Gitano Summer

by Uncle Pahgre

That the Egyptians and the Chaldean strangers Known by the name of Gipsies, shall henceforth Be banished from the realm as vagabonds. – Longfellow: The Spanish Student

Just about the time the gray hairs outwit their youthful counterparts it becomes clear that our memory fades as well. Episodes of youth are shrouded in the pure green paradise of summer, which lasts forever. When I was a boy it never even seemed to get dark on summer nights along the San Miguel. Then the great snows of Depression Decembers amounted to at least twenty feet dumps, not paltry six inch flirtations common to the mountains today. Flooded pastures and crisp quake leaves filled in the gaps of the daily celebration. That’s what some remember, the pleasantries, the simplicity of the Rockies. Others, who were offered the same joys, recall the strife and that’s the basic difference between the old gentleman who strolls the cigar evening, cane in hand and the curmudgeon who sits whining in his wilting rocker, the victim of it all, damning his final hand of cards before the deal is over. In was one of these summers, 1937 or 1938 that Placerville cautiously received the Gypsies from Spain.

For decades our town had been a major railway hub shipping cattle and ore along with hardrocker necessities and food to feed the hungry miners up in Telluride. The rails brought a landed assortment of humanity from bums to bankers. Local cowboys, dreaming they had finally made the big time in Dodge or Abilene kept the local sheriff busy on Saturday nights. Otherwise his position demanded visiting his constituency and drinking their lemonade on the peaceful porches of the San Juans. I had just turned ten years old the night the Gypsies pulled their brightly painted wagon into town. “Watch out, they’re gypsies,” said Mrs. Caldwell from her sun porch, the one built for her by her son, before he left for the trenches of France in 1917. “What do they want here,” she continued, throwing fear into the little bones of her grandsons, moonstruck behind pioneer curtains at the nomadic entourage spilling from the waggish carriage. “They want to sharpen your knives and repair your pots and pans,” said Dr. Twill, the local dentist and the closest thing to a mayor that we had. “They don’t mean any harm.” “I saw them up in Leadville last month and they were nothing but trouble,” quacked another citizen.

“They steal horses and put evil curses on people. They read palms, relish fortunes and sell sugar pill remedies for everything from broken hearts to the gout.” The dark-skinned cargo ascended from the wagon as one copper smith surrounded himself with unfinished wares and began to tune his violin. The Roma children looked around at the bustling little burg intent on new friendships and maybe a little mischief. The men announced their services, quite accustomed to the hostile stares of the stay-at-home world. “Maybe they have whiskey,” said a thirsty Mr. Brennan, who had come across the Atzigan in France in the early Twenties on his way to America.

“They always have bootleg of some sort…and cigars.” “I don’t trust them. Just look at their patchwork clothing,” continued Mrs. Caldwell. “Those horses look too good to be pulling around a carnival wagon like that one. I wonder where they stole them.” Brennan took offense. “We had gypsies in Ireland, but we called them Travelers,” explained Brennan. “Some say they arrived from India via Persia, others said they were the landless ancestors of those orphaned during the Cromwellan Wars of the 1600s. Displaced at best, they wandered my island under the constant scrutiny and suspicion of near-do-wells who themselves had little more than a thatched roof over their heads. I guess everyone has to have someone to look down on so as to prop up their precarious existence…”

“Say what you will, Brennan, popped Carl Perkins, a Cousin Jack from Marshal Basin, “but I’ll be keeping a close eye on that bunch. They’ll steal anything that ain’t nailed down good.” I remember asking my father if he had a nail of two to spare reflecting on treasures such as my fishing pole, my American Flyer and my Joe Lewis photo up on the wall next to my bed. “I tell you there’ll be trouble until we run them out of town,” said Perkins. The patriarch of the Gypsy family couldn’t help but feel the weight of the bucolic reception. He was a veteran of the kind of discrimination aimed at those who would reject assimilation even on the rare occassion that it is offered. People who stay to themselves and jealously guard their diminished culture don’t mix well. The only reason they had ventured into town was to buy provisions, sharpen knives and perhaps trade a horse or two.

