The Lost Wagon Train

by Zane Grey

  “So that’s your demand,” replied Latch, addressing the five dark-faced hungry-eyed outlaws. “Well, men, under ordinary circumstances, that’d be a fair and square demand. In this case, however, it’s absolutely impossible for me to give in to it.”

  “An’ why?” queried Keetch, sonorously. “Latch, you hardly need be told that you’re on trial hyar by the majority of your band.”

  “On trial for what?” countered Latch. His game was to play for time, not to force the issue, to match his wit against their ignorance and lust.

  “Wal, fust for killin’ Sprall, an’ Leighton, who’s aboot gone.”

  “You have no right to try me for that,” returned Latch, forcefully. “I was absolutely true to my word. It is the law of our band. I killed Sprall on his own word that he knew Leighton had betrayed us. I shot Leighton in the act of maltreating this girl. But not for that. I shot him because he had brought her along with us—alive.”

  “Latch, you swear to thet?”

  “Yes, I swear. I never looked at the girl until after Leighton fell.”

  “Wal, as fer thet, Cornwall told you she was a very beautiful gurl. We all heerd him. An’ we all hev eyes for ourselves. But I’ll take your word, Latch…. Now, men, speak up, yes if you believe the boss, no if you don’t. Texas, how aboot you?”

  “Yes,” replied the gunman.

  “No, señor,” replied the Mexican, Augustine, and Latch made the mental reservation that that negative sealed the vaquero’s doom, here or at some future time.

  “Yes,” returned Mandrove, the preacher who had seen better days.

  Creik and another shouted in unison, “No!”

  “Wal, boss, countin’ me it’s a daidlock. Three of us believe you and three don’t. Thet’s aboot as good as acquittal, accordin’ to court rules…An’ now we’ll heah why you won’t give the gurl up or share her with your men.”

  “I’m your leader, I know,” rejoined Latch, deliberately. “Satana and I are solely responsible for that—raid last night. His Indians were drunk and you men were merely tools. My orders were to kill everyone, but I can’t stand for violation of this girl—or any girl.”

  “Ain’t you gittin’ chicken-hearted, boss?” queried Creik, with a leer. “She’ll have to be killed, anyhow, same as the rest of that wagon train.”

  “That’s different, Creik,” replied Latch, with difficulty restraining his sudden fierce desire to kill this slave-driver.

  “Fellars, it shore is different,” interposed Keetch. “You know how we all hated to watch them poor wimmen an’ kids scalped. Wal, it’d be even wuss for a gang of rowdy ruffins like us to take the gurl—thet way.”

  “Pards, I’m ag’in Latch,” drawled Texas. “But to kill this woman that way doesn’t go with me.”

  “Put that to a vote,” sang out Creik.

  Keetch, evidently relieved at what seemed favorable to the leader, did as bidden. The vote went against Latch.

  “Wal, Cornwall, we don’t need your vote, but we’d like to heah it, anyway.”

  “I’d never vote to save any woman’s honor,” flashed the youth, with a terrible blaze in his eyes. His tone and gaze were so unexpected that they enjoined silence. Latch was stunned. He felt betrayed by one he trusted.

  “Latch, you lost this time,” resumed Keetch.

  “Can I buy her freedom?” queried the leader. “I’ll turn over all money and goods—and the rum back in Spider Web for you to divide among yourselves.”

  The hot harangue that followed soon ended in a victory for Latch. His tempting offer overwhelmed even the most vicious.

  “All right, boss, you buy her freedom,” said Keetch, plainly gratified.

  “What’s he mean by freedom?” queried one.

  “Why, her body—while she’s livin’,” replied another.

  “I mean her life, too,” rang out Latch.

  Passion broke bonds then, and the portent of angry acclaims, of black looks, of surly whispers, argued a ruthless thumbs-down for the captive.

  “Latch, air you oot of your haid?” queried Keetch, plaintively. “You cain’t make a law for your band—set them to spill blood—and then break thet law yourself.”

  “If you’ll let me explain,” burst out Latch, nerving himself for a last stand.

  But Lone Wolf interrupted with cold sarcastic speech directed at his rival gunman.

  “You never was born in Texas.”

