“Trying to earn my keep,” Smoke deprecated. “We’ll set off charges once we get out of Carvajal’s camp. Gather the men and tell them what is in store. We’ll leave at once and infiltrate the valley tomorrow night.”
“None too soon, believe me,” Carbone allowed.
While they addressed the small force of volunteers, a hatless rider rushed into the village, shouting for Martine. He hurried up to them on a lathered horse.
“Don Miguel, there is terrible news. That bastardo, Carvajal, and his army have been seen riding toward your hacienda. It is feared they will attack it.”
“They’re certainly not coming to surrender,” Martine observed, his anger rising.
Smoke Jensen thought fast. “I’ll take half the men and head that way. With them out in the open, it will be easy pickings. We can cut down the odds, too.”
“I’ll go along, of course,” Martine stated.
“I counted on that,” Smoke told him. “Let’s get going. The sooner we reach your headquarters, the sooner we can hurt Carvajal.”
They came out of the rising sun. Fifty hard-bitten men and Gustavo Carvajal. Rudolfo Malendez saw them first. He scratched his gray hair and rose from his resting place against the tree trunk. One of the bandit army killed him with a knife. The sheep Malendez had watched through the night made tiny, frightened sounds and scattered from under the hoofs of the horses.
“This is going to be easy,” Pedro Chacon boasted. “These people are like the sheep they tend. Baaabaaa!”
Father Xavier had just finished reading a passage in his brevery and set about lighting oil lamps in the small chapel when the sound of approaching hoofs drew his attention. Could it be the Patron returning? He swung open the tall, wooden portal and stepped onto the wide landing in time to catch a bullet in the chest.
He staggered and fell, sprawling on the three low steps at the front of the church. Immediately the bandits opened up, firing through windows and open doorways of the ten small two-room adobe houses around the high wall of the hacienda. Death and fire had come to Rancho Pasaje.
Women and children screamed in fright. An old man, the former gatekeeper of the main house, snatched up a shotgun and blasted the life from one hardcase. He broke the single-barrel weapon, and aged fingers trembled with the urgency he put behind reloading. Three .45 slugs smacked into him and ended his efforts. Pedro Chacon watched smoke curl from the muzzle of his six-gun and grinned broadly.
“Didn’t I tell you? Easier than rabbits.”
Twenty men, with Carvajal in the lead, went directly to the hacienda. They found the wrought iron gate closed against them, along with the high, double-panel door. Carvajal did not waste time trying to breech this obstruction.
“Get ladders. We go over the walls,” he commanded.
“Why are we taking the risk of going in here?” Tomas Diaz asked. “Just to burn it?”
“No. I have something special in mind. That’s why I have the best men with me. I sent Pedro Chacon to round up the girls and young women. I expect he’ll amuse himself with a few of them while he’s at it. I can trust you and these others to hold your fire when I say so.”
“ ‘Hold our fire’?”
“Yes, my loyal Tomas. We are going to take prisoners inside this oh-so-fine hacienda.”
Several bandidos returned with ladders, and the picked men swarmed up and over the walls. A brief rattle of gunfire followed, then the doors and gate were swung open. Carvajal entered, swaggering. Three white cotton-clad bodies lay on the ground, diminished in death. He waved an arm to illustrate his instructions.
“Secure the patio, dig out the servants. Tomas, you and I will go visit the lady of the house.”
They found her door bolted against them. “Go away,” a feminine voice demanded from inside. “I have a gun in here, and I’ll use it.”
“Go get something to use as a ram. Bring four men back with you,” Carvajal ordered.
Tomas hurried off on the errand. Meanwhile, Carvajal studied the stout oak door. It would take some effort. Well worth it, though, he considered. Curious, he strode along the hallway. The door next to the master bedroom yielded to a stout kick.
She sat in the middle of the bed, sheet and blanket gathered around her. Big-eyed, the girl of six or so had a hand over her mouth and tears trickled down her cheeks.
“Would you like to take a trip with me, little one?” Carvajal asked pleasantly. Solemnly, she shook her head no. “Oh, come, we’ll have a lot of good times.”
