Gunsmoke for McAllister

by Matt Chisholm

  He discussed the sign they followed with all the seriousness of an expert, noting with pride how a mule had cast a shoe here, hew that horse had a peculiarly characteristic shuffle of its off forefoot. It was his opinion that all the animals were in good condition and were going strongly, but Rawley showed signs that he wanted to be out of this country fast and was pushing the animals to their limit now. McAllister agreed, Diaz was right in everything he said. He was taking a liking to the tough little vaquero and was beginning to think that he might get by if it came to a fight.

  At noon, they stopped and consulted. They had been steadily climbing for the past two hours and were in good green country. It was still hot, but there was a welcome breeze up there.

  ‘You know where he’s headed now, Diaz?’

  ‘A man cannot know for certain, amigo. But it is my guess that he is heading for the river. He will cross the river and then head north-east for the saddle. That is his quickest way through into New Mexico.’

  McAllister said: ‘Good, let’s turn back.’

  They returned the way they had come and reached the basin shortly before nightfall. They kept to an easy pace so that the horses would not be put to any strain at all. They had a lot going against them – physical weakness, paucity of numbers and lack of food – so McAllister did not mean them also to suffer from rundown horses. However, when they reached the basin, they found that Gato had been generous far beyond their expectations. He had brought not three horses, for which Sam had asked, but four. He had also brought fresh meat. By the time McAllister and Diaz arrived, the Apaches had lost themselves once more in the vastness of the hills. The two men were greeted by the smell of cooking deer meat. So frantic did the smell make them that they could scarcely find time to unsaddle and throw their mounts into the corral. They all ate royally that night and it was a merry party that sat at the rough table in the cook-shack and wolfed down the venison that Carlita served. McAllister looked at his companions with some appreciation. Nobody would have guessed the hardships that they had lately suffered, nor could they have any idea of the dangers they faced in the near future. McAllister was only too well aware of the fact and, as was his habit when he had time to think, he cursed himself for being damned fool enough to have gotten himself into this crazy business.

  When they were through eating, McAllister took a look at the animals the Apache had brought in. He couldn’t help smiling when he found that the first was a strong and heavily made mule with an army brand on its shoulder. He hoped they didn’t come upon any army patrols before they were able to get rid of the animal or they would have some smart talking to do. Two others were particolored Indian ponies which had been run hard for a long time and didn’t look as though there were many more miles in them. There was an old saying that when a white man had given a horse up as completely bushed, an Apache would mount him and get another twenty fast miles out of him. Maybe an Apache could have got some action from these two pieces of crowbait, but no white man ever would. The other horse was a tall Spanish horse, a sorrel, and it had not had a good meal in many a day. It had also been run down to skin and bone. But it was still a lot of horse and had a wicked eye. McAllister felt sorry for the man who chose to run it.

  Having finished his inspection of the stock and noted that they were all now eating their heads off, which was a good thing, he walked back for a talk with Sam and the others. It would be smart, he opined, to move a good distance away from the basin before they made camp for the night. They all agreed with that. Diaz suggested further that they take advantage of the cool and travel by night for at least a few hours. They were surely pretty safe from Rawley for a while and most of them would sleep little in the night cold of the hills with no blankets. He and McAllister knew the trail taken by the quarry and he, Diaz, knew the way like the back of his hand. They all thought this a good idea and decided that they should travel by night until around midnight and would halt when they came to good grass and water for the stock. They caught up their horses and saddled by starlight right away. Diaz, claiming boldly that he could ride anything on four legs, decided that he would ride the Spanish sorrel. As he had no saddle and nothing more than a rope hackamore, the task was at first a little too much for him and amid general laughter the animal dumped him three times before the Mexican did indeed prove himself the master. He rode him twice around the basin, showing the animal that he meant business, and there appeared to be a working understanding between them. They packed all the food for themselves and the animals that they could carry on the two Indian ponies, neither of which took kindly to the arrangement, and mounted Carlita on a home-made saddle of McAllister’s blanket on the mule. They then moved out, going up the eastern trail from the basin and walking the animals steadily into the night. McAllister was pleased to get away from the mine, for he feared not so much a return of Rawley’s men, but a change of mind on the part of Gato and his Apaches. He would rather have to face Rawley and his little army than Gato and his handful of braves any day.

