Angel was on his feet even as the man hit the ground, the edge of his right hand extended now slightly forward as the guard scrabbled to his feet, winded, his eyes wary now and frightened. He made an inarticulate noise in his throat and rushed at Angel, who swayed to one side and then hit the man at the base of his right ear with the calloused edge of his right hand. The man smashed face down, hands clawing at the wooden boards in pain, and Angel was behind him, astraddle the man’s back, the barrel of the Peacemaker jammed into the base of the guard’s neck.
‘Denniston,’ he said. ‘Which way did he go?’
‘Go to hell!’ spat the guard.
Angel cocked the six-gun and repeated the question, getting the same answer.
‘I haven’t got time for this,’ Angel said reasonably, and shot the top of the man’s right ear. The roar of the six-gun and the searing pain brought a terrified scream from the man, who bucked and fought against Angel’s weight on his back.
‘One more time,’ Angel said grimly. ‘Which way?’
‘West,’ groaned the man. ‘Through the mountains above Kiowa.’
‘Where’s he heading?
‘I don’t know,’ the guard said.
Angel cocked the Peacemaker again.
‘Sweartogodsthetruth, mister!’ screeched the guard. ‘Nobody knew where they was goin’. The Colonel, he was the only one knew!’
Angel lifted himself off the prone man and stood back, allowing the man to get to his feet.
‘How many men with him?’ he asked.
‘Forty, fifty, something like that,’ he man said.
‘You goin’ after him, mister?’
‘Something like that,’ Angel parroted.
‘He’ll kill you for sure, when he sees you,’ the guard said. Some of his confidence was coming back. He touched the wounded ear and winced, looking at the blood on his fingers and then up at Angel with hate in his eyes.
‘I hope he shoots your balls off,’ he said venomously.
‘That’s a thought,’ Angel said equably. As he spoke he moved the Peacemaker in a short arc, the barrel flashing in the dawning sunshine and smacking the guard, who was too surprised to move, alongside his unwounded ear. He fell to his knees like a poleaxed steer, his mouth agape, eyes rolling up in his head.
‘Sleep warm,’ Angel said, and hit him again.
Chapter Thirteen
‘End of the line, Mister President.’
Grant’s aide came into the plush parlour of the railroad carriage which the President used on his cross-country trips and saluted.
Grant looked up from the copy of the St Louis Democrat he was reading, the cigar cocked as always in the right hand corner of his mouth. He acknowledged the salute with a nod and heaved himself off the comfortable seat.
‘Well, we’ve had our pleasure, gentlemen,’ he said to the other three men sitting opposite him, ‘and now we must work for our vittles.’
They all smiled with varying degrees of uncomfortableness. Grant was a man who loved to get his backside into a McClellan and pound across this godforsaken wilderness for hours. Grant would cheerfully pitch a tent and spend the night out on the plains or in the mountains, happy to sit by a big fire of buffalo chips and swig from a bottle of Irish whiskey. A gentleman, however, (which they all privately agreed Grant was not and never would be) found such pastimes about as congenial as the abominable wagons and stagecoaches by which one was forced to travel in the country west of Las Animas, Colorado. It was to be another six years before the railroads would join hands and the AT&SF was pushing fast up the approaches to the Raton Pass between Trinidad and Las Vegas. Right now it was just a long hard climb.
‘We’ll keep our visit here as inconspicuous as possible, Mr Dempsey,’ Grant said to his aide.
The young soldier saluted, and went out. Grant looked out at the unlovely huddle of railroad shanties and rubbed his hands together. He was as bored with the gentlemen of the east as they were outraged by him, and he was frankly eager to spend some time with his own kind again.
Professional soldiers were a special breed. Grant loved them all like brothers.
This campaign trail he was now blazing was in many ways an historic one. The newspapers back east had made much capital of the fact that an American President was actually going to follow the route of the old pioneers down the Santa Fe Trail. He had made major speeches along the way, and smiled, recalling the ovation he had received at St Louis. Kansas City had turned out with flags and bunting to greet him, and there had been a very agreeable dinner at Fort Larned that had developed into a long and heated discussion of military tactics and policy which had gone on into the early hours of the morning.
Grant smiled. He was looking forward to some of the stops along the route that lay ahead through the mountains. He took a boyish delight in throwing his staff into confusion by making side trips to destinations they had not built into his itinerary. Well, dammit, he thought: a President has to have some fun, too.
‘The escort has arrived, sir,’ his aide said, entering the compartment. ‘Major Godwin presents his compliments.’
‘Have him come in,’ Grant said, waving his cigar.
After a few minutes there was a knock on the door and a short, slimly built man with graying hair came in, his uniform dusty but correct, saluting with a smart snap that made Grant smile with pleasure.
‘At ease, Major,’ he said. ‘Take a seat.’
The Major sat down stiffly, his eyes wide at the opulence of Grant’s railroad carriage.
‘Only way to travel,’ Grant smiled. ‘Pity we can’t go all the way in it.’
‘Yes, sir,’ the Major said. ‘I wouldn’t mind going the rest of the way in this myself. It’ll be,’ he added hesitantly, ‘a bit rougher riding from here on in, I’m afraid.’
