by Ralph Cotton
They heard Rizale suddenly let out a load “Yii-hiiii!” above the sound of wood on wood skidding, bumping and screeching as the big sled raced down the inside stairs. They stared awe-stricken, seeing the big sled streak out through the open door, across the front porch and shoot straight out above the porch steps into the front yard.
“No! No, Señor Swann!” Bedos cried out, bolting from between the two and running to Ansil Swann, who lay limp, tied down to the wood sled. From the chemenea, Rena came running, a long wooden bean spoon clutched in her hand.
On the front porch, Rizale stepped out, pushing the high-backed wheelchair. He gave a dark chuckle, looking at Bedos and his daughter stooped beside Swann and the sled lying in the dirt.
“That’s a lot faster than this,” he called out, gesturing at the empty wheelchair. The sled’s two skid marks lay fifteen feet long across the hard earth to where the sled stopped.
Tate stood staring as if dumbstruck.
“Jesus,” he whispered.
Gaines gave a short laugh.
“Believe me, I’ve seen him do worse,” he said.
Tate turned, facing Gaines, wearing a strange stunned expression.
“It’s true,” Gaines said, seeing Rizale step down from the porch, pushing the wheelchair in front of him. “That’s why it’s important to never get on his bad side.”
Stooping over Swann lying on the sled, Bedos cried out, “By the saints’ mercy, he is alive!”
“How can you tell?” said Rizale, stopping and looking over at the limp body on the sled.
“His heart still beats!” Bedos said, tearful with gratitude, his eyes darting upward.
“So,” said Rizale, “why wouldn’t it beat? People take rougher rides than that every day.”
“But poor Señor Swann is so ill,” said the old Mexican, “so very ill.”
“Oh? I hadn’t noticed,” said Rizale.
Even with his hands tied, the old Mexican worked feverishly to untie Swann from the wood sled. Rena helped. She looked over at Rizale.
“Please, give us the wheelchair,” she said to the big hairless gunman.
“Come get it, little darling,” Rizale said. “I’m through with that sick ol’ bastard, ’less you want me to shoot the ropes off him.” He laid his big hand on his short-barreled Colt.
“No, señor, please! Don’t shoot him, I beg of you,” Bedos shouted, bending down over Swann with his tied hands covering Swann’s face, as if to shield him.
“Damn, son,” Rizale said to Bedos, “I hope the old fool is paying you well.” He gave the chair a stiff shove toward Rena as she hurried over to get it, and walked on to Tate and Gaines.
“The trick will be getting him upstairs the same way.” Gaines grinned.
Rizale glanced at the hacienda as if considering it for a moment.
“Yeah, I suspect it will be,” he said. “I figured anything I do now will soften them up—make them answer quicker when we ask them something.”
“You think so?” said Gaines. “Let’s just see.” He took a step forward and watched Bedos and Rena lift Swann into his wheelchair and dust him off.
“Señorita,” he said, “did the Swann woman take the household goods to the old mines to hide them from us?”
“No comprendo, señor,” Rena said, looking baffled. She shook her head.
“See?” said Gaines to Rizale and Tate with a shrug. “A while ago, she spoke better American than I do. Now she don’t know nothing I’m saying.”
“I speak English, mister,” Rena said clearly. “But I did not understand your question. I don’t know where they took the wagonload of goods. The señora didn’t tell us.”
“Oh, I see,” said Gaines, sounding dubious. “The four bays neither, I don’t expect?”
“That’s right. She told us nothing,” Rena said. “We are paid house servants here. We ask no questions. We are told what to do, and we go and do it. That is all.”
“All right, then.” Gaines gave a sly grin. “You go finish fixing supper. After that, I’ve got something for you to do.” He ended in a dark suggestive laugh.
“Wait a damn minute,” Tate said just between himself and the two gunmen, not liking the way these had taken over. “This is supposed to be my show. I brought you here to show you how I go about handling the Swanns.”
“That is true,” said Gaines. “But I suppose we should have warned you, me and Rizale here just have natural ways of taking things over when it suits us.” He stared at Tate with a thin smile. “And right now it suits us, eh, Gilbert?” He gave a nod toward the woman.