“Fine looking horses they’ve got,” repeated Mrs. Caldwell. These wanderers were recent refugees from the civil war that ravaged their native Spain, outcasts from a conflict that had not officially requested their presence but churned up their lives anyway. The kindred’s grandfather had joined the Anarchist Party in 1935 after bold strikes had gained a little leverage for starving peasants in Andalusia. He worked in the fields, harvesting grapes for the wealthy sherry producers around Sanlucar. One day in 1936, after the Nationalists had liberated Cadiz he was taken from the fields by a Falangist gang and murdered in a nearby ditch with about 20 other leftists, who had no politically ideology except their hunger.

The Fascists had no tolerance for Reds, especially low-caste tinkers who joined the unions and burned churches. It was soon after that his son, Emile, sold what little he had and escaped to America with his new wife and the remnants of both families. After a sojourn into the local market, where they traded in services and paid the rest in gold, the residue of rovers wandered back to their camp, set up along the river near Specie Creek. It was there that the local sheriff, bored of cowboys and lemonade, would visit them that night. Emile, who had crowned himself King of the Gypsies (a title confused in the translation from Romani to English) since there were no other Gypsy pretenders in earshot to denounce his throne, greeted the lawman from atop a stunning white Arabian. “Where did you manage to acquire such a fine horse?” he asked. abruptly as Emile’s family watched from the campfire. “Did she just wander into your camp one night?”

“I traded two raindrop colts for her over near St. Elmo,” answered Emile. “I’ve got a bill of sale here…” “No reason to produce a piece of paper what may or may not be legit,” said the sheriff. “Fine horse. I hope you folks ain’t looking for trouble. We’ve got a nice little town here and I won’t have a bunch of gypsies throwing a wrench into things. You can stay until you’ve completed your rounds here but at the first sign of trouble I’ll lock you up and ask questions later.” Emile, accustomed to harsh treatment from the authorities, smiled and said he understood the sheriff’s concerns, adding that there would be no problems and that his family would be gone by the end of the week. That was the same night that Arnold Blackman’s young quarter horse came up missing.

“One minute he was in the corral and the next he was gone,” explained Blackman at the sheriff’s office. “He’s a lazy beast and has never shown the inclination to wander from the bountiful pasture near my cabin. I can’t explain it. Even if he took off he’d surely be back by now.” The sheriff rode back out to the gypsy camp and, interrupting the evening’s music, demanded to see Emile. “We got a quarter horse missing from the Blackman place. Know anything about it?” he accused, spitting chew from the hole under his long drooping mustache. “No, sir,” answered Emile. “You know that horse stealin’ is still a hanging offense in this part of the country,” he frowned. “Now tell me what you know about the disappearance.” With his family dumb struck Emile denied any knowledge of the occurrence. “You’ll be coming with me until you regain your memory,” said the sheriff. “We don’t cotton to thieves around here. Nobody steals nothin. The last time a horse turned up missing there were your kind about.”

Gypsy wagons traveling through Placerville in the 1930s. Always under suspicion due to a tainted reputation, the nomadic Roma survived as smiths and tinkers, often telling fortunes and playing music in communities that tolerated their eccentric way

Emile smiled attempting to take the heat off his tribe. As his children looked on he agreed to accompany the lawman to the local jail, a cedar log shack at the far eastern end of town. And, while his family tried to make sense of it all, that’s where he spent the night. “Your damn right he’s got Blackman’s quarter horse. They’ve hidden it in the woods,” said Mrs. Caldwell. “Lord knows what else they’ve walked off with,” said Perkins. “Sticky-fingered bastards. I say let’s burn them out tonight. Then maybe the big cheese will start to melt.” Mr. Brennan then spoke up. “We’ve got no proof of any wrongdoings on the part of those people. You can’t just…” “No proof!” cracked Perkins sarcastically. “Did you take the horse, Sam or did he just vanish? The Irish don’t steal, or do they?” he pushed.

Brennan just glared back in the face of Perkins, considering his options with the much larger miner. “Sam Brennan is not under suspicion here, Perkins,” said Mr Twill. “The animal could be anywhere.” “He’s somewhere under that gypsy tent,” continued Perkins. “I say we load up, go on out there and see for ourselves.” “Not so fast,” said the sheriff. “If he’s guilty he’ll pay dearly. I assure you. But until we have proof there’ll be no more of that talk.” The whole town was soon abuzz with rumors about gypsies, magic potions and enchanted horses. Some said the nomads had secret powers over the living. Others shuddered that they were in league with the dead, or worse. The sheriff returned from a cross-examination at the jail with nothing to report. “Tomorrow we’ll search for proof and question the rest of his band,” said the sheriff. “They won’t leave the county with their leader in jail. I told that bohemian that he could save a lynching if he came to and told the truth but he denied any connection with the disappearance.”

