by Lou Cameron
“At this speed? With sea cliffs just to the side?”
“Slide your hand under mine. I’ll guide you till you get the feel of it. Come on, Pilar. This could be important.”
She gingerly put her left hand on the tiller between them as he slid his hand over hers. He still guided as she got the feel of it. Her hand felt cool and a lot nicer than the tiller handle. He felt her confidence growing and eased up his own pressure. Then he grabbed harder as he warned, “You’re over controlling. This is not a handful of reins, Pilar. You don’t have to neck-rein a motor vehicle to make it turn. Think of it as a very responsive cow pony that only needs a hint, see?”
She did, and as she started, steering better, she said, “This is fun! I did not think it would be so easy to steer this thing. You are right, it does not have a mind of its own, like a horse. It is most obedient, no?”
“Yeah, but on the other hand, you can’t depend on it to sidestep any bumps, and it’ll run right into a tree a horse would walk around no matter what you did with the reins. Put your foot on my instep and feel. I may as well teach you how to brake, just in case. This lever, here, is the throttle. It stays where you set it, so you don’t have to worry about it. I’m not up to teaching you about the gears or spark lever just yet. If I can teach you to hold her on the road or to stop when I yell to, we’ll be ahead of the game.”
He was aware of Robles glaring at the backs of their heads, so he laughed and said, “I know I told you I’d show you how to drive, Robles. Later. You can shoot a gun better than a pretty girl, and, what the hell, she’ll be getting off soon.”
Robles didn’t answer. Pilar said, “You can’t leave me anywhere, Ricardo! I have no money. I have no friends in San Blas. What would I do alone there? I am not the sort of woman who can sell herself for money in a seaport, and I have nothing else to sell!”
He said, “We’ll drop you off well this side of town. Don’t walk in before daybreak. By then it should be over whether we’re alive or not. I just went through the boxes in back. Here – take this and stuff it somewhere it won’t show.”
He reached into his side pocket with his free hand and put the roll of bills in her lap, adding, “Relax, Robles. There’s plenty left for you and yours. Apparently the guys who drove this thing collected the egg money for their rurale captain. They had a whole ammo box stuffed with bills and some poor bastard’s gold teeth. We can spare a lady train fair home.”
Pilar picked up the roll with her free hand and gasped, “My God, how shall I ever be able to repay you, Ricardo? There must be a thousand pesos here!”
“More like fifteen hundred. Why should you worry about paying us back? It’s not our money. Buy yourself a new hat or something with the change.”
He heard Robles unsnapping the metal box in back. He said, “That comes later, too. I want the loot shared evenly among the men. You and Morales get time and a half, of course.”
“That is most generous Captain Gringo. What about your share?”
“I don’t want any. My comrade back in camp and I have enough to buy drinks, smokes, and railroad tickets, if nobody’s shooting at us at the time. I’m trying to encourage you guys to make that possible.”
The man standing with his head out the turret hatch called down, “I see lights in the road ahead!”
Captain Gringo peered through the slit ahead of him and slowed down as he made them out a few seconds later. He said, “Looks like a checkpoint. Some guys with guns standing between a fire on either side of the road. Hang on, kiddies. They don’t look like rurales. Those are federale uniforms. The army’s getting into the act.”
“Are we going to run the roadblock, Captain Gringo?” asked Robles, adding, “They can’t hurt us in this thing.”
Captain Gringo said, “They can sure hurt the guys behind as in that open truck. Silencio. The next few minutes may get tricky.”
He braked to a stop a pistol shot from the troopers and missed, “Out of the way!” as he rolled over the back of the seat and elbowed his way up into the turret. A noncom stepped out in the road and called out. “Hey, rurales. Why you stop there? Come closer and show us your trip ticket, eh? We have no instructions about you guys.”
Captain Gringo opened up with the machine gun, feeling almost sorry for the federales as he chopped them down, whether they ran, fired back, or just stood there, until all eight of them lay twitching in the firelight.
He stuck his head up out of the hatch and saw Morales had stopped in hailing range. He yelled, “Detail some men to shove those bodies out of sight over the cliff. Then kick out those fires.”
