by Jake Logan
“Put your hands in the air or die!” Slocum ordered, slipping into the room behind them.
The second man spun and took a shot at Slocum, but too late. Slocum’s shot caught him with a lead bullet in the face. The other man tried to charge back into the house, but his falling buddy blocked the doorway. Slocum rushed over to cover them.
Slocum jammed the muzzle of his Colt to the man’s temple. “I’m counting to three, then I shoot you. Tell me who you are, who you work for and where the others are at. One—”
“Ricky Carmella. Ricky Carmella. My boss is—my boss is Andrew, and he is gone with the mules.”
Slocum ripped the man’s gun away and then looked up at Don Carlos, who was taking ropes off his hands as he stood in the doorway.
“Ah, amigo,” said Don Carlos. “Why did it take you so long to get here?”
They hugged each other.
“I came as soon as I thought you had finished your business with some sweet thing and needed to be back at your casa.”
“Soon enough. Soon enough.” Don Carlos dropped his chin, and at the sound of the woman’s voice, his head flew up. “Clara?”
“That guard bastard down there won’t rape anyone ever again.” She rushed over and hugged her boss. “You are all right?”
“I’m fine, my darling. Give me that gun,” Don Carlos said, holding her tight. “You may shoot one of us waving it around like that.”
She handed him the revolver.
“Where are the other men?” the older man asked, looking around.
“Locked in the mine,” Don Carlos said.
“Where are the women and children?” Clara asked.
“They put all the families in the warehouse,” Don Carlos said to her and his mine superintendent. “Ralph, have you met my amigo, Slocum?”
“Yes, he untied us.”
Slocum shook Ralph’s hand.
“How did you ever take them on by yourself?” Ralph asked.
Slocum shook his head. “They were down to three guards, who were obviously buying them time for the pack trains to get out of the valley.”
“How far away are they? Do you think they have gotten away with the ore?” Don Carlos asked.
“Somewhere between here and the pass up north would be my guess,” Slocum said.
“No way to stop them.” Don Carlos dropped his chin in defeat.
“Do you have some tough men working for you?” Slocum asked.
“Yes, but—”
“Go get them out of the mine. Are there any horses or mules to ride?”
“Sure, but—”
“We need them. We’ll need saddles and guns.” Slocum’s mind was rolling out the things that he needed to make up an army.
“The guns are in the supply room,” Don Carlos said. “There’s ammo too.”
The young man, no doubt an accountant who couldn’t shoot, came over with an inventory book. “What all do you need, señor?”
“Blasting powder, blasting sticks, detonating caps—let me see. I’ll need some bows and arrows.”
The man dropped the book down against his legs. “We have none of them.”
“These mountain people work in your mine?”
“Sí.”
“They will know all about them. They’ll find some.” Slocum thanked him.
Inside of an hour, Slocum had assembled a dozen good riders, men who could ride and shoot. They carried saddlebags loaded with blasting sticks. Two of them had made crude bows and short arrows.
Outside the ring of lamps, Slocum spoke with a man Don Carlos introduced as Indio, a hard-faced man with lots of Indian blood in his veins.
“Can we take another route and cut them off at the pass?” Slocum asked him.
“Sí, señor, but it is a difficult and dangerous path, and not all of us who take that trail at night will live, I fear.”
“Tell the men of the danger. I want six to go and try to head them off. Tell them how hard and bad the ride will be before you ask for volunteers. You must cut them off from the pass and send them back to us. Shoot blasting sticks at them. Kill anyone who does not turn back. I figure they will be up there at the pass near dawn.”
In his deep, rusty voice, Indio said, “All right, I know the men I need. They will follow me. They hate these men for raping their daughters and wives when they were here loading the mules.”
Slocum nodded his approval. “They deserve to die.”
“They will,” Indio promised him.
“We will come up the trail from behind them and cut off any retreat.”
“Vaya con Dios,” the man said.
Slocum agreed and sent the man on his way. “You wish to wait here?” he asked Don Carlos.
“Hell, no. I want all those bastards killed and I want to help do it.”
“Get a horse for both of us then. Mine is tired.”
“Ralph! Two good horses,” Don Carlos shouted and waved his arms as though to bring on an army.
Two stout horses soon appeared. Don Carlos called them to come over, then he turned to Slocum. “Why are you here?”
“A bandit called La Cucaracha attacked my friend McCarty’s hacienda and kidnapped his wife, Martina. McCarty lost his arm and has two bullets in his back so I came up to find his wife. Someone said they had her at a place in Sierra Vista, but they had moved her when we got up there. You were late getting home, so I came to look for you. I will have to get back to looking for Martina and the Cockroach soon, though. Do you know anyone who has ever talked to or seen this one they call La Cucaracha?”
“I should have known you are doing good for people,” Don Carlos said and shook his head. “My God, this has been a nightmare.”
The man continued, “You can find no one who has seen La Cucaracha because he is a ghost.” He shook his head. “There is no Cockroach.”
“But they say he leads them.” Did Don Carlos really know?
“No, his men get his orders and they follow them. He is never there.”
