by Ralph Cotton
“Everybody hold tight,” the leader of the buckboard guards said with determination. “We might have our hands full any minute here.” He said to the nearest guard, Tom Marlin, “Tommy, run in and tell Mr. Brewer what’s going on out here.”
On the street, the gambler walked toward the mercantile store at an easy pace, a couple of the other men hurrying past him on his way. When he arrived at the spot where the two crates had been pulled away, he looked down innocently at the body of Elmer Fisk. A broad patch of blood had blackened on the hole in Fisk’s chest. The dead outlaw’s eyes were open, staring straight ahead in surprise.
“He’s stabbed through the heart!” said Duckwald, he and his brother-in-law, George Epson, having been the first two to arrive as soon as Phillips had announced his grizzly discovery.
Shear looked at Fisk’s gun still in its holster. “He was taken unawares. That’s for sure,” he said. “Fisk would have fought like a panther otherwise. He half turned and stared coldly at the buckboard guards. They stood curiously staring back from the far end of town.
“Here’s the son of a bitch who killed him,” said Duckwald. He stared at the gambler. “I’d bet my life on it.”
“Careful, Rudy,” said Tinnis, with no joking manner to either his tone or his expression. “You may be doing just that.” His coat lapel lay open, the Colt Thunderer Shear had given him in clear view.
“Rudy, you’ve got to stop accusing Lucas,” Shear said in a gruff voice.
“He killed him, Big Aces,” said Duckwald with conviction.
“For God’s sake,” said Shear in a disgusted tone. He stared at the gambler. “For once and for all, Tinnis, did you kill Elmer?”
“Of course I killed him,” the gambler said, staring at Duckwald. He pulled the dagger from inside his shirt and held it up. “Here’s the knife I killed him with. I’ve been waiting for my chance to kill him ever since he ran me off the cliff.”
“See, I told you he killed him,” said Duckwald. “He knew what Elmer did to him.”
“Fisk ran him off the cliff?” Shear said with a dark, curious look on his face.
“No!” said Duckwald, getting rattled. “I mean, yes! I mean, hell, I don’t know, but Lucas must’ve thought he did. That’s all that mattered to him. You heard him. He killed Elmer.”
“All I heard was him making an ass out of you,” said Shear. His black-handled Remington streaked up from his holster, cocked and aimed at the big gunman’s face. “Get out of my sight, Rudy, before I shoot your eyes out.”
Duckwald backed away, Epson right beside him. When the two were gone, Shear turned back to the gambler, who still held the dagger in hand.
“Obliged, Big Aces,” Tinnis said quietly.
“Put the pigsticker away, Lucas,” said Shear. To the men, he said, “I know for a fact that Lucas didn’t kill Fisk. I saw one of them guards walking away from here in the night.”
The men grumble and milled and gave hard looks toward the buckboard guards.
“Don’t worry about them right now,” Shear said to them under his breath. “They’ll all get what’s coming to them before this day is over.” He looked back at the gambler and asked, “Why’d you say you killed him, Lucas, when you didn’t?”
The gambler didn’t answer. He slipped the dagger back inside his sleeve and looked away toward a distant mountain range.
The rest of the men stood staring, not knowing what to make of the matter.
“Even if you had, I’d have to say he deserved it, running you and your horse off the cliff like that.” He looked at the other men for support; they nodded in agreement.
“I always said Crazy Elmer was crazy,” Phillips said sincerely.
“Well, hell, Dent, we all did,” Shear said, spreading his hands patiently. He said to the rest of the men, “Get fed, get ready.” He gave a secret thumb toward the buckboards and the guards surrounding them. “These jakes won’t know what hit them.”
Tinnis Mayes smiled to himself and pulled his coat closed over the Colt Thunderer holstered under his arm.
Before the sun had reached its midmorning level in the wide blue sky, the three buckboards had rolled out of New Gold Siding, headed east into a long stretch of deep-cut hills reaching toward the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Ten railroad security riders flanked the buckboard wagons, five on either side. In addition to the security riders, a crew of five rail hands sat in the bed of the lead wagon, atop a tall load of firewood. A shotgun rider sat beside the driver of the middle wagon, the one carrying the big heavy safe covered with tied-down sheets of canvas.
