Dead Man's Saddle

by Mike Kearby

  Miguel twisted himself free of the bandit's grip.

  "Another lesson, muchacho," the bandit snarled and pointed at the hanging corpses. "That is what we all become sooner or later. Someday, we all find ourselves in that tree with a placard and a lariat around our necks."

  Miguel swallowed hard, contemplating the bandit's words, trying to understand their meaning. "Then why do what we do only to end up…there?"

  The bandit flashed yellow teeth. "Look at them, muchacho!" he growled, low and guttural.

  Miguel obeyed fearfully.

  "To face death on one's own footing is what makes a man's life interesting and valuable."

  Miguel returned his gaze to his benefactor; confusion still clouded his face.

  "Would you rather grow corn, muchacho?"

  Miguel quickly shook his head, no.

  "Good," the bandit said proudly. "Así es la vida."

  Miguel thought about the bandit's words. Such is life.

  "Now, muchacho," his benefactor said, his voice tinged with impatience. "Get off your horse and help bury those two."

  26.

  East of Arroyo

  de la Soledad, Texas,

  October 1848

  Susannah dragged the back of her hand across her forehead. "You're just going to leave us?" she asked. Disbelief and frustration coated her words.

  Carrigan swung up on his pony. "It's dangerous waiting here, Susannah. Wes won't be sending one man at a time this go around. It's been seven days since I turned June loose. I figure in his state, he made it to Gonzales in four days."

  Susannah inhaled deeply.

  "That means Wes and his boys have been on the trail for three days now."

  "You're sure?"

  "Pretty sure, but that's why I'm riding out this morning. I have to be dead sure."

  Susannah settled a hand on Justus's shoulder. "And what do we do?"

  "You wait."

  Susannah exposed a strained frown. "I thought waiting was dangerous?" she uttered sarcastically.

  Carrigan ignored the comment. "I'll be back by late afternoon. You keep the shotgun close. If you see anything suspicious, you fire it off, twice. I'll come running…that I promise."

  Carrigan topped the bluff west of the Arroyo de la Soledad and rode across a flat expanse for a half mile before stopping in a break of oak and cedar overlooking the next rise. He surveyed his surroundings, heavy cedar at his back and rolling scrub in front of him. He eased his pony into the cedar and pushed against the saddle horn to straighten his back. The landscape below rolled until it opened into a small ravine. He could see down the neck of the canyon for miles. If Wes and his deputies were coming, he reckoned he would be able to spot their sign from here. He lifted a hand to his forehead and studied the country beneath the shade of his palm. The dry vale was hauntingly familiar and jarred a distant memory in his head. Carrigan rubbed his chin, thinking to a faraway time in Mexico. After a several minutes, a swell of memories of his fifteenth birthday rushed back to him. He dismounted in silence keeping a careful eye down the canyon. A smile tugged at his mouth. Juan Negras's bandits never made celebration of turning another year older. Carrigan remembered his benefactor's harsh reminder of the reasoning. One year closer to your end, muchacho. What's to celebrate?

  It was on that day that he began one of the longest, most difficult journeys in his life, an undertaking at the behest of Juan Negras. It was the first day of thirty harsh, grueling days during which he tracked a man from El Sauz to San Miguel. No small feat for a full-grown man, much less a young boy turned fifteen.

  The man he tracked, Tito Arredondo Robles, had offended his benefactor in some manner, and even though he asked Juan Negras what Robles had done, Negras never offered an answer.

  "He has injured me, isn't that enough? I mean why do you need to know what this man has done. Isn't it enough that I have asked you to correct this unpleasant situation?"

  "But… "

  "That would be enough for me. Did I ask you all kinds of questions when you requested my assistance after your mama and papa were, God rest their souls, killed?"

  "Juan Negras, I am sorry."

  "Who taught you to shoot a pistol and ride a horse as well as any charro?"

  "I will do as you ask."

  "Who taught you how track a man?"

  "I've never tracked a man, Juan Negras."

  "Exactly, muchacho, now it is time for you to learn to trail a man, not to ask why, for someday when you wish to track the men who killed your mother you will have this lesson to guide you."

