by Paul Lederer
‘The comancheros,’ the stage driver said, as if speaking from a deep hollow, ‘they’ll be back with more men. The women – the comancheros don’t treat women well, Black.’
Then the driver slumped back, passed out from a lack of blood. Cameron Black cursed silently, bent and picked up the injured man and walked to the open door of the coach past Bell’s sprawled, unconscious form.
‘What are we going to do?’ Axel Popejoy said. The little man was perspiring through his shirt, his eyes were haunted.
‘We’re going on,’ Cameron Black said, as the two women helped him hoist Kyle Post into the coach. ‘There’s nothing else we can do, is there?’
Besides, as the driver had said, a man does have obligations, even if performing them was likely to put his own neck in a noose.
TWO
First things first, Cameron Black told himself. Grumbling beneath his breath, he removed ‘Mr Bell’s’ belt and bolo tie and bound his ankles and hands. Then he roughly rolled the half-conscious outlaw farther off the road with his boot toe. From the coach Eleanor and Popejoy watched him, offering neither help nor criticism.
Bell was conscious, but he did not speak. His eyes, however, spoke volumes of hatred and swore vengeance as they fixed on Cameron Black. The man would not forget this rude treatment, nor the humiliation of having allowed it.
‘There’s probably a reward out for this guy, wouldn’t you think?’ Popejoy did offer diffidently once Bell was bound. ‘Maybe we should take him along.’
‘Do you want to be responsible for watching him?’ Cameron asked. Expecting no reply, he went on about his business.
The shotgun rider, Jerry Yount, was hanging forward out of the box. Cameron stepped up, shouldered the dead man and took him away from the uneasy horses. If there was time he would scratch out a shallow grave for the man, but not now. There was no telling how long the outlaws would be gone, determine to regroup and attack again.
For now he began moving the rocks that had been rolled into the trail to block it. Head-sized and larger, they were a heavy task for one man working alone. Cameron was drenched with sweat in no time. The sun had already fallen and soon the desert night would grow cold, but for now the heat of the torrid day lingered. His mouth was dry, his hands raw. He worked with his eyes on the distances of the flatlands, listening for the sound of driving hoofbeats or the stealthy whisper of boot leather over sand.
A star-shadow fell across the rocks where Cameron was working and he glanced up sharply. The girl stood there, shawl across her shoulders, small hands folded, her eyes watching him as he toiled.
‘You’re a help,’ he muttered.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Quit being sorry and give me a hand. We’ve got to clear these rocks if you ever hope to see Fort Wingate and your lover.’
Eleanor took in a sharp breath, perhaps not liking to hear her beloved Lt McMahon described in that way. Cameron Black continued to work the rough stones aside and when he glanced up again he saw Eleanor doing her best to roll some of the rocks from the trail. He grinned to himself. Well, maybe she is all right, he thought.
When finally it appeared they had enough of a path through the rocks to walk the team forward, Cameron straightened up, holding the small of his back, taking in deep gusts of air. Eleanor, shivering now, studied him uncertainly.
‘How’s Kyle – the driver?’ he asked.
‘Aunt Mae is tending him … I don’t think he’s doing well.’ She paused, ‘Are you going to take over the driving, Mr Riley?’
‘So it seems,’ he answered, wiping back his hair, replacing his hat. ‘There’s no one else, is there?’
Eleanor glanced around as if someone might appear from off the desert. ‘No,’ she said reluctantly. ‘There’s no one else.’
‘I can get us into Calico. Kyle told me that there’s a retired driver running the way-station there. He’ll drive you the rest of the way to Fort Wingate come morning.’
That seemed to relieve her mind a little. Cameron had the idea that the girl trusted him not at all. If she had known how close he had come to just cutting one of the horses out of its harness, saddling it and riding away, she would have thought still less of him. It was not that he cared nothing for those in his charge, but he had developed a fondness for his own neck over the years and did not wish to present it at Fort Wingate for stretching.