“There they are, men, right below us,” said Shear, “just like plums ripe for the picking.” He looked down at the three-wagon procession from a ridge above a sandy flatlands dotted with creosote, cactus and mesquite. Along the other side of the pass, four more of his men rode along at the same fast, steady clip.
Riding parallel to the wagons below, Shear looked from face to face of the railroad men until he spotted Chester Gerst, the shoulder-length hair, the thick beard, the faded sombrero—the partly shadowed face of the man he’d seen on the street the night before.
Behind Shear, Swean got excited and said, “Hot damn! When, Big Aces, when?”
“As soon as we can get ahead of them and catch them in a cross fire,” said Shear. He batted his heels harder to his horse’s sides. “Just remember, the second guard on the left is all mine . . . the man with the black sombrero.” He pushed his horse harder, veering away from the edge of the ridge just enough to stay out of sight for the time being.
“Is that the snake who killed Elmer Fisk?” Swean asked, gigging his horse right behind him, along with the others.
Shear didn’t answer.
Riding side by side, Tinnis and Sentanza looked at each other. The gambler saw the question in Sentanza’s dark eyes, but he refused to reveal the truth to him.
Sentanza finally leaned over a little and said beneath the sound of the horses’ hooves, “If a man did to me what Crazy Elmer Fisk did to you, he could never turn his back on me. I would kill him any way I could, even if I had to mash his head with a rock.” He stared at the gambler as if expecting a reply.
But Tinnis had admitted the killing to Shear and Shear had turned it down. He only returned Sentanza’s stare. “I have no more to say on the matter, Mingo,” he said sidelong.
“You and I could be pals, amigos, Lucas,” Sentanza whispered, smiling. “I cover your back, you cover mine, eh?”
“The way you covered Callahan’s back?” said Lucas.
“That was an unfortunate thing,” said Sentanza. “I wish it had gone differently.”
“I bet Callahan does too,” said the gambler. He jerked his horse’s reins and pulled the animal away from Sentanza a little. But the persistent Sentanza pulled his horse right alongside him.
“When this is over we will all split up and go our own way to lie low for a while,” he said. “You would do well to stick with me. I am going to Mexico. I have many friends there. They would welcome you, if you are with me.”
“Obliged,” said Tinnis, “I’ll keep it in mind.” They pounded on in unison, keeping up with the rest of the riders.
“Good,” said Sentanza. “You must be careful carrying a large amount of money in this wild, lawless land.”
“Sound advice,” said Lucas. He keep his horse moving quickly along the rock trail, knowing if he ever went anywhere with Mingo Sentanza, he would not even expect to ever come back alive.
In the shotgun rider’s seat in the second wagon sat an older railroad man known as Papa Dorsey. He sat in silence with his shotgun across his lap. He looked up and all around as the wagon entered a pass into the hillside that had been blasted and carved out two years earlier to allow wagons and crews to reach a new high trestle over Skull Rock Canyon.
Once the wagon had followed the lead wagon deeper into the pass, Dorsey eased the tip of the shotgun barrel over into the driver’s side.
“From here on, Mason, you�
�ll still be doing the driving, but I’ll be giving you the directions,” he said in a lowered voice.
“What?” said the driver, a younger man named Mason Edwards. He gave Dorsey a bemused grin and tried to scoot away from the tip of the gun barrel.
“Don’t try pulling away from me,” Dorsey said in the same low, even voice. “One more mistake like that and I’ll blow you in half.”
“Papa?” said Edwards. “What is—”
“Shut up and pay attention. Do like I tell you if you want to stay alive,” said Dorsey, jamming the barrel into the young teamster’s ribs to make his point. Dorsey stared straight ahead, to keep from drawing any attention from the guards. But above them he had already caught the first glimpse of Shear and his men spreading out in front of them along both sides of the trail.
The young teamster drove along with a worried look frozen on his face. But only a few seconds later both edges of the cliffs above them began to erupt in gunfire, much of it concentrated on the wagon in front of them.
“Go!” Papa Dorsey shouted in the driver’s ear.
