Sidewinders:#3: Cutthroat Canyon

by Johnstone, William W.

  “Don’t worry. Luz is as strong as an ox. And if you tell her I said so, I will deny it to my dying breath.”

  Bo managed to chuckle. “Don’t worry. I won’t say anything.”

  When the rope had been made fast around him, Pepe gave it a couple of tugs. Bo felt the slack go out of it. Pepe made a stirrup out of his hands, and Bo put a bare foot in it and stepped up. The rope held most of his weight as he began to walk up the canyon wall.

  He was never quite sure where he found the strength to do that, but he managed to reach the top a few minutes later. Luz and Teresa were waiting for him, as Pepe had promised. They reached out to grasp his arms and pull him onto a ledge. Bo sprawled out on it, his chest heaving.

  He stayed there catching his breath for only a couple of seconds, though, before he sat up and started fumbling with the knot that held the rope. Scratch was still down there.

  His fingers still didn’t want to work right. Teresa knelt in front of him and said, “Let me.” She pulled at the knot and had it untied in moments. She dropped the rope back down over the rim.

  The other end was tied around Luz’s waist, Bo noticed. She wore trousers and a man’s shirt, like Teresa. The top button was unbuttoned so that the upper halves of her big breasts spilled out of the shirt. Bo had a hard time imagining the madam on horseback, and wondered if that was how they had come down here into Mexico, or if they had brought a wagon.

  While Bo sat there and rested, Teresa and Luz hauled Scratch up out of the canyon. Then they dropped the rope down to Pepe again, and the bodyguard scrambled up it like the ape he had reminded Bo of earlier. As he coiled the rope after Luz untied it from around her waist, he said, “I am sorry we could not bring the horses up here. We will have to walk out.”

  “Don’t worry about that,” Scratch told him. “It’ll feel mighty good to be on our feet again, I reckon, after danglin’ like that all day.”

  Pepe helped them up, and when they proved to be unsteady, he got between them and looped an arm around each of them. Their progress was slow but steady as they followed Teresa off the ledge and onto a narrow, winding trail that twisted upward into the mountains. Luz brought up the rear, carrying a Winchester.

  “When we get higher up, this trail will lead to another that goes down into the valley,” Teresa explained. “We left the horses there.”

  “What about Davidson’s man in the bell tower?” Bo asked.

  “He cannot see in the darkness. As long as we are in hiding before daylight, we will be safe from his eyes…and his gun.”

  “We’ve never cottoned much to hidin’ out,” Scratch said. “I reckon under the circumstances, though, it ain’t such a bad idea.”

  “You are in no shape to fight a battle right now,” Teresa said. “You must rest and recover from what Davidson has done to you.” Her voice caught a little as she went on, “I…I am sorry you had to endure such torture because of me.”

  “I reckon you had your reasons for doing what you did,” Bo said. “And if you’d gotten away with blowing up that shed, it would have done considerable damage to Davidson’s operation, at least for a while. We can talk about that later, once we get out of here.”

  “Yeah,” Scratch said, “and we can start figurin’ out how we can get our hands on some guns, too…because I aim to pay another visit to Cutthroat Canyon later on.”

  “Count on it,” Bo said.

  The trek out of the mountains took more than an hour and used up all the reserves of strength the Texans had left, and the rocky ground was terribly hard on their bare feet. By the time they reached the horses, Pepe was carrying them more than helping them walk. He lifted each of them onto the back of a horse. Teresa swung up behind Bo, while Pepe rode behind Scratch. Even at a slow walk, they had to hold the Texans on the mounts. Luz followed on a third horse, answering the question that had gone through Bo’s mind earlier.

  They took a roundabout route toward San Ramon. Having grown up in the valley, Teresa knew all the trails, both there and in the surrounding mountains and foothills. That was how she had been able to lead Luz and Pepe to the ledge above the canyon.

  Eventually, Teresa whispered, “We must go the rest of the way on foot. Pepe will take the horses back into the hills and hide them.”