From the hallway, the sound of the men employing the ram interrupted his game of cat-and-mouse. Carvajal gave her a cheery wave and returned to her mother’s room. The muffled report of a firearm came between the crashes of the ram. The bullet sent a shower of splinters from the face of the door and struck one young bandit in the chest.
He winced and looked down, then plucked the spent slug from his leather vest. “That’s a thick door,” he observed, then went back to hurling the ram.
El Rey del Norte quickly became bored and impatient at the efforts to breech the portal into Señora Martine’s room. He prowled the hallway, hands behind his back, the long, split-tail coat of his general’s uniform flapping against his calves. He stopped at one door and flung it open.
A brown-faced boy of seven hurtled at him, a tiny dagger in one hand. Laughing, Carvajal grabbed the lad by his extended wrist and yanked him off his bare feet. “So,” he chortled. “You inherited your father’s talent with weapons, niño. I like to see high spirits in a boy.” He took the knife from limp fingers and sat the child on his feet. “You are going on a long trip with us. Go get dressed.”
“I won’t!” the boy shouted defiance.
Carvajal gave him a sound swat on the rump that sent him staggering into the room. “Do as I say.”
From the inner courtyard came the wails of women servants and pleas for mercy. Ruthlessly, the bandits slaughtered the older ones, reserving the younger for a different fate. Highly satisfied, El Rey paced back through the hall, located the third of Martine’s children and put them in the charge of Tomas.
“We’ll be leaving soon,” he advised. He paused, snapped his fingers. “Martine y Ruiz will have heard of this. He will come. We leave a rear guard of twenty men to give him a small surprise, eh?”
“That will be most fitting, Excellency,” Tomas agreed.
“Fine. Bring the woman and the brats, and we will head for our camp.”
Nineteen
An hour later, Smoke Jensen and Martine rode in with Martine’s retainers. They saw the smoke of burning buildings at a good distance. It prepared them, in part, for what they saw. Every structure outside the hacienda itself had been put to the torch. At a distance of a hundred yards the bodies could be seen huddled on the ground. Carvajal’s rear guard had opened up on them at that range also.
A bullet cracked overhead, and Smoke Jensen swung the column to the right. More rounds followed them. The lack of accuracy didn’t impress Smoke about the ability of Carvajal’s men. He led the small troop wide of the settlement until the hacienda’s walls came between them and the defenders.
“We haven’t any choice but to go right at them,” Smoke declared.
Martine nodded agreement. “If they don’t shoot any better than they have so far, we have a good chance.”
Smoke cracked a grim smile. “You may lose a few good men.”
“From what I see, I already have. No, my friend, worry over that is time wasted.” Martine settled the reins over the huge horn of his saddle and drew both revolvers. “I say we get in close and clean out this scum.”
“Suits,” Smoke agreed. He fisted both of his Colts.
They came like a whirlwind. Smoke and Martine took five men each and split around the walls of the hacienda. Pablo Alvarez waited for the signal, with the other ten, to make a frontal attack. Some among the outlaws congratulated themselves in so easily running off their opposition. Quickly and bloodily, they learned of their mistake.
; Smoke Jensen saw a fat bandit giving more attention to a tequila bottle than his area of responsibility. The bottle shattered an instant before Smoke’s .44 slug punched through the inebriate’s head. Smoke saw movement to his right and turned his torso from the hips to meet the threat.
A grinning soldier of El Rey widened his eyes in surprise at the speed and girth of the gringo on the spotted horse. His rifle cracked and disturbed the air over Smoke Jensen’s head a moment before blackness claimed him and Smoke sought another target.
Two bandidos rushed into the street from what had once been a small cantina. They appeared directly in front of Smoke Jensen. One died before he realized his mistake. The other unlimbered his six-gun and burned powder in a useless effort to stop Smoke.
Smoke felt the passage of the bullet an instant before his hammer dropped and the .44 Colt bucked in his hand. His aim proved much truer than his enemy’s. The outlaw buckled in the middle and did a little knock-kneed dance while his life leaked out through a hole in his belly.
