Bandit Gold

by J. R. Roberts

  “That’s one possibility,” Clint corrected. “The other is that Lloyd, Vargas and Linda had already decided to turn against Manning before they got off the train. Lloyd and Linda seemed to be sort of close—at least Lloyd felt awfully jealous of any man who seemed to interest Linda.”

  “Like you?” Krammer grinned.

  “What’s important,” Clint said, avoiding the question, “is the fact Lloyd, Linda and Vargas killed Manning and got away.”

  “With the gold,” Krammer added.

  “And my pistol,” Clint stated grimly.

  “Don’t know that I can rightly help you, Clint,” the lawman said a bit sheepishly. “You see, this is actually beyond the limits of my county so I can’t very well form a posse and go after the killers. Maybe we should contact some federal marshals....”

  “That’s all right, Sheriff,” Clint assured him. “This is pretty much between Lloyd and me anyway. You could do me one big favor however.”

  “Can’t say yes or no until I’ve heard what it is.”

  “Can you convince the liveryman to take care of my wagon and team until I get back?” the Gunsmith asked. “I’ll probably be gone for a few days, but I’ll pay him for his trouble when I get back.”

  “Well, sure,” the sheriff answered, watching Clint examine the ground between the corpses and the railroad tracks “Where will you be heading, Clint?”

  “There’s a set of wagon-wheel tracks here,” the Gunsmith pointed at the ground. “And a set of hoofprints along side them. Seems simple enough. I’ve just got to follow the trail they left until it leads me to Lloyd and the others.”

  “They’ve got about half a day’s head start on you, Clint,” the lawman commented. “That wagon oughtta be going fairly slow, but you’ll still have a hard time catching up with them.”

  “I’ve got to try, Sheriff,” the Gunsmith stated as he climbed into the saddle on Duke’s back. “You’ll talk to that liveryman for me?”

  “I said I would,” Krammer nodded.

  “You can also tell him if I don’t return in seven days, he may as well sell my wagon and gear and make his profit that way,” Clint instructed. “I won’t be needing it.”

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Clint Adams wasn’t a very accomplished tracker, but even he had little trouble following the trail left by the wagon and the horseman that accompanied it. Lloyd, Linda and Vargas weren’t making any effort to cover their tracks, probably assuming they had plenty of time to get wherever they were going.

  The trail soon led to the shore of the Colorado River which divided the Arizona Territory and the State of California. That’s when he had to stop Duke and dismount to examine the ground more closely. The wagon tracks turned into the river, disappearing in the water. However, the hoofprints went in an opposite direction. His quarry had split up.

  It seemed unlikely that the person on horseback had been Linda, so that meant either Lloyd or Vargas had ridden on across the Arizona prairie while the others crossed the river into California. Which trail should Clint follow?

  To the Gunsmith, reclaiming his modified Colt .45 was more important than the gold shipment the outlaws had stolen south of the border. If one of the men had ridden off to get supplies or contact someone in a nearby town, either Lloyd or Vargas could be the horseman. If the outlaws had split up the gold and parted company for keeps, it seemed probable that Lloyd and Linda had ridden across the river into the next state while Vargas went his separate way.

  Which man had Clint’s pistol? Stansfield Lloyd was a professional gunman. At first this seemed to make him the obvious choice, but Lloyd had his Remington .44 which he’d used successfully in the past. Would he exchange his trusty weapon for the Gunsmith’s Colt?

  He might, yet Vargas had lost his gunbelt after Clint threw it off the train. The Gunsmith had also disposed of the cross-breed’s ivory-handled dagger and hold-out knives, but Vargas had obviously had at least one more knife tucked away in his gear. If Lloyd had decided to stick with his Remington, Vargas—a knife artist who wasn’t especially fond of firearms—may have taken Clint’s gunbelt simply to replace his own.

  Clint didn’t have any trouble deciding what to do next. A wagon with two people and a chest of gold couldn’t move as fast as a lone man on horseback. He’d follow the hoofprints and hope he’d catch the others later.

  The sun was an orange sphere melting into the horizon when Clint trailed the horse tracks to a small town with a crudely made sign bearing the legend ARCO IRIS.