  Bo and Scratch had regained some of their strength during the ride. They were able to dismount with only a little help. Pepe took the reins of the other two horses and set off into the night while Teresa and Luz led the Texans through the cultivated fields toward the cluster of adobe huts.

  When they reached the village, Teresa went to the door of one of the huts and called through it, “Evangelina!” Bo heard the sound of a bar being removed from its brackets on the other side of the door, which swung open a second later. No light came from inside the hut. All the lamps had been blown out.

  A young woman in a long skirt and low-cut peasant blouse ushered them inside. When she had closed and barred the door behind them, she commanded in a low voice, “Light the lamp, Enrique.”

  A match rasped. Flame moved through the darkness, caught the wick in a crude oil lamp. A flickering glow welled up.

  Bo saw that they were in a small, spartanly furnished room. A rough-hewn table, a couple of chairs, and a stone fireplace filled up most of the room. Thick curtains hung over the single window. Through an arched doorway, he saw another room with a rope bunk in it. A straw-filled mattress rested on the bunk.

  “Welcome to my home, Señores,” the woman said. “Teresa tells me that you are enemies of the man Davidson. This means you are my amigos.”

  Bo looked at her in the lamplight, and his jaw tightened. She was a little older than Teresa, but still young and beautiful. At least, she had been beautiful before someone had taken a knife to her and left an ugly red scar down each side of her face. From the looks of the scars, her cheeks had been sliced open down to the bone.

  “Son of a—” Scratch exclaimed before stopping himself.

  The woman called Evangelina smiled, but the pain in her eyes remained. “I know. No man can bear to look at me now save Enrique, and he is…well, not right in the head.”

  The white-whiskered old man who had lit the lamp grinned and chortled. “I still think you are pretty, Evangelina, even after the gringo cut you.”

  “Who did it?” Bo asked. “Davidson?”

  Evangelina shook her head. “The one called Wallace. I thought at first he was nicer than the others who came to me in…the place where they took us. But then one night, he grew angry at me when he could not…” She shrugged. “He became angry and took out his knife and said that no man would ever want me again.” She laughed, but the sound held no humor. “He was right about that. And in a way it was a blessing. Señor Davidson told Gomez, the cabron who runs the house, to send me away.”

  “Wallace will pay for that,” Bo said.

  “Bet a hat on it,” Scratch added.

  Evangelina said, “You must sit down and rest. I have food and wine. Not much, but whatever I have I am willing to share.”

  Bo sank gratefully into one of the chairs at the table. Scratch took the other. Bo said, “You know you’re taking a big chance by helping us, don’t you, Señorita?”

  Evangelina shook her head. “I don’t care. All that matters to me is striking back against the men who have invaded our home and ruined our lives. From what Teresa tells me, you two are the best chance of doing that.”

  She brought them cups of wine, and tortillas and beans. There was a gourd full of clean water from the stream, and Bo and Scratch passed it back and forth, drinking deeply. After being empty for so long, Bo’s stomach threatened to rebel at first, but then it settled down and the food began to make him feel better.

  When they had finished eating, Teresa said, “We should clean those wounds.”

  “I can do that,” Evangelina offered. “I had plenty of experience with my own.”

  “Got any tequila or pulqué or mescal?” Scratch asked.

  “Fetch the te
quila, Enrique,” Evangelina said. “You are right, Señor Morton. It will help to cleanse the wounds.”

  “Well, yeah, that, too,” Scratch said with a smile.

  Bo grimaced and his breath hissed between his teeth as Evangelina used a tequila-soaked rag to wash the blood away from the gash the bullet had left on his head. She did the same with the deep graze on Scratch’s side. Then she heated water in a pot over a small fire in the fireplace and pressed hot, damp compresses to the bruises and scrapes on their torsos. They soaked their bruised, lacerated feet in pans of hot water as well.

  A great weariness stole over Bo as this was going on. He knew he wasn’t going to be able to stay awake much longer, so he told Teresa, “Somebody better stand guard all the time. Davidson’s liable to send some men to search the village tomorrow when he finds out we’re gone. Wake us before dawn and Scratch and I will slip out of here so they won’t find us. We don’t want to bring any trouble down on your friend’s head.”

