by John Benteen
He stood up, letting the bolas dangle from his hand. “All right,” he said quietly. “Time to ride. Get them on their horses, Theo.”
“Si.” Braga arose, the Mauser in his right hand, a knife in his left. In the fireless camp, he was only a shadow in the dark, like the two captives. He stood over them. “Up, hombres.”
“Yes,” Mario said; then, like a panther, he leaped, straight at Braga. And, in the faint light of stars, Fargo caught the outline of a knife-blade poised, saw that Mario’s ankles were no longer bound.
Taken by surprise, Braga stepped back, tripped, went down. Fargo sprang forward, reaching for the shotgun, hand freezing before he touched it. The Fox’s thunder would, in the quiet night, be like sounding an alarm.
Then Mario was on Braga like a pouncing cat, and Fargo could not shoot anyhow for fear of hitting Theo. The two figures wrestled, and Braga grunted, and then in darkness, one of them was on its feet, all this in a trio of seconds, and running for the horses. Mario! Fargo thought, and he saw the Mauser in the gaucho’s hand. He threw himself to the ground just as a spurt of flame cleft the darkness. A bullet whined above his head. Then Mario had reached his horse, was in the saddle, bent low. The animal, well-trained, had not been picketed like Cimarron, had grazed only ground-reined. When the gaucho struck it with his spurs, it rocketed off across the pampa.
Fargo cursed, scrambled up. There was no time to see to Braga, Manuelo; he had to get Mario before the gaucho could vanish in the night, reach the estancia, give the alarm. Besides, he needed Mario alive. He hesitated only a fraction of a second; then he was in the saddle of Braga’s pinto.
The animal snorted as he gouged it with his spurs; then it broke into a full run from a standing start, stretching its belly close to the ground as Fargo put it after the fleeing gaucho. Mario already had a start of a hundred yards or more; Fargo caught a glimpse of him as his horse crested the side of the hollow. Then the pinto was also over the rise, and out on the open pampa visibility was better. The sky full of stars gave just enough light for Fargo to see the moving blot that was horse and rider against the immensity of the plain and guide on it.
Then it was a race, Mario’s long legged bay against the stocky pinto. The spotted horse had surprising speed; not for nothing had a horseman like Theo Braga picked him as personal mount. Slowly the gap closed between Fargo and the fleeing gaucho.
Mario, peering over his shoulder, was aware of that. He raised in the saddle, twisted, fired another round from the Mauser. In that light, at that speed, a hit would have been a lucky accident; Fargo did not even duck. Instead, he spurred the pinto harder, gathering up the dangling bolas he still clutched.
The thunder of hooves on the plain was like a drum roll. The pinto, warmed up now, was running even better. Slowly but inexorably, it gained on Mario’s bay; and the gaucho did not bother to shoot again, but once more bent low in the saddle, lashing the horse with the rein-ends. But still the pinto closed the gap; and now the bolas was whirling over Fargo’s head. He was far from expert with it, but he had practiced enough at least to hope; if he failed in this, there was still the chance of bringing down the bay with a rifle shot; but it was a long one and they were so damned close to the ranch, he told himself, that he begrudged every report of a gun ...
Fifty yards, now; forty; thirty. He saw Mario rise in the saddle, turn, and knew the Mauser was aimed once again. At this range, there was a chance, and he ducked as the gun went off, heard the bullet scream by his head. Then the pinto had eaten up another ten yards of Mario’s lead, and Fargo raised himself again and, as Mario fired once more and the bullet came too close, gained momentum with the bolas and, at fifteen yards flung it with all his might.
He could throw a sixty-foot riata with great accuracy and at that range the bolas was more accurate. Its weighted ends whirling, it sailed through the darkness. His aim was good; it wrapped itself around the bay’s hind legs in a tangle; the horse snorted and went down. Mario, pitched from the saddle, hit the ground hard, and Fargo was off the pinto while it was still running at full gallop. He himself tripped, got up, and now the Colt was drawn as he ran forward. Mario, stunned, tried to rise, lifting the Mauser; Fargo loomed above him, raised a booted foot, brought it down hard on the gaucho’s forearm. Mario gasped as Fargo’s boot pinned his gun hand to the ground; then the muzzle of the Colt was centered between Mario’s eyes, against his skull.