Martine appeared then, herding two of Carvajal’s bandits ahead of him. His smile made a white slash in his dark face. “It worked perfectly. They were all concentrating on Alvarez and the men who came at them from the front. I have two wounded. How about you?”
Smoke had not checked the five who came with him. He did so quickly. “Looks like Negocio got a scratch. Nothing more. We’ve won a cheap victory. Something tells me that these aren’t the only men Carvajal sent to visit your hacienda.”
“Most likely. I am sure these cerdos will tell us all we want to know.”
An eerie silence settled over the ruins outside the hacienda. Weeping, one man brought news of the wanton slaughter inside. Martine’s face hardened and he spoke in a near whisper.
“What of my wife and children?”
“Gracias a Dio, they are not among the dead,” the sad-eyed man reported. “But we can find them nowhere in the hacienda.”
“Where are they, you pigs?” Martine demanded of the captives, addressing them as he had before. “What has been done with my family?”
They might have been eager enough to surrender, but they showed themselves reluctant to talk. Smoke Jensen dismounted and walked up close to them. He towered over the uncomfortable pair. He produced a nasty grin and drew his Bowie from its belt sheath. Slowly he waggled it before them.
“It’s remarkable what a heated knife blade can do to loosen a tongue,” Smoke remarked lightly.
Eyes fixed on the wicked blade, they listened to Martine’s translation. They both paled and one lost control of his bladder. Smoke Jensen nodded to a bed of coals, a blue flame flickering from the ruins of the building.
“Since you have so conveniently provided us with a fire, I see no reason why we should not take advantage of it.”
The one who had wet his britches fell to his knees. “I will tell you what you want to know, Señor,” he blurted.
“¡Callerse!” his companion hissed.
Smoke made a nasty face and moved closer to the defiant one. “Have you always been a thief and murderer? Or did you once work on a rancho?” The surprise in the man’s eyes confirmed Smoke’s speculation. “Then you’ve seen horses gelded, bulls cut?” Without giving the man time to answer, Smoke growled to one of Martine’s men. “Take down his trousers.”
Uttering a great sob, the man fainted. Smoke Jensen looked down at him indifferently and turned to the other man. “Still willing to talk?”
He swallowed hard and nodded, eyes glazed and fixed on the knife. “Señor Martine, your wife and children were taken by El Rey del Norte. They are to insure your cooperation. His Excellency demands that you give up this attempt to hinder him in rebuilding the empire of the Aztecs. Your wife and children will live so long as you obey him.”
Martine wanted to smash this low brute, grind him into the ground. Fury and worry for his family mingled in his mind. He smashed a fist into his open palm. “If only we could have gotten here sooner.”
“They didn’t come by the way we had been told. Must have spotted your man and changed routes after he rode off,” Smoke surmised. He asked the captive, “How long ago did Carvajal leave here?”
“Oh, it has been some time. An hour and a half, perhaps.”
“No problem trailing them,” Smoke stated. “I’ll take most of the men and start at once. You’d best do what you can for your people here.”
Half an hour along the clear trail of Carvajal’s bandit army, Smoke Jensen reined in. An old man stood at the side of the road, hat removed respectfully and held in front of his chest.
“You are looking for the ladrónes who rode this way, Señores?” the old-timer asked.
“We are,” Smoke told him.
“They are far ahead of you.”
“We know that.”
“What is it you wish to do when you find them?”
“Kill them,” Smoke said simply.
Light twinkled in the ancient’s eyes. “I hoped you would say that. I am called El Viejo, the old one. As you can see, I am a woodcutter.” He gestured to his burro, heavily laden with bundles of firewood. “Do you know where it is they are going?”
“There is a camp in the mountains to the east of here,” Smoke told him. “In a large valley surrounded by high crags.”
“I know this country well. Would it please you to find another route that would put you in front of these hombres malos?”
For the first time since they had reached the hacienda, Smoke Jensen produced a warm smile. “It would indeed.”
“I can lead you.”
“Then show us the way,” Smoke invited.
“I must take care of my burro, first,” El Viejo diverted.