  They reached good grass just before midnight with a mountain freshet tumbling nearby and decided to halt. They had made about twenty miles and, though they had not gained on Rawley, at least they were further forward than they would have been if they had stayed back at the mine.

  They found themselves a rocky position which could be defended, hobbled the animals and settled down to sleep as best they could without protection against the chill of the night. McAllister stood first watch, Porfirio took over from him and allowed him a sound sleep till dawn. First light saw them on their way, stepping up the pace a little and with McAllister out in front to make sure Rawley didn’t have a man watching his back trail.

  It was while riding advanced guard that McAllister came on Rawley’s first camp site. He dismounted and took a good look around and found it curious that the party that had camped around the fire was a good deal smaller than the one that had been on the trail. This discovery led him to investigate further and, circling, he found that Rawley had scattered more than half his force around a central point. This dividing of his forces puzzled McAllister at first, but after a while he thought he could see what Rawley had in mind. The man was remembering what had happened back at the mine, the time McAllister had gotten right down among his men and created havoc. Rawley plainly thought this might happen again, hoping that his enemy would work his way to the main camp and then find his retreat cut-off by the scattered men. It looked to McAllister as if Rawley thought that he was being harassed by one man, or two at the most. He grinned wolfishly to himself and decided that he was going to give Rawley an awful surprise. Rawley was too strong to be hit head-on, but there were ways of whittling a superior force down. And McAllister meant to start as soon as possible.

  Chapter 11

  Rawley sat on his fine-looking sorrel horse and watched his armed train moving slowly into camp. Another day had passed and it had been as uneventful as the night. Instead of comforting the man, this made him doubly wary. It was possible, as he knew full well, that whoever had been harassing him had given up, either because he couldn’t attain his objective or because he was fearful of the Apaches in the hills. Speaking for himself, Rawley had a healthy dread of Indians. He knew only too well what they were capable of. He didn’t doubt that he could get the better of them with his small army of well-armed men, but he wasn’t in this business for the heroics, only for the profit. He had kept Pepe all through the day hovering in the van, to the rear and on the flanks looking for sign, but the man had found none. If there was anybody trailing them, he was doing it well.

  His men went about the work of making camp without being told what to do. They were, he thought, unusually quiet. He watched them unloading the gold and supervised its stacking. He would sleep where he could keep his eye on it. Sitting down on a rock, he contemplated each man in turn, assessing them. He was aware that they were naturally dividing themselves on the trail into two parts. There were those who owed allegiance to no one, but who carried out their
orders fairly well; and there were those who tended to gather around a man known as Rico. A strange name to give a man – it meant ‘rich’ in Spanish. And they already had a man called Rich. This Rico was a man with something of a reputation. There were rumors about his having had trouble with the Mexican rurales, but Rawley did not reckon that the man was a Mexican himself. Certainly, he was dark and he favored Mexican clothes. However, his manner and his movements were those of an Anglo. In manner, he was a quietly aggressive man with an element of menace about him that belied the soft darkness of his eyes. He was tall and strong, had the unusual habit of carrying two belt-guns and had proved himself to be an excellent shot with pistol and rifle.

  He was the center of some half-dozen men, all of them ruffians to a man and all of them of evil reputation. Looking them over now Rawley decided that if he was going to have trouble, it would be from this bunch. He therefore straightway started planning. He started adding up the odds. On his side he had Carlos and Rich. The latter was hurt and might prove of no help whatever. Carlos was a skilled man with a gun, but Rawley would not have liked to gamble on his reliability. Only if there were certain profit in something for him could the man be even half-trusted. On Rawley’s side there was his own cool nerve and his reputation. On these he would have to rely. He had done that on many occasions in the past and had never lost by it.