  The gunman, who had been kneeling on one knee, after the fashion of riders at times, slowly rose to his feet. His lean face turned a scarlet hue, then paled.

  “Hell you say!” he replied, coolly, but his eyes gave forth a wicked light.

  “Yes, the hell I say!”

  Keetch interfered hurriedly. “Hyar, you gamecocks. This is a court, not a place for you gun-throwers to clash.”

  “Shet up,” said Texas, curtly.

  “Keep oot of this heah, you old geezer!” added Lone Wolf.

  Keetch got back hurriedly. The other men on that side of the room with Texas spread away from him. But neither Cornwall nor Latch moved. Latch scarcely caught the significance, and Cornwall was indifferent.

  “Texas, I’m callin’ you,” went on Wolf. “You’re from some nigger country where women air white trash. Not from Texas!”

  “I heahed you,” rejoined Texas, malignantly. “An’ I’m sayin’ you’ll swaller that—or you’ll swaller lead.”

  They eyed each other. The thing between them was not of the moment. Each would have welcomed any excuse to meet on common ground. They respected nothing on earth except speed with guns. An abnormal curiosity possessed them, yet likewise a monstrous assurance. Latch had always anticipated this meeting. More than once he had interfered with it. Here his lips were locked because he was certain that Wolf would do away with the most dangerous of his enemies. With Texas dead or out of commission the issue narrowed down into Latch’s favor.

  Probably both gunmen saw in each other’s eyes the lightning-like betrayal of thought—motive—stimulus to action. A convulsive wrestling sound ended in the simultaneous flash and bang of guns. Under the smoke Latch saw Wolf stagger a step forward and fall. When that smoke lifted a little it disclosed Texas on his face, smoking gun in hand, and still as stone.

  Keetch uttered a hoarse cough. “Aggh!… Wal, they always itched fer this. An’ one time’s as good as another so far’s we’re concerned. It changes nothin’.”

  Latch did not agree with Keetch’s ultimatum. Few men were wholly impervious to sudden death. Leighton’s followers showed something that roused Latch again.

  “Men, listen,” he began, in a loud voice. “Circumstances alter cases. I feel justified in breaking my own law. I’m opposing you! And I’ll fight till the last beat of my heart. Not one man of us will come out of this alive. Now I ask you, hear my reasons before it’s too late.”

  “Wal, boss, speak up,” said Keetch. “Thet’s fair enough.”

  Before Latch could moisten his dry lips to give utterance Cynthia moved out from behind him to confront the opposition. She stood erect, with little head uplifted. The sunlight caught the rippling mass of golden hair and made it glow. Every line of her form portrayed intense emotion, courage, eloquence.

  “Men, let me tell the story,” she began, in a voice that stilled them. “I am Cynthia Bowden, niece of John Bowden, whose wagon train you massacred last night. I—l am the sole survivor. I am twenty-three years old. I lived in Boston…. When I was seventeen I knew Stephen Latch. I met him during his last year in college. He was a friend of my brother Howard Bowden. He visited my home. Stephen and I were thrown together, and when he went back home to Louisiana we were interested in each other. He came North frequently. The time came when we fell in love with each other. My brother was a gambler. Stephen won a large sum from him—more than he could pay. And when Howard found out about the attachment between Stephen and me he saw a way to ruin Stephen. He told my father. He used and exaggerated a connection Stephen had had with a disreputabl
e woman. He inflamed me so with jealousy and hatred that I openly scorned Stephen—insulted him—betrayed him—drove him to his ruin…. He horsewhipped Howard in the lobby of the Boston Hotel…. The Civil War broke out. Stephen offered his services—asked for an officer’s commission in the Confederate army. Meanwhile I had allowed the attentions of another Southerner, a friend of Howard’s and rival of Stephen’s. His name was Thorpe. He had received a commission as colonel in the army of the South. With Howard’s connivance and treachery Thorpe disgraced Stephen, so that the commission was denied him—A duel followed. Stephen—killed Thorpe… and he fled—an outlaw.”

  She paused a moment as if to gather strength. Toward the last her voice had begun to break and fail, but her spirit drove her on.