  “Let us worry about that,” Teresa said.

  Bo would have argued, but he was too blasted tired to do so. He dozed off, not knowing where or when he would wake up, but too far gone to do anything about it.

  CHAPTER 20

  Cool darkness surrounded him when awareness came back to him again. At least, he hadn’t died in his sleep and gone to hell, Bo thought. It would be a lot hotter and brighter if he had.

  He opened his eyes. He was lying on something soft, and when he shifted a little, it rustled underneath him. A straw-filled mattress like the one he had seen in Evangelina’s bedroom, he decided. But he wasn’t on that bunk. Some sort of roof was fairly close overhead, so that he couldn’t stand up without banging his head on the planks. He could see that much because faint light filtered down to wherever he was through cracks between the boards.

  A soft snore made him turn his head. Scratch was sleeping on another mattress beside him. Under the mattresses was a hard-packed dirt floor, and the walls of the chamber were made of stone. They were in some sort of underground room, Bo realized, a hidey-hole underneath one of the huts in the village, probably Evangelina’s. And it was day now, because the light coming through the cracks was sunlight, not the flickering glow of the oil lamp.

  Bo heard the mutter of voices overhead, and opened his mouth to call out to whoever was up there and let them know he was awake. He stopped without saying anything, though. Instead, he pushed himself up on an elbow, reached over, and clamped a hand over Scratch’s mouth.

  The silver-haired Texan jerked away and started to bolt upright, but Bo’s other hand on his shoulder held him down. When he saw awareness come into Scratch’s eyes, he took his hands away and held a finger to his lips in a signal for silence.

  Someone had wrapped bandages around Scratch’s midsection where the bullet had grazed him. Bo put a hand to his head and felt a bandage there as well. He sat up—there was room in the hiding place for that—and Scratch did likewise. Both men listened intently, trying to make out what was being said above them.

  The voices suddenly grew louder as boots thumped on the boards. “If you see any sign of those two, you’d damn well better let us know, or you’ll be sorry,” a man said in harsh tones.

  “Don’t worry, Señor, we will come to the mine immediately and tell you.”

  That was Evangelina. Her words were meek and submissive, and she didn’t sound at all like the fiery, defiant young woman she had been the night before.

  Bo had figured out that it was the next morning now, and Davidson’s men had come to the village to search for him and Scratch, just as he thought they would. The search had reached Evangelina’s hut.

  It hadn’t taken long, though, for the men to see that no one was there except the scarred young woman and the somewhat addlepated old man. Footsteps clomped out. Bo and Scratch breathed a little easier then, but they didn’t relax until part of the floor above them rose, forming a trapdoor. More light flooded into the hidden chamber, making both men narrow their eyes against its brightness.

  Evangelina leaned over the opening, blocking some of the light. “You can come out now,” she told them. “Davidson’s men are gone.”

  Bo and Scratch stood up, hoisted themselves onto the edge of the opening in the floor, and climbed out. They saw that they were inside Evangelina’s bedroom. A woven rug had covered one side of the trapdoor, the other side of which was flush with a wall. Unless someone knew the opening was there, they wouldn’t spot it without a thorough search. Obviously, Davidson’s men hadn’t been that diligent.

  Enrique stood to one side, grinning as usual. He wore a serape today, and one hand came out from underneath the coarsely woven cloak holding an ancient cap-and-ball pistol. “I don’t need to shoot anyone, Evangelina?” he asked.

  “No, no shooting,” she told him as she gently took the heavy revolver out of his gnarled hand. She looked at Bo and Scratch and added, “If they had found the trapdoor, Enrique was going to kill them. The shots would have brought the rest of Davidson’s men, but at least you would have had their guns to make a fight of it.”

  “I’m glad it didn’t come to that,” Bo said. “I thought Davidson confiscated all the guns in the valley, though.”

  Evangelina shrugged. “His men missed a few that our people were able to hide, like this one. But we have only a handful, and a limited amount of ammunition. Not enough to stand up to Davidson and his men.” She made a face. “Not enough co-jones either, when it comes to that.”