  Clint’s limited Spanish failed to translate Arco Iris into rainbow, a name that hardly suited the dreary little town. Arco Iris wasn’t much larger than the Pueblo Indian hamlet El Lobo had used as a temporary headquarters.

  The buildings in Arco Iris, like the Pueblo hamlet, were made of adobe. However, the style was clearly of a Spanish flavor, as if someone had transplanted a chunk of a Mexican town to Arizona. Clint entered the hamlet and cautiously glanced about the whitewashed adobe structures with their tile roofs and ornate windows. The town would have seemed deserted except for the yellow lantern light visible in a few windows and the softly played guitar music coming from a cantina.

  Despite its tiny size, Arco Iris had a jailhouse with iron bars in the windows, built onto a sheriffs office. Following his habit, Clint headed for the local lawman’s headquarters and dismounted. He tied Duke to the hitching-rail outside and approached the sheriffs office. The door was open.

  “Qué quiere usted?” a voice demanded. It belonged to a fat figure seated behind a small wooden desk. His feet were propped up on the furniture, barely leaving room for a bottle of tequila.

  “Sorry, friend,” Clint replied. “My Spanish isn’t very good.”

  “You a gringo, huh?” the fat man remarked. A sly smile crept across his bearded face. If he’d removed the tin star from his soiled shirt, he could have passed as a former member of El Lobo’s gang. “Your dark skin and that sombrero fooled me for a minute. We don’t get many of your kind here.”

  “I wouldn’t guess you get many strangers of any kind,” Clint commented dryly.

  “Not too many,” the lawman admitted as he raised the bottle to his lips. “You want somethin’, gringo?”

  “I’m looking for a man who may have entered town a few hours ago,” Clint began. “My name is Clint Adams and—”

  “And my name is Rameriz Santos,” the sheriff shrugged. “So what?”

  Clint ignored his attitude. “The man I’m looking for is a thief and a killer.”

  “Isn’t everyone, senor?” Santos asked with a grin.

  “Not quite,” Clint told him. “You are the sheriff of this town, aren’t you?”

  “Sí,” Santos nodded. “And the mayor and the undertaker.”

  “Then you should be concerned about who rides into Arco Iris.”

  “I care.” Santos shrugged. “I don’t care much for gringos or what they want. Nobody here does. That’s why no gringos live here. You Anglos don’t like us and we don’t like you.”

  Clint felt his temper begin to boil, but he kept it under control. “Well, I don’t intend to stay here any longer than it takes me to find the man I’m after,” he explained. “The sooner I do that, the sooner I’ll be on my way.”

  “That sounds pretty good,” Santos replied. “This hombre you want, he’s a half-breed named Vargas, no?”

  Clint nodded.

  “He’s over in the cantina,” Santos stated, lowering his feet to the floor. “We go talk to him together, okay?”

  “If that’s how you want it, Sheriff,” the Gunsmith agreed.

  Santos waddled around from behind his desk. He wore a gunbelt with a Bowie knife in a sheath positioned at a cross-draw angle on his massive belly. He couldn’t have looked more like a bandido if he wore cartridge belts across his chest.

  “I just want to make sure you ain’t some gringo bounty hunter who thinks he can just kill a mejicano in cold blood,” Santos stated. “And then you ride outta here and b
rag about how you took him in a fair gunfight.”

  “I’m not a bounty hunter,” Clint replied. “And I’m not eager to kill anybody. Vargas either has something that belongs to me or he knows where I can find it. That’s all I want from him.”

  “Let’s go hear his side of the story,” Santos said, walking toward the door.

  Clint followed the sheriff outside and they headed toward the cantina across the street. His hand remained close to the pistol grips of the modified Stevens shotgun. Santos was the worst excuse for a lawman Clint had encountered for some time and he was well aware that just because a man wears a badge doesn’t make him above corruption. Santos was the type who could be paid to give shelter to an outlaw like Vargas—and he might not object to shooting a gringo in the back if he thought he could make an additional profit in the process.

  As they approached the doors of the cantina, an old man in an apron stepped outside with a broom in his hands. He saw Santos and quickly stepped aside.

  “Buenas noches, jefe,” he said with a humble bow.