‘That’s it,’ he said, looking at the road ahead, hands on his hips. ‘Long time since I handled a team, but I can get us up the canyon and onto the flats.’ It was, he thought, a good thing the team was dead tired and also knew their way to the way-station. It was now dark as sin in the canyon, and, as he had said, he hadn’t handled a four-horse team for many years.
He helped the young lady into the coach, glanced at Kyle, lying limp across the seat, his head on Aunt Mae’s lap, at the frightened little drummer. He closed the door sharply, climbed into the box, unwrapped the reins from around the brake handle where Kyle had left them looped, snapped the leathers once and started the horses up the twisting canyon trail toward the way-station beyond.
The starlight only showed the way for the first few miles as the stage rolled higher into the depths of the cool canyon pass. Topping out the rise, Cameron halted the weary team to let them blow, and looked ahead to try to focus his memory of the trail. By then the moon, though not yet risen, had lent a haunting glow to the western sky, allowing faint landmarks to be picked out.
The passengers had stepped down to stretch their legs – at least Axel Popejoy and Eleanor had. Aunt Mae had remained behind, still ministering to the badly wounded Kyle Post. Cameron had begun to develop a deep respect for that honest woman who had leveled her revolver at the onrushing outlaws and then begun tending the wounded. He wondered at her background. Perhaps her husband, too, had once seen war.
Cameron watched the backtrail still, but there was no one there as yet. There would be. The comancheros wanted that army payroll. If their scheme had been thwarted because of Bell’s misstep – or Cameron Black’s quick action – they still had no reason to give up. They faced, so far as they knew, an inexperienced stage driver, two women and an ineffectual drummer. It was likely that by now they had freed Bell and discovered these facts. Bell would be furious at the way things had transpired. Not only had he lost the gold, but he had been humiliated and trussed like a pig by Cameron Black.
And yes – he knew who it was that he had faced. There had been that moment of shocked recognition in the outlaw’s eyes when Cameron had beaten him down as much to silence him as to stop the robbery attempt. This was now the topic of conversation between Eleanor and Popejoy who had stepped away a little to walk and loosen up their travel-stiffened legs.
‘Who is this Riley?’ Popejoy was asking. ‘How do we know that he means us well?’
‘What do you mean?’ Eleanor asked wearily. The drummer was a tiring traveling companion with his store of inexact knowledge and aimless prattle. He was much worse than any of those proverbial ‘old women’ people always spoke of. ‘He certainly hasn’t done anything but save our scalps, as they say out here.’
‘I heard Bell call him something else!’ Popejoy said in an excited tone. His face was lost in the near-darkness, but his white handkerchief was clear as the small, round man mopped his brow nervously. ‘Black. That’s what Mr Bell called him, remember?’
Eleanor shrugged, wearying again with the salesman’s chatter. ‘Black,’ she said, thinking back. ‘I believe you are wrong. I thought Bell said, “Back!” as he drew his gun. Maybe he did say Black, and meant to follow with “black-hearted so and so”, or somesuch. I don’t know, and I can’t see why it’s important, Mr Popejoy.’
‘No?’ Popejoy’s voice became sly. He tucked his kerchief into his breast pocket and leaned nearer. ‘You could be wrong. We might have fallen into the hands of the outlaws without even knowing it. I’ll tell you this – I also heard the stage driver call this man, Riley, “Black”.’
‘And so
?’ Eleanor asked, glancing toward the front of the stage where Cameron sat, loosely holding the reins of the team as the western sky grew slowly brighter, the moon beginning to spread cool silver light across the plateau. She heard a coyote howl somewhere and the following yips of its pups. Otherwise the desert night was silent. She started slowly back toward the coach, Popejoy on her heels.
The little man went on, ‘Why didn’t he want us to take the outlaw along with us? There’s sure to be a reward for him.’
‘He told you why, Mr Popejoy. How could we guard the man? It would just have meant more risk for us … if his friends decided to rescue him.’
‘No, there’s more to it,’ Popejoy persisted. They had reached the coach and the drummer opened the door to help Eleanor aboard.
