Young Ole Devil

by J. T. Edson

  ‘Hard enough, sir,’ Ole Devil confessed and, without elaborating upon the incident with the bear, described the fight that had followed the quartet’s arrival. He finished by saying, ‘I’m sorry it had to happen, sir, but Di had to kill the last of them—’

  ‘You’d rather he’d’ve killed you, or her?’

  ‘No, sir, but—’

  ‘That fancy rifle of your’n was empty, way you told me, and she’d got your pistol?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Then somebody had to stop that jasper and she was the one best suited to do it, I’d reckon.’

  ‘I’m not gainsaying that, sir,’ Ole Devil replied. ‘But Di’s—’

  ‘I’ve never figured she was a many no matter how I’ve raised her,’ Brindley interrupted and his harsh tones were strangely gentle. ‘Boy, Di had to burn down a Comanche buck when she was fourteen. Eighteen months later, she blew half the head off a drunken Chicano’s’d got the notion of laying hands on her. ’Tween then ’n’ now, she’s been in three Injun attacks and done her share to finish ’em. Maybe that wouldn’t be counted lady-like, nor even proper, back in the U.S. of A., but Texas’s a long ways different I’ve reared her to know how to defend herself. So I’m not holding it again’ you ‘cause she’s had to do what I taught her.’

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ Ole Devil said sincerely.

  ‘Do you reckon there’s more of them varmints?’ Brindley inquired, with the air of getting down to business.

  ‘I’m not sure, sir,’ Ole Devil answered. ‘If there are, I’d have expected them all to be along after the first try had failed. The wounded man would know for sure, but he’s in no condition to answer questions.’

  ‘Maybe you didn’t ask him the right way,’ Brindley suggested.

  ‘Maybe, sir,’ Ole Devil conceded. ‘But I think we’ll get more out of him when he’s rested, in his right mind, and has had time to think about his position.’

  ‘Huh!’ the old man grunted, but did not pursue the matter any further. ‘Way I see it, we don’t have too much time to get to Santa Cristobal Bay.’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘So how’re you planning to handle the mule train?’

  ‘I once tried to teach my grandmother how to suck eggs, sir,’ Ole Devil drawled, having detected another challenge. ‘She took a hickory-switch to my hide. One thing about me, I learn fast and easily—and it sticks once I’ve learned it.’

  ‘What’s that mean?’ Brindley asked, although his attitude suggested he knew and approved.

  ‘I’m just the General’s messenger, sir,’ Ole Devil replied. ‘If he hadn’t considered that you were competent to handle the collection, he’d never have suggested that I came.’

  At that moment, the kitchen door was opened and Di entered. She was carrying a tray, with a sugar basin, milk jug and two steaming cups of coffee.

  ‘Where’s Mr. Galsworthy?’ Brindley wanted to know when the man did not follow his granddaughter into the room.

  ‘Just now gone,’ the girl replied. ‘Said to tell you “Good-bye and thanks for listening.” Reckoned he’d head over to Gonzales and see if there was any other way he could get his gear shifted east. When do we pull out, Grandpappy Ewart?’

  ‘How do you know we will be?’ the old man demanded, accepting the cup which—having set the tray on the table—she was offering to him.

  ‘Five hundred rifles, say ten pounds apiece; which I’d sooner go over than under,’ Di remarked, half to herself and ignoring her grandfather’s question as she passed the second cup to Ole Devil. Hooking her rump on the edge of the table, she screwed up her eyes and was clearly doing some mental calculations. ‘Take ’em out of their boxes ’n’ wrap ’em in rawhide, we could manage twenty-six to a mule. Be better at twenty-four though, which’ll mean using twenty-one knobheads xix for ’em. Another twenty to tote the ammunition. Fifty ought to be enough. Which’s lucky, ‘cause that’s all we’ve got on hand.’ Her gaze flickered to the younger of her audience. ‘What do you say?’

  ‘You put the sugar in,’ Ole Devil drawled. ‘But you forgot to blow on it.’

  ‘That mean you agree, or you don’t?’ Di challenged.

  ‘I’d say that the agreeing to how it’s to be done stands between yourself and your grandfather,’ Ole Devil countered. ‘What I could do, sir, is go to in to Gonzales and ask Colonel Gray if he can let us have enough men to act as escort to the Bay.’