  The sheriff ignored the old man, but Clint didn’t fail to notice that he’d addressed Santos as chief, suggesting that the lawman ran his town like a bandit leader or a feudal lord. The Gunsmith despised such petty dictators. He’d pulled down more than one self-styled Nero from his throne, but he realized he couldn’t play Don Quixote and pit himself against every evil-doer he encountered. As long as people are willing to knuckle under to tinhorn tyrants, there’d always be masters and slaves, one way or the other.

  The inside of the cantina was shabby and drab, with half a dozen tables and twice that many chairs and a bar that consisted of a column of wooden crates with a long, wide board nailed across its top. Two coal-oil lanterns hung from ropes attached to the ceiling.

  At one table sat a sad-faced man with graying hair and a withered right arm. He pressed the frets with his stony hand, the mangled fingers of the other still able to strum the cords. The music was as sorrowful as the player’s appearance, yet it had a haunting, rather disturbing beauty, a melodic version of the macabre grace of a vulture in flight.

  There were only three other customers in the cantina. Two younger men dressed in peón garb who shared a pitcher of beer seemed to concentrate on the uncanny music. The third man sat alone with a bottle of tequila, a glass and a pile of salt on a table. Mike Vargas had just poured himself a drink and was about to pinch into the salt mound when Clint and Santos entered. He didn’t, recognize the Gunsmith at first, but as they approached his table an expression of astonishment appeared on Vargas’s face.

  “This hombre wants to talk to you, Señor Vargas,” the sheriff declared. “He thinks maybe you have something that belongs to him.”

  “He’s loco,” Vargas replied stiffly. “I never took nothin’ from this gringo. He just wants to—”

  “Stand up, Vargas,” Clint snapped.

  The cross-breed looked at Santos. “You gonna let him give orders in your town, Rameriz?”

  “Do it, señor,” the sheriff told him in a flat, hard voice.

  Vargas slowly rose from his chair. He wasn’t wearing a gunbelt or carrying a pistol. An ivory-handled dagger, identical to the one he’d carried on the train, was in a sheath at his hip.

  “Does Lloyd have my gun?” Clint asked, his frosty gaze locked on Vargas, his hand resting on the butt on his scattergun.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, gringo.” Vargas sneered.

  “You and Lloyd threw me off that train into the desert to die, Vargas,” Clint stated. “You’ve murdered at least one innocent man and probably a lot of others I don’t know about. Killing you won’t bother me a bit, so you’d better talk.”

  “You wanta kill me, Adams?” the cross-breed smiled as he stepped away from the table. “Then put down your guns and try to take me ...”

  He slowly drew the dagger from its sheath. The seven inch, double-edged blade reflected the lamp light like a slither of silver fire.

  “My way!” Vargas challenged.

  “That seems fair,” Santos commented with a shrug. He drew his Bowie knife and offered it to Clint, handle first. “You either fight him with cold steel or you get out of Arco Iris.”

  Clint glanced at the Bowie knife and then glared at the smug face of Mike Vargas. The Gunsmith’s expression didn’t reveal the apprehension and downright fear he felt as he took the Bowie from Santos. He’d seen Vargas in action and knew the man was far better with a knife than himself. Clint had never favored bladed weapons, but he had no choice except to fight Vargas on his terms or leave without finding out any more than he knew before.

  “I told you he’s loco!” Vargas laughed.

  Clint held the Bowie in his left hand as he backed away from Vargas and Santos. He drew the shotgun and placed it on the table occupied by the two young peónes. They stared up at him with surprise and awe.

  “Watch my guns, amigos,” he requested. “I don’t trust your jefe. Comprende?”

  “Sí, señor,” one of the men nodded.

  The Gunsmith unsheathed his Colt pistol, his eyes never leaving Vargas and Santos. He put the handgun on the table next to the Stevens. The guitar player began picking the cords in a monotonous, yet rhythmic tune that seemed to emphasize the tension of the upcoming duel.

  Clint took the Bowie knife in his right hand and nodded at Vargas as he approached his opponent. The cross-breed moved to the middle of the room, his body crouched in a low fighting stance he’d known since childhood.

  The guitar music ceased.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Vargas snarled and slashed out at Clint with his dagger. The Gunsmith jumped out of the path of the blade and narrowly avoided a sudden thrust as Vargas immediately altered his attack, changing tactics with swift, smooth ease.