  "I understand."

  "Good, and muchacho, just so we both can sleep well in the future, be sure and bring me Tito Arredondo Robles's tongue when you return."

  "His tongue?"

  "Si, his tongue, you know, just to make sure Tito don't say nothing to nobody about what you done to him."

  "But to get this man's tongue means I will need to kill him first."

  "You learn quickly, muchacho," Juan Negras smiled.

  He tracked Robles for those thirty days through a God-awful country filled with every stinging plant and insect on earth. By the time he caught up with the man, his legs and arms bore visible proof of the landscape's torturous inhabitants in the form of large reddish welts and infected scrapes. By the thirtieth day, he hated Robles too, but for reasons much different than Juan Negras.

  On the evening of the thirtieth day, Robles finally made a mistake and camped next to a creek beneath the face of a small canyon. Under a moonless night, his meager cook fire was visible for miles down the open expanse of the canyon. Carrigan used the night as cover. He tied his horse to a cedar at the top of the canyon and crept painstakingly down the darkened slope.

  The next morning, he hunkered in a clump of sotol twenty feet from Robles. He sat uncomfortably tired, exhausted from his journey and lack of sleep, pondering whether this man Robles would go to heaven or to hell, then later, whether his own soul would stand a chance at salvation. He watched, dry mouthed, as Robles made morning coffee. He cursed silently as the man, Robles, sat contentedly watching the brown liquid boil completely unaware of the ambush waiting twenty feet away. Desirous of having at least one good mark by his name at the final reckoning, he let Robles take one sip of coffee before placing a bullet in the middle of his forehead. Vaya con dios, Tito Arredondo Robles. He offered silently as the man slumped forward, dead.

  Later, Carrigan understood that Juan Negras's lesson was not one of tracking but of patience. Back then, he wondered occasionally if Robles had really done anything to offend Juan Negras or if he was simply a man of no importance in his benefactor's world. Either way, Tito Arredondo Robles was no longer living and nothing would ever change that fact.

  Thirty days later upon his return to the bandit's camp, he casually dropped Robles's tongue near the feet of his benefactor and neither of them ever spoke of the incident again.

  Carrigan inhaled and drifted back to the present. He studied the landscape with a careful eye. A fair measure of patience, unnatural to his character, settled over him. "Yes Juan Negras," he recalled, "this place is very much like the one where Tito Arredondo Robles lost his tongue."

  Later, with the midday sun directly overhead, and no sign of Cauble or his men, Carrigan wondered if he had been wrong about King's wounds. Maybe he died before making it to Gonzales. He scanned the horizon once more, re-checked the sun, and then rose from his brush cover. He straightened and stretched his back and legs when a flash of movement caught his attention down inside the canyon. He squatted and took a hard look below him. A glint of motion moving up the canyon slope came into sight briefly.

  Sunlight on polished metal.

  He threw his gaze on the spot several hundred yards down the hillside and smiled grimly.

  There.

  Dark movement, slow, bunched, crept through the breaks. Carrigan crouched lower to hide his silhouette. Horse flanks crossed below him. The shadows moved across the slope of the hill over rock and brush.
The distinctive clop of hooves and the spray of gravel let Carrigan know the riders held little concern of discovery. He counted each passing silhouette.

  One.

  Two.

  Three.

  Four.

  "Hmmmph," sounded quietly in his chest. He lifted both pistols from his holster and exhaled peacefully. The time, so carefully planned, was at hand. He glanced around once more, distracted by the noise and carefree attitude of his targets. The nicker of horses followed by the clang of hooves on rock gained his attention once more. Carrigan glanced back and exhaled strongly.

  Don't get your back up, this is as good a spot as any to settle up with Wes.

  Down the trail, the lead horse and rider eased into a small clearing.

  Carrigan cocked each pistol with silent, deadly precision.

  Keep on coming.

  The second horse eased into the clearing.