  ‘Why’d we need them?’ Di asked, just a trifle indignantly.

  ‘Those four renegades could have friends,’ Ole Devil pointed out. ‘And if they have, we’ll most likely have them to content with.’

  ‘I don’t recollect’s how Grandpappy Ewart’n me’s ever needed to ask Lawyer Gray to do our fighting for us,’ the girl protested. ‘Nor anybody else, comes right down to it.’

  ‘I’m not gainsaying that? Ole Devil assured her. ‘It’s one of the reasons why I didn’t bring men from San Antonio. But seeing how important our mission is and that we don’t know for sure what we might run up against—’

  ‘We’ve got a feller close by’s could maybe help us on that? Brindley pointed out, with the air of having solved their problem.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Ole Devil agreed. ‘If you want to go and question him-’

  ‘Way he is, it wouldn’t do a whole heap of good,’ Di warned. ‘I thought we’d decided to leave him until morning.’

  ‘Sure we did,’ Ole Devil conceded. ‘But if you want us to-’

  ‘I’ve not seen anything to make me think you pair don’t know what you’re doing,’ answered Brindley, to whom the words had been directed. ‘So I’ll go along with it.’

  ‘Anyways, sir,’ Ole Devil drawled, not a little impressed by what he knew to be a compliment. ‘I’ll look in on him while I’m attending to my horses. Which I’d like to make a start at, if that’s all right with you.’

  ‘Go to it,’ Brindley authorized.

  ‘Can I take it that you’ll collect the shipment for me, sir?’ Ole Devil asked as he came to his feet.

  ‘You can take it,’ Brindley confirmed. ‘We’ll talk out the details over supper.’

  Leaving the house, accompanied by Di, Ole Devil noticed Galsworthy riding along the trail through the gathering darkness. Ignoring the departing man, they went to the barn. On unlocking and opening the storeroom, they found their prisoner was laying on the bed. Mucker was covered by a blanket and apparently sleeping.

  ‘Shall I wake him?’ Ole Devil inquired.

  ‘I wouldn’t, was I you,’ the girl answered. Tellers I’ve seen took like he was when they’d been hurt got over it better if we let ’em sleep.’

  ‘That’s what I’ve found, too,’ Ole Devil agreed and closed the door.

  On their arrival to carry out the interrogation the following morning, Ole Devil and Di learned that they had been in a serious error regarding Mucker’s condition. Going in to rouse him, they found that he had been stabbed through the heart with a thin-bladed weapon—and had been dead for several hours.

  Chapter Twelve – It Was My Fault, Sir

  ‘Son-of-a-bitch!’ Diamond-Hitch Brindley ejaculated, taking an involuntary step to the rear as she stared at the lifeless body on the bed. ‘How the hell did this happen?’

  ‘I’m more interested in who did it,’ Ole Devil Hardin answered, studying the wound and taking note of the small amount of blood which had oozed from it. ‘Because he sure as hell didn’t do it himself.’

  ‘None of our boys’d do it!’ Di declared.

  ‘I never thought they had,’ Ole Devil assured her.

  ‘Galsworthy!’ the girl spat the name out.

  ‘What about him?’ Ole Devil inquired, although he had been considering the handsome man as a possible suspect.

  ‘It must have been him!’Di stated.

  ‘How did he know about this feller?’ Ole Devil challenged.

  ‘I—I told him!’ Di admitted and, as the young Texian swung to face her, took on the attitude of defiance
which he remembered from the previous afternoon. ‘Hell, the walls of our place’re so thin that he could hear what you and Grandpappy Ewart was saying. So I figured on stopping him listening

  and reckoned he’d be interested in hearing about them four fellers jumping us.’

  ‘And as soon as you’d mentioned this feller, he said he’d be going,’ Ole Devil guessed.

  ‘Not straight after,’ the girl contradicted. ‘He finished his coffee, then asked if I reckoned Grandpappy’d do what the General wanted and I told him it was likely. So he said he’d head for Gonzales and see if he could make other arrangements.’

  ‘You weren’t to know what he was planning, Ole Devil drawled. ‘I’ll say one thing, though. If it was him, he s a cool son-of-a-bitch. He must have come straight over here, let himself in, killed and covered this feller up and left, all within about five minutes.’

  ‘We’d best go tell Grandpappy Ewart,’ Di sighed.

