“Three? All of them heading in the same direction?”
“I’m not sure why they’re on this trail, but two of them are after the map thief, just like us.”
“We’ve got to hurry up and find what’s going on!”
“We’ll be facing three six-shooters. There’s no reason not to believe all of them are fully loaded. Changing our tactics is all we can do unless we want to end the day as worm food.” England Dan spat. “That’s assuming they’d bother giving us a decent burial. More likely, they’d leave our carcasses for the coyotes.”
“What are we going to do, Dan?” Cooley’s voice rose in pitch until he almost sounded like a banshee.
England Dan didn’t have an answer, but giving up now wasn’t in his blood. They faced odds that almost guaranteed they’d die. Bile rose in his throat. Let Cooley hunger after the Lost Banshee Mine. His reason for getting the map back was simpler. It belonged to them, him and Cooley, and nobody had the right to take it.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
LARS JENSEN TURNED the map around, then leaned back against his saddle and lifted the map to match patterns of stars. It took a few seconds for him to stop. There wasn’t any obvious connection between the points and the Xs and the upside-down Vs on the map and anything he saw in the slowly lightening sky. Besides, his arms got tired fast. He half closed his eyes and realized how close to passing out he was.
The blood loss from his wound was worse than he thought. He should have eaten a couple more steaks to help replace the iron in his blood. The vet who had patched him up had recommended some rest before he hit the trail. Jensen knew he was tougher than the doctor thought, but the doc’s suggestion was proving to be accurate. His hands still shook, and riding along in a stupor meant he relied more on his horse staying on the track than he liked. A rider had to be in control all the time. Lars Jensen was anything but in control due to his occasional light-headed wobbling in the saddle.
“Poke’s going to be here soon enough,” he said. Where his brother had gone was something of a mystery, but if Jensen had to guess, he’d gone to Bisbee. Jensen had passed the trail to the copper-mining town around noon. He’d considered camping there and waiting to see if his guess was right, but a nagging thought kept him moving.
“Miners. Them miners aren’t going to give up easy.” He drew his gun and opened the gate. A slow turn of the cylinder showed each chamber was ready to send a bullet into anybody trying to take the map.
If only Poke would show up, Jensen could give him the map and ride out. He’d gotten shot up and killed folks with whom he had no quarrel. That didn’t bother him too much. Everyone died. They ought to have been proud that it was by his hand. But how he had failed to put the killing round into Alberto Gonzales worried him. The lawman had been like flypaper all the way from Mesilla. A small thing like getting plugged wasn’t going to stop him.
“Leastways, we’re in the same condition. It’ll be a right interesting fight to see which of us wants the other dead the most.”
Jensen chuckled at the idea of two invalids facing each other. It made life more vital. The showdown ought to be in the middle of a street, with the townspeople fearfully looking out windows as the two gunmen squared off. A piano player needed to witness the fight to write and sing a mournful ballad. Hands going for their weapons. Both slower than normal because of their injuries.
“I’d smoke him,” Jensen said to himself. “Even all banged up, I’d take that deputy.” He lifted his gun and pointed it at a big rock directly ahead.
“You won’t get the chance. If I had an ounce of sense, I’d pull the trigger. Don’t move!”
Jensen sat up so fast, his head spun. He tried to swing his pistol around, but the dizziness betrayed him. His eyes blurred, and when they cleared, he stared straight at Alberto Gonzales. The deputy marshal had a rifle trained on him.
“For two cents, I’ll pull the trigger. No, that’s wrong. I’ll do it because you’re the owlhoot who shot me.”
“I’m getting sloppy. If I’d paid more attention to what I was doing, you’d be six feet under by now. Or buzzard bait.” Jensen recovered enough to judge his chances of training his six-gun on the lawman as being almost exactly zero. Lying about being the deputy’s attacker didn’t hold water. The lawman knew he had been the one.
Gonzales wore a dark coat, and the sombrero’s ornaments gave the best hint where the man’s head was. The silver beads and sequins caught what little daylight remained. Or maybe it was starlight now. Jensen’s mind spun all around. If he made a wish on one of those doodads on the sombrero, did that improve his chance of ending the deputy’s life once and for all?
Instead of trying, he laid his six-gun on the ground and lifted his hands until his chest burned. “I can’t get ’em any higher. I’ve been shot in the back and patched up by a vet.”
“In Oasis?” The deputy spat. “Their doctor lit out for Bisbee with most of the rest of the town a month or more back. I had to get patched up by a whore.”
“Did you enjoy it?” Jensen came to his knees, then rocked back and forth to get momentum enough to stand. He wobbled about, unable to stop. He hated showing such weakness, especially to a lawman—and one he thought he had already killed. “I hope she charged you.”
“You shut your smart mouth.”
Alberto Gonzales came forward slowly. Every step showed how difficult it was for him to stay upright. Jensen waited for him to get closer. The two could end their feud with a wrestling match rather than shooting it out. That wasn’t as satisfying, but depending on how Gonzales died, it might be better feeling the life slip away as he tightened his grip around his throat.
“You should have given up a long time back,” Jensen said. “You don’t even know what you are arresting me for.”