“All right, man,” Fargo panted. “Turn loose. The knife, the gun, all.”
Mario cursed. Then his body went slack. Fargo saw the hand unclench itself from the pistol. The other hand held a facon, a gaucho’s knife, and Mario, under the Colt’s threat, tried to rise and, with measured force, Fargo hit him with the gun barrel. Mario grunted and fell back.
Fargo stepped away, picked up the Mauser and the knife, thrust both into his belt. The bay was trying to get up; Fargo went to it, helped it. He cut a length of rope from the riata on its saddle and tied the unconscious gaucho’s hands. Then he mounted the horse, went after the pinto, caught it without trouble. Ten minutes later, with Mario, still out, lashed across the bay’s saddle, he rode the pinto back into the hollow.
As he entered it, a voice from down there challenged him fiercely: “Quien es?”
Something eased inside of Fargo. “It’s me, Braga,” he said quietly.
“Thank God … ” He saw the stocky silhouette lower the shotgun. “That bastard, did you get him?”
“I’ve got him,” Fargo said.
“Neal, I’m a fool. I should have known he might have an extra knife on his saddle, beneath the pads. He got it into his boot somehow, cut his ropes. And then he was on me like a panther.”
“I was afraid he’d gutted you.”
“No. When I fell back, I hit my head on a rock; it stunned me. He didn’t even take time to stab, was off and running. But, Dios mio, what an idiot I am!”
“No more than me,” Fargo said. “I’ve been in this business a long time. But it looks like Mario has, too. Well, we won’t give him a second chance. What about Manuelo?”
“Manuelo’s dead,” Theo said.
“So?”
“He was stupid, but very brave. As I came up, he tried to get me, even bound as he was. My knife took care of him.”
Fargo bit his lip. Two men would have been better than one. But he said nothing as he swung down off the pinto. He was glad that Theo Braga was still alive; not only had his liking for the man deepened as a result of Braga’s performance in the gunfight, but what he planned could not be carried off without Braga’s help.
“It doesn’t matter. Here’s your Mauser. Make sure that Mario’s tied tight, while I get Cimarron. Then well be riding.”
“To where?”
“I told you where,” Fargo said. “To the pasture with the fighting bulls in it.”
~*~
The sound came from out of darkness, and it was enough to raise the short hair on the back of a man’s neck—the bellow of a full-grown Spanish fighting bull.
Beginning as a rumble, like distant thunder, it mounted into a roar, a scream, hung ululating in the silence of the pampa, then died off in a rasping sob, a ferocious grunting. Cimarron snorted, ears laid back, as Fargo reined him in.
“Hold the stallion,” he told Theo and swung down.
On foot, he covered the last ten feet to the fence. Its posts were visible, but its strands were not in the utter darkness. The wind, blowing from the men to the cattle, had carried their scent into the pasture. As Fargo explored the taut-stretched, sharply barbed wire with his hands, finding five strands, the topmost six feet above the ground, he was aware of black shapes moving toward him across the plain beyond. The bellow came again, with something in it like the chiming of a great bronze bell. Attracted by the odor of strange men, the fighting cattle, with the ferocity and curiosity of their kind, were trotting toward the fence. A hundred of them, Fargo thought. It would take a while for all of them to gather here. He hoped the fence would hold them. If the
y were aroused, there was a chance it would not.
He turned away, swung once again into Cimarron’s saddle, keeping a tight rein on the nervous stallion. From the horse’s back, it was possible to see a steady stream of cattle trotting across the pampa; and he could vaguely make out, in their lead, an enormous shape, thick-necked and humped, one that halted from time to time and raised its massive head and emitted that blood-chilling bellow. There was not much doubt that this one was El Diablo Negro, and Fargo thought of his brief apprenticeship in the ring and was glad that he had never had to face such an animal. A fighting bull, four or five years old, was one thing; an old herd bull kept for stud, like this one, was something else. The Black Devil must be seven, eight years old, maybe more; and he would have had dozens of encounters with other bulls, mounted men and men on foot; there would be no chance of working him in a ring with cape or muleta.