“Ah, son, son,” said Rizale, looking the woman up and down as he spoke. “It suits me, front, back and sideways.”
The two stood flanking Tate as the woman pushed the wheelchair to the porch steps and helped her hand-tied father lifted the chair, Swann and all, onto the porch.
“No palavering up there,” Gaines cautioned, seeing both Bedos and Rena bent over Ansil Swann, adjusting him into the chair.
“We are not talking,” Rena said, straightening and turning toward the men. “We are only doing what must be done.” She placed a hand on her hip.
Rizale chuckled.
“I like her. She’s got real sand,” he said sidelong to Gaines, Tate standing in between them. To Tate he said, “A pepper sprout, you said?”
“Yeah, a pepper sprout,” Tate said grudgingly.
They watched Rena step down from the porch; behind her Bedos finished adjusting Ansil Swann’s shirt and trousers.
“What is this?” Bedos whispered to himself, feeling the shape of a small jackknife in Swann’s pants pocket. He gazed into Swann’s blank lifeless eyes as he fished the knife out with his tied hands and hid it quickly inside his shirt. Swann’s dead eyes did not change as the old Mexican looked down at him and stepped back from the chair.
“Get done with that chair, old man,” Gaines growled, “’less you want to be strapped in it beside him.”
“Come, Papa,” Rena whispered to her father. “Don’t do anything to anger them. Can’t you see they are madmen? We must protect Señor Swann and get these monsters away from here.”
• • •
When the meal was served and Gaines gestured for Bedos to sit across the table from him, the old Mexican did as he was told. He ate with his hands still tied, and upon every opportunity he reached his hands under the table and tried to hold the knife in a way to cut the ropes from his wrists without being seen. Next to Bedos sat Tate; across from Tate sat Rizale. On the porch, Ansil Swann sat in his wheelchair, staring lifelessly at the gathering. On the table in front of each gunman sat a bottle of Swann’s fine select bourbon, imported all the way from Kentucky.
Gaines lifted his bottle of bourbon, swished it and took a long swig. He set the bottle down and let out a whiskey hiss.
“I admire a man who likes good bourbon,” he said. He raised a spoonful of beans and peppers, blew on them to cool them, then grinned and spoke to Rizale.
“So, Gil,” he said, “do you suppose that old rooster bumped his stone against this young pepper sprout every chance he got?”
“Son, if he didn’t,” said Rizale, “he’s not like any rich man I ever heard of. He’d be a disgrace to American business barons.”
The two laughed; Tate only gave a token half grin.
Pepper sprout?
Bedos heard what they were saying but had only a slight idea they were talking about his daughter. He stared curiously, wanting to cut at his ropes under the tables but knowing better to try right then.
“Señorita, you are working too damn hard,” Gaines said, grabbing Rena’s wrist as she laid down a platter of hot flatbread. “I want you to sit right here on my knee—”
“No, turn me loose!” Rena said angrily, trying to jerk her arm away from him. “I am not some puta—”
“Sure you are, honey,” said Gaines. “You just need some friendly coaxing, is all.” He groped at her breasts; her blouse tore down the front. Bedos jumped up from the table.
“Get off her, you pig!” he bellowed.
“Stay out of this, old man!” Gaines shouted, turning his face away from Rena long enough to warn Bedos.
Rizale said, “What does a man have to do to eat in peace around here!”
When Gaines turned his face back to Rena, she slapped him hard across his face; beans flew from his mouth. The sound of the slap resounded all around the yard. Gaines staggered in place but held on to her wrist.
“Oh, son!” Rizale laughed. “She just brought you your hat and sent you packing!” He gave a deep belly laugh, seeing the red handprint on Gaines’ jaw.
“She didn’t hurt me!” Gaines flared. Holding Rena’s wrist, he stood up quickly and backhanded her hard across her face.
Rena shrieked, not because of Gaines’ hand across her face, but because she saw Bedos lunge up from his seat and land atop the table like some aging mountain cat.
