The Baron War

by Jory Sherman

  “You measurin’ the sky?” Roy said. “Whyn’t you go get your damned surveyin’ stuff and do it right?”

  David walked over to the rope strung up across the road and pulled on it. It was tight enough, perhaps. If any riders came on fast, it might trip up a horse or two. He heard the rope creak on its moorings. He would have strung up a dozen or more. One lariat was not enough to tumble an army, and this one would break if enough weight struck it. He ignored Roy’s taunting, as he had all night long. Roy Killian was a bully, and David knew all about bullies. A bully wanted attention and approval. Ignoring them made them mad, but once he decided to fight back, he knew he would be descending to their level. He had run into bullies all his life. Matteo Aguilar was a bully. Almost every boss he’d ever had was a bully at heart. A bully took pleasure in making someone else feel off-balance, ill at ease, defensive.

  Ursula had said that she had raised Roy, but David couldn’t fault her. No, Roy was probably the way he was because his father had been a rakehell who had abandoned his wife and son, a drifter who had lived by the gun and died by the gun. Jack Killian’s shadow was over David’s marriage to Ursula as much as Roy was a substance in it.

  If only they didn’t have to live in Roy’s damned house. And those two women, Wanda and Hattie, they were enough to drive a man to strong drink. And Ursula was always putting a bug in Wanda’s ear to marry her boy, and Hattie, too, for that matter. If David had been a jealous man, he would have resented all the attention those women gave to Roy Killian, but he was not. In fact, he was damned glad that Roy drew all the fire in that house—it gave him a measure of peace in the middle of a whirlwind.

  He wished Roy would marry Wanda and then the house would get so small he and Ursula would be forced to leave and live somewhere else. Hattie, too, perhaps. But Roy was as wild as those mustangs David had seen running on the plain when he’d first come to work for Aguilar. Matteo had told him that the Mexicans, in the old days, had called this region “the plain of wild horses.”

  And, working with the Mexicans when he surveyed the land for Matteo, he had learned that the whole Rio Grande Valley was known by another name as well, one more fitting, perhaps. The name in Spanish still sent shivers up his spine: “El llano de los muertos.” The plain of the dead.

  There was death here on this plain, David knew. This was blood-soaked ground. He had found skulls when he set up his theodolite, and holes in the skulls, from arrows, from bullets, from lances. He did not know who the skulls had belonged to, white men, Apache, or Comanche, but they represented violence and death and no one had cared enough to bury the bodies of the dead. Their bones had been scattered by wild beasts—coyotes, wolves, and the like.

  He looked up at the sky again and felt its peace descend on him. The plain of the dead was also a tranquil place at times, and he thought that it might be so always if man did not tread its wildness. This “war” with Aguilar was only a small speck on the broad land that was soon to erupt into a civil war that would sweep everyone up in its violence, pit North against South, friend against friend, blood against blood. Perhaps the entire United States would become one vast plain of the dead when it was all over. The thought of all that made him sick, and he no longer found solace in gazing upward into the endless reaches of the sky. He turned away from the taut rope and started walking back into the trees where Roy and Al were still waiting for their own little war to erupt on the Box B.

  “Get enough air, Dave?” Roy asked.

  David did not answer.

  “Roy,” Al said, “why don’t you lay off the man for a while?”

  “Aw, I’m just teasin’ old David here. He can take it, can’t you, Dave?”

  “Oh, I can take it, Roy. Question is, what’s the point in raggin’ me all the time? Keep your mind off your own troubles?”

  “What troubles?”

  “I don’t know. But you do.”

  “Now, what the hell’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Seems to me a man ought to know what troubles he has. I’m not a mind reader.”

  “No, you sure as hell aren’t. You wouldn’t like what’s in my mind right now.”

  “I probably wouldn’t.”

  “Well, just drop it, hear?”

  “All right, Roy. Whatever you say.”

  The three men were silent for a time. David kept wondering when whatever was preying on Roy’s mind would come bursting out of his mouth in a stream of invective.