“Arson. You burned down a store, and the proprietor and his wife were inside. Both of them died. They were my friends.” The deputy’s face hardened. “I hear their screams in my sleep.”
“That’s your problem, then. You’re not dead enough to little things around you.”
“But what the marshal sent me after you for is mail robbery. You stole US mail. That’s a federal crime. Turn about and put your hands behind your back. I’ve got shackles just the right size.” The deputy lifted a set of handcuffs for Jensen to see. The rifle wavered until Gonzales tucked the stock under his arm to steady it.
Jensen waited for his chance. “I know you want the map. Go on. Take it and let me go.”
“What map are you going on about?”
“This one.” Jensen pressed the toe of his boot down on the map.
“What’s it a map to?”
The deputy came closer. Jensen judged how to move. The rifle was held awkwardly. He was more likely to get whacked in the head than shot when the lawman moved to put the shackles on his wrist. He glanced down at the ground. If he pushed Gonzales away and off-balance, he could scoop up his gun, turn and fire. It hardly mattered if he wasn’t his usual accurate self. Hitting the man in the chest would likely be a killing shot at this range.
“You know what it shows. That cavalry-payroll robbery six months back.”
“I don’t recollect any robbery. The army’s closemouthed about the men they lose and anything that transpires on their posts. Stick your hands out behind you and bend forward.”
Jensen did as he was told. This made his play all the more dangerous. Off-balance, he was an easy target. But he dropped to his knees, twisted hard and rolled, fumbling for his six-gun. He flopped onto his back and started to shoot.
The night exploded with gunfire, and none of it was his. For an instant, he wondered why he wasn’t racked with pain with a half-dozen bullets ripping into his body. Then Alberto Gonzales straightened, twisted about like a screw going into a piece of wood and fell to the ground. Jensen poked his gun at the lawman.
“Save your bullets. He’s dead.�
�
Jensen looked up as another shadow-cloaked figure came out of the murky twilight. White smoke rose from the muzzle of a six-gun.
“Thanks, Poke. I was about ready to take care of him.”
“This the deputy marshal from over in New Mexico Territory that’s been dogging your tracks? I heard tell he was dead.” Poke Jensen ejected the six spent cartridges from his pistol and reloaded.
“I thought I’d taken care of him, but he was tougher than he looked.”
Poke Jensen nudged the body with his toe. “Not so tough now.” He slid his gun back into his holster. “You got the map?”
If there had been any question who had saved him, that demand put it all to rest. Lars Jensen slipped his gun into its holster and picked up the map. He smoothed out a few wrinkles and held the map out for his brother.
Poke snatched it away and held it up to peer at it. “You sure this is it?”
That startled Jensen. He squared off in case he had to throw down on his brother. Poke had a way of keeping him confused, no matter how straightforward a thing was.
“That’s the map the miners had. The one named Cooley bought it off a cowboy in Oasis, and he got it from the scum who stole it off Rivera. Or maybe Rivera gave it to him with a dying wish that he give it to you. Whatever the reason, it made its way into Cooley’s hands, and there it is.”
“You kill this miner?”
“There’s nothing to think he and his partner will be any trouble.”
“That’s not what I asked. Did you kill both of them dead?” Poke Jensen hunkered down and put small rocks on each corner of the map so he could study it without the slight breeze blowing it around. He moved it a quarter turn, looked up at the sky to find the Big Dipper, then adjusted the map a final time before running his finger along the dots toward the X.
“I answered,” Lars Jensen said, his temper rising. Poke never thought his brother dealt with matters properly. Lars had reached the end of his rope now. He’d gotten shot in the back, and then Poke had come up and killed the deputy when he was fixing to end the man’s life in a more satisfying manner. He’d been cheated, and it wasn’t fair.
“We have to get through the mountains into New Mexico Territory. From Mule Springs, we can find where Beeman hid the payroll.”
“I don’t want any part of it, Poke. You go on. I’ll ride a different trail.”
“What’s got into you, boy? This is the Fort Bayard payroll we’re talking about. There has to be a thousand dollars in gold coins, gold bars and greenbacks. With Beeman and Rivera gone, there’s no reason not to cut you in for a share.”
Lars Jensen had heard this before. He settled down and looked at the map. It still made no sense to him, though he located the spot his brother said represented Mule Springs. From there, finding the way back into the mountains might not be that hard. All the trouble he’d gone through to get the map should make him a few dollars.
“A share? Half?”
“I said a share. Ten percent’s a goodly sum. That’s at least a hundred dollars. You can have it all in gold coin. Think of having five twenty-dollar gold pieces rubbing together in your pocket. You’d be rich.”
“And you’d take the lion’s share. I want half.”
“You didn’t risk your neck in the robbery. There were a half-dozen men guarding the payroll and we had only expected a couple soldiers. Our ambush went down fast, but it took longer than we expected. We had to blast open an armored wagon, too. Why, we barely got away when a patrol came riding up, blowing their horn and kicking up a powerful dust cloud.” Poke Jensen spat and wiped his lips. “Beeman didn’t get away, I reckon you’d say. I decoyed them away from him when he got hit. You know the rest.”