“All right, Theo,” Fargo said tersely. “Put him over.”
Gagged, Mario, who had recovered consciousness, made a terrified sound. Fargo’s stomach knotted a bit, but he smoked his cigarette, shielded with his palm, calmly. He had not forgotten Mario’s treachery with the knife.
The cattle were closer now. Theo led Mario’s bay up alongside the fence. Then, suddenly, he gave Mario a terrific shove.
Baggy pants flapping, hat sailing, the gaucho, hands bound behind his back but feet free, went flying over the wire. He landed hard, rolled, scrambled awkwardly to his feet.
Twenty yards away, El Diablo Negro lowered his head, raised that terrible bellow once again. As he pawed dirt, it was echoed by the cows and younger bulls gathering around him as the ganado gathered.
Mario was up, now, and running. He ran along the wire, and Fargo galloped after him with the shotgun trained. Mario saw it and turned away, ran diagonally across the pasture. Then the cattle, seeing that motion in the darkness, went after him, El Diablo Negro in the lead. Fargo heard the thunder of hooves, caught the glint of starlight on black-tipped horns. Mario ran swiftly, stumbling, getting to his feet. He vanished into darkness, pursued by twenty, thirty animals.
Fargo reined Cimarron around so hard the stallion pawed the air. “All right!” he snapped at Braga. “Let’s go!”
They galloped at full speed down the fence. As they went, cattle passed, headed in the opposite direction. In the distance, that terrible bellow split the air again; like a trumpet, it would summon every fighting animal in the pasture. Fargo grinned, with satisfaction but without any mirth at all. It was a lousy way to die.
But better Mario than him. Then they had reached the far corner of the pasture. He pulled up El Cimarron. Now he would find out what the stallion was made of.
“Braga,” he said, “can your pinto make it?”
“If the stallion does.”
“I think he will.” Fargo spurred the horse, put him up hard against the fence, so close that the barbs pressed into Cimarron’s chest. He wanted the horse to have the sense, the understanding, of this obstacle he would have to jump in darkness. Then he whirled Cimarron away, Braga following on the paint. Withdrew a hundred yards, whipped off the cavalry hat, slapped Cimarron on the rump with it and gouged with spurs.
The great horse stretched its neck, went into a dead run, straight for the five tight-stretched, steel-toothed strands. Fargo knew he could clear the six feet; the trick was taking off, in darkness, at exactly the right time, for the wire was nearly invisible. A yard too soon, a yard too late, and Cimarron would go down in a deadly tangle.
Because the stallion had never been trained for jumping with a rider on its back, there was nothing he could do to help it; only balance his weight and hope. Cimarron pounded on; then suddenly he leaped. Something leaped inside Fargo as well, with exultancy; never had he ridden a horse that jumped so high, so cleanly, and with such controlled and gathered neatness. But whether the stallion had judged right—
Cimarron came down, and now Fargo could lift him on the bit, and the big horse ran on, until Fargo could control and pull him up, and the fence had been cleared as neatly as if the stallion had sprouted wings. Cimarron pivoted on hind feet; now, in darkness, Braga was coming on the pinto.
Fargo sat tensely, waiting; the animal had heart, but it was so short, so stocky ... Then he saw it leave the ground, in a jump of incredible height. Fargo’s hands tightened on the reins; there was, in his plan, no margin for error; and if error there was to be, this was where it would occur. He relaxed slightly; the pinto was high above the wire, coming down ...
Then, having misjudged by a fraction of an inch, the horse stumbled, hind foot catching in the top strand. Fargo cursed, as its forelegs buckled; it rolled, and Braga went sailing, sprawling. Fargo touched Cimarron with spurs again, galloped forward. Braga was scrambling to his feet; but the pinto lay still, a hulk on the ground. Fargo knew immediately that its neck was broken; it was dead.
