Wife Stealer

by F. M. Parker

  "Travel as fast as you can," Carlos said to Leo. "Most likely no one will know what has happened to the women. Still, there may be pursuers, and so the farther south you go the safer you will be. Change horses at every one of our stations."

  "I'll travel today and through the night, and not rest until dark tomorrow. If I need fresh horses between stations, I'll buy them. Emanuel is our best driver and no one will catch us."

  "Leave at once. Guard the women closely for they will try to escape. And watch for bandits."

  "Rafael is worth any three other pistoleros and will help me keep the girls safe," Leo said, and nodded at the pockmarked man. "What about you?"

  "I'll find Tattersall and we'll kill Hawkins. Then I'll follow behind you to stop any gringos who chase us."

  Maude heard the name Hawkins. She recalled that the old man had called Leo Señor Valdes, and that Ben had stolen Valdes horses, and the connection came together for her. Carlos and other men planned to kill Ben. He was in danger and she had no way to warn him, nor to tell him she had been taken captive and to come and rescue her.

  Carlos spoke. "Arrange for our priest to conduct a wedding as soon as I arrive back at the rancho."

  "Two weddings," Leo said.

  "Right. Now get the women into the stagecoach and be on your way."

  THIRTY FOUR

  "Look at the face on that man," Crampton said, peering through the night at the horseman passing by on the street.

  "One damn ugly hombre," Butcher replied.

  The two scalp hunters had just come out onto the sidewalk in front of La Posada Cantina in El Paso when Ben, mounted on Brutus, came past. He was illuminated briefly as he rode through the light shining through the windows of the cantina.

  "He has to be that Hawkins we've been hired to shoot," Crampton said.

  "I think so too, for there couldn't be more than one man that ugly in El Paso."

  "Tattersall found out that Hawkins is staying at the El Prado. Let's follow this fellow and see if that's where he's going. If it is him, what do you say to us shooting him and not wait for Tattersall's help?"

  "I like the idea, for then we'll get Valdes's money quicker," Butcher said.

  * * *

  Ben rode Brutus into the dark alley behind the hotel. When near the stables, he dismounted and dropped the reins to ground-hitch the horse. He approached the stables warily, for Lester Ivorsen knew where he was staying and just might be mad enough to try to shoot him. Ben found no enemy lurking in the stables, only the horses of other hotel patrons in some of the stalls. Brutus was brought forward and given a pitchfork of clover hay and a generous ration of shelled corn. The horse went for the grain first. While he crunched away, Ben rubbed him down with one of the brushes supplied by the hotel.

  Ben left Brutus eating contentedly and went through the night along the stone-paved walkway to the hotel. He had just arrived from Canutillo. There he had gone to Tom's wheelwright shop to check for a message from Maude, and found none. He had then returned to Silas Dunlap, grazing his sheep by the river, and had had him point out the horse tracks of the rider who had carried off the woman.

  The tracks had been easy to follow until they struck the heavily used road leading west toward Silver City. There they had merged with scores of other horse tracks and he had lost them. Ben was frustrated at not being able to follow the tracks farther, and deeply worried about what might have happened to Maude. Tomorrow at first light he would continue his search.

  He halted at the entryway into the walled courtyard and peered ahead into the partially lighted area. To aid those people arriving after dark to find their way, the manager kept a hurricane lamp lit and hanging on an iron pole in the center of the courtyard where the path from the street met the one coming from the stables. The light only partially lit the large enclosed area, not reaching the darkness under the trees on the perimeter nor the wall of the hotel on the side next to the stables. Still thinking of Lester, Ben stepped sideways to get out of the light coming along the pathway.

  Just as Ben moved a pistol fired with a bright red flash from the deep night shadows beneath a tree on the left side of the patio. Instantly he felt a sting across the outside of his left arm up high near the shoulder. He flinched and moved to the side, and at the same time drew his Colt six-gun.

