by Mike Kearby
“It’s that fella’s bottle,” Pure mumbled. His knuckles whitened around the Peacemaker’s rubber handle.
“Huh?” July said and glanced over at the bottle resting next to the man.
“It’s full.”
July directed his gaze on the man resting in front of the hut. “Appears so.”
“That seems strange after a night of festivities.”
July gazed at Pure and shook his head, grinning.
“Look at him,” Pure said.
July’s eyes darted back to the man.
The man’s left hand disappeared under the brim of his sombrero.
July leaned over the front of his saddle and watched the man with great interest.
Pure made a face. “You’d figure the bottle would be empty.”
July didn’t wait for Pure to finish. “Or near empty after a long fiesta.”
“In my experience, men that observe holidays with a full bottle don’t usually give up until the bottle’s finished,” Pure said.
July watched the man’s head rise slightly. The man raised his hand toward his mouth once more. July caught a brief glance of what rested in the man’s hand. He smiled with a quick shake of his head. “I’ll be,” he said.
“What’s that?”
“He’s eating an onion.”
Pure let his eyes drift away from the bottle and over to the man. “An onion?”
“Yep.”
Pure drew back his lips in disgust and squinted hard. “I reckon that’s something a man doesn’t get to witness everyday.”
“Not especially pleasing to the eye.”
“Or to the mind.”
“Probably why his bottle is still full.”
Pure tossed a quick glance at July and shrugged questioningly. “How’s that?”
“It’s an old wives tale,” July explained. “Eating a raw onion like that causes your stomach to bloat, so you don’t get so drunk when you’re on a bender.”
“Well, I sure couldn’t drink mescal and eat an onion in the same set-to.”
“Takes some constitution, that’s for sure.”
Pure turned his gaze back to the man and scratched the back of his neck. After a long minute, he shook the rein and clicked his tongue. The Kickapoo mount started forward. “Watch your back,” he whispered to July.
July nodded and kept a long stare on the man sitting in front of the hut as he rode by.
The man kept his eyes hidden under the sombrero.
The peaceful silence of the street suddenly seemed sinister and foreshadowing.
“Pure?” July said in a hushed voice.
“Yeah?”
“Explain to me again what we’re doing in old Mexico.”
Pure looked down the road and didn’t answer.
July looked back at the man with the onion. “Pure?” he called out softly.
Pure kept his eyes focused on the road ahead. “I heard you the first time.”
“You figure to answer?”
“Come to get our gold coin, mostly.”
“Mostly?”
“I reckon we also come to kill Gunns.”
July exhaled. “Outside our own country.”
“Yeah.”
“Ain’t that illegal?”
“I reckon Mexico law wouldn’t hold favor with such planned activities.”
July glanced back at the slumbering figures around the street. “Just who is the law in these border towns anyway?”
Pure straightened at the question. He didn’t answer immediately. After several seconds of thought, he said, “Down here most localities have a top dog called the caudillo.”
“El jefe.”
“Yep.”
“And who takes care of problems for the caudillo?”
Pure tossed a brief glance at July. “Probably men like those back behind us.”
“Like that man eating the onion?”
“Yep.”
“Like those men lounging around the street.”
“Yep.”
“Pure?”
“Yeah?”
July tossed another hurried look back over his shoulder. “You know what?”
“What?”
“You’ve got me feeling like one of those damned sheep right about now,” July mumbled.
Thirty-Three
December 1878 - On the Road to Ciudad Guerrero, Tamaulipas, Mexico
Five miles outside of Nuevo Laredo, the road to Guerrero turned west for a hundred yards. Pure reined the Kickapoo horse from the road and headed for a free-standing ridge of rock twenty-yards away. He maneuvered the horse around the wind-eroded slope.
July urged the piebald to follow.
The inside wall of the formation was lower than the outside and offered a hiding place for the men and their horses from any eyes traveling to Guerrero.
“What are we doing?” July asked.
“Making ready.”
“I’m almost afraid to ask why,” July said.
“There’ll be men following.”
“More the reason to keep breezing these ponies.”
“We keep running we might not find a place to stop.”
July glanced back down the road to Nuevo Laredo. He watched patiently for some sign of pursuit. “Seems quiet enough.”
“They’ll be coming.”
“Uh-huh,” July hummed.
“Won’t be long.”
July let the humming die in his throat. “I’m beginning to feel like nothing good ever happens to a Texas cowboy in old Mexico.”
Pure’s expression turned serious and reflective. “The way our luck has been drifting lately,” he said. “I can’t really say that I can tell the difference between Mexico and Texas anymore.”
July smiled grimly. “I reckon I can still separate the two in my head.”
Pure nodded and pulled his Colt. He opened the ejector gate and checked his loads. “It’ll be that fella eating the onion,” he said without looking up.
“And the others too?”
“Yep.”
“Coming at us like the Kickapoo?”
“Probably.”
July pulled his Colt and checked his loads. After he finished, he closed the gate, and then glanced back down the road. “We just going to wait here and let ’em go by?”