He wasted no time in useless regret, although this could be disaster. Risk was risk, and when you took as much of it as he and Braga had, something was bound to go sour; nobody could win them all. Nevertheless, it meant covering twenty miles riding double; and, strong as Cimarron was, not even he could carry four hundred pounds, or nearabouts, at top speed for that distance without having to rest. And, in Fargo’s scheme, there was no time for rest …
He kicked left foot free of the stirrup, stretched out left hand. Braga glanced at the dead horse, comprehended, and then was, in a lithe swing, up behind Fargo on Cimarron’s rump. Fargo turned the stallion across the bull pasture. They could make it now; all the fighting cattle would be drawn to the other end, from whence, above the thud of Cimarron’s hooves, came a terrible cacophony of bellowing and bawling. By now, Fargo thought, there would not be enough left of Mario to recognize as human...
Two miles; even carrying double, Cimarron raced across the pasture without faltering. Ahead, Fargo saw another row of posts looming against the skyline. He pulled the horse up, and, swinging down, passed the reins to Braga. Now to put the second phase of his plan into effect ...
He had no wire cutters, but he needed none. The blade of the Batangas knife winked in starlight as he bared it. Then, at a fence-post, he went to work.
Any ordinary knife would have been ruined after the first few blows. But as Fargo hammered with a rock, the super-hardened steel of the Batangas knife bit cleanly through the strands of barbed wire where they crossed the post. One after another of the wires twanged, curled loosely to the ground. Fargo ran to the next post, severed them there, and at the next half dozen after that. Smiling grimly, he lifted himself into the saddle again. When the black cattle found the gap in the fence, drifted through it, rounding them up would give at least some of von Stahl’s gauchos something to keep them busy.
“Let’s go,” he said to Braga, and the big stallion raced on through the night. Now everything hinged on making it to the estancia before daylight—and on Cimarron’s strength and stamina.
Chapter Six
The stallion had put in a lot of hard traveling that day, but at first he ran smoothly, easily, despite his double burden. Fargo rode alertly, the shotgun up, ready for instant use. According to Mario, there should be no guards inside the perimeter of the estancia, no further opposition until they reached the headquarters of the place itself. The boundary guards, meanwhile, should have been drawn off by the uproar of the blood-maddened cattle. Fargo hoped his assessment of the situation was right; if his plan were to work, there was no time for fighting between now and dawn.
Because, he had seen from the first, there was only one way to play this, short of bringing in a massive army—and that last would not have worked, not with Carla and Caesar Hierro in von Stahl’s hands as hostages. No, what he and Braga had to do was hit the estancia in early morning, while men slept soundest, gain entrance somehow to its main house, take von Stahl himself captive. Then the shoe would be on the other foot; with the German as hostage he could get the girl and the old man clear of the estancia without having to fight again. O
nce safely in Buenos Aires with them, he could then recruit the army he would need to come back here and wipe out whatever leaderless snakes then remained in this nest.
But the timing had to be right, perfect; tonight was his only chance. Gauchos came awake early, and once the reserve von Stahl kept at the ranch was up and about, there would be no way to get to the German. Fargo’s mouth thinned; if only Braga’s pinto had cleared the fence, there would have been no problem. Now, though, it was going to be close, damned close, and if they did not make it, the chances of hiding through a full day on this place, with its riders aroused like hornets, would be slim, almost non-existent.
Twenty minutes passed, thirty. The thud of hooves was steady, rhythmic, but Fargo could feel now the pounding of the stallion’s powerful heart beneath the ribcage, the pumping of great lungs. Another ten, and there was nothing for it to stop, give the horse a chance to blow. Cursing the loss of time, he and Braga swung down, and Fargo loosened the girth. Cimarron grunted with relief, stood with legs widespread, head lowered, nostrils flaring. He rubbed his head against Fargo’s thigh and Fargo scratched the bump beneath his forelock, between his ears. In that instant, a kind of current seemed to flow between them, and Fargo recognized its significance. Inside the stallion’s brain and heart, a turning point had been reached, a decision made. The horse felt need of him, was offering loyalty, allegiance, maybe even love. From now on, he was Fargo’s horse. Horses were like women in that respect, he thought; they fought you ’til they loved you, and then they would meet any demands you made of them and follow you through any danger. At least, now, Fargo knew that Cimarron would neither give up, no matter how hard he was pushed, nor turn against his rider. And that was important.