  He fired twice, bracketing the location of the flash, hunting the shooter's chest, and kept moving so as not to give his enemy a stationary target. A man cried out and Ben heard something heavy fall, something that could be a man's body. Damn that Lester for forcing Ben to shoot him.

  Red flame blossomed on Ben's right in the blackness by the wall of the hotel. The bullet skimmed past the side of Ben's face with the snarl of a deadly bee.

  Ben fired twice again, one shot on each side of the flash, wanting to kill his enemy. Two men shooting at him meant that it wasn't Lester, for the man had no friends who would try to kill Ben. Maude's father was an ornery bastard and most likely angry at Ben; however, he wouldn't be party to a deliberate night ambush.

  A second shot at Ben, poorly aimed, came from farther along the side of the hotel. Then came the pounding thud of feet as a man ran from the patio. The nerve of Ben's second adversary had broken and he was fleeing.

  Ben stopped moving. There could be a third man or a fourth and Ben didn't want to blunder into one of them. He crouched and his eyes probed the darkness. He waited turning his head and listening intently. He saw nothing, and heard nothing, except the moans of the wounded gunman off a ways.

  A man shouted from the main entrance of the hotel, "Stop that shooting out there for I've sent for the sheriff."

  "Tarlow, stay inside," Ben shouted back. Tarlow was the hotel owner. "It's not safe."

  Ben crept soundlessly toward the source of the moaning sound He held his pistol ready to shoot should the man be only pretending to be injured. The man came into sight, a crumpled form on the flagstones of the courtyard. When closer still, Ben could make out the man's pistol where it had been dropped on the stone-covered ground.

  Ben picked up the gun and rolled the man onto his back. The man looked up into Ben's shadowed face.

  "That you, Crampton? I can't see good."

  "Yeah, it's me," Ben said in a coarse voice.

  "Did we get him?"

  "He's dead."

  "Good," the man said in a weak voice. He felt his bloody chest and found the hole where the bullet had struck him, breaking the thick sternum bone and plowing deep into his body.

  "Goddamn, I'm bleeding bad." He inserted his finger into the hole, trying to plug the flow of blood.

  Ben wanted to question the man for there was much he needed to know. However, he waited for the man to speak. The most truthful information would be that which came voluntarily while the man thought Ben was his partner.

  The man was silent for a time. Then he spoke slowly, with his words slurred. "I'm done for, ain't I? A doctor won't do me any good?"

  "That's right," Ben said. The man was quiet again, considering his plight. Finally his words came, mere whispers.

  "I thought so. Tell Tattersall that you get my share of Valdes's money." His voice was faint, sliding down, ever weaker.

  "Whose money?" Ben wasn't certain he had correctly heard the last words. The man didn't respond, holding his finger jammed into the hole in his chest and barely breathing.

  "Whose money?" Ben said more loudly. The man was dying, and Ben held his thoughts by only a little spider's thread. He slapped the man sharply. "Whose money?"

  "Valdes," the man whispered. He went slack, all life gone.

  "Valdes," Ben said. So that was what all this was about. He grabbed the man by the collar and dragged him into the light of the hurricane lantern. He knelt beside the man to examine his face. He was a stranger.

  Ben rose to his feet. Ramos Valdes had hired men to come to El Paso to kill him because of the horses he had stolen. The gunmen would most likely have succeeded if Ben hadn't been concerned about Lester wanting reveng
e on him. He had been god-awful lucky.

  Ben saw that Tarlow had come forward and now stood in the edge of the light from the hurricane lamp. He called out to the man. "Tell Sheriff Willis that two men tried to shoot me. One got away. This one wasn't lucky. I'll talk to the sheriff, but later. Right now I've got something to do south of the river."

  "All right, Ben. I'll tell him what you said."

  Ben went to the stables, took Brutus away from his shelled corn, and saddled him. Valdes had a freight station in Ciudad Juarez. Ben knew where it was for he was almost as familiar with that town as he was with El Paso. That was where he would start his search for Valdes.