In front of them the driver of the first wagon flew off his seat and fell to the rocky ground as a bullet tore through him and left a bloody mist in the air. The shotgun rider tried to grab the traces, but the wagon had already begun to veer to the right side of the trail.
“Get around it!” Papa Dorsey shouted above the heavy gunfire and screaming bullets. On either side of them, the armed guards’ horses reared and whinnied wildly. The guards struggled to get the animals under control, but the rifle fire took both man and animal to the ground.
The young teamster did as he was told, rather than be chopped down like the others. He slapped the traces to the wagon horses’ backs and sent the heavily loaded wagon around the first wagonload of firewood that had gone up one side and turned over in the rocks beside the narrow trail.
“Dorsey, help me!” the shotgun rider from the first wagon shouted as the second wagon went by. But as he grabbed for the wagon, Dorsey lifted a Colt from his holster and shot the man backward without taking the shotgun off the young teamster.
Dorsey shouted above the melee to the young teamster at his side, “You’re doing real good, Mason boy! Don’t stop now.”
Chapter 19
It was midmorning when the ranger and the bounty hunters rolled on toward Nuevo Oro. Sandoval drove the wagon they had taken from Ray Metcalf and the other three gunmen on their way to catch up with Shear and his men. The ranger sat on the wooden seat beside him. Thorn sat in the wagon bed, his gloved hand resting on the Gatling gun, his head slightly bowed in sleep. Sam looked back at Thorn, then to his left at Sandoval as he recalled the running gun battle the evening before.
The three had cut their ride short by using the steep trail the ranger had learned about from the man he left lying dead on the hillside. By the time they’d caught up with Metcalf and his three cohorts, the wagon had traveled halfway across a stretch of flatlands on a thick carpet of sand, broken by land-stuck rock and boulders and strewn with saguaro cactus and mesquite.
When they’d swung wide around the wagon and cut the men off, the Gatling gun had held them pinned to the ground for half hour before they’d split up and attacked from three directions at once. When the fight was finished, and three of the gunmen lay sprawled dead along the wagon tracks in the sand, Thorn stood with his knee-high boot clamped down on Metcalf’s chest.
“Never fire a Gatling gun at a marine and expect him not to take it away from you,” Thorn said, his left hand resting on the hilt of his Mameluke sword. He held his big horse pistol pointed at Metcalf’s forehead.
“A—a what?” Metcalf asked haltingly. He lay wounded, bleeding in the hot sand, one leg cocked at the knee. He stared up as if confused. Yet as Thorn took his boot from Metcalf’s chest, lowered his horse pistol and shoved it into his holster, the gunman’s hand inched toward his raised boot well.
“Never mind,” said Thorn. He half turned and looked out across a thick swirl of wind and sand.
“Look out, Captain—” Sam shouted, seeing Metcalf sit up quickly, his hand coming out of his boot well holding a small hideout pistol. But before Sam’s words got out of his mouth, even as his big Colt came up from his holster, he heard a sharp rush of wind whistle through the air.
Metcalf’s hideout gun swung away and fired wildly as Sandoval’s fourteen-inch sword sliced through his chest, stopping at its hilt with a jarring impact.
Sam’s Colt was out now, and so was Thorn’s horse pistol. But neither of them fired; they didn’t need to. Instead they stood staring at Metcalf as he fell backward to the ground. The point of the sword blade behind him stopped on a broad flat rock and slid back up, the hilt rising out of his chest as if drawn by some unseen hand.
Lowering his pistol again, this time closing the holster flap over it when he put it away, Thorn said in a proud but matter-of-fact voice, “Keep up the good work, Sandy.”
“Aye, aye, Captain,” Sandoval had said, walking over and retrieving his bloody sword. . . .
Sam pictured it now in his mind as they rolled along in the gun wagon, their horses’ reins tied to the tailgate.
These two were fighting men, Sam thought to himself.
They were without doubt among the best he’d ever seen. Even here in these lawless badlands, the two had handled everything the land and its inhabitants had thrown at them.
Yet Thorn had made a mistake taking his eyes off Metcalf. Even though it had only been for a second, the ranger knew all too well how quickly a second became an eternity in this unforgiving terrain. Looking away for only a second had nearly cost the battle-seasoned old captain his life.