  “Where are Teresa and Luz?”

  “They went into the hills before dawn to hide with Pepe during the day,” Evangelina explained. “They will be back tonight. In the meantime, Teresa told me to keep you safe and let you rest. Would you like something to eat?”

  Bo realized that he was famished. He said, “Yes, ma’am, we surely would.”

  “Yeah, my backbone’s ticklin’ my belly button,” Scratch added. That struck Enrique as funny and sent him off into spasms of laughter.

  Evangelina heated a pot of stew filled with savory wild onions and chunks of goat meat. Bo and Scratch wolfed down bowls of the stuff, and cleaned up the last drops with pieces of tortilla. Evangelina had coffee as well, and as Bo was sipping the thick, strong brew, he thought that the woman was probably emptying her larder for them. People in villages such as this one never had much, and the people of San Ramon probably had less than most because of Davidson’s harsh treatment of them. With many of the men off in the canyon slaving in the mine, their farms had gone neglected.

  As soon as they could, he and Scratch would have to leave here. They didn’t want to be a burden to the very people they were trying to help.

  So far, that hadn’t worked out very well, he mused. They hadn’t accomplished a damned thing except to kill three of Davidson’s hired guns. And as dangerous as Jackman, Tragg, and Hansen had been, there were hundreds more men like them scattered throughout the West. Davidson could replace them without much trouble. Skinner, as well as Lancaster and his blasted Gardner gun, represented much bigger threats.

  “I have to go work in the fields,” Evangelina told them when they had finished eating. “It will be better if you get back in the hidden space under my bedroom.” She smiled. “Cooler there during the heat of the day, too.”

  “Sounds good to us,” Bo said. “How did you happen to have a hiding place like that anyway?”

  “A number of houses in the village have them, but Davidson and his men do not know that. We used them to store food, goat milk, things like that.”

  Bo nodded. Such cool places weren’t unusual in hotter climates. Folks had to do what they could to make food last longer, because it tended to spoil quickly because of the heat.

  They climbed back into the underground room, taking a gourd of water and some tortillas with them, and Evangelina lowered the trapdoor into place. She left Enrique’s old hogleg with them.

  “I think you could probably make better use of it than him, if the need arose,” she said. “He will come wi
th me to the fields, so no one should disturb you.”

  Once she was gone and the Texans were alone, Scratch suggested, “One of us ought to stay awake, I reckon, just in case anybody comes snoopin’ around.”

  “Good idea,” Bo agreed. “You can sleep first, if you want to.”

  “No, I’m wide awake. And you’re the one who got shot in the head. You probably need more rest.”

  “You lost more blood,” Bo pointed out.

  “I ain’t so sure about that. Head wounds bleed like the devil.”

  That was true. Bo shrugged and rolled onto his side. He was asleep within minutes.

  They spent the day like that, alternating dozing and staying awake. No one disturbed them until Evangelina and Enrique returned as the light coming through the cracks in the floor began to fade, signifying that another day was over. When the trapdoor rose, Enrique looked in at them with his toothless grin and motioned for them to come out.

  The curtains had been drawn over all the windows. Evangelina looked tired from her day’s labors as Bo and Scratch joined her in the hut’s main room. She told them to sit down at the table, but Bo said, “We’ve been taking it easy all day, Señorita. Why don’t you sit down and let us see what we can rustle up for supper.”

  “I’m a pretty fair hand at cookin’, if I do say so myself,” Scratch put in.

  Evangelina smiled. “That would be nice, for a change. Very well, Señores.”

  Bo realized that when she smiled, the scars on her cheeks weren’t as noticeable. Or maybe he was just getting used to them.

  Either way, he hoped that before he and Scratch left this valley, Evangelina and everyone else who lived here would have reason to smile again, because they had been freed from Porter Davidson’s tyrannical hold on them.

  An hour after dark, a soft tapping on the door announced the arrival of Teresa, Luz, and Pepe. Evangelina blew out the lamp and then let them in. Once they were inside, Enrique relit the lamp, as he had the night before.