The Badlands Trail

by Lyle Brandt

  He didn’t cock the Colt yet, though his thumb was ready on its hammer, index finger tucked inside the weapon’s trigger guard. He’d schooled himself to draw and fire instinctively, but riding up on trouble with his gun in hand—if there was trouble to be met—gave him an edge.

  Of course, nocturnal prowlers might just have the same idea.

  They might have him outnumbered and outgunned.

  He reached the spot where maybe-movement had attracted his attention. Compañero sniffed the night breeze, snorted once, and then stood still. Scanning the brush, Bishop saw nothing to alarm him, nothing man- or even mouse-sized moving through the dark. Regarding tracks, he’d need a lantern to survey the ground and wasn’t packing one.

  So, maybe nothing.

  Bishop spent another moment watching, waiting, ears pricked to the prairie night, but all in vain. When he was satisfied that no threat lay in wait for him, he put his Colt away and clucked to Compañero, moving on.

  * * *

  * * *

  TOO CLOSE FOR comfort, Amos Finch decided, letting pent-up breath escape his straining lungs. Rising from where he’d hidden when the drover nearly spotted him, he sheathed his skinning knife and eased back through the darkness, waddling in a crouch until he’d put a hundred yards between him and the herd, finding his grulla gelding tethered to a blackjack pine.

  Pulling his knife had been a reflex action. Finch could easily have dropped the cowboy with his Schofield .44 revolver, but that would have brought the other trail hands down on top of him, five shots left against at least a dozen guns.

  To hell with that.

  Finch could be reckless when his blood was up, and understood that, but he didn’t mean to die before his time—whenever that might be—if he could put it off.

  This was the second night he’d sniffed around the northbound herd, not knowing who the boss man was or where they’d come from, caring even less. To Amos Finch, a trail drive was an opportunity for profit, making off with any animals that he could sell, no questions asked. Cattle were good, but there were too damned many of them in this herd for Finch to grab enough of them that it was worth the risk.

  Now, horses, on the other hand . . .

  He’d counted riders on the drive and checked out their remuda when they’d stopped last night. Thirty-some prime mounts he’d have no trouble selling in Arkansas, the Texas Panhandle, maybe across the Rio Grande if he felt like a long ride down to Mexico.

  And once the sale was made, there’d come the sharing up.

  Aside from Finch, there were six others in his gang, all thieves and cutthroats. Four of those were white, like Amos, while the other two were Mexicans with “Wanted” posters out on them back home. Six surefire killers, counting Finch, and one convicted rustler who’d escaped from custody before a sheriff in New Mexico could string him up.

  Division of their spoils should be as usual, one-third for Finch, the rest of it split up six ways. If they pulled down a thousand dollars, say, he’d have $334, rounding it up, each of the others pocketing $111.

  That was about the limit of Finch’s arithmetic, but if some others didn’t like it, he could always thin their numbers. Knock off one, the other shares increased to $133.20 and so on.

  Fewer mouths to feed meant more for Amos Finch, and that was all he had to know.

  Well, not quite.

  Before anyone got anything, he’d have to hatch a decent working plan, and there was no time like the present to begin.

  * * *

  * * *

  HOW MUCH LONGER, do you figure, till we cross the line into Missouri, Bill?”

  Gavin Dixon had an answer roughed out in his mind, but sitting with his foreman by the campfire, sipping strong black coffee out of metal cups, they needed something to talk about until they both turned in.

  “To reach the border,” Pickering replied, “another two weeks if we don’t run into any trouble. If we do . . .”

  He let it trail away and sipped his steaming brew. The coffee wouldn’t keep Dixon from sleeping through the night, but he’d remain alert enough to pick up on the first hint of a problem with his stock while they were bedded down. One of the side effects of bossing any trail drive that he’d ever been a part of, going back to when he was a teenager.

  “I hear you,” Dixon said. “I want to bypass Joplin City, if we can. Don’t want our drovers getting liquored up and mixing with those miners, much less cardsharps and fancy ladies.”