Pure pushed the gate closed on his Peacemaker and slipped the gun back into its holster. “Or kill them.”
“What’s that?”
“Or kill them.”
July pushed his hat to the back of his head. “Shoot ’em in the back?”
“Well that would be one way of killing them.”
July’s face strained. “What about questioning ’em first?”
Pure stepped down from his mount. He began to chew the Snapping and Stretching gum rapidly between his front teeth. “You do remember that there’s going to be more than a couple of these fellas riding here for us?”
July nodded. “At least six by my count back in Nuevo Laredo.”
“And you figure they’ll be of a mind to answer our questions?”
“When you say it like that, no.”
“How else would I say it, July?”
“No need to get riled?”
Pure pounded the Snapping and Stretching between his top and lower teeth. “Who said I’m riled?”
July rolled his right leg over the saddle cantle and stepped out of the stirrup. “You know you do that whenever you have you’re mind set to a thing?”
The gum flattened between Pure’s teeth. “What’s that?”
“The gum.”
Pure stopped chewing. “What about the gum?”
“You chew it real fast between your top and bottom front teeth.”
Pure leaned in close to his horse and untied his lasso from the saddle ring. “Hmmmph,” he muttered and then resumed chewing. He grasped the lasso in his right hand and started for the dirt road.
“What are you going to do?” July called out.
“See if I can snare s
ome varmints.”
“You need my help?”
“Be nice.”
July followed Pure south down the road, toward Guerrero.
Fifty yards from the rock ridge, Pure stopped and held out one end of the rope. “Take this end,” he said and pointed to a small mesquite across the road. “And tie it to that tree.”
July dragged the lasso to the tree and tied a half-hitch knot four feet up the trunk. “You aim to snap these fellas from their horses?” he asked and pulled against his rope to check his knot.
“No, just stop them in front of it.”
July glanced back to where the horses stood hidden. “That rock formation makes a pretty good ambuscade.”
Pure wrapped his end of the lasso around a chest-high stand of oak scrub. “Uh-huh.”
“We going to hide behind it and wait for these fellas?”
“You are. I’m going to settle in amongst those rocks behind me on this side of the road.”
“Are we coming out shooting or talking?”
Pure ignored the question. “All of them will be hung-over, I reckon.”
“What about the one with the full bottle?”
Pure thought for a minute and then pushed the Snapping and Stretching gum into his lower lip. “’Cepting him,” he said.
“Shooting or talking? I need to be prepared.”
Pure glanced up. “What’s your take on E.B. hiring out for our killing?”
July smirked. “I imagine old E.B. isn’t partial to even odds in his killings.”
Pure lowered his chin. “We’ll be needing to kill them all ’cept full-bottle.”
July nodded. “So we need to kill five?”
“Five or six.”
“Two against five or six?”
“I reckon the numbers will improve once we start shooting.”
“I suppose.”
“July?”
“Yeah?”
“Maybe this will make it easier.”
“What’s that?”
“We just need to kill everyone but full-bottle.”
“So you said.”
“That way no counting is involved.”
July nodded again and rubbed the back of his hand across his mouth. “Pure?”
“Yeah?”
“All this killing…it ever make it hard for you to sleep at night?”
Pure straightened and locked eyes with July. “Hell, I haven’t had a good night’s sleep since last April.”
“You figure it’s gonna be that way for the rest of our lives?”
“Probably. We’ll get used to it, someday, I suppose…I hope so anyway.”
July exhaled a long exhausted breath, turned, and shuffled toward the rock formation. “Me too,” he muttered.
“July?”
July stopped and turned his head back over his shoulder. “Yeah?”
“How come you waited so long to tell me?”
The ranch foreman frowned to signal his confusion to the question.
“You know … about the gum?”
July gave a quick shake of his head. “I don’t know, today just seemed like the right time to tell you.”
Pure nodded. “Well, thanks for that.”
In the distance, a horse grunted.
Pure turned back north and listened. After a few seconds, he glanced over at July and nodded. “That’ll be full-bottle,” he said coolly and then hurried for his hiding spot.
Thirty-Four
December 1878 - On the Road to Ciudad Guerrero, Tamaulipas, Mexico
July stroked the piebald’s muzzle in a circular motion to keep the animal calm. He peered out to the road from his hidden vantage point and watched as the six riders from Nuevo Laredo pulled rein at the lasso stretched across the road. Then suddenly, from the corner of his eye, a blur of movement caught his attention. Pure had exited the hiding spot and with long, purposeful, yet hurried steps. He rushed forward toward the assassins. July’s hand instinctively fell from the horse’s lower lip and to his Peacemaker.
Pure’s gun exploded.
Once, twice, three times.
A man straightened then arched backward. An anguished groan spewed from his mouth.
The killing’s begun.
July sprinted from behind the rock formation, Colt raised and firing.
Chaos ensued quickly enough.
Horses reared.
Men cursed and grabbed for pistols.
The pop, pop, pop, of bushwhacking gunfire continued at full strength.
Men began to die.