He tapped the man nearest him in the turret and said, “You, take your machete and shinny up one of those poles on the landward side. Hack away the wires. Do it now.”
As he made room for the grinning guerrilla to climb out, Robles said, “Ah, I see why you wish the fires out. It will take them until morning to find where we cut the wires. But why are we cutting the wires at all, my captain?”
“Jesus, that’s a dumb question, Robles. If we have time, we’ll cut some more. They’re already expecting us in San Blas. The one thing we have going for us is that they think we’re walking! When the line goes dead, they’ll start looking for the break way to the north. Before they can compare notes, we should be there and halfway back.”
“Ah, si, and with this grand vehicle, we can simply drive into the fort atop Cerro de Basilio and load the truck with guns and ammo for El Aquilar Negro, no?”
“No. That’s a dumb question, too. Haven’t you figured out by now that they haven’t reactivated that old Spanish fort above San Blas?”
Robles gasped, “The thought never crossed my mind! How did you know this thing, Captain Gringo?”
“The thought crossed my mind that if I had a mess of goodies hidden in an old Spanish fort, I’d sort of like to keep it a secret. Police informers keep telling us the stuff is there. El Aquilar Negro was told it was there. By who? A government official who gossips to rebels a lot? It’s an obvious setup, muchacho. They tried to bait you guys out of a stronghold they’re hesitant to attack by telling you there was a good reason to come out and get shot.”
“Madre de Dios, it is so obvious, once one thinks about it! But, Captain Gringo, if the guns are not in the old fort above San Blas, why are we going to San Blas?”
“To get guns and ammo, of course. Those guys I just shot were federales, and the army’s just moved into this area in force. Armies need supplies. A lot of supplies. The railroad only carries stuff as far as San Blas. So San Blas is where we’ll find their quartermaster depot. Not up on a stupid mountain abandoned as useless years ago. By the railroad tracks where guys like los federales, and us, can get at ’em!”
*
They hit another checkpoint at about three in the morning. This time Pilar, at the tiller, just kept driving while Morales, another quick study, lagged a quarter of a mile back until Captain Gringo simply machine-gunned the roadside troopers, who’d been set up to stop regular road traffic, not armored vehicles that bore down on them spitting automatic fire.
Captain Gringo liked to vary his methods to confuse the other side. So he didn’t stop to clean up or cut wires. Less than an hour later, still riding up in the turret, he saw he might have made a mistake. Ahead, in the moonlight, he saw a whole troop of cavalry coming up the road! He growled, “Smart thinking. The guys back there were supposed to check in from time to time by wire, and they missed an all’s-well, right?”
The cavalry troopers spotted the armored motorcar at about the same time. Whatever they’d been riding hard to intercept, it hadn’t been a horseless carriage bearing down at them at twenty miles an hour!
They reined in and an officer yelled to dismount and take cover. Not the smartest thing he could have yelled on a narrow road hemmed in by a rock wall on one side and a sea cliff on the other.
The smart riders wheeled their mounts and headed south at full gallop as Captain Gringo opened up with the Maxim, blowing ho
rses and riders to hash on the road or sending them off the cliff to the sea-washed rocks below.
As Pilar steered around a fallen horse and the rider, the top-heavy armored vehicle swayed dangerously. He called down, “Run over the bastards, and let’s have some more speed! We can’t let any get away!”
So Pilar swallowed hard and opened the throttle, whimpering with fear as she clung to the tiller with both hands and tried to keep them on the road. She scared the hell out of Captain Gringo, too. But he saw they were gaining on the wise-asses who’d retreated down the road ahead. They were doing at least thirty and swaying like a steel ship in a heavy sea as he stuck to his gun and proceeded to empty saddles as they overtook them. As he spilled the last rider over the edge of the sea cliff, horse and all, Captain Gringo dropped down and yelled, “Slow down! We’re coming to a curve!”