  “That could be a hitch, all right,” said Pickering.

  Joplin City, occupied by lead miners and those who serviced them, was named for a parson who had tried to save their wayward souls some twenty years before the Civil War. Once upon a time it had been “Union City,” signifying merger of the mining camps that sprouted up along Joplin Creek Valley, before dreamer Patrick Murphy filed a city plan and named it for himself. That didn’t stick, and later on the growing settlement was christened after Reverend Harris Joplin, dead these many years and pretty much forgotten by the folks he’d left behind.

  The pastor wouldn’t recognize Joplin today—or, if he did, would likely call down fire and brimstone on the nest of smelters, rough saloons, and brothels that bore witness to his fading memory. Today there were some seven thousand full-time residents in Joplin, a majority of them men still mining lead, still single, working shifts around the clock by lamplight, blowing off what steam remained to them when they returned aboveground at ramshackle pleasure palaces, outnumbering the city’s churches ten, maybe fifteen, to one.

  That would attract trail-weary cowboys, naturally. Dixon had discussed it with them once already, but he would reiterate the ground rules when they’d closed the gap to one day’s travel. His hands were free to spend their pay however they desired, but only when it was their time to waste, not his. He wasn’t bailing any drunks or brawlers out of jail, much less advancing anyone’s pay.

  Bill Pickering, his coffee almost gone, was still computing miles that lay ahead of them. “Once we’re across the border,” he observed, “we’ve got another four weeks, easy, till we hit St. Louis. That’s if nothing holds us up, o’ course.”

  “Of course,” Dixon agreed. “And wouldn’t that be nice?”

  A veteran of many drives, both as a drover and the boss, he’d never seen one yet that ran according to a master plan without some unexpected hurdles to be cleared. He hadn’t liked the clouds that afternoon, maybe a storm front building up to the northeast. They might mean rain, or even lightning that could spook a herd into stampeding. Hell, he’d even seen bolts from the heavens fry a steer from time to time—and once, a grim surprise, take down a horseman on the open prairie up in Kansas, three days out of Dodge.

  So, maybe rain and maybe worse, or it could still be snow. Forget the fact that it was April. Freakish weather came around when least expected, never welcomed by dirt farmers, cattlemen, or anybody else, and there was nothing they could do but drive the herd on through it, holding to whatever schedule nature might allow.

  “Shift change,” said Pickering, checking his pocket watch to verify that drovers from the first night shift weren’t skimping on their duties. “Reckon I’ll be turning in, boss.”

  Dixon was about to second that when one of his hands stepped into the firelight, still trailing his mount before he dropped it off at the remuda for a rest. Dixon immediately recognized the snowflake Appaloosa and matched it to the drover’s face.

  “Toby,” he said in greeting. “Something on your mind?”

  “Yes, sir,” Bishop replied. “It’s likely nothing, but I thought you ought to know.”

  * * *

  * * *

  IT WAS CLOSE there for a second, but he didn’t see me,” Amos Finch assured his men.

  “Good thing for you, ese,” Jaime Ybarra said.

  “Good thing for all of us,” Reed Dyer chimed in.

>   “Easy as pie,” Finch said. “The bum never came close.”

  Okay, that wasn’t strictly true, but why raise apprehension for his men, who were erratic at the best of times, easily thrown off stride. The kind of thugs that he’d recruited were, by definition, hell-raisers and misfits, always contrary and sometimes cowardly. The last thing Amos needed was to give them any reason to back out.

  “So, when you plan on hitting them?” Bert Fitzer asked, before he scooped more beans and rice into his maw.

  “There’s no rush,” Finch replied. “We’ve got a couple weeks, and likely more, before the herd gets to Missouri. I just want to eyeball them another night or two, get their routines down, then we’ll make our move.”

  The faces ringed around him in firelight were dissolute, world-weary, from the late teens to early forties in age. Most of them had been in jail at one time or another. Those that hadn’t done time yet were either lucky or were faster on the draw than any lawmen who had tried to take them in. None would have raised an eyebrow in a gambling hall, saloon, or whorehouse, but they’d all stand out like sore thumbs in a Sunday congregation.