  “Surely all of you know how he organized this band, meaning to wage guerrilla warfare against the Northerners—how he fell into robbery—and then to horrible crime…. It must have been a strange dispensation of God—that I escaped that massacre—that I was carried away—to meet Stephen Latch face to face…. I had failed him, deserted him. I am the cause of his degradation…. Before God I must be responsible for his being an outcast—a murderer—a leader of desperadoes—a partner of bloody savages. That is my story. That is why he bought my freedom from you—why he seeks to save my life…. But I am ready to die.”

  A long pause—which Keetch, with difficulty, broke. “Wal, by Gawd!” he rolled out, at the gaping mute men. “Fellars, did you ever heah the like? … Circumstances do alter cases. An’ I’m fer lettin’ her live.”

  “Wha-at! An’ go oot to put the soldiers on our track?” ejaculated Creik.

  “That gurl would never betray Latch.”

  “If we knowed she wouldn’t, I’d say let her go.”

  These and other like comments showed how Cynthia’s beautiful presence and tragic eloquence had swayed the outlaws. Keetch turned to her with something of deference.

  “Lady, we might break our law an’ let you live.”

  “I—I don’t care to live…. God has failed me…. I have become alienated from my family. … My uncle murdered——”

  “Wal, it’s shore tough,” interrupted Keetch, kindly. “But you’re young. Life is sweet. Latch hyar won’t always be a robber…. Do you still love him?”

  “I do—love him…. I always did. … It has been my ruin, too,” she answered, sadly.

  “Wal, you can marry Latch,” rejoined Keetch, vigorously slapping his leg. “It’s the only way to save your life. Will you?”

  “Yes,” she replied, as if shocked by an incredible and irresistible possibility.

  “You cain’t ever go back there,” declared Keetch, his broad hand sweeping the east and north. “You’ll be an outlaw’s wife. You’ll have to hide an’ live in the loneliest canyon hole in this hyar West. Will you do that, too?”

  “Yes—if Stephen wants me——”

  “Want you? My God!” breathed Latch, passionately coming out of his trance. “That idea never came to me. … Cynthia, if you’ll marry me…. Surely I’ll not always be——”

  His lips froze over such a forlorn utterance.

  “Yes,” she whispered, as if dazed. “I said—I’d follow you—to the end of the world.”

  Keetch intervened to rub his big hands gleefully. “Boss, you win. An’ you’re a lucky dog…. Fellars, drag oot these Texas roosters thet’d rather shoot than eat turkey…. Mandrove, I reckon you can do the trick, huh?”

  “Marry them?” queried the ex-preacher.

  “Shore. Splice them proper an’ bindin’?”

  “Indeed I can. I’ve kept my Bible,” replied Mandrove, dreamily.

  “Haw! Haw!… Damn lucky fer the boss. Go fetch it an’ somethin’ you can write a marriage certificate on. If we haven’t got nothin’, we’ll shore find it in this Bowden ootfit.”

  Creik and Augustine had dragged the bodies of the dead men outside and could now be heard speculating upon what valuables might be found on them.

  “You keep what you see an’ gimme what’s hid,” suggested the slave-driver.

  “No, señor, you mucha sleek,” declared the vaquero.

  Mandrove limped out on his errand, and Cornwall, cold and strange, went to the door to gaze out. This affair did not have his approval. Keetch and Black Hand sat down to wait. Latch had stepped to Cynthia’s side, yearning but not daring to take her hand. She seemed dazed, and looked at the blank log wall with eyes no mind could fathom. Moments passed. The smoke slowly drifted through the rents in the roof. Keetch got up to scrape dust over blood spots on the ground floor. Black Hand asked for a smoke.

  “Lester, will you stand with me during the—the ceremony?” asked Latch.

  “Colonel, if you don’t mind, I’d rather not,” replied Cornwall.

  It struck Latch then that he had seen the youth look strangely at Cynthia. He recalled that Cornwall had a hatred for women. He stalked outside, and Creik and the vaquero entered.

  “Señor,” said the Mexican, softly, “our niggah-trailin’ hombre get beeg roll greenback….”

  “I’ll cut your greaser tongue out,” interrupted Creik.

  “Creik, divide what you found equally,” ordered Latch, sternly. “But wait…. Here’s Mandrove.”