  Al stretched one of his legs, wriggled the toe of his boot. Then he did the same with his other leg, waggling his toe for several seconds. “Waitin’s the hardest thing to do,” he said. “Not knowin’ just exactly what you’re waiting for.”

  “You sound as if you’ve done this before,” David said.

  “Once or twice’t.”

  “What were you awaitin’ on?” Roy asked.

  Al stepped in place for a couple of seconds, not making much sound with the soles of his boots. He leaned against a live oak and shifted the rifle from one hand to the other. It was still warm out, but he could feel the temperature falling slightly as the night drew toward morning. “I ’member one time,” he said, “me’n Kenny Darnell was up on the Brazos, hidin’ out ’long the river, waitin’ for two jaspers what had robbed a feller over to Waco. They were a pair of mean sons of bitches and we heard they had a hidey-hole somewheres about and when they sobered up, they’d be comin’ back.” Al paused, wiped his mouth with a swipe of his sleeve.

  “And did they?” Roy asked.

  “We waited three days up yonder, with nothin’ to bite on but hardtack biscuits and mean old jackrabbit jerky, and water in the river so salty you daren’t drink a drop, and skeeters eatin’ us alive and rattlesnakes slitherin’ up by day and rats tryin’ to gnaw on our boots ever’ night.”

  “Sounds bad,” David said. “How come you waited that long?”

  “Oh, we figgered them two was comin’ thataway, all right, and the longer we waited, the madder we got. We didn’t have no warrants, but these boys had robbed an old couple in Waco and we knew they was mean as spring bears comin’ out of hibernation, and one of ’em had beat the old lady because she begged ’em not to hurt her husband, which they did, the bastards, and we kept thinkin’ of those two old people and what these old boys had done to ’em, so we waited, three long days and three nights.”

  “Did they finally come on by?” Roy asked.

  “Me and Kenny was ready to wring necks by the third day out there. We commenced to arguin’ and layin’ into each other like two cur dogs. Then we got into a hell of a fight, with him throwin’ the first punch and then me landin’ a haymaker, side of his jaw. We was goin’ at it when we hear someone hail us.”

  “Who was it?” Roy asked.

  “It was them owlhoots. One of ’em said, ‘You fellers mean to kill each other?’

  “Me’n Kenny turned and saw them two killers standing up there on the slope like a couple of spectators at a prize fight. They wasn’t suspicious or nothin’. Well, Kenny, he looks at me, and I look at him and then we stepped out and drew our pistols.”

  “You got the drop on them,” Roy said.

  “They were plumb caught with their pants down. We showed them our badges and they got these sad looks on their faces.”

  “So you had them,” David said.

  “Well, it wasn’t over, by a long shot,” Al said.

  “What happened?” Roy asked.

  “Before we could take them into custody, one of them asked us what we were fighting about. He said he was just curious. Kenny told him we was fighting over whether we should just kill those two on sight or run them into the hoosegow in Waco.

  “Well, the other one got mad at that and went for his pistol. As soon as he did that, Kenny threw down on him and let fly a ball right into his gut. By then the other jasper was in a crouch and clawing for his iron, when I stretched my arm straight out and snapped the hammer down. My shot caught him high in the chest and he never did reach that pi
stol in his holster. He got the damnedest expression on his face and began to spit out blood. Just for the hell of it, when he was down on his knees and tryin’ to catch a breath to curse me with, I shot him again with my .44-40 and blew half his arm off.”

  “What about Darnell?” David asked.

  “Kenny, he didn’t shoot anymore, but ran up the slope and laid the barrel of his pistol aside the head of the jasper he’d shot and asked him how he liked being beaten with it.”

  “And, what did the man say?” Roy asked.

  “He said, ‘Sweet Jesus, don’t do that.’”

  “Man, that was something,” Roy said. “You killed them both, then?”

  “I had to drag Kenny off of his man. The man’s face looked like ground-up pork sausage. He was fair a bloody mess.”

  “He died?” David asked.

  “Hell, he was dead a good two minutes before I got Kenny to quit.”

  “What about the fight you and Kenny had?” Roy asked.

