking from the west to provide blinding cover in the otherwise open valley. Once close enough to see Carmelo’s magnificent stallion it’s no longer enough to run him off and take his herd. On most days, Carmelo can easily outrun trouble but after a full day of herding strays, his roan’s worn. Realizing escape is improbable and having no place to hide, he makes his stand. Chances aren’t good but if he inflicts enough pain, they might withdrawal. Carmelo kills three Comancheros before their first bullet finds its mark, then, two more quickly follow. Mortally wounded, he continues to fight, taking out three more before the final fatal bullet hit his heart. Falling into his last thoughts, he re-lives his life with Anso and Anna, pictures his perfect high mountain meadow filled with mustangs, and sees the wonderful life he and Maria will never share.

Anso learns of Carmelo’s demise when the rider-less roan races into the hacienda courtyard an hour after dark. Quickly organizing a search party, it doesn’t take long to find the decimated battle ground. Too shocked and heartbroken to think, the search party helps Anso return Carmelo home leaving the six dead Comancheros for buzzards and coyotes: a fittingly worthless decomposition for their equally worthless souls.

Jorge’s awoken by the Madame at his favorite Cat House with news of what’s happened. He refuses to believe; Carmelo’s always so careful and when he gets in bad situations always so brave. After accepting this ugly reality, Jorge must go after the Comancheros to avenge his brother’s death. He’s hell bent on just that when Anso intervenes, desperate to prevent a double tragedy. After heated debate, Anso convinces Jorge that his family obligations trump his vengeful rage, that justice is best rendered letting soldiers from Fort Carson hunt the Comancheros down. With immense personal angst Jorge reluctantly acquiesces to his father’s wisdom.

Jorge arrives at Fort Carson later that morning and is informed the regiment’s somewhere around Española chasing an Apache raiding party. Rather than give the villainous Comancheros an opportunity to slink back to Texas, Jorge decides to ride to Española hoping to intercept the soldiers. On his hurried way down Taos Canyon, he picks up fresh tracks of both hoofed and unhoofed horses, an indication he’s on the murderous trail. The Comancheros are no doubt heading to Santa Fe on their way back to Texas and Jorge tails them to Embudo Station where they’re setting up to ambush the train when it stops to take on water before the long climb into Taos. Jorge stealthily positions himself in the rocks above the Comancheros predisposed to dismiss Anso’s wisdom.

In what can only be described as an unkind act of entropy, Jorge launches his reckoning to coincide with the Comanchero ambush, but what neither group realizes is that the soldiers from Fort Carson are less than a mile away. Once the siege begins, soldiers race into Embudo taking up defensive positions around the perimeter. From his vantage point above the Comancheros, Jorge’s able to pick off several outlaws, including the bandit who put the terminal bullet in Carmelo’s heart. In the ensuing chaos, late arriving soldiers can’t distinguish thieving Texans from justice seeking New Mexicans. While Jorge’s position in the rocks prevents the Comancheros from being much of a threat, he’s fully exposed to the soldiers. Systematically Jorge avenges his brother, each time his Winchester barks, he stoically whispers, “this one’s for Carmelo.” Just as Jorge eliminates the last of the murderous Comancheros, a well-placed shot from a Calvary sharpshooter strikes Jorge in the neck killing him instantly.

These first two tragedies utterly paralyze Anso, the third one about to play out is less violent but equally devastating. With no heirs and little motivation, opportunists swoop in. Anso meekly tries holding on but each time he rallies he just can’t find the will to work. When Calvin arrives, Anso’s in the final stages of liquidation. He’s sold his prized horses and is negotiating with Victor Ortiz on the sale of his land. Victor’s keenly interested in Anso’s eight thousand acres because it includes the two-hundred and fifty-acre mountain meadow along with valuable water rights. Two sticking points in negotiation cause the sale to languish. First, Victor insists that Anso vacate his hacienda because Victor’s oldest daughter, who Carmelo rescued from the drunken miners, is getting married and needs the house. Second, Victor’s exploiting Anso’s desperation by offering far less than a fair price.