‘Don’t fret yourself, laddie,’ boomed Grant.
‘I’m looking forward to the journey. What have you got for me?’
‘We brought two ambulances, Mister President,’ the soldier said. ‘Good teams. A light escort, as specified.’
‘Right, right,’ Grant said. ‘Don’t want to look like an expedition. What’s our route?’
‘It’s a fairly straightforward one, Mister President,’ Godwin said. ‘From here we follow the old Trail up to Trinidad. You are making a speech at a dinner given in your honour by the Friends of the Republican Party of Colorado in the Baca House . . .’
‘Speeches,’ grumbled Grant. There was a world of feeling in the word.
‘Yes, sir,’ Godwin said. ‘From Trinidad we head down through the Raton to Fort Union. I am commanded by my superior, Colonel Whitenfield, to present his compliments, and to extend an invitation to dine with the officers of Fort Union upon your arrival there.’
‘Fine, fine,’ nodded Grant. ‘May want to make a detour on the way, though.’
‘Sir?’ Godwin looked dismayed.
‘Cimarron, boy, Cimarron,’ Grant said. ‘One of the best chefs I ever had opened an hotel there. The St James. Ought to get a decent meal off Henry, wouldn’t you think?’
Godwin remained silent, his face a study in embarrassed confusion.
‘Well, boy, what is it?’ Grant barked. ‘Speak up, speak up! ’
‘Ah, begging the President’s pardon,’ Godwin managed. ‘But the Cimarron. The St James. It — uh — it hasn’t the best reputation, sir, I mean. There have been . . . fights. Shootings.’
‘Killings, you mean?’ Grant said, a smile spreading across his bearded face. ‘Good, good. Liven things up.’
‘Yes, sir, Mister President,’ Godwin said. He’d let Grant’s staff handle that one. If he got back to Fort Union and told that fat fool Whitenfield that he’d let Grant go rummaging around Cimarron, where a man could get shot for spitting carelessly, his own commission wouldn’t be worth the parchment it was printed on.
Grant stood up, ending the interview.
‘Get your men ready, Major,’ he said. ‘We’ll leave as soon as the baggage is stowe
d aboard the ambulances. Have you got a horse for me?’
Godwin’s mouth fell open slightly.
‘You wish to ride, Mister President?’ he managed.
‘Goddammit, boy, what else would I want a horse for?’
‘I’d be honored if you would accept the use of my horse, sir,’ Godwin said, recovering. ‘I’ll put one of the men in an ambulance with your staff.’
‘Good.’ Grant nodded, and the younger man went out. He watched the soldier go, with a smile touching his lips. They must think I’ve forgotten how to fork a goddamned horse, he thought. That’s what being a politician does for you. Thirty-odd years in the Army and they think you forget how to ride just because you sit in a fat chair in the White House. By God, he thought, I might just show them a thing or two before this trip is over. He lit another cigar and started putting his papers together.
Denniston rode at the head of his column, a smile on his lips. It was happening. Everything he had planned, organized, built for, coming finally to its preordained conclusion. He looked over his shoulder at the men behind him. Cannon fodder, he thought. Every one of them would be either dead or a criminal whose only end would be the gallows. He knew his history: the conspirators who had murdered Lincoln had been hunted down at enormous cost to the young Republic, but hunted down one by one they had been — and then hanged. The Government had taken no chances.
Nor would it this time. There was no question but that the attack which he, Denniston, would lead would bring about the greatest manhunt in the history of the United States, and he relished the thought. His name would live in history along with Grant’s, locked together at the moment of Grant’s death, so that whenever men spoke of one they would automatically speak of the other.
The irony of it, the full truthful justness of that fact, made Denniston smile again. Justice, indeed, he told himself. He had no illusions about his own future. As soon as he knew Grant was dead — and his soul longed to be the instrument, the actual visitor of that death — he would head for Denver. Long, long ago he had placed funds in a bank there, together with documents and letters which established a new identity for him. With the money and the new identity, he could head for San Francisco and there take a ship to England. In England he would buy a farm somewhere, perhaps in the rolling hills of Surrey, not too far from the pleasures of the metropolis, and spend the rest of his days in quiet peace among the incurious British. If his plan failed, he would kill himself. He did not think suicide dishonorable; he knew that in their hearts most soldiers felt as he did. The Paladins of old, the Crusaders, the Samurai of Japan, all had a code in which dishonor equaled death, either death in battle facing an enemy, or death by one’s own hand in the sight of whatever God a man worshipped. Denniston had fled only once from death. He knew he would never do so again.
Now the long march was almost over.
He had led his men across the mountain trails between Laughlin and Tinzja Peaks, the long cavalcade snaking and twisting its way through the desolate awesome mountain country and then up around the western edge of Raton Mesa, down the long falling slope of the sierras until they came to the tumbling, rushing waters in the gorge of the Picketwire River, running north and westwards to Las Animas.