  The outcast minister had returned with something beside his Bible—a change of mien, of look. Even his voice, as he began to read the marriage service, seemed different. A bloody bandaged hand held the book. He read well and fluently, with an intonation and inflection that caused Keetch to whisper: “By Gawd! he’s a parson all right! I alius reckoned he was a liar aboot thet.”

  In what seemed the longest and most poignant moment of Latch’s life, Mandrove ended with, “I pronounce you man and wife.”

  He closed the Bible and knelt: “Let us pray.”

  The watching members of Latch’s Band stared, with eyes popped out, with grins setting on their faces.

  “Almighty God, let not your holy words fail of truth and binding right because they are spoken by an outcast minister, in the presence of men as lost and depraved as he himself. Out of evil good may come. I solemnly unite this parted couple as the last rite of my religious life, and I beseech you, 0 Lord, to work upon them and their future in your inscrutable way. It is the fallen who have always had divine help. Bless this strange meeting of two lovers who have sinned and suffered. Bless their marriage. Guide them away from this wicked life of blood and pillage. Ordain some dispensation of Christ, some immutable decree of Heaven that they shall be saved in the end. That at least their souls shall be saved. Who can tell but Thyself why this man and this woman found themselves again, out on the naked shingle of this wild desert? If love ruined them, 0 Lord, still love again can resurrect. I pray mercy for him and for her. I pray you let fatherhood shock him out of this sordid career of blood and greed. And so through this woman who failed him in love he may rise again. Amen!”

  CHAPTER

  7

  SPRING came early at Fort Union that year of 1863. There had been an unusually mild winter in the mountains of Colorado and New Mexico. The great fur-trading business had passed its zenith years before; nevertheless, trapping was still done extensively by trappers who worked independently. This had been a favorable season for them, and a hundred or more had come down out of the hills with their pelts. Beaver were still the largest assets, but mink, otter, fox, marten, and other furs brought high prices.

  There were ten Indian trappers at the fort for every white one, and as the Indians were easier to deal with than the white men the fur-traders reaped a harvest. Tullt and Co. bought one hundred thousand pelts that spring.

  By April 10th Fort Union was busier than it had been at any time since the beginning of the Civil War. Two wagon trains had arrived that day, one of one hundred seventy-four wagons from Santa Fe, bound east, and the other of eighty-six wagons under escort from Fort Dodge by way of the Cimarron Crossing and the Dry Trail. This caravan was under Bill Burton, an old scout, and it had come in with some dead
and many wounded to report a scrimmage with Comanches. But for the escort of dragoons they probably would have been wiped out.

  Burton looked askance at the nine hundred to a thousand Indians of mixed tribes present at the fort. In Burton’s opinion there were no good or peace-loving redskins.

  What with the tents and shacks outside the stockade, Fort Union presented quite a settlement. Thousands of horses and cattle grazed out on the bleached grama grass of the range. The mountain tops were still white with snow, but ragged black patches and belts told of the ravages of the spring sun. The wide gate to the fort stood open and unguarded, to permit the exit or entrance of anyone at will. Tullt and Co. had their large store inside the stockade, where they kept on hand an immense stock of merchandise, from a caravan wagon to a bag of candy. The Indians bought many of the latter. And often trappers, rich with their winter’s catch, purchased a wagon to haul furs that would fetch a much larger price at Independence, Missouri. The Indians presented a motley assemblage. They all wore tight-fitting deerskins and moccasins. Some of them wore white men’s hats, but most of them were bareheaded. A few had blankets, and all of them had buffalo robes. The majority were dirty and shiftless, and hung around the stores and the saloon for no apparent reason. There were two-score and more of white men garbed like Indians and just as dirty and shiftless. These were the riffraff of the frontier, a bane to all the forts. But nothing could be done about it. They came and went, the same as the Indians, and not many of their faces ever became well known to the soldiers. Gambling and drinking went on day and night. Shooting scrapes were not the order of every hour, as at Fort Dodge; nevertheless guns cracked often, and many were heard only by the night hawks and the soldiers on guard duty.

  Major Greer had charge of ten troops of dragoons. Before the war he had had twice that number, which, he was wont to state, was far less than he needed. Fort Union was then a distributing point for all New Mexico; and owing to the increasing hostility of the Indians, the movement of freight and the escort of caravans had grown exceedingly difficult to manage.