  “Oh, that was over. We had plumb forgot what we was fighting about and we were-out from facing down those two scalawags. We packed them on their horses and took them into Waco. The sheriff there stood ’em up on pine boards in front of the drugstore and put placards by ’em. Those two drew quite a crowd and we had a passel of free drinks at one of the cantinas.”

  Roy whistled long and loud.

  To the surprise of the three men, there was an answering whistle from the road.

  “Shhh,” Al said, and bent low and leaned forward, bringing his rifle up to his shoulder.

  Roy and David hunched down and aimed their rifles as well.

  “Who do you suppose that was?” Roy asked.

  “Be quiet,” David said.

  “Whistle again, Roy,” Al said.

  Roy’s mouth was dry as sand. “I can’t,” he said.

  “David. Can you whistle?” Al asked.

  “I’ll try.” David whistled, but his mouth was almost as dry as Roy’s. The sound did not carry far.

  “Hell,” Al said, and put a couple of fingers to his mouth and pursed his lips. His whistle was a loud one, piercing, and both Roy and David ducked as if they had been poked in the ears.

  Then the three men waited for several seconds. Finally there was an answering whistle and they could hear men running up the road toward them, their footfalls heavy, as if they carried heavy weights.

  “Here they come,” Roy said, spotting two or three men emerging from the shadows in the distance, their silhouettes etched in moonlight.

  Roy hammered back his rifle.

  “Hold on,” Al said.

  “I got a bead on one.”

  “We don’t know who that is yet.”

  “Hell, Al, you want me to ask ’em their names?”

  “Just wait a second, will you?”

  Then they heard another whistle.

  “Those are Mexicans, I think,” David said.

  “Yeah, but who’s that coming up behind them?” Al asked. “That was where that whistling came from.”

  “They’re carrying rifles,” Roy said.

  “Yeah, but there’s something funny about the way they’re carrying them,” Al said. “They don’t seem to be expecting trouble.”

  “Yeah,” David said.

  Roy eased the hammer back down. He let out a breath and quickly drew in another one. He gripped the rifle tightly to keep from getting the shakes.

  David felt his muscles begin to quiver and the rifle in his hands took on weight as if it had suddenly turned to lead.

  Al licked dry lips with his tongue and kept a thumb pressed lightly on the hammer of his rifle, his index finger gently snugged against the trigger, ready to pull it slightly when he cocked, to muffle the sound of the sear engaging in the lock.

  Then they all heard a voice yell in Spanish: “Corren, corren”—and the men on the road began to run faster.

  “That’s Anson’s voice yonder,” Roy croaked, his throat dry as a late-summer corn husk.

  “Anson?” Al said.

  “What?” David whispered, just before his teeth began to chatter.

  “Andale,” they heard Anson yell, and the running men loomed larger in the soft light of the moon, their figures limned with pewter.

  “And there he is, with Peebo,” Roy said, his voice scratchy as sand glued to paper.

  “Well I’ll be damned,” Al breathed, and rocked back on his legs, letting his rifle-barrel dip from its aiming point.

  “Anybody there?” Anson called.

  Roy stood up. “Over here, Anson. Look out for that rope stretched across the road.”

  “Here we come,” Anson said, and all of the running men turned and started toward Roy, David, and Al. “And right behind us, here come horses at the gallop.”

  Moments later Anson ordered the Mexicans to drop to their bellies as he and Peebo came up behind them as their legs were crumpling underneath their bodies. He and Peebo were out of breath, but they turned as they sat down in the trees and both pointed to the road.

  “Aguilar?” Al asked.

  Anson, still out of breath, nodded. Peebo gasped like a fish out of water and checked the lock on his rifle.

  David sucked in a breath and looked up at the sky for a moment. The moon had turned into silver as a faint light from the east began to seep into the velvet of night, and from the direction of the Box B headquarters there came the early crowing of a rooster, and beneath it he heard the rolling thunder of hoofbeats pounding up the road just ahead of the breaking dawn.