Calvin’s unexpected arrival is an act of divine kismet. While Anso doesn’t initially believe the Colorado cowboy has enough cash to buy him out, he hopes to leverage Calvin’s sudden emergence to compel Victor to pay a fair price; maybe even to keep the hacienda that’s been in the family hundreds of years. Calvin’s empathy and admiration for Anso is so great he eagerly agrees to pay the asking price and to allow Anso and Anna to stay on in their hacienda. Calvin convinces Anso that with Carmelo’s roan and his appaloosa they can quickly rebuild the Marquez line. Anso takes great satisfaction telling Victor their deal’s off and in a desperate attempt to secure needed water, Victor’s suddenly willing to pay considerably more than Calvin offered but Anso, being a man of great integrity, honors his agreement. “There are things,” he tells Anna, “more important than money.”

Calvin constructs his homestead on the aspen knoll in the middle of the high mountain meadow to keep a watchful eye on his growing herd. The big threat is bears and wolves; bears seldom attack wildlife but wolves have no such compunction. He chooses the aspen grove because it has easy access to water along with a view of the Rio Grande valley that’s nothing short of spectacular. By his estimate, life’s turning out pretty dang darn good, he has a beautiful ranch, is making good money selling lumber and meat to miners and lately, Anna’s been talking about her niece, Theresa, who’d make an excellent rancher’s wife.

What Calvin can’t fully appreciate is all good Yin is eventually offset by less salient Yang; sinister energy is always in motion; never satisfied or satiated. New Mexico is America’s newest territory and even though the United States signed a treaty with Mexico stating all Mexican land deeds will be honored, the newly Americanized Mexican citizens are learning what every other country and culture who’ve trusted American treaties has learned; namely, they can’t be trusted. Historians assert the blatantly scandalous land robbing era was about Anglos stealing land from Mexicans who they felt were racially inferior. What it was really about though, was western swarming Protestants stealing land from entrenched Catholics who they proselytize were religiously inferior. The same phenomena played out earlier in Texas, only by the time the Protestant thieves arrive in New Mexico, they’ve fully perfected their craft.

Victor Ortiz loses his ranch two years after Calvin moves down from Colorado. A corrupt territorial judge with full capitulation from an equally corrupt territorial governor had declared all per-territorial land claims null and void based on their newly surveyed maps. Then in an act of unmitigated hubris that repeats itself up and down the Rio Grande corridor, land is seized on an unprecedented scale. Generational landowners try to organize but to little avail. As modern American’s repeatedly are required to learn and then re-learn, justice for the poor and middle class is blinded by corruption. The Valdez ranch on the north side of Calvin falls next to bible quoting Judge Pearson who holds public auctions for the newly apportioned land only they’re held in his office without notification. With the Ortiz ranch to Calvin’s south and the Valdez ranch to Calvin’s north in Judge Pearson’s pocket, he sets his sights on Calvin’s eight thousand acres and the priceless water rights they contain.

This creates a dilemma for the zealously ambitious judge. He can’t steal the land outright because Calvin’s an Irish/Polish American with what could be argued within a corruptly illegitimate legal system is a legitimate claim, even if he is Catholic. It’s one thing to steal land from Mexicans and Indians, no one’s overly concerned, one could probably even get away with it on an immigrant if they’re careful. But to steal land from an Anglo-American citizen likely draws unwanted attention, which runs the risk of exposing the entire enterprise. The thought of paying a lowlife Catholic for land repulsed the bible quoting judge but he has no choice, so, offers Calvin what is by all standards for a corrupt judge in a lawless land a fair price. Calvin of course refuses, he has no use for more money and cares about what happens to his adopted family. He also feels strongly that someone should do something about this out-of-control corruption.