“No, Papa!” she shouted. But it was too late. Bedos launched himself onto Gaines’ back. His tied hands looped down over the unsuspecting gunman’s head. His left hand gripped Gaines by his shirt. With Swann’s jackknife open in his right hand, Bedos stabbed Gaines repeatedly in his upper chest, his shoulder, his throat and face—short vicious strokes. Dallas Tate sprang up from his seat. But he only stood staring in stunned disbelief.
“Whoa, son!” shouted Rizale, also up from his seat, his Colt out and cocked. But the big, hairless gunman couldn’t take a clear shot at Bedos that didn’t run the risk of shooting Gaines instead.
“Shoot! For God’s sake, shoot!” Gaines screamed, running in short broken circles, his arms flailing wildly. Bedos clung to his back like some lethal insect, delivering blow upon blow with the wicked three-inch knife blade. Blood flew; a piece of Gaines’ left eye came out of its socket on the tip of the knife blade.
Seeing Rizale’s short-barreled Colt search back and forth for a shot, Rena hurled herself at the gunman. But Rizale knocked her away with a swipe of the gun barrel. Swinging the Colt back at the tangle of limbs, blood and gore, Rizale took a chance and pulled the trigger, sending a bullet through Bedos’ head in a spray of blood and brain matter.
The impact of the shot flung Bedos sidelong. The weight of the dead Mexican hanging around his throat sent Gaines to the ground, the bloody jackknife blade buried in his upper lip.
“Son, son!” said Rizale. “Looks like he’s took an eye out.” He stooped beside his fallen partner, lifted Bedos’ bloody arms from around his neck and laid him flat on his back. Gaines lay convulsing in pain, his left eye a pool of dark blood. His face was covered with blood, stabbed, shredded and carved to pieces.
Tate stooped down beside Rizale and winced at the sight of Gaines.
“Uake id out . . . ,” Gaines begged, his words deformed by the knife blade inside his mouth.
“The hell’s he saying?” said Rizale.
“I think he’s saying ‘take it out,’” said Tate.
“The knife?” said Rizale, appearing bewildered at what to do for the wounded man.
“That would be my guess,” said Tate. He stared in horror, amazed that in a few passing seconds Gaines’ normal face had turned into a bloody mass of sliced meat and exposed bone matter.
“Jesus, son!” said Rizale, rubbing his hand up and down his thighs nervously. He looked around at where Rena was knocked out on the ground. She was gone. “I don’t think you’re going to live either way, ol’ pal,” he said. “Maybe we ought to just . . .” He stopped short and looked all around for Rena again. “Where the hell did she go?” he said.
“I don’t know,” Tate said, “but this knife’s got to come out.”
“Uake id out . . . ,” Gaines repeated, his body shuddering like a man stricken with a terrible fever.
“I hate doing this,” Rizale said. He gripped the bloody knife blade and pulled, feeling it grit across the roots of Gaines’ upper teeth. As soon as he had the blade out, he slumped, but only for a second. Then he and Tate both leaped away from Gaines as a rifle shot rang out and a bullet hit the ground beside the wounded man’s head.
“Damn it, woman! Stop it!” Rizale shouted, rolling in the dirt, his Colt coming back up from his holster as the second rifle shot resounded and dirt flew up beside his knee. “Are you loco?” He fired quickly; so did Tate as a third round thumped into Tate’s shoulder. Tate flew backward; his next shot went wild into the air.
Rena stalked forward, firing, sobbing, her breasts half-exposed through her torn blouse. Her next shot grazed Rizale’s thigh. He yelped like a dog.
“The hell with you, then!” he shouted.
His next shot sent Rena’s head flying sideways. She fell to the side beneath a red mist of blood. The rifle flew from her hands.
“My God, son!” Rizale said to Tate and the wounded Gaines lying shaking on the ground between them. “See how it is with these people? You never know what’s going to set them off.”
Tate staggered up and stood unsteadily on his feet, his right hand gripped his bleeding shoulder wound.
“Jesus, Rizale,” he said, “looks like we’ve killed the only help we’ve got.”
Rizale wagged his gun toward Rena lying on the ground. Her bloody hand scratched toward the rifle lying in the dirt near her.