“Unload him and put him on a long tether to graze. We’ll leave some water.”
“Gracias, Señor. I am yours to command.”
They entered the mountains twenty minutes later, cut across a hogback ridge and dropped into a deep, lush valley. The vegetation seemed tropical to Smoke Jensen, who missed his pines and aspen. Tall, scaly trees rustled and sighed, bent in the strong breeze that blew above them. Colorful birds, whose names Smoke did not know, flashed through the limbs, chattering to one another. Unexpectedly stout for his great age, the woodcutter maintained a good pace on horseback. By noon the rescue party had crested the spine of the range and began to descend among lower, rounder mountains.
“We are not far,” El Viejo advised Smoke Jensen. “Another hour maybe.”
Impatience put hot hooks in Smoke Jensen’s mind. With two dozen men along, he felt certain they could best the bandits, particularly if they set a good ambush. Could they do it, though, without bringing harm to Martine’s wife and youngsters?
That consideration urged caution on his plans. He’d know more when he found out where they would come out of this part of the range. Gradually, the terrain took on a vaguely familiar appearance. The old man had led them close to Cabesa de Borrego and the valley where Carvajal had his camp.
“You’ve done a good job. Now if only they are behind us,” Smoke told El Viejo when the old man called a halt and indicated the scant trail left by comings and goings from the hidden valley.
“Traveling as they were, they must be an hour or two behind us,” El Viejo speculated.
“Then we had better get started,” Smoke prompted.
He and Martine’s men set about felling several smaller trees. These they topped and trimmed away excess branches. “Leave some of them long,” Smoke instructed. “Put a point on them.”
Unaccustomed to thinking like Arapaho or Blackfoot warriors, the workmen from Martine’s ranch had no idea what Smoke planned to do with the logs. Most accepted that they would be used to block the trail. Not so, they soon learned.
Smoke gathered up half a dozen braided leather riatas from the vaqueros and rigged the poles into dead-falls. At his urging, two men backed their horses, drawing the heavy, green logs into the air and securing them to the tripline. Smoke approached an agile youn
gster of sixteen or so.
“Take these branches we’ve cut and shinny up that tree. Work your way out on the limb and use these to hide the dead-fall.”
Grinning with suppressed excitement, the youth followed directions earnestly. With swift, sure moves, he wove an overlapping pattern of branches that caused the deadly trap to disappear into the background. Smoke then located some springy young saplings at the edge of the trail and fixed wooden spikes to them. Then he bent them back away from the pathway and secured them to triplines.
“No time to dig a proper pit,” Smoke complained aloud. Mention of it brought smiles to the faces of several men. They had used such means to trap bears and other large game.
When the last of their preparations had been carefully hidden, Smoke selected positions for the men. “You’ll be up in these rocks. Pick a spot which leaves the trail open to you for a long way. Let the head of the column get through to me. I’ll drop the first ones in line and get them to run through here without paying much attention to the surroundings. You men who will be farther down the trail, close off their rear when you hear the first shots. Push them hard. Don’t give them time to think about Señora Martine and the children, or any other captives.”
All they could do now was wait, Smoke thought as the men faded into the underbrush. The position he picked for himself was the most dangerous. He would remain on horseback, in the middle of the trail, around a bend from the center of the ambush site. If all went well, he should be able to fight his way to the side of Martine’s wife and free her and the kids. Yeah, all he had to do was wait.
Smoke Jensen heard them long before any of the outlaw army came into view. They laughed and talked loudly. Squeals of protest came from the women captives. Lewd suggestions dominated the conversation. A thick, soft layer of leaves muffled hoofbeats so that Smoke caught sight of the first bandit before he heard their horses.
Surprise painted the face under the big brim of a fancy sombrero. Its owner knew the huge man in front of him did not belong to El Rey’s army. His hand dropped to the butt of his .45, and he pulled it halfway out of leather before a bullet sped from Smoke’s .44 and stopped his heart. Smoke Jensen triggered a second round and spilled a mean-faced bandit out of the saddle.
Fury of the Mountain Man Page 19