  Finch’s second in command was Shelby Gretzler, thirty-one, an inch taller than Amos but a few pounds lighter. Fitzer was a redhead, freckled, also in his thirties. Dyer was in his early forties, with a harelip some sawbones had tried to fix in childhood, leaving him with a speech impediment that prompted fits of rage whenever some fool joked about it to his face. Earl Mullins might have been their oldest, but he swore the gray had started showing in his hair when he was just a sprig. The Mexicans, Ybarra and his sidekick, Mariano de la Cruz, were cutthroats from Juárez and looked enough alike for rednecks to mistake them for brothers.

  Six thieves, drunkards, and killers, temporarily allowing Finch to lead because his reputation put them all to shame, at least until some bigger, tougher hombre came along.

  Between them, they had guns enough to start a small war, but Finch hadn’t planned their current job to be a bloodbath. It was different from taking down some small town’s bank, where it made sense to let a few rounds off at the beginning, cow the locals, maybe even kill one or two of them to make the point that they could get along without a sack or two of gold.

  By contrast, tapping a herd was stealthy work; going in at night and stealing stock without a lot of racket, slipping off into the dark with animals enough to sell for profit.

  “We’re still just goin’ after the remuda?” Mullins asked.

  Finch nodded and leaned across to pour himself another cup of coffee from the tin pot on the fire. “It’s like I told you. Too much trouble drawing steers away without stampeding them or catching lead from the night watch.”

  “I like a nice stampede, me,” Mariano said, and chuckled to himself.

  “It ain’t good business,” Finch reminded him. “They keep their mounts tied up together, so they don’t stray in the dark. We slip in, cut the line, and lead them off. Be quiet doing it, and there’s a chance to pull it off without them noticing.”

  “And if they do,” said Gretzler, “all but three or four of ’em will be on foot.”

  “Still shooting at us, though,” Dyer reminded them.

  “That’s where the quiet part comes in,” Finch said. “But if we’re under fire . . .”

  “We shoot back, right?” asked Mullins.

  “Same as always,” Finch assured him.

  “Shoot to kill?” asked Fitzer.

  Nodding, Finch responded, “Is there any other way?”

  * * *

  * * *

  I’M HEARING THAT you didn’t really see this whatever-it-was,” the foreman, Pickering, remarked.

  “That’s true enough,” Bishop allowed. “It started with a feeling, then there was a shadow, something moving, but I never got a look at it.”

  “Coyotes?” Gavin Dixon asked him.

  “Could’ve been, boss. But I haven’t heard them calling any night so far.”

  “We’ve got a waning crescent moon tonight,” said Pickering. “On top of that, coyotes put a lid on all that yipping when they hunt.”

  “Makes sense,” Bishop acknowledged. “But the shadow, what there was of it, seemed . . . bigger, somehow.”

  “Just this shadow, though,” Dixon replied. “When you rode up on it, you saw nothing?”

  “Maybe I wasn’t quick enough.”

  “You felt no need to shoot, though.”

  “No. I didn’t want to spook the herd or ruin anybody else’s sleep until I had a clear target.”

  “And as it is . . .” The boss had made his skepticism plain enough, without elaborating further.

  “Right. I said it might be nothing, boss.”

  “You did. And since you tipped off the new shift, which was the right thing, you can pack it in and put your mind at ease.”

  “Yes, sir. Good night to both of you.”

  “And you,” said Dixon.

  Pickering sat staring at the fire and kept his mouth shut, likely pondering another cup of coffee, but he hesitated when his hand was halfway to the pot and drew it back.

  Bishop retreated to the place where he’d deposited his bedroll after he unsaddled Compañero, lightly tethered him with tallgrass all around to graze on overnight. The snowflake Appaloosa knew when it was time to sleep and Bishop left him to it, thinking of himself now that their working day was done.