Indio came by with his armed men all on horseback. He spoke in a strong voice. “Be ready, patrón. We will send them back to you.”
“God be with you, hombres,” Don Carlos shouted, and the crowd cheered as the men tore away in the night.
Slocum stepped up onto his horse. Don Carlos followed him, and they trailed Indio’s band up the road. Behind Slocum and his friend rode two dozen armed men ready to meet the wave of mule trains that he counted on Indio turning back. Only time would tell if the plan would work.
“We need to be at the base of the pass to catch them,” Don Carlos said as they rode side by side.
Slocum agreed. Dust was churned up by the horses’ and mules’ hooves. Slocum’s belly rubbed on empty. This was a desperate business. Some of the men were to take a deadly shortcut in the darkness. If Indio and his crew failed to turn the bandits back, there would be no recovery of the ore. The boiling dust stung Slocum’s eyes. Up ahead, Indio and his men soon took their leave from the main trail and disappeared into the night.
Slocum led the second column with Don Carlos. Since he was in the lead, the stirred-up dirt wasn’t as bad for him as for the men in back. They trotted their animals when the terrain let them. A jingle of metal, the protest of their saddles, mules and horses snorting out of their nostrils and men’s coughing filled the night. The dark junipers along the way looked like giant squat frogs. No moon overhead made their progress slower than Slocum would have liked.
Hours later, he heard a mule up ahead braying away and halted the column. “Keep our mules quiet,” Slocum ordered. Men jumped off to muzzle their animals, but not before several had brayed.
“What is it?” Don Carlos asked him.
“That may be them. They may have put off climbing the mountain till daylight,” Slocum said. “Everyone get your guns. Tie your animals good or we may have to walk back.”
“I can hear them,” Don Carlos said. “There are many mules up there.”
“You’re right—”
“They may try to charge us. Spread out and lay down some fire,” Slocum ordered. “How are you doing?” he asked his friend.
Don Carlos, his teeth clenched, managed, “Hurting like hell.”
“You have any liquor?” Slocum asked the man on Don Carlos’s other side, who was using a folded sleeve torn off his own shirt to press on the wound.
The man shouted over his shoulder for some liquor. The miners’ bullets were taking effect on the bandits. Wounded men and mules were screaming in the night. A man running low to reach them delivered a bottle to Slocum.
He raised Don Carlos’s head and the other man, Ramon, fed him some of the liquor, mescal or tequila, probably. The pack train bandits had stopped shooting, and Slocum felt they were either about to run away up the mountain or charge back through them.
“Amigos,” he shouted “be ready! They may try to break through us.”
The thunder of hooves told him he had correctly guessed their plan.
Anger must have powered them. The miners rushed to block any opening and fired the repeating rifles from the mine armory in a constant barrage. Horses, mules and riders went down. When their magazines were empty, the miners, armed with knives or their bare hands, tore the bandits from their mounts to stab or beat them to death.
“Any get by?” Slocum shouted over their war cries.
“One or two got by us,” one man responded.
“Three or four of you head back for the mine so they don’t harm anyone there.”
“There are three of us who have guns and animals to ride,” a man shouted. “We will take care of the mine and the families.”
“Be careful. They’re butchers,” Slocum shouted back. “How many of our men are wounded?” he asked the first man who brought a lighted torch.
“Not many,” the young man said.
“Good. Bring those who can be moved over here—carefully.”
Shortly, several of the men began collecting loose horses and mules.
Four men who had been wounded lay beside Don Carlos, some of whom were only slightly injured and would be able to ride back under their own power. Things were shaping up. Several mules with packs still on them were being gathered. Two dead miners were located, and their bodies were brought to Slocum’s command post.
“We need some long poles to make ambulances between two horses or mules to transport Don Carlos and the other badly wounded men back to Sierra Vista.”
“Hell, I can ride a horse,” Don Carlos protested.
“No, you can’t,” Slocum said, loud enough that all the men nearby heard him. Others tending the wounded nodded their approval of his observation of their patrón’s condition.
“There is a corral down the road,” a young man said. “It has some good rails in it.”
“Borrow them. We can pay back the owner later.”
The man took some others and they raced off to get the rails.
“I’m not a baby,” Don Carlos protested.
“No, but it is important that you live,” Slocum said.
“Seven wounded outlaws,” a gray-haired man with a rifle reported, driving his wards into Slocum’s central command area.
“Find out about their boss. Who they work for.”
“What if they won’t tell me? They’re being pretty closemouthed.”
A big, burly man from the mine stepped up, armed with a machete. “Which one won’t talk to you?”
“Him, for one.”
The knife-wielding man put the sharp edge of his instrument to the man’s chest. “How many fingers do you have?”
“Ten.”
“No, now you will have nine. Put your hand on that log.”
Bug-eyed, the outlaw shrank back. “What do you need to know?”
The big man gave a head toss to the interrogator. “Ask him before I chop his whole hand off.”
“Who do you work for?”
A silence spread over everyone. Except for the raucous braying of some mules, the valley was shrouded in quiet.
The man barely managed to say, “La Cucaracha.”