  But the attacks worried him, for he felt that they had shaken the confidence his men had in him.

  As soon as the camp was set up and the cook had started the evening meal, Rawley started placing his men, scattering them around the central point as he had done the evening before. Rich he bedded down by the gold and left Carlos to keep him company with a half-dozen others. The rest he placed carefully out in the rocks and brush. Rico he left to last because he wanted a word with him unobserved by the other men. During the ride that day, Rawley had extemporised a plan, knowing that he would have to fool a cunning if not overly intelligent man. When they reached the spot where he intended to post Rico, well away from the others and out of earshot, he started straight in.

  ‘Rico,’ he said, ‘we’re in a spot.’

  The man squatted and started to build a smoke. He looked up at Rawley from under his heavy dark eyebrows. ‘What kind of a spot?’

  ‘I ain’t referrin’ to the feller’s been shootin’ us up nor the Indians. I’m talkin’ about our own men.’ The wariness that Rico tried to hide was transparent. This was Rawley’s first plain warning that the man was dangerous.

  ‘What do you mean?’ he asked.

  ‘I know for sure some of the boys’re goin’ to jump me for the gold before this trip’s out.’ Rico could scarcely hide his look of alarm. Rawley laughed deep down inside. He reckoned he had been right and this fellow had planned to jump him himself. He was now frightened that somebody else might beat him to it. He stared hard at Rawley and then turned his eyes away.

  ‘Who?’ he demanded.

  ‘I ain’t sayin’ who,’ Rawley told him bluntly. ‘But I know every Goddamn one of ’em.’

  Rico began: ‘Rawley, I swear –’

  Rawley laughed.

  ‘Hell, I ain’t meanin’ you, man. Sure, you thought about it. Who wouldn’t? I would in your boots. But you’re too smart to think you could pull it off. I ain’t a greenhorn. I’ve taken precautions. Nobody can get that gold, Rico. I made sure of that. But maybe I need a little more help than I have right now.’

  The man jerked his dark eyes up to Rawley. He was still alarmed, but his cunning little mind was thinking its way through the problem.

  Rawley went on.

  ‘That gold back yonder in camp – that ain’t nothin’. This is the third load I’ve taken into New Mexico. There’s enough gold there for a dozen men to start new lives. If there was a good man among this bunch, I’d think about going partners with him. I’d think about it real good.’

  Rico licked his lips.

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘You.’

  ‘Why me?’

  ‘You got sand. You can handle a gun better’n any of’em. You’re smart. You know where the profit is.’

  Rico looked like he swallowed it.

  ‘Sure,’ he said.

  ‘Think about it,’ Rawley said. ‘You could have enough gold to buy all you want for the rest of your life.’

  Rico nodded.

  ‘I’ll think about it,’ he said.

  ‘Don’t take too long about it,’ Rawley told him and walked away. He chuckled to himself. The man he had left was sweating, not knowing what to think.

  He walked back to the gold and stood by Rich. The wounded man was looking a little better.

  ‘How you feelin’, Rich?’ Rawley asked.

  ‘I’m healin’, boss. I reckon I got good reason. When we hit town I’m goin’ to be fightin’ fit to spend that gold.’

  They laughed together.

  Rawley sat and ate his meal with the wounded man, then retired to his spot in the surrounding rocks from which he could look over the gold-packs. He slept lightly with his rifle under his hand, waking every now and then to look out over the moonlit scene and to listen to the night. He expected an intruder tonight and was almost put out that none came. Uneasily he rose in the morning, hoping that the man had lit out and would not be heard from again. He went around waking the men and calling the guards in. The cook busied himself with breakfast, Pepe took a look around and came back to report that nobody had been near the camp during the night. Rico came in to single Rawley out and whisper to him –

  ‘I thought it over, boss.’