Tensions rise all summer as the God-fearing judge goes about acquiring most the land on the east side of the Rio Grande gorge. The more he acquires though, the more that stinky little Polack sitting in his mountain meadow with his precious water rights eats away at Judge Pearson. As fall approaches, the judge is presented with an unexpected opportunity; three criminals stand before his bench facing several years in the newly constructed Santa Fe prison for doing things to a Mexican woman that would have gotten them hung had she been Anglo. The Judge offers these criminals an out, if they’ll perform a discrete task.

It’s not much of a decision so, with minimal fanfare, the Judge arranges their escape from Taos County jail. In the dead of night, the three criminals sneak up Marquez Mountain to the cabin Calvin built in the aspen grove where Darwin now has his base camp. They set Calvin’s cabin on fire and wait for the flames to engulf the structure. That’s when Calvin “kismet” Kincaid bolts out of the cabin with a pistol in one hand and a rifle in the other. He never sees his assassins, only the flash of their bullets speeding from barrel to target. As Calvin lays on the ground bleeding, his expectant bride races out of the cabin. Theresa is shot several times before reaching Calvin, collapsing beside him. Those that tell this story usually say that seeing his beloved bride dead beside him was a pain worse than death. They say that in his rage, Calvin pulls his nearly lifeless body upright and starts shooting at the flash flames that fill his chest with lead. There is some disagreement as to whether he kills any of his assassins on account of what happens later, but those who tell this tale like to say that with his last gasp, Calvin puts a bullet through the head of the man who shot his beloved Theresa. While there’s no way to know if that part of the story’s true, there’s a certain code-of-the-west quid pro quo that mandates tragic stories such as this, end with a fitting form of frontier justice.

The bodies of Calvin and Theresa Kincaid are never found. The official account recorded at the Taos County Courthouse states that Calvin sold his ranch to Judge Pearson for an undisclosed sum so he could move Theresa to San Francisco for a better life. Locals, however, know Calvin and Theresa are buried deep beneath the aspen grove beside Kismet Creek in unmarked graves over which aspen logs were placed to mark the spot the God-fearing judge could later say a proper prayer. Legend further stipulates that the mystic Mason who carved the cabin’s cornerstones also built a stone vault somewhere on Marquez Mountain where the fortune Calvin amassed selling meat and lumber to miners is still entombed. Those that repeat this aspect of the legend are likely to be spotted on Marques Mountain in the summer walking around with ground sensing metal detection technology.

The reason no one knows what happened to Calvin and Theresa is because as soon as the three outlaws escape jail, Judge Pearson organizes a posse to hunt them down. He proselytizes with profound rhetoric that any man who would do what these vermin had done to such an undeserving woman, deserved to die. He skillfully guides the sheriff’s posse to the perfect ambush spot between Taos and the Kincaid ranch. It’s there the honorable, bible quoting, Judge Pearson fires the fatal shots that give the outlaw’s their one-way ticket to damnation. In stories told by the posse, it’s never clear if two outlaws were killed and the third was previously thrown over his horse or if they killed all three. This is why romantics maintain Calvin got his justice.

This necessary history portends the very few constants and far fewer certainties we’re allowed. It’s as certain the sun will rise as such stories need proper closure, whether they be romantic revivals of Arabian adventure or tragic tales of people tied to their land. After twenty-four years Darwin’s still a relatively new character to the Marquez Mountain plot line but understands his requisite role in the code-of-the-west quid pro quo. For you see, Judge Pearson and all the interlopers who came after Calvin never learn to harmonize with the land in ways Calvin, Anso, and Carmelo could. That’s why nature eventually settles accounts; call it the Yin of the Yang, perhaps even kismet if you’re so inclined, but this is the story exactly as locals tell it, which is why Darwin knows his destiny is to die alone in the afternoon on Marquez Mountain beneath the tall aspen where Calvin Kincaid and his beautiful bride are buried. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves, we still have Darwin’s story within the story that needs to be told.