She paused to say, ‘This man, Riley – whatever he chooses to call himself – has done nothing but help us, protecting us from the comancheros, and now driving the coach so that we may continue. I wish to speak no further of him. I do not know the man; I only judge him by what I have observed.’
Popejoy said, ‘I had forgotten that I was talking to a woman.’
Eleanor said in measured tones, ‘It would gratify me immensely if you would simply quit speaking to me altogether,’ and she stepped aboard, shrugging off his proffered hand.
Aunt Mae sat where she had been, still gently stroking the driver’s head. His eyes were partly open, but there was no spark of life in them. Not one of them believed that Kyle Post could survive the trip to Fort Wingate. But maybe, just maybe, he could make it to the Calico Station. Mae murmured to him and smiled down; Eleanor felt closer to her kindly aunt than she ever had before.
‘Riley’ called down from the box, ‘Everybody ready?’ Receiving an affirmative answer from Eleanor, Cameron Black cracked the long coach whip and the team lumbered to weary yet eager motion, wanting to reach the comfort of a stable, the waiting water and hay of Calico way-station, ahead along the dark miles of the high desert.
Cameron Black watched the trail ahead now. Illuminated by the rising half-moon it was a ghostly but pleasing aspect. The long rocky road stretched out ahead over a rugged land where now here and there clumps of stunted live oaks could be seen along with manzanita and laurel-leaf sumac. Distant broken hills crowded the valley. He guided the team without urging it onward. The animals were tired, but game. He used the reins only to ease them back gently, as they tended to attempt making a headlong dash toward the perceived comfort ahead from time to time. Only once did he lift his boot to the long handle of the brake, as they dipped down a deep-shadowed declivity into a misshapen arroyo.
Cameron found his uneasiness growing as they neared Calico. What had he gotten himself into now? If his buckskin horse hadn’t broken its leg in that unseen squirrel hole he would be into Texas by now, away from all of his troubles. Instead here he was riding directly back into them.
He must, he decided, be some kind of fool. There was something in what Kyle Post had said, of course, about a man having obligations. There was something in his own sometimes tilted integrity driving him. And – he did not let himself dwell long on this passing thought – there was some indefinable, forgotten chivalry prompted by the dark eyes of Eleanor Gates. Why, he couldn’t have said. She, after all, was betrothed, off to meet a man of much higher caliber and promise than he: a rambling hunted man of small character. Fine, he thought grimly, he would see that she was taken nearer to her beloved Lt McMahon, and maybe one day she would shed a small tear when they hanged Cameron Black.
God help all romantics!
Cameron began to smell woodsmoke, and glancing to the stars, he decided they were near enough that it could only be from Calico. That thought lifted his spirits a little. He would deliver the passengers, coach and army gold into this Stan Tabor’s care, his conscience salved. Then, by hook or crook he would nab a horse from the way-station, toss his battered saddle aboard and light out toward the far lost ranges where no man could track him, leaving these people and their small problems far behind.
They crested a low knoll half an hour on, and by the pale moonlight, Cameron saw the squat form of the way-station, its outbuildings, and the slender barred shadows cast by corral rails. He slowed the team now, halted it and leaned back wearily in the box.
‘What is it?’ the voice of Axel Popejoy demanded from inside the coach. ‘Why are we stopped here?’
‘Trying to decide if we want to go down,’ Cameron murmured.
‘Is it Calico? Of course we want to go down!’ Popejoy said. By now he and Eleanor had both clambered down from the coach to walk forward beside the wagon box. The off-wheel horse stamped impatiently, wanting to reach its stable, water and feed. Cameron held the team back. Eleanor looked up at him out of the darkness, her eyes moon-bright, concerned, sensing something.
Popejoy persisted. ‘What sort of trick is this? I can smell woodsmoke. There’s a cozy fire burning in the fireplace and they’ll have warm food and beds for us …’ His impatient voice broke off as he realized what he was looking at.
It was not chimney smoke they saw, not the promised warmth of a hearth. Calico Station had been raided. Smoke lay like a pall across the valley. The station had been burnt nearly to the ground.