“Look at this,” he said. “She ain’t even dead.” He raised his voice for Rena to hear. “But she’s going to be, if she don’t forgo grabbing for that rifle!” He aimed the short-barreled Colt as he spoke. “Get over there and get her, damn it, Dallas.”
“I—I can’t hardly walk,” Tate said, staggering in place, his chest and shoulder covered in blood.
“You’d better get yourself to walking, son, if you know what’s good for you,” Rizale said menacingly. “Somebody’s got to attend to all this.” He gestured the Colt all around at the bloody table, the dead and wounded.
Tate staggered forward, one slow step at a time, until he stopped beside the slow-crawling woman and clamped a boot down on the rifle just as she clasped a hand on it.
PART 3
Chapter 18
Will Summers stood at the corral and watched the three bay fillies playing in a large corral under a blue and perfect Mexican sky. Across the corral, he saw the big black stallion he thought he’d eaten the day he found ol’ Hendrik wounded and dying in one of the many abandoned mines above Dark Horses. At this point he wanted to say “all’s well that ends well,” but something cautioned him against it. True, he’d not only escaped the hangman; he’d delivered his horses to the Swanns as promised. Not only that, but he’d helped Ansil Swann by accompanying his wife and delivering the gold to Don Manuel.
All right, he’d made a lot of money for delivering it, he reminded himself. But that was nothing to be ashamed of. He’d saved the Swanns from becoming completely insolvent after a lifetime of hard work and accumulating an empire. He’d also helped the two ranch hands make a lot of money in the process.
Good enough. . . .
Down the corral rail a good thirty feet, Bailey Swann stood beside Lonnie Kerns, her hand on his forearm. Summers looked at the two, then lowered his eyes and shook his head slightly. When Don Manuel had told her that he had investors who would buy the rest of the gold ingots, Bailey had come to Summers and asked him to go back to the mines and make one more delivery with her. He’d turned her down. They had been fortunate enough to get the first load here without running into either Mexican bandits, American outlaws, Apache, rurales or federales.
Besides, he’d reasoned, they had brought the first load here to Don Manuel. He should be willing to send his own men for the second load at a reduced price, and she should be willing to take that reduced price for not taking the risk herself.
Bu
t Summers knew Bailey Swann didn’t see it that way. Now that she had collected a fortune, she wanted more. Maybe that’s the way it is with folks like the Swanns, Summers thought. He wasn’t judging her; he was just seeing her differently now. He’d seen before how she played men one against the other, the way she had with him and Dallas Tate.
Time for you to go, he heard a voice say inside his head. And he knew that voice was right. He had a feeling she thought she’d make him jealous seeing her play up to Lonnie Kerns. Let her think it, he told himself, looking back at the bays playing in the morning sun. He had done his part. Once the wagon was back at the ranch, he would take his money and go. Fair enough, he told himself.
“Señor Summers,” said Don Manuel, smiling widely, walking across the yard to him, “the man who has brought me such a wonderful business opportunity—not to mention such fine breeding animals.” He swept a long dapper hand toward the corral.
“It was my pleasure, Don Manuel,” said Summers. He gave a respectful nod. The don wore a pale blue suit embroidered on the shoulders, cuffs and trouser legs with gold filament. He stood poker rigid behind a wide pearly smile, and raised a long finger for emphasis. Sunlight flashed off a large gold ring.
“On the way over here I ask myself,” he said, “why does this man look so unhappy, after all the money he has made here today?” He shrugged and spread his hands. “Yet I have no answer for myself. So I must ask you, if I am not being too forward, why do you look so unhappy?”
“Didn’t realize I did, Don Manuel,” Summers said. “But just for the sake of being factual, I didn’t make all that money today, just a portion of it.” He paused, then said, “For helping the Swanns out, by bringing it here.”
“Ah, then you did not make enough?” the tall, graying Mexican aristocrat asked.
“I made plenty, Don Manuel,” said Summers, “more than I’ll likely make all year dealing horses. So I can’t complain.”
“Good, good,” said the Don, “then I was mistaken. You were not unhappy.”