“Meanwhile I’m out a good horse,” shrugged Blackman. “I don’t trust those people…” “There’s one way to be sure that he won’t steal again,” said Perkins. “I won’t stand for gypsies coming into my country stealing and laying out curses…I say let’s string him up now!” The strawberry vigilantes had regrouped at the Blackman place. The threat of spilled blood was already on their hands. A rope hung on the wall. A man was in the cell. A large cottonwood lingered with wide gaps on its dance card for the evening. “What are we thinking?” sensed Mr. Twill.

“What insanity! If you kill you’ll never be the same people, even if he’s guilty of stealing 100 horses! We must maintain a sense of justice or we’re no better than common murderers.” “Stealing is stealing and hanging is hanging,” chimed in Mrs. Caldwell. “What other choices do we have? I say burn them out and run them down the road. Then we, as a town, can replace Blackman’s stolen mount. We don’t want those people skulking around at the edge of town anyway.” “Running them off is too good for them,” said Perkins. “They need to be taught a lesson. A man dancing from a limb don’t steal. Let’s proceed with a little frontier justice…the terrible swift sword and all…” “I’ll shoot the first man that forces his way into my jail,” threatened the sheriff, adjusting his holster.

“Now you all settle down or the Gypsy will have a lot of company. We’ll pay a visit to their camp first thing in the morning and sort this thing out. I promise that, if the Gypsy had anything to do with this you’ll get your justice. I didn’t like the way he sat on that Arab. If he’s to blame it will give me great pleasure to dispense the law.” Emotions continued to run amuck. Nothing this important had happened in Placerville since the ore train was robbed by those boys from Utah in 1898. The imagined fortune, in reality amounting only to about $100, had left three men dead and one train guard blind. Before that there were Utes to contend with, water wars and bandits from the Disappointment Valley showing up for afternoon tea. Imagine this brash gypsy appearing right here in the daylight and by nightfall a valuable horse is gone. It all adds up. Who wanted to sleep while a felon cooled his heels in the midst of a once peaceful patch of paradise? A slap in the face. No one went home. The hour grew late as a jug was passed around. Talk turned tough, then subsided, then got tough again.

As the dawn approached everything remained on edge. A small contingent of Emile’s family bravely arrived and begged for mercy saying he had not committed any crime. They we’re received by the stares of the righteous intent on an eye for an eye. “You’d better have that horse hid real good,” threatened Perkins. “We’ll be coming your way before breakfast to see what else you’ve been up to. When we’re finished your Gypsy King will be sucking dust.” Emile’s wife asked to see her husband but was denied by a tired sheriff now facing the mob mentality of his neighbors. Twill cautioned against hard talk in front of the children. Perkins countered by calling them little thieves whose daddy wouldn’t be coming home. Blackman appeared with a shotgun which he pointed menacingly at the Gypsies. He ordered them off his land. No one moved.

Everyone was so worked up that they didn’t see the logger from Sawpit leading the prodigal quarter horse into Blackman’s corral. The man’s name was Christy. He was covered in sawdust as he approached the group. “Got another swig of that hooch?” he asked. “It’s been quite a trek from my camp to here. Seems your boy has fallen in love. I found him down by my gate, making eyes at my Appaloosa filly. Didn’t know where he belonged until I did some snooping around. The brand is hard to decipher. Fine looking horse though.” In the early morning light a jury of eyes met and quickly dropped to the ground. No one said anything. Perkins looked at Brennan for acquittal. Mrs. Caldwell busied herself with her apron, yawning about chores and chickens to feed. The sheriff galloped over to the jail to free its inmate. People prepared for the day. Members of Emile’s family shed tears of relief. A terrible miscarriage of justice was narrowly averted in Placerville. A few days later the sheriff rode out to the gypsy camp which had been deserted the morning before. There was nothing there. The visitors had moved on to sharpen knives, tell fortunes, and maybe trade a few horses.