  Carrigan strained forward. The animal was riderless. He swallowed hard, knowing, yet disbelieving. The third and fourth horses moved forward. A bead of perspiration fell on his upper lip. His confidence retreated. There was only one rider and a string of saddle less, riderless ponies.

  Carrigan's heart pounded. A block of ice sat in his belly.

  Susannah.

  He jerked his gaze back up the hill and then back below.

  How could you be so stupid?

  He exploded for his horse, holstering both pistols as he ran, fearing the worst, angry at his situation, when in the distance two shotgun blasts reverberated in the air.

  Susannah, he screamed inside and vaulted into the saddle. His body prickled, alive, driven to action. He pushed the pony up the slope just as a musket ball whizzed by overhead. Carrigan twisted in the saddle and drew one of his Colts. The lone rider from below was racing hell-bent for him.

  Carrigan fired once, with little aim, but much effect.

  The man doggedly pushed his horse left, but hollered roughly, "Where you headed in such a hurry, half-breed?"

  "Hyah!" Carrigan shouted at the stallion and dug his heels into the animal's ribs. "Hyah!"

  The man's voice trailed after him. "I 'spect your girlfriend is already dead."

  The stallion responded immediately to Carrigan's nudge carrying the hill effortlessly.

  Carrigan snaked the horse through the cedar quickly forgetting Cauble's deputy, all his focus pulled forward toward the cabin and Susannah.

  27.

  East of Arroyo

  de la Soledad, Texas,

  October 1848

  Carrigan swept across the bluff, possessed, riding hard for the cabin, for Susannah and Justus. Firm of purpose, he leaned tight on the stallion's neck, while his mouth twisted in the agony of unknowing.

  If anything happens to Susannah.

  He tossed a quick glance the trail behind him.

  Empty.

  The lone rider was nowhere to be seen. Carrigan frowned, confused at the rider's sudden vanishing. He thought about the musket shot fired over his head.

  That was an easy shot.

  Wait.

  Carrigan straightened and pulled hard on the left rein. The horse slowed quickly. Carrigan pulled left and turned the stallion in a cloud of dust. The landscape behind remained silent and riderless.

  He's not chasing you…he's herding you!

  His jaw relaxed, and his expression immediately changed to one of realization. He pulled his hat from his head and slapped it against his thigh.

  You fool! Cauble has you climbing that tree again.

  Carrigan pushed his hat back on his head and turn the stallion north, determined to head off the lone rider before he reached Arroyo de la Soledad, and resolute that Wes Cauble would never trick him again.

  Carrigan gave the stallion its head, riding low over the animal's withers, leaning in and out of cedar and oak branches, riding downhill in an ever-decreasing northeasterly direction. Half a mile in, he caught sight of the lone rider, down slope, and off his right side. Carrigan tightened his mouth and urged the stallion faster with a quick brush of the rein.

  The rider, still leading the string of spare horses, threw a hurried glance left and angled his horse farther down the slope.

  Carrigan reined right. The riderless mounts, tied to the lone rider's horse, were now acting as cover for the fleeing brigade deputy. Carrigan flashed a satisfied grin at the rider's panic, lifted one of the Texans from its holster and took careful aim on the last horse in the string. Unaffected by his own stallion's shaky downhill stride, Carrigan fired and watched his target collapse.

  An eerie, death scream filled the slope.

  The downed horse's bulk, jerked against the deputy's saddle, and in a surreal moment, toppled both rider and mount.

  Carrigan, riding at full gallop, pulled even with the tumbling mass of horse and man. He glowered at the man's face, remembering, connecting, and finally knowing.

  Johnny Matthews!

  Hey little deputy!

  Leaning right, he lowered the Colt and fired a well-placed headshot into Matthew's horse, killing the beast immediately while the deputy continued a free-fall through the cedar and scrub before coming to a halt in a fast rising cloud of dust and gravel.

  Carrigan reined the stallion and dismounted mere paces away, keeping the stallion between him and the deputy. "Johnny Matthews!" he yelled in deadly hostility. "You best grab for your pistol, for I aim to take your life, now!"