Around them and above them the mighty peaks towered. The wind moaned in the canyons, and the men shivered in the cold of the high altitudes. Rio de Las Animas en Purgatorio — river of souls in Purgatory — Denniston rolled the words around his tongue. How beautifully apt it was!
How just — the word kept coming back to him when he thought of the culmination of his plans.
It was fated to be.
Now they were approaching their final camp.
Tomorrow, if all went as expected, Grant’s train would reach the end of the AT&SF line at Las Animas. By that time, Denniston’s vedettes would be in place, stationed strategically all along the possible routes that the Presidential caravan might take, runners with the best horses that money could buy ready to swing into the saddle and bring the information back to him.
His lip curled as he thought how cheaply, and how easily, he had bought the young Major at Fort Union who had provided him with so much vital information. The robberies, the ambush of the wagon train, had all been made possible by information provided by the soldier, and the more deaths Denniston’s men had wrought, the deeper into Denniston’s toils the soldier fell.
Finally, he had managed to get the one document which made the final coup possible. He had not, of course, known why Denniston wanted it. It was simply one piece of information among a number which he was told to get. Denniston, like many other fanatics, worked very much on the need to know principle. The Presidential itinerary was a simple one. He was speechmaking across country: St Louis, Kansas City, Trinidad, Santa Fe. There was a Republican Convention in Santa Fe at which he would naturally be expected to appear, and Grant was wasting no chance of capitalizing on the journey.
Denniston had considered the possibility of an assassination by sniper at the Convention and discarded it. He wanted Grant to know why he was dying. And the military ambush which he, Denniston, was planning to effect would be a fitting way for Grant to go. Again the word justice occurred to him. Death by ambush in the canyon of the river of lost souls. Just, indeed. Denniston’s face was set and cold. He looked out over the tumbled land like an eagle seeking prey.
Chapter Fourteen
Angel watched them set their trap.
Although he was no military strategist, he could not help but admire the effectiveness of Denniston’s dispersion of his men. Between the chattering Picketwire and the road, at a place where the old Trail curved around and almost back upon itself as it labored upwards into the mountains, Denniston spread his men among the trees, where they dug holes and shallow trenches, lying and mock-sighting the Winchesters and Springfields on their imaginary target in the road. At the crest of the curve itself, among tumbled boulders that frowned down on the steeply-sloping Trail, Denniston’s men manhandled the spindly Gatling gun into position, its brassy snout dulled now with blacking, stacking brush and tree branches around it until it blended with the broken land, its field of fire the curve below, towards which men fired upon would unquestionably scatter. Behind and around the gun other men were scooping out shallow dugouts, rolling big rocks into position to provide cover, a further addition to the terrible scything weight of fire which the primitive machine-gun would lay down on the Trail below. The opposite side of the Trail was simply a huge mound of broken rock, boulders, sliding shale and scree, around which the Trail curled like a snake skirting a stone. Among the jumbled, faceless rocks Denniston placed the rest of his men. They merged into the scenery almost as soon as they sank down to the ground.
The sum total of the dispersion was a wall of death through which no living thing could possibly go.
Angel nodded grimly. How long did he have?
How far away was the quarry? Why was the President of the United States coming through this empty, forbidden place? It did not matter.
What did matter now was that he find a way to head off the President, to ensure that no one entered this place of death.
It was slow going.
He could not allow himself or his tired horse to make any noise, yet he must find a way through mountain country he had never seen and get to the Trail below the ambush. His whole body ached with fatigue. He had not eaten a warm meal for three days and the stubble was thick and rasping on his unshaven chin. His clothes felt heavy and sticky with sweat.
He worked his way over northwards, always bearing west when a canyon or a coulee offered a path through the tumbling mountains. And always he kept the tumbling Picketwire on his left, wary as an antelope for vedettes from Denniston’s column, leading the stumbling horse as well as he could, sometimes sliding down yards of broken stone to the edge of the indifferent river.
He almost missed the first lookout.
The man was leaning indolently against a tree, his brown shirt and pants b
lending with the darker greens of the pines, a brand new Winchester canted across his forearm. Angel clamped a hand over the horse’s muzzle: a whinny of alarm from the animal now could give the guard all the time he needed to fire a warning shot, bringing reinforcements down the canyon from the army above. Angel went on his belly and wormed forward until he was within ten feet of the guard. The man was peering off down the Trail, his face three—quarters turned away from Angel as Angel came up off the ground in a long fast hard run, the flat—bladed throwing knife already raised as the guard heard the movement and turned, frantically trying to get the Winchester into firing position, seeing Angel’s hand drop. For the merest fraction of a second the man’s eyes picked up the whickering blade and then it drove deep into his throat, smacking his head against the tree as it went straight through, killing any sound he might have made, and pinning the man momentarily to the wood behind him. Then the dying weight of the guard against the razor edge of the blade freed it slightly, and he went down in the soft pine needles without a sound, thrashing slightly for a moment, and then as still as the death which had claimed him. Angel looked about him quickly, and, spying a cordon of rocks off near the edge of the river, dragged the man down to it and unceremoniously tumbled the body behind them.
Trap Angel (Frank Angel Western #3) Page 9