  38

  MATTEO LOOKED AT the bodies of the dead men by the light of the mesquite torches. One of the scouts, Pedro Castillo, had lighted the mesquite branches at Matteo’s command. The limbs were green and they crackled and made foul-smelling smoke. The leaves made the light brighter as they caught flame, and the trapped air inside the limbs sent jets of fire streaming through the flames and made a demonic hissing sound. Castillo thought it was a grisly scene, but he did not say anything to Matteo. The light flickering on the faces of the dead made their faces seem to move and assume grotesque expressions.

  “They did not even cover up the bodies with stones and leaves,” Matteo said to no one. And no one spoke to him about that as the two scouts sat their horses on either side of the bodies in the trees, holding their torches high above their heads.

  The men behind Matteo stared at the lifeless bodies as if they were looking at dolls on display in a shop window, without expression, without comment. One or two held their stomachs with their hands as if trying to keep from vomiting. These were the young ones who had not seen much death.

  “Do you see Nuncio here?” Matteo asked. “Do you see the face of Obispo?”

  “No, Patrón,” Castillo said. “They are not here. We looked before you came to this place.”

  “Go over the tracks,” Matteo said. “Use the torches. Tell me what happened. Tell me where the other men are, where they have gone.”

  The two scouts left the dead to shadows as they rode their horses over to the trail. They stopped by Anson’s dead horse and waved their torches over the corpse as Matteo watched from where he sat his horse.

  “There are no saddlebags,” Castillo said.

  “This is not one of our horses,” Tomaso said.

  “No, this horse has the B in the box. See?”

  “I see.”

  The two scouts dismounted and began to search the road. They crossed it and walked into the fringe of the grass bordering the trees on the other side. One of them went into the forest and was gone a few moments. Then both of them examined a spot just inside the trees and they walked some ways down the road and back to their horses. They stomped out the burning brands and remounted. Matteo rode over to them.

  “What did you find?” Matteo asked.

  “One man, he walked across the road. He was with two men there, then he walked back. Then four men walked across the road and then three men and one horse met with them and they all went toward the Baron rancho. The
y are all gone.”

  “So, Nuncio and the others surrendered,” Matteo said. Neither of his men said anything. “Do not try and catch them,” Matteo said. “But you ride ahead and take care. If you see anyone, one of you ride back and tell me. We will go.”

  “Yes,” Castillo said, and the two scouts rode off slowly as the half-moon climbed in the sky and made the shadows shift on their moorings like black cloth sliding almost imperceptibly at the invisible urging of gravity.

  Matteo turned in the saddle and raised his hand. “Adelante,” he said, and spurred his horse into a walk. He marked the moon as it rose and mentally measured off the distance to the Baron ranch. A wise man, he reasoned, would have turned back at this point. A wise man would have waited for another time. A wise man would have counted his losses and started over under more opportune circumstances. But he carried the reasoning further: The man who waited never moved forward. No—this was the time. This was what he had planned for so long. Now was the right time. With Martin’s wife dead, he would not be at his best. He would still be grieving and he, too, had divided his forces. Anson was somewhere ahead of him, probably on foot, or riding the horse so that he could guard his prisoners at gunpoint. Anson had lost men, too. Perhaps he himself was wounded.

  Now was the time, Matteo thought, to get back the land that his family had sold too cheap, to reclaim what was rightfully his. Martin had no right to live on Aguilar land—land that had been in Matteo’s family for generations; land granted his forebears by the Spaniards as land grants, for their loyalty and distinguished service to the crown.

  The bitterness he still held for his family rose up in him as he thought of the way they had squandered their inheritance. But he had exacted revenge for their treachery and they were all dead, as Martin Baron and his son would soon be dead. Then he would be, once again, the largest landowner in the state of Texas, perhaps in the entire United States.

  Matteo knew in his heart that he was destined to be a powerful man, and he envisioned himself with a large and magnificent hacienda, thousands of cattle, and vast riches, the wealth of a king, of a mighty sovereign. He lived with those dreams every day of his life as he had lived with them ever since he had been banished from the Rocking A by his family. He had come back from the land of the dead to claim his rightful property and he would never again let any man lay claim to Aguilar land—not Baron, not anyone.