Pilar wailed that she didn’t know how to slow down! Then she stood on the brakes with both feet, and at least they were sliding instead of rolling when they hit the rail of boulders some thoughtful road builders had put along the curve. A couple of rocks rolled down the slope to the sea below, but they stayed on the road, with the front wheels on the very edge of the drop.
He climbed over beside her and threw the gears in reverse, saying, “Good girl. I knew I could bank on you.”
Pilar didn’t answer. She’d buried her face in her hands and started to bawl. Behind him, one of the men was crying, too.
Captain Gringo backed to safety, then squinted out the slit on Pilar’s side and saw that Morales, in the truck, had made it this far, too. He grinned and reversed gears again to continue on their way.
It was almost dawn when they passed through a little seaside village. It wasn’t on his map, but Pilar remembered it from her trip up from San Blas with her late husband. She said they were about three miles from San Blas itself. He braked to a stop on the far side of town and said, “Okay, doll. There was a light over the door of a posada back there. Walk back and tell them your mount threw you and that you’ll wait there until the morning stage arrives. Don’t show them your Wad. Haggle for food and a seat by the door. The southbound stage won’t get here before full light. Act surprised if you hear anything about us, either way. Make sure it’s all over before you go to the depot for your ticket home. Go with God, muchacha, and have a nice life.”
He reached across her to open the steel door on her side. She sobbed, “You do everything so suddenly, Ricardo! Is this really adios? I can’t believe it!”
He kissed her, then shoved her out. She was crying as he pulled the door shut, threw the vehicle in gear, and drove on, saying, “Robles, get your fat ass next to mine and let’s see if I can teach you to steer in the next couple of miles.”
Robles chuckled and said, “I think that one liked you, Captain Gringo.”
The American shrugged and said, “I liked her, too. But there’s a time and place for everything. Put your hand on this tiller. I’ll hold your wrist till you get the feel of it. Damn, you have ugly hands, Robles.”
“Your great paw does nothing for me, either. But I am beginning to see why you northerners do not march with adelitas. Marching with such uncivilized people must be very frustrating, especially at night around the fire. But I must say we made better time than anyone in Mexico would have considered at all possible!”
“That’s the general idea, Robles. You guys would still own Texas if Santa Anna hadn’t given Houston a couple of extra days to set up at San Jacinto. Your general had more guns, more men, probably the same guts. But he didn’t like to sleep alone and he didn’t like forced marches. So he rode to battle in a carriage with a sixteen-year-old mistress and a wagon train of luxuries, slow, while a mess of desperate and doubtless less comfortable Texans dug themselves in, just in time.”
“You do not have to rub it in, Captain Gringo. I said I got the point. Where are we going to hide these vehicles when we get to San Blas? I do not know the town.”
“That makes two of us. We’d better ask directions. I see buildings ahead, so we must be there. You’re on your own. Steady as she goes while I get back up in the turret.”
As he started to climb out of his seat, Robles said, “Hey, not so fast! I do not know how to stop this thing!”
“We’re going slow. Just run it into something solid and it should stop. But don’t stop unless I tell you to, right?” He left the cursing Robles at the steering tiller and stuck his head out the top. He saw Morales in the truck behind and waved him closer. As the truck got within shouting distance, Captain Gringo yelled, “You don’t know nothing. You just work for me, and I’m working for our beloved el Presidente! Got that?”
Morales beeped the bulb of his tin horn twice. Captain Gringo laughed and turned to face forward. The buildings were rising on either side now. He called down to Robles, “Swing inland at the first broad street. There has to be a civic center some damned place.”
He saw he’d guessed right when they turned the corner and he spotted an imposing customs house of lava blocks with a plaza beyond. A couple of men in uniform were standing out front. They gaped as they saw what had just turned the corner. He cupped his hands to his mouth to shout, “Hey, which way to that army depot? We need gasolino!”
One of them pointed the way they were going and shouted back, “By the railroad depot, that way. Are you guys army?”
“Hell, no, can’t you see we’re desperadoes?”
They laughed, the dumb bastards.