  Matthews searched desperate and clumsy around his crumpled body for a weapon. "You wouldn't shoot an unarmed man, would ya?" he cried out. "I've lost both my musket and pistol."

  Carrigan turned his head and caught sight of both weapons lying back up the slope. He stepped from behind the stallion and walked toward the downed deputy. "No more than you would hang an innocent rancher," he spat and unholstered the remaining Colt.

  "Hold on now, mister! Just hold on a second."

  "Hold on? You didn't hold on for my father when you hanged him. How does it feel to be the helpless one now, Johnny?" Carrigan shouted. He quickened his pace. A reddish flush glowed at his neck. He raised both Colts to chest level and locked his elbows. He felt alive. All of his senses tingled with energy. He was wound tight as a pocket watch. "My father died way too young," he said. "Heck of a thing for a man to lose his life at a young age, huh, deputy?"

  "Hey! Wait…wait…wait…wait!" Matthews hollered and lifted his hands to his face.

  The familiar click of cocked hammers sounded. Carrigan flared both nostrils. He could already smell the spent gunpowder.

  "Wait, damn you!" Matthews pleaded. "I was only following orders! Can't you understand that?"

  The glint of polished metal from the overhead sun bore directly on Matthew's chest.

  "Hold it!" Matthews pleaded. "Didn't you hear me? I was only doing what Wes told me to do!"

  Carrigan stopped a foot from the cowering man. An overpowering smell of fear oozed from the frightened deputy's every pore. A voice from long ago sounded in his head.

  Always make your enemies come to you, muchacho.

  "It's Wes you want. Not me!"

  The man who runs after his enemy…rides hot-headed and without good thinking, that man always gets himself killed.

  "I didn't want any part of what happened to your mama and papa! It was Wes," Matthews rambled. "You know how he is. He would have killed me if I didn't follow his orders."

  "That's what June King said too," Carrigan ranted. "I didn't believe him either, Johnny and that's why you're going to end up just like him. We all have to pay for our sins."

  "Hey! You can't just shoot an unarmed man down. I'm an officer of the law!"

  The Colts, ignorant of the warning voice and oblivious to Johnny's pleadings, bucked, left then right, angry, deadly.

  Carrigan smiled. "Hell of a thing, huh, Johnny," he muttered, mocking, cold, and lethal.

  The Colts continued to dance, stepping gracefully in synch with Johnny Matthews's flailing body.

  "Hell of a thing."


  28.

  Matamoros, Mexico,

  May 1848

  Miguel stared at his benefactor, then to the unfolding scene before him. Now twenty, he had seen the bandits kill before, he, himself, had killed before…but never had he seen the bandits kill Anglo Texans before.

  Rob their cattle…yes.

  Torch their land…yes.

  Take their women…yes.

  Kill…no.

  The fear of reprisal from the devil rangers was too great.

  So this was something different. Edgy and anxious about the proceedings, he rocked back and forth in his saddle, tense.

  "Why the squirming, Miguel?"

  Miguel looked back at the man, Juan Negras, the man who had saved him, the man who had buried mama and papa's bones, the man who taught had him how to ride and shoot. "Are you really going to do this?" he asked, uneasy.

  Juan Negras shook his head from side to side with a tight grin. "Maybe you are not prepared for this life, muchacho."

  Miguel ignored the jab. "But these men are Texans," he muttered.

  "Texas thieves on Mexican soil, Miguel," the bandit chief stated flatly. "Is what I am doing not what the Texans do in kind to Mexican thieves on Texan soil?"

  "So you are making a political statement?"

  Negras took a minute and then erupted into a loud laugh. "Yes, a political statement, Miguel. Very good, yes? I am making a statement," he chortled and then nodded at the five pistols aimed at the two bound Texans.

  The pistols erupted in fire and smoke.

  The bound Texans dropped unceremoniously to the dirt thoroughfare.

  The residents lining the street erupted into cheering and clapping.

  Negras looked back at Miguel and raised both eyebrows. "And my statement is, death to gringos," he said curtly and then with a sad shake of his head added, "this world we live in is a very horrible place, Miguel."

  "So you're the law?"