“They couldn’t prove you had anything to do with the robbery, but they sent you over to Yuma on other crimes.”
“All trumped up, every last one of them. They had no idea how big a desperado they’d run to ground. Look, Lars, see this mark? Beeman put it on the map. It’s a number. It means the distance to go along this here road before lining up the peaks. You’d never know that, and finding the payroll’d be impossible. Me and Beeman agreed on these things before the robbery. We were partners, Lars. His share goes to his ma. She’s over in Hueco Tanks, outside of Franklin. Works in the stagecoach way station.”
Lars stared at his brother. This was the first time he’d ever heard a charitable word from him, a single thought of another’s well-being. It was worth the effort to retrieve the payroll to see if Poke meant it about giving some of the money to Barton Beeman’s mother.
“How long will it take?” Lars felt drained from his encounter with Gonzales. He needed to rest up. Having a hundred dollars in gold would help him find a place worthy of a little vacation. There were several fancy spas farther east in New Mexico. Mineral springs, posh hotels. He’d heal faster taking the waters and eating exotic food.
“As long as it takes. I don’t see it taking up more than a week of your precious time.”
“A week,” Lars Jensen said. “I can afford a week. For a hundred dollars.”
“For a hundred dollars in gold,” Poke Jensen said.
The tone his brother used made him wonder how the week might end. He’d keep his six-shooter close and never turn his back on Poke. He’d not make the same mistake Alberto Gonzales had. Not at all.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
THAT’S GUNFIRE!” ENGLAND Dan Rutledge looked up, startled. “It’s coming from farther up the trail.”
“The two sets of tracks. Whoever’s up there is shooting it out.” John Cooley’s eyes went wide, and he looked around, as if the next bullets would come his way. He got to his feet and put his arm around the mule’s neck. From the difference in the way they responded, the mule comforted Cooley rather than the other way around.
England Dan wasn’t so sure it was exactly that Cooley was right. Or not exactly. The rapid fire sounded more like a six-shooter being emptied. Then there was nothing. With no second gun firing, it was more an ambush than a fight. He touched his Webley and knew that was how he’d have to fight. Shoot first, a single shot, and make it count. But six rounds? Somebody was sorely angry.
“There must have been more than the sneak thief who took the map. If he had a partner, what we heard was a falling-out.” He took a deep breath to settle his own jangled nerves. Sneaking up on one man was possible, even when all his Webley held was a single bullet. But two men? A completely different problem. Then he chewed on what little they did know in a different way.
“This might be to our benefit,” England Dan said. Cooley stared at him as if he had lost his mind. “Two robbers. One kills the other. He’s not expecting us to show up to take the map back. He’ll be careless, thinking his partner was the only one who knew about the map.”
“So you want us to keep going after them? After him?” Cooley looked around a tad wildly, as if hunting for a way to escape.
“It makes sense he’ll be overconfident. He thinks he’s won by killing his partner.”
“Killing his partner,” Cooley repeated dully. He fixed his gaze on his partner.
England Dan read the worry there. If the thief killed a partner, what about the only one with a bullet chasing after the map doing the same to his partner? “You’ve got your knife. We can take him by surprise.”
Cooley touched the blade sheathed at his side. It was nicked and needed sharpening. He was more likely to use it to open airtights than in a fight. “How rich do you think it is? The Lost Banshee Mine?”
England Dan stared at his partner. The question carried an obvious intent. If he hinted that the hidden mine was played out or even lacked vast quantities of gold, Cooley had reason to back out. He’d rather eke out a meager living at the Trafalgar Mine than risk tangling with whoever had stolen the map. For a man risking everything to be a miner, Cooley lacked courage.
Or
maybe it was more complicated. England Dan wondered if cowardice was his partner’s problem or simply lack of faith in his own abilities. Taking risks every day was the life a miner accepted. No one in their right mind pickaxed hunks of rock, lugged them out, crushed and reduced the product and all for a few flecks of color. It took a certain bravery to work in a rock tomb, blow up mountains with dynamite, breathe bad air and endure sudden floods. But Cooley lacked the resolve to grab for the big prize.
“We can both get rich, John. Very, very rich, if the Irish Lord—your Lost Banshee Mine—is half as productive as stories say.”
“Something happened to the old owner. What happened there? How’d the map come to be drawn?”
“Questions we’ll never answer if we let someone else use the map. And remember. It’s your map. You bought it.” England Dan felt uneasy using such an argument to get his partner moving along the right trail. He wasn’t all that sure there was any gold to be had. Secret mines, hidden treasures, all that was the exciting stuff of campfire tales. It sounded promising, but reality had a way of being less. A lot less.
And more dangerous.
“What you say makes sense. All right. Let’s go, but should we wait until morning?”
England Dan considered this. They were tired from riding this far, but the rapid fire followed by eerie silence warned any delay worked against them.
“Let’s ride. Slowly. That way we’re not as likely to ride into an ambush.”
“The shooter is looking ahead, not behind,” Cooley said, nodding. The way he spoke told how he was trying to convince himself he wasn’t being suicidal. “Let’s go, Mabel. Don’t you go making any of those braying noises you are so famous for.”
Lost Banshee Mine Page 22