  He rode south the short distance to the Rio Grande, forded the slow-moving water, black as ink in the darkness, and went into Ciudad Juarez. Ben had been careful not to kill any of the Valdes family or their men. However, they considered his theft of their horses to be worth his life, and they had tried to collect it. That added a deadly dimension to the game. He would give them more of a fight than they had bargained for.

  THIRTY FIVE

  Miguel sat rocking in his favorite chair—in fact, his only chair—in the darkness in front of his one-room abode in the Valdes warehouse. The room was provided as part of his payment as night watchman for the Valdes Freight Company.

  He was thinking of the two American señoritas the Valdes brothers had stolen from their homes and carried away. They were very pretty, too pretty for their own good. The señoritas had been forced into the stagecoach by Carlos and Leo, and the doors lashed shut with lengths of rope to prevent them from jumping from the vehicle and escaping. The stagecoach had sped off into the night with Emanuel driving the two teams of horses and Leo and the pistolero Rafael riding horseback ahead to watch for bandits. Miguel knew the señoritas would never be seen north of the Rio Grande again. Valdes and his sons took whatever they wanted even the women of the tough Americans.

  Miguel didn't like the men from north of the river. He had fought with the Mexican Army against the American invaders at the battle for Mexico City in 1847. The Americans had beaten them, with Miguel being wounded in the leg in the fighting. That defeat was a terrible memory even after all the years that had passed. Yet he was sorry to have been part of keeping the señoritas captives.

  Miguel felt the presence of something or some person near in the darkness behind him. Before he could turn, a man whispered in Spanish, "Don't move or make a noise and I’ll not kill you."

  A hand caught Miguel by the shoulder and another clamped him around the neck. He felt the great strength in the hands and his old heart began to pound wildly. He tried to speak, but couldn't find his voice. He did not think this was a thief who had come to rob the warehouse. This was about the American señoritas, and the man who held him would be very angry and that made him dangerous. Miguel should have expected someone would come and should have locked himself in his room.

  "I'll not make a sound," Miguel said, his voice hoarse because of the pressure on his neck.

  "Then you're safe," said the unseen man. The man's hands slid down Miguel's sides, found his pistol, and took it from the holster. "Do you have another gun?"

  "Yes, a rifle, but it's in the room." The hands caught Miguel by the neck and shoulder again. "I have questions for you."

  "Ask me anything," Miguel said. He was frightened about the hand holding him by the neck. The grip was so tight that he could feel the bones of his spine grinding against each other.

  "Has any member of the Valdes family been here recently?" Ben asked.

  "Yes."

  "When?"

  "Early today."

  "Who?"

  "Carlos and Leo."

  "Not Ramos?"

  "No."

  "Any men with them?"

  "No. I didn't see any."

  "Did they mention anyone? Any Americans? A man named Tattersall?"

  Ben decided obtaining information by asking questions was taking too long. "Tell me everything you know and that they said."

  "Carlos told Leo to take the American señoritas south. That he was going to stay here and join with this Tattersall to kill a man named Hawkins. Then they both left."

  The hand on Miguel's neck clenched down and he gasped at the pain. He was certain that he was going to die. And all because of the Valdes brothers' desire for American women.

  After a few seconds, the hand eased its grip and Miguel could breathe again.

  "Old man, I think you just lied to me." Ben was surprised at the mentioning of taking the women south. He recalled what Silas had told him about the man he had seen with the woman near the Rio Grande at Canutillo. He had been wearing a large sombrero. What this old man had just said agreed with that. Either Leo or Carlos had been the man with the woman.

  "I didn't lie! I didn't!" Miguel exclaimed. "Leo put the señoritas into the stagecoach and left with Rafael. Then Carlos left."

  "Two señoritas?"

  "Yes, two."

  Ben eased his grip on the man's neck. "When did they bring them here?"

  "The smaller one last night. It was dark and I had to light a lantern to show them through the warehouse."

  "The second one. When?"

  "Early today."

  "The names of the señoritas, old man? What were their names?"