  ‘What’ve you got to tell me about?’ Ewart Brindley’s cracked tones inquired from outside the storeroom.

  Turning, the girl and Ole Devil saw the old timer approaching across the barn. They stood aside and let him through. Then, after he had looked at the corpse, he turned his cold gaze upon them.

  Although the young Texian met Brindley’s scrutiny, he was far less at ease than showed on the surface. The previous night had done much to cement the amicable relationship that had been developing. Over supper, Di had told of how she had been saved from the bear. As he had been receiving the old man’s gruff thanks, Ole Devil had sensed that the matter had cut deeper than heart-felt gratitude. Unless he was mistaken, Brindley had been impressed by the fact that he had not attempted to use the rescue as a means of attaining his ends. Nor had his prestige diminished when, after having eaten and made a fruitless search of the renegades’ bedrolls—which had been fetched from the barn by two of the hired hands who had said that the prisoner was still sleeping—he had spent an enjoyable evening in the company of his host and hostess. He had taken a lively and genuine interest in their arrangements for transporting the shipment, while also making it plain that he considered it was their concern and he would be merely an official passenger. In return, they had questioned him about the bid for independence and the state of affairs to the west. As they were supporters of Houston’s policies there had been no cause for controversy between them.

  All in all, Ole Devil had gone to spread his bedroll on the floor of the guestroom with a sense of achievement. His diplomatic handling of the Brindleys had, he felt sure, established the grounds for complete co-operation based on a mutual liking, trust and respect for each other’s abilities.

  Finding the man murdered, when they had hoped that he would supply them with vitally important information, might easily ruin all that had been achieved. However, Ole Devil knew what must be done.

  ‘It was my fault, sir—’ the young Texian began.

  ‘No more’n mine!’ Di interrupted and told Brindley what had happened between herself and Galsworthy in the kitchen, ‘Hell, I never thought—’

  ‘Nope, and neither did either of us,’ Brindley put in soothingly, glancing at Ole Devil as if in search of confirmation. After he had received a nod of agreement, he went on. ‘I never took to that jasper, though. He never looked me straight in the eye when we was talking.’

  ‘I noticed that, sir,’ Ole Devil admitted. ‘But I’ve known a few gambling men who wouldn’t and that’s what I took him to be.’

  ‘And me,’ Brindley declared. ‘But it looks like he was tied in with them other four. Which fetches up another right puzzling point.’

  ‘Why’d he come here?’ Di concluded for her grandfather.

  ‘That’s the one, gal,’ Brindley confirmed. ‘Either of you smart young ’n’s got the answer?’

  ‘He was counting on them getting you, Devil,’ Di suggested. ‘So he came here to see if he could hire our mules and us to help him collect the shipment.’

  ‘It’s possible,’ Ole Devil conceded. ‘Did he tell you what he wanted moving, sir, or anything about himself?’

  ‘Not a whole heap about either,’ Brindley replied. ‘He reckoned he’d come up from Victoria and had some supplies’s he wanted to take east afore the Mexican army got there. Wasn’t nothing about him to make me think otherwise. Anyways, you pair came in afore we could do much talking.’

  ‘He must’ve been with those four yahoos when they first saw you, Devil,’ Di guessed. ‘Then headed here after he’d sent them to get you. I’d swear that he didn’t know we’d fetched one of ’em in alive until I told him.’

  ‘His hoss wasn’t lathered when he got here,’ Brindley commented. ‘Which it would’ve been had he come as fast’s he’d of needed to if he had known. I reckon you could be right, Di-gal. Only, him saying he’d come from Victoria, it doesn’t sound like he was after using the mules to collect the rifles.’

  ‘He might have come to find out what he’d be up against if I should get by his men,’ Ole Devil surmised. ‘Or so that they could make you do what they wanted if I hadn’t. You know, I couldn’t help thinking yesterday that he didn’t strike me as the kind of man who would give up as easily as he did when he found out that General Houston needed your mules.’

  ‘He gave a good reason for doing it,’ Brindley reminded his guest. ‘A lot of folks, some’s you wouldn’t expect it from, are putting Texas afore themselves these days. Wasn’t no reason why he shouldn’t be.’

  ‘God damn it to hell!’ Di spat out furiously and indicated the body with an angry gesture. ‘If we’d made him talk—’

  ‘There was no way we could have, the state he was in,’ Ole Devil pointed out.