Slocum pointed at him. “Who is he? Tell us who he is!”
The man shook his head and shouted out loud, “I don’t know! I never met him.”
With two hands on the machete handle, the big man slashed off the outlaw’s left ear alongside his face and the blood flowed freely. “No more lies! Tell us.”
“Mother of God!” the gang member screamed, holding the side of his head with his hand. “You have killed me. I have never seen him. Only the big bosses see him.”
Don Carlos, lying on a blanket, nodded at the stone-faced Slocum standing above him. “See? It is as I told you.”
No one had seen him—yet he led many gangs.
Unbelievable.
10
Slocum caught a young man by the sleeve. “Take a fast horse. Ride to the mine. Get another fresh horse there and ride like the wind to Sierra Vista to Don Carlos’s casa. You know where he lives?”
“Sí, señor.”
“There is a woman there named Donna. Tell her to get a doctor and meet us on the road coming to town from Oro Canyon, and that we are bringing her Don Carlos, who has been wounded.”
“Tell her to bring me some good whiskey too,” Don Carlos said and closed his eyes.
Slocum gave the boy a slight shove to hurry him on his way. “Be quick about it.”
The racket of someone dragging poles sounded good to Slocum as the mine foreman further interrogated the outlaws seated on the ground. The man in charge of the pack train recovery reported to them that he had recovered all but three mules.
“That is good news,” Slocum said to Ralph, who was to be in charge. Then he went to check on the conveyances that were to take the three worst injured, including Don Carlos, to medical attention. In the first light, he could see many of the men had lesser wounds and were busy working on many projects. But he couldn’t miss the pride on their faces.
“We don’t have enough mules,” a man said when he joined those making the ambulances.
“Go tell the men to unload some of the ore and use those mules. Lives are more important than gold.”
“Sí, señor.”
Slocum found his own horse tied with a few others. He led him back to the central command.
“They are unloading some mules,” Ralph said when he joined him.
“Good. Don Carlos, you all right?”
The solemn man nodded from the pallet. He cleared his throat, “I am fine.”
“Liar,” Slocum said with a grin. He turned back to Ralph. “Are the mules coming for the ambulance?”
“Sí, señor, and I will need a few men to ride with that train,” Ralph said.
“Will you need me?” Slocum asked.
“No. We can handle it. I have sent for food and help from the mine.”
“Do you think we have all the gang? How has the interrogation gone?” Slocum asked.
“We know a man named Tonto Silva got away. He was one of the leaders of the gang and the most hated one for what he did to many of our women during the time they held the mine to get the ore.”
“We’ll find him,” Slocum said. “Who else?”
“There was a madman called the Bad One that we cannot find. He strangled everyone with his huge hands, anyone who objected to their actions.”
“Have we learned anything about La Cucaracha?”
“No one knows him by his face,” Ralph said. He called to his man, and the gray-haired interrogator came over. “Slocum asks about La Cucaracha.”
The man nodded. “These men are peons. We have none of the leaders. They escaped.”
Slocum nodded that he understood. This was the case in many such incidents. The real bad ones sneaked away.
“Señor, they are ready to go with the wounded,” a young man shouted.
After giving Ralph a firm handshake, Slocum told the man to keep up the good work. They carefully loaded his friend Don Carlos in the conveyance, and Slocum mounted his horse, thanking all who could hear him. A cheer went up and he waved, riding beside Don Carlos, who was in a swing between two mules.
Before they reached the mine, several carritos loaded with food and more help for the others stopped, and a woman handed Slocum two tortilla-wrapped burritos. A man gave him a bottle of red wine.
“Gracias. The rest of the men need this too,” he said.
“Should we use one of these wagons to haul the wounded?” a man on horseback asked him.
“No,” Slocum said. “This is easier on them than a carrito.”
Don Carlos was eating when Slocum rejoined him.
“Food for a king,” his amigo said.
“I thought I’d never eat again,” Slocum said and laughed, grateful for every bite.
Several woman and children were standing beside the road that led to the mine. They had rosary beads in their hands and many were on their knees, praying for Don Carlos and blessing him.
Don Carlos managed to sit up and nod at them in passing. The sad thing was that one of the wounded men had died on the trip back. They were down to two ambulances carrying wounded men. Slocum, concerned about his friend’s weakening condition, made them continue on. Time slipped away, and he grew more anxious about Don Carlos’s wound going untreated and the complications that might result.
A bit before noon, they met the conveyance bringing the doctor and Donna, who came from the surrey with her dress hem held high as she raced to where Slocum dismounted to stand beside his friend.
“How is he?” she asked, out of breath and still a few feet away from seeing Don Carlos.
“Looking for the whiskey he asked for.”
“Aw, hell with his whiskey. How is he?”
Don Carlos opened his eyes and smiled for her. “I’m—fine.”
“You don’t look fine to me,” she snapped, and everyone laughed. Then she stepped aside for the doctor and shook her head. “He’s as loco as usual.”
Donna motioned for Slocum to come over and spoke under her breath. “You should know. Nada left the casa last night and was not back when we left.”