‘Who …?’ Eleanor asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Cameron had to tell her. ‘Maybe the comancheros managed to get here ahead of us. Maybe Apaches. Maybe …’ He tilted his head back and rubbed his tired eyes. ‘I don’t know,’ he repeated.
‘What can we do?’ she asked, sounding more practical now, as if the recent troubles had strengthened, rather than diminished her resolve.
Cameron said, ‘There might be trouble down there, more than we can handle. However, there might be more wounded people at the station needing help. There may be a fresh team of horses we could use to make a run toward Fort Wingate. We would have a more defensible position at the way-station than aboard the coach if there is more trouble on the way. I just do not know. I do know that we just can’t sit here and wait for the comancheros to catch up.’
‘Unless there are men down there, hidden, waiting for us,’ Eleanor commented.
‘Yes,’ Cameron Black agreed. ‘But I see no one moving, and there are no saddle horses around the buildings. We have to go on down, I think. Eleanor, ask your Aunt Mae if she will hand me back that extra Colt. When we do go in, I want all of the firepower that’s available at hand.’
‘But surely …’ Popejoy said, his voice squeaking a little, ‘we can’t simply ride up there … knowing there’s been trouble.’
‘Sir,’ Cameron Black answered quietly. ‘The way I see it, that’s all there is to do. If you’ve a better idea, I would very much like to hear it.’ He added, ‘If you would prefer to take your chances out on the desert alone, God bless you, and I wish you well.’
Popejoy made no response; there was no answer possible. He climbed back into the coach. After a moment, Eleanor was back with the second revolver. Handing it up to the grim-faced man she wished just for a moment that she were confident enough with a weapon, that she were some woman of the West capable of seating herself beside him with a ready Colt in her own hand.
But she was not, and she knew it. Feeling vaguely ashamed, she hoisted her skirts and clambered back into the coach, tensing as Cameron Black slowly, silently, let the team have its head and start forward toward the dark, cool valley which now seemed to smell not of warmth and promise, but horribly of smoky death and destruction.
THREE
A grove of great white oak trees clustered closely around the way-station at Calico. Their leaves and branches had been touched with fire, and they appeared forlorn, surprised by the violence, as they spread wide branches across the moonlit sky. A dog yapped, but it was from far away. A lost and mournful disappointment in a humankind it had once trusted so deeply.
Cameron Black halted the team well away from the yard. The horses tugged against the set reins in frustration.
They would have to hold in t
heir desires for a while longer. Cameron was not going to slip up onto the way-station with a team and coach. He was going to cat-foot it on ahead a little, through the oak grove and try to scout out the situation. Eleanor looked from the darkened coach window to ask a question, but he put a finger to his lips and sat briefly on the ground, tugging off his boots. If there were Indians around – and there were indications that there might be – he would have to out-Indian them, and a boot moving across leaves, perhaps snapping a twig, would give him away to an alert listener.
With his Winchester in hand, one Colt in his holster, the other shoved down behind his belt, Cameron moved on through the moon shadows. The silver half moon rode high, like some pocked survivor of a sky battle. A horse whickered and fell silent. From somewhere a gathering of bats rose and swooped low across the night.
Cameron stubbed his toe on a rock, winced and silently cursed and continued his winding way toward the burned way-station.
Reaching the verge of the oak grove he crouched low, listening and watching. There was no movement in the pole-and-adobe building. No man-shadows creeping across the yard. Only once did he think he heard a small sound, like a pained sigh, but he could not be sure of its location and it did not come again.
Taking in his breath, he took the chance and crossed the space between the oaks and the building in several long strides. Cameron pressed his back to the wall of the adobe, feeling the heat that was still trapped there, smelling the rank charcoal scent of the burned surrounding structures.
It was a risk, but Indians seldom forted up, and so Cameron leaned toward the heavy plank door of the adobe building and found it ajar. Nudging it with his bare foot he held back, rifle in an ‘at arms’ position, his grip tight, his hands perspiring. There was no response from within, and so he ducked low and took one more chance.