  ‘Even if it did come out wrong, you was both acting for the best by leaving him to sleep,’ Brindley interposed. ‘Anyways, there’s not a whole heap of sense in crying over spilled milk. What we’ve got to do now is figure how we’re going to play out the deal, way it’s gone.’

  ‘We could send Joe Galton and a couple of the boys alter Galsworthy,’ Di offered. ‘A dude like him couldn’t hide his sign so they can’t find it.’

  ‘He’ll be long gone by now and might not be all that easy to find,’ Ole Devil warned. ‘Even if he is a dude, those four who were with him weren’t and he could have more of them with range savvy. In fact, I’d bet on it. He must have been counting on us not finding out he’d killed the man until it was too dark for us to pick up his tracks. Which means he wasn’t going to stay on the Gonzales trail. So he either knew he could find his way across country, or had somebody waiting who could.’

  ‘I still say Joe and the boys could trail him,’ Di insisted.

  ‘Don’t let me talk you out of the notion,’ Ole Devil replied. ‘It’ll be a big help if we can find out just what we’re up against.’

  ‘I’ll float my stick along of you on that, Devil,’ Brindley drawled. ‘Go and tell Joe, Di-gal.’

  ‘Sure,’ the girl answered, nodding to the corpse. ‘I’ll have him took out and buried while I’m at it.’

  ‘Might’s well,’ Brindley agreed. ‘It’s got to be done.’

  ‘You wouldn’t change your mind about me going into Gonzales and asking Colonel Gray for an escort, would you, sir?’ Ole Devil inquired as he and the old man followed Di into the barn.

  ‘That side of it’s up to you, boy,’ Brindley replied. But I d sooner not. Like I said last night, all his men have families to move east. They’d not rest easy going off and leaving ’em to do it. Anyways, my boys’ve gone through Kiowa, Wichita and Comanche country ’n’ come out of ’em all with their hair. So I reckon we could handle anything a bunch of white fellers try to pull on us.’

  All of Ole Devil’s last lingering anxieties left him as he listened to the first sentence of the answer. It implied that, despite the murder of their prisoner, the old man still respected Hardin’s opinion and judgment.

  ‘What I’ll do,’ Brindley continued, ‘is have Tom Wolf and his boys ride with the train.’
>
  ‘How about your place here, sir?’ Ole Devil asked, being aware that his host had intended to leave half a dozen men as guards for the property.

  ‘They couldn’t have stopped the Mexicans burning it down, happen the army comes through this way,’ Brindley answered. ‘And there won’t be all that damned much left for anybody to steal. So they’ll be more use with us than sitting on their butts here.’

  ‘We’ll forget Colonel Gray then, sir,’ Ole Devil stated, being satisfied that his host would not have reached such a decision if he had had doubts over their ability to manage without a military escort ‘From what I’ve seen of them, your men can take care of themselves.’

  ‘You can count on it, boy,’ Brindley grinned, pleased that his guest was showing such confidence in his men. ‘They’re not Mission Indians. Let’s drift on out and see what’s doing. I want to be moving out in an hour.’

  Ole Devil’s acceptance had not been made merely to please his host. All of the mule packers were Tejas Indians. However, he had noticed that they were lean, tough-looking men with an air of hardy self-reliance that made them very different from those members of their tribe who had fallen into the hands of the Spanish priests. That was one of the factors which was causing him to go along with Brindley’s wishes. He also agreed with the old man that the escort soldiers from Colonel Gray would probably react unhappily at being taken away from their families at such a time.

  Emerging from the barn, Ole Devil looked around. Not far away, Di was talking to Joe Galton. A tall, red-haired Texian of about twenty, dressed in buckskins, Galton was Brindley’s adopted son and acted as cargador xx for the train. They had met the previous night, after Galton had returned from a successful hunt for camp meat Ole Devil had found him quiet but friendly. Out of the cargador’s hearing, Di had claimed he was not only good at his duties but was also an excellent farrier.

  Turning as the girl walked away, Galton called two names and was joined by a pair of the Indians. They went to the corral, collected horses, and started to make ready for leaving. Going across to Galton, Ole Devil told him about Tommy Okasi and requested that if they met, the cargador would bring him to the pack train.