  "I can't remember," Miguel said, wanting the hand to let go of his neck.

  "Think fast for I have no time to waste."

  Miguel's brain was racing to remember what Leo had called the small señorita. The name came to him. "Leo called her Maude. Yes, Maude was the name of the smaller seriorita, the first one they brought."

  "What did she look like? Describe her."

  "She was small like I said, and had golden hair, like the sun."

  Ben had no doubt that the old man was telling the truth about Maude, for how else could he know her name and the color of her hair? Also, the time was right, enough time for someone to ride from Canutillo to Ciudad Juarez with her.

  "Now give me the name of the second one. Be quick about it."

  "I don't know it. I never did hear it spoken."

  "You lie."

  "No, no. The second señorita was brought just before they left. I saw her. But Carlos ordered me to help Emanuel harness the horses and I wasn't close enough to hear what they said."

  "All right. What did she look like?"

  "Taller than the first one and just as pretty."

  "What else do you remember about her?"

  "She had strange eyes."

  "How strange? Describe them."

  "They were green eyes, large green eyes."

  Carlos and Leo had kidnapped the two women and carried them south, just as their mother had been kidnapped years before. She had remained with her captor to raise her two sons. Now those sons were imitating their father, and had assumed these women, just as their mother, would remain with them. Ben had come to fight the Valdes family for trying to kill him, only to discover they had kidnapped two young women, one of them Maude.

  His anger rose white hot. About the Valdes family wanting retribution for the horses, Ben could understand. But when it came to stealing Maude, that was a fatal error on their part, and Ben would take terrible vengeance.

  "That's all I know about the señoritas," Miguel said.

  "When did Leo leave?"

  "Yesterday morning."

  Hours ago, Ben realized. Leo would drive hard and with frequent changes of horses for the stagecoach, could be deep in Mexico by now.

  "What are you going to do if I turn you loose?"

  "Whatever you tell me to do."

  "You will forget that I was ever here."

  "That is what I would choose to do. If the Valdes sons found out that I had told what they had done to the señoritas, they would kill me."

  "If they didn't, then I would."

  The hands released their hold on Miguel. He did not hear the man leave. Yet he knew he was once again alone. He rubbed his sore neck and drew in a deep breath. He shive
red at the sweetness of the air.

  THIRTY SIX

  "You're a stupid man," Carlos raged at Crampton. His hand was on the pistol belted to his waist. He wanted the American to fight so that he could kill him.

  Crampton recognized the challenge and kept his hand away from his pistol. He had barely escaped from Hawkins's bullets, and didn't want a fight with the angry Mexican.

  Crampton still couldn't believe how quickly, or how accurately, Hawkins had returned his shot. The man's bullets had straddled his chest, so close that each had burned his flesh as they drove past. Had Crampton moved either left or right when he fired, he would be dead now.

  "You found out that fighting Hawkins is more dangerous than killing some Indians from hiding," Carlos said. He shook his head in disgust for he saw Crampton wasn't going to provide him with the opportunity to shoot him.

  Tattersall didn't like Carlos's rough words to his man, but he held himself reined in. He would only take Crampton's side if it really came down to a gunfight.

  The three men were in the boardinghouse in El Paso where Tattersall and his men had taken lodging. Carlos had arrived a few minutes before to find Crampton telling Tattersall about the attempt to kill Hawkins.

  "Was Butcher alive when you left?" Tattersall said. Crampton had acted like a coward, and Tattersall hadn't expected that.

  "I don't know. He shot at Hawkins. He must've missed, or not hit him hard, for Hawkins shot back at him, and at me. I didn't hear anything more from Butcher. He could be alive or dead."

  "If he's alive, Hawkins will make him talk," Carlos said. "Now he probably knows that the Valdes family has come north to kill him."

  "I'll round up my other men and we'll deal with him tonight," Tattersall said.

  "No," Carlos said. "You've never seen what the man can do with a gun, especially a rifle. You don't want to go straight at him when he's ready for you."

  "I say there's enough of us to kill him."