Robles had heard the exchange and steered them along one side of the plaza. There was an old church one way and a newer cluster of functional stucco buildings dead ahead. In case anyone was lost, a handy sign on a lamp post had an arrow and was lettered 39th Quartermaster Depot.
Robles could read. So he simply followed the arrow until they saw a gate ahead. There was a sentry box and, of course, a sentry came out to stand in the center of the road, gun across his chest at port arms. Robles didn’t know how to stop. So he didn’t. The guard yelled, “Are you loco en la cabeza?” as he leaped out of the way at the last minute and fell on his ass. Captain Gringo didn’t want to make more noise than he had to. So as the guy started to get up, he just shot him with his .38.
It wasn’t silent enough. As they drove into the depot, doors started opening and soldados came boiling out as, somewhere, a bugle sounded. The tall American in the turret shrugged, dropped behind the Maxim, and squeezed the trigger with one hand while he spun the turret around and around with his crank in the other. The turret began to reek of cordite and hot brass, but he wasn’t nearly as unhappy about that as the quartermaster troops he was smoking up. So the ones who could still stand staggered back inside the barracks to shoot at him from cover. He called down, “Robles, steer over there and see if you can run me along those windows! Close! Scrape the bricks!”
Then he told one of the others riding with him to hand up the grenades one at a time. Robles drove in a circle, swung toward the barracks, and as a bullet spanged off the steel armor, point-blank, Captain Gringo began to heave grenades, blind, with his head safely down. Some of them hit brick and bounced off to explode behind them on the hard-packed dirt. Others went through windows, where they did a lot more damage. Robles got to the end, swung away, and circled back as Captain Gringo, out of grenades, covered the gaping glassless windows with the muzzle of his Maxim. There was nobody peeking out just now, so he held his fire. He called down, “Robles, step on that brake pedal and see what happens.” So Robles did. They slid to a stop and, since they were in gear, killed the engine.
Then sudden eerie silence was broken by Morales driving in through the gate. He stopped nearby, his own engine running, and called out for some instructions.
Captain Gringo yelled, “Those crates piled by the tracks – get over there, bust ’em open, and load all the ammo you can find. Machine guns, if they got ’em. Don’t worry about smaller arms. I’m covering you here, so move it!”
Morales drove away, beeping his horn.- This time Captain Gringo
didn’t think it was funny. They could get at the engine from inside their armor. But the damned fool who’d designed this thing had left the starting crank on the outside, and Robles had stalled broadside to the barracks!
Captain Gringo dropped down inside, adjusted the spark and gears, and said, “I have to go out and crank. If I don’t make it, do the best you can, muchacho.”
“No, you are too valuable, Captain Gringo. Let me! It was my fault we stalled, no?”
“No, it was mine. I ordered you to stop,” sighed Captain Gringo, opening the door on his side. It was the safe side, so nobody could hit him until he got to the rear. Then he took a deep breath, stepped out in the open, and grabbed the crank, growling, “One crank’s all you get baby!”
But it took three, and then, as the engine caught on, someone in the barracks caught on and bounced paint and lead confetti in his hair as he ducked back around the tank, muttering, “I’ll get you for that!”
But when he got back up behind the machine gun, he saw nothing but a haze of gunsmoke in one window. He fired a short burst through it to let them know he had them zeroed in. Then he called down to one of his men, “Let me know when Morales starts back. What are they up to right now?”
“They are putting boxes on the truck, my captain. But how long can we safely stay here?”
Another bullet spanged off the turret. Captain Gringo put a burst through that window, too, and called down, “Who said it was safe here now? We stay till we go. Uh-oh, some guys never learn!”
This time, when he fired, he caught the first sniper just as he was propping his rifle over the window sill. The federale’s head exploded in a cloud of red mist.
The belt was about used up, too. Captain Gringo reached down for another and just had it threaded in when he heard two beeps and his lookout said, “Morales is coming, my captain!”
Captain Gringo yelled, “Robles, move that lever to your left and circle when she starts crawling forward. The throttle’s set. Try and keep between the truck and that damned barracks as we pull out.” And then, not waiting for an answer, he cranked the turret around to cover his other vehicle.