One of the riders drooped forward with a heavy scream.
Another slumped sideways and rolled off his mount.
The unmistakable fragrance of gun powder filled July’s nostrils. He tossed a quick glance down to his right hand. His Colt bucked vertically.
Another assassin slid to the ground.
July watched the serape flutter above the falling man and then settle unceremoniously, yet peacefully around the dead figure.
Full-bottle reined his horse left with a shout of, “Heeyah!” The assassin attempted to skirt the ambush around the stretched rope barrier.
Pure raised his Peacemaker at full-bottle’s maneuver with a focused and steady aim. He pulled on the trigger. Blood exploded from the horse’s neck. The animal screamed and stumbled to its knees. Full-bottle pitched forward and sailed over the horse’s head.
July kept his approach for the remaining figure.
The man reined his horse around and unleashed three rapid shots at July while spurring his horse back in the direction of Nuevo Laredo.
July stood straight with dogged determination. He lifted the Colt to eye level and steadied his shooting wrist with his left hand.
The horse sprinted past July at a building gallop. The man’s pistol clicked empty. He reached for the second pistol.
July swiveled at the waist.
The man turned in the saddle and fired wildly.
July squeezed his left eye shut and sighted the escaping assassin with his right eye. He pulled the trigger in rapid succession.
The fleeing man fell and bounced twice on the road.
July lowered his gun and inhaled deeply.
“Shoot that horse!”
July turned and looked at Pure in confusion.
“Shoot that horse, July! Don’t let him get back to Nuevo Laredo!”
July wheeled. The Colt rose automatically. The gun belched smoke and fire.
The horse stumbled forward.
July inhaled and holstered the Colt. He licked his lower lip and then dragged his gun hand shirtsleeve across his forehead. He paused for several seconds and then glanced back at Pure.
“You did good,” Pure said.
July nodded. “Don’t feel like good,” he said. “Now, we’re shooting horses.”
“No time for that.”
July stood in the road, slack-faced. “I know,” he said.
Pure motioned for July to join him. “Give me a hand here,” he shouted. “It’s time we got on with asking full-bottle a few questions.”
Thirty-Five
December 1878 - On the Road to Ciudad Guerrero, Tamaulipas, Mexico
Full-bottle sat up. He glanced about the roadway. His expression showed disbelief and shock. He dabbed at a red welt rising on his forehead and began to ramble with lack of clear thought. “You fellas are in a heap of trouble, ambushing us like that.
The law won’t go for this.”
“What law?” Pure asked. He looked over at July. “Did you see any law in Nuevo Laredo?”
July stuck out his bottom lip and shook his head.
Pure looked back at full-bottle. “He didn’t see any law either.”
“We…all of us…are law abiding citizens here.”
Pure looked back at July. “Did you see any law abiding citizens in town?”
July shook his head again.
Pure returned his gaze to full-bottle. “He didn’t see any of those either.”
Full-bot
tle exhaled a sliver of breath through a half-opened mouth. He appeared flustered. Well, the town will sure enough get a posse together and hunt you down and string you up for this.”
Pure leaned over and backhanded the man across his left cheek.
Full-bottle’s eyes widened. His left hand was immediately drawn to his cheek. He rubbed his reddening flesh in a circular fashion.
Pure leaned in close to the man and winced at the smell emanating from the man’s mouth. “Law abiding citizens don’t wear double-holstered pistols,” he said, his voice rising with each word. “Law abiding citizens don’t follow two men riding through their town!”
The man’s expression dropped. He looked from Pure to July. “You fellas going to kill me?”
Pure glanced over at July. “Your call.”
Full-bottle tensed and waited for July’s answer.
“Probably so,” July said.
Pure straightened and looked at full-bottle with dark eyes. “Maybe not…that is if you tell us what we want to know.”
Full-bottle dropped his gaze to the ground between his legs.
Pure pushed the Snapping and Stretching gum forward to his front teeth and began to chomp loudly. “It’s your call.”
Full-bottle glanced up. A hapless look hung on his face. After several seconds, his gaze dropped back to the ground. “Whataya want to know?”
“How come you come after us the way you did?”
Full-bottle let loose with a yielding exhale and stammered, “There…there was two of them.”
Pure leaned in close. “What’d they look like?”
“One of them wore a fancy pair of handcrafted spurs.”
Pure’s face flushed in realization. He squatted in front of full-bottle and bore his gaze deep into the man’s eyes. “They give you their names?”
Full-bottle looked up at Pure and then glanced to July. He shook his head blankly and issued a whispered, “No.”
“And I don’t suppose you asked?” Pure said.
Full-bottle made a face and twisted in the dirt.
July bore a hard gaze into full-bottle. “Those Texas boys weren’t as green as you figured were they mister?”
Full-bottle grabbed a handful of dirt and then flung it back into the ground between his legs.
Pure reached forward and pinched full-bottle’s chin between his thumb and forefinger. He swiveled the assassin’s face toward him. “What’d they pay?” he asked and dug his thumb into the man’s flesh.