  Or so he hoped, at least. If he had missed a lurker in the night . . .

  Forget about that now, he thought.

  Tents weren’t carried on a cattle drive, due to their extra weight and taking up space better used for packing food. A cowboy’s saddle served him as a pillow, and Toby’s bedroll consisted of a rubberized ground sheet and a wool blanket. That was better than what drovers called a “Tucson bed,” meaning no pad beneath them and no blanket over top.

  Keeping his saddle close wasn’t for comfort only. If any kind of problem roused him in the night, Bishop would need to mount up in a rush, no wandering around in darkness looking for his tackle. Like most other cowboys he had known, Bishop had spread his lariat around his open bedroll, hoping to keep snakes away from him. That might be simpleminded superstition, but he’d learned to do it as a youth, and he’d been spared from rattler bites so far.

  If something worked, why change it?

  In final preparation for shut-eye, Bishop took off his boots and stood them upright to his left, decreasing odds that some nightcrawler would climb into one of them. Next, he removed his gun belt, curled it within reach of his right hand, his holster’s hammer thong released. The Winchester was tucked under his blanket, right hand resting lightly on its walnut stock and well back from its trigger.

  Now all Bishop had to do was shake the nagging sense that something—or someone—was watching from the outer darkness, sizing up potential prey.

  * * *

  * * *

  I’M NOT SO sure about the boss,” Mariano de la Cruz remarked, keeping his voice pitched low to stop it from carrying.

  “He’s just another loser gringo,” said Jaime Ybarra in reply.

  “I think he’s more than that. Maybe a fool who’ll try cheating us.”

  Ybarra tilted the bottle in his hand to take another swallow of mescal before he passed it back to Mariano. “How he’s gonna do that when we’re with him all the way? We get the horses, kill anyone who tries to stop us, then we sell ’em. Stand right there and watch him count the buyer’s money out. We take our share and go our own way if you still feel bad about it.”

  “But suppose he tricks us? Leads us into an ambush, eh?”

  “Who has he got to ambush us?” Ybarra asked. The liquor had begun to make him feel light-headed, which was, after all, the point of drinking it.

  “He don’t need anyone but who we’ve met already,” Mariano said. “Five gringos agains
t two of us. You know damn well that none of ’em like Mexicanos, eh? They won’t think twice about killing us and splitting up our shares amongst themselves.”

  “That’s if we let them,” Jaime said, grinning.

  “You got a better plan, then?” Mariano prodded him.

  “Maybe I do,” Jaime answered back. “Maybe I do.”

  “Is it a secret, then?”

  “No secret,” Jaime said. “Look, we need them till we get away with the horses, yes? That’s work for all of us. But when we’re done with that . . .”

  “Then kill them,” said de la Cruz. “I’m liking this idea, my friend.”

  Jaime heard the scrape of footsteps first and cleared his throat, alerting Mariano just as Amos Finch came up behind them, backlit by the dying fire.

  “Making a night of it?” their Anglo leader asked, trying to make a joke of it.

  “Just passing the mescal, jefe,” said Mariano. “You want some?”

  “No, thanks. I’m turning in. Long day tomorrow, shadowing the herd without them spotting us.”

  “We both be ready,” Jaime said. “How do you say it? All bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.”

  “That’s how we say it,” Finch agreed. “See you at sunup, give or take.”

  Jaime and Mariano watched him go, waited until they heard Finch settling down into his bedroll. When Ybarra spoke again, his voice was lowered to a near whisper.

  “Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed . . . Sounds like a damn skunk to me.”

  “A skunk or a gringo,” muttered de la Cruz, taking another hit on the mescal. “I never saw much difference between the two.”

  Ybarra would have laughed at that comparison, but worried that the sound might carry to the spot where Finch was lying now, still wide-awake and maybe listening. He would assume that any laughter coming from the two Mexicans was aimed at him, and there was nothing to be gained by rousing anger or suspicion in their leader’s mind.

  Leader for now, that is.