  ‘What did you decide?’

  ‘I’m with you.’

  ‘Good.’

  The horses were brought in, the pack-animals were loaded and men saddled up. Rawley showed particular interest where men rode today, making sure that he broke up Rico’s bunch. He sent Pepe out in front to scout and got the train on the move. Hoofs clattered through the rocks and men beat the pack animals into motion. Rawley rode down the line to take the lead. The train lined out and started to wind its way through the rocks, a narrow creeping line in a massive landscape.

  They had ridden for a half-hour when the shot sounded.

  Rawley at once stood in the stirrups and held up his hand. Slowly the train came to a halt. There was a clatter of hoofs from up ahead and a riderless horse came into sight. Rawley recognized the animal as Pepe’s. At once he sought enough room on the trail to bunch the train up and gave orders for Rico to go forward with a half-dozen men and see what had happened. There was no turning off this trail and he couldn’t go forward until the way had been cleared. Rico picked his men and rode forward at a fast pace. Silence fell as the hoofbeats died away. Rawley put a few men under cover of the surrounding boulders in case the train should be jumped. He found that his nerves were strung tight and he would have been almost thankful if something violent had happened then and there.

  After a while they heard the sound of hoofs again and Rico came back with his men to inform him that he had found nobody except Pepe whom they carried with them now, wounded in the shoulder and declaring that he was going to die. Rawley’s instinct was to rage, but he controlled himself admirably in front of the men and gave the order to move out. This time he put Rico and the men he had with him out in the van of the train. The wounded Pepe was slung on a horse and told to hold on the best he could. He sobbed that the motion of the horse would kill him, but nobody took much notice of him.

  They hadn’t covered the next quarter mile when the second shot came. One of the men from the advance guard tumbled from the saddle and lay still. Rawley put spurs to his horse and rode forward at a breakneck speed. One of the men of the advance guard yelled and pointed.

  ‘There he is, yonder.’

  They all looked up into the rocks and saw the man on the run. Even as they watched, they saw him vault aboard a horse and go racing off into the east.

  Rawley bellowed: ‘After him. Get him alive if you can. A hundred dollars for the man
who gets him.’

  They didn’t need any second bidding. Every man there rammed the spurs home and quirted his animal. At a breakneck speed they clattered away through the rocks. Rawley followed them. He could see the fugitive disappearing ahead. Some of his men had their belt-guns out and were blazing away with no result whatsoever. The fleeing rider turned a corner and disappeared and just at that second Rawley knew they were riding into a trap. He bawled a warning, but nobody heard his voice above the thunder of the hoofs and the sound of the shots. His men swept around the corner.

  It seemed to him that the sound of the hoofs stopped abruptly all in one second as if every horse there had been whisked from the ground by a giant hand. The guns stopped abruptly, horses screamed and men yelled.

  The pandemonium was cut through dramatically by the flat slam of rifles.

  Rawley reined in at the corner and was appalled at the chaos that met his eyes. The narrow way was strewn with riders and animals. A man staggered to his feet, ran a few yards and was knocked from his feet by a rifleshot. Somebody spotted Rawley and shots came his way. Desperately, he neck-reined his horse around and spurred back the way he had come. In a second, he was out of danger, but he kept on going, for his great fear now was that the train itself would come under attack. He knew that he had been mistaken and that there was more than one man against him. There had been several riflemen in the rocks firing on his men. And they hadn’t been Indians. These were white men armed with repeating rifles.

  As he approached the train, the guards there were standing with their guns in their hands, alarm showing on every face. He started yelling to them at a distance, telling them to get the gold under cover, but they seemed too stupefied to move until he rode among them. They moved then. His presence seemed to bring them back to their usual tough and capable selves. They hustled the pack mules and horses into the rocks and took up defensive positions.