  The cross-breed swung a backhand stroke at Clint’s face, missing flesh by less than an inch. The Gunsmith’s leg lashed out and Vargas groaned and doubled up when Clint’s boot slammed into his abdomen just above the groin. Clint moved in, trying to slash Vargas’s knife arm to disable his opponent, but the cross-breed’s dagger danced faster and Clint retreated.

  Vargas attacked again and Clint barely dodged a dagger thrust. The Gunsmith and Vargas leaped away from each other and squared off once more. Clint raised his foot and jerked his knee forward. Vargas thought Clint was about to throw another kick and slashed low to attack the leg before he realized the tactic was a feint. Clint’s left fist caught the cross-breed on the jaw and knocked him backward into a table.

  Vargas whirled and lashed out at Clint, again missing the agile Gunsmith. Then he dropped into a low crouch, knife held ready, left hand poised parallel to the right. Clint adopted a similar stance, facing his deadly adversary. A sly grin slithered across Vargas’s lips and Clint knew what he was about to do—at least, he hoped he’d guessed correctly.

  The cross-breed suddenly tossed the dagger from his right hand to the left, trying to catch his opponent off guard as he had done in numerous knife fights in the past. Clint had recalled witnessing the knife duel between Vargas and one of the peónes. He’d expected this tactic and prepared for it. Clint struck out with the Bowie knife, the sharp edge hacking into Vargas’s left hand.

  Vargas screamed and staggered backward. His dagger and two severed fingers fell to the floor. He clutched his maimed hand, trying to plug up the blood that spurted from the stumps of his fingers. Clint held the Bowie high, giving the cross-breed a good look at the scarlet stain on its blade.

  “Now talk!” he demanded.

  “Cristo!” Vargas exclaimed through clenched teeth. “Stan has your gun! He’s been practicing with it. Every time the train stopped he’d go do some target shooting to get used to the pistol. Said it was better and faster than his Remington.”

  “Did he use it to kill Manning and the other man?” Clint asked.

  “Sí!” Vargas confirmed. “He shot them down so quick they didn’t have time to blink their eyes before they died.”
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  “Why’d you two kill Manning?”

  “For the gold,” the cross-breed confessed. “We took most of the risks. Why should we share with him? Turned out Manning felt the same way about us. As soon as the train was out of sight, he and his men tried to gun us down. We won.”

  “Why’d you split up at the river?”

  “Because Stan suddenly pulled a gun on me and told me to ride on,” Vargas hissed. “He said he couldn’t trust me not to turn against him! Estúpido! Does he think he can trust that puta Linda? Stan tells me I don’t get no gold. Says I should feel lucky ‘cause he’s lettin’ me live and if he ever sees me again he’ll kill me. So he and Linda head for California and I wind up here...” he squeezed his wounded hand tighter. “Que chigada! I hope you find him, Adams. I hope you two bastardos kill each other!”

  “Nice seeing you again too, Vargas,” Clint remarked as he backed away from his injured opponent.

  When he reached the table where his shotgun and pistol lay, Clint tossed the Bowie knife to the floor and reached for his firearms. Sheriff Santos quickly waddled toward him, a smile plastered on his fat, bearded face.

  “Hey, Señor Adams,” he began, “what is this about gold? Maybe you could use a partner....”

  “Hardly,” Clint replied, shoving the shotgun into its holster.

  “But, señor,” Santos whined, “I am not a greedy man. You could keep most of it for yourself and—”

  Clint saw Vargas’s right hand streak toward the back of his neck. The Gunsmith recalled the hide-out throwing knife the cross-breed had carried before and immediately realized what the man was about to do. Clint grabbed his Colt from the table, hastily aiming and cocking the pistol. He squeezed the trigger a tenth of a second too late. Vargas had already hurled his knife even as Clint fired the gun.

  The thrown knife whirled across the room, turned once in midair and struck flesh. The spear-point tip plunged deeply into its victim and a cry of agony filled the cantina. The roar of Clint’s Colt followed and a .45 slug smashed into Vargas’s throat, tunneling through his neck to sever the spinal cord and burst vertebrae as if it were made of crystal.