Had Thorn seen it . . . ? Sam asked himself. Sandoval had seen it, he was certain. At any rate, it wasn’t his place to mention it, Sam told himself, watching the dusty trail ahead of them.
But as they rode on, as if he’d heard the ranger’s thoughts, the bounty hunter looked back over his shoulder at Thorn dozing.
“The captain is tired,” he said quietly, with a thin smile.
“So am I,” Sam said, showing courtesy.
“And I too,” Sandoval agreed. “But I have watched my father closely this trip. He is more tired than I have ever seen him.”
His father . . . ? Sam noted that it was the first time he’d heard the younger bounty hunter call Thorn his father. He weighed and considered his words before saying them.
“Why bounty hunting?” he finally asked as the wagon rolled along, the rooftops of Nuevo Oro rising up through the wavering heat and swirling sand before them.
“Why not bounty hunting?” Sandoval replied, staring ahead.
The ranger let it drop. He had stuck his nose where it didn’t belong. Now he needed to back away.
But after a pause, the bounty hunter said, “When a man spends most of his years in battle, it’s hard to find another way of life . . . one that suits his nature.” He paused for a moment, then said, “My father has lived as a warrior. I believe he would prefer to die as a warrior. Does that make sense to you?”
“It doesn’t have to make sense to me,” Sam replied. “It only has to make sense to the captain . . . and to you, since you’re the one having to reckon with it.”
Sandoval only nodded, and put the matter aside as they drew closer to the town.
When the gun wagon rode onto the main street of Nuevo Oro, stirring up fresh dust, townsmen ventured out of their shops and houses for a better look. At the sight of the Gatling gun, and the badge on the ranger’s chest, they hurried over to the hitch rail out in front of the adobe hotel.
“Welcome to New Gold, Ranger, or Nuevo Oro as it was called,” a man said. He jerked his hat from his bald head just as the wagon came to a halt. “I’m Fenton Wright.” He added with relief, “It is danged good to see some law riding in here!” He looked at the badge on Sam’s chest and big Gatling gun beneath Thorn’s gloved hand. Thorn was awake now and sitting tall.
“I’m Ranger Sam Burrack,�
� said Sam. “This is Cadden Thorn and Dee Sandoval.”
“All three of you rangers, are yas?” Wright asked, as other townsmen gathered around them.
“No,” said Sam, “but we’re working together, tracking the same men.”
“Well, that’s good enough for us,” said Wright. “We all feel better just seeing yas.”
“Why?” said Sam. “What’s happened here?” He looked all around, already satisfied that Shear and his men had been here and gone. He saw the large charred circle of ground where the men had roasted the calf.
“There was a man killed here last night,” the towns-man said. “He was with a gang of desperate-looking gunmen, the ones you’re tracking, like as not.”
Sam, Sandoval and Thorn swung down from the wagon as a man in a leather apron stepped forward from among the other townsmen. “Want all these horses watered and tended?” he asked, reaching out as if to step into the wagon.
Sandoval stopped him. “This wagon doesn’t leave my sight. Bring four fresh wagon horses if you’ve got them. We’ll swap them out. Water these other horses with buckets, right here while they’re resting.” He fished a gold coin from his vest pocket and flipped it to the livery hostler.
“You’ve got it coming, mister,” said the hostler. He hurried away to get four fresh wagon horses.
“Where is this man who was killed?” the ranger asked Fenton Wright.
“He’s cooling in a root cellar out back of here,” said Wright. “Want to see him? I’ll take yas to him.”
“Yes, obliged,” Sam said. “On the way you can tell us everything.”
“Are you in a hurry?” Wright asked. “Because if you are I can talk pretty danged fast. I am, among other things, a professional auctioneer, or augere, if you will.”
“Fast suits us,” said Sam.
Sandoval stayed with the gun wagon, his rifle in hand. By the time Sam and Thorn had reached the root cellar, Wright had given them the full story, about the railroad men with what appeared to be a large safe in one of their firewood wagons. He told them about the body they were going to see and how someone had hidden it among some wooden crates. He finished talking as he reached down and pulled the root cellar door open.
