The Revenger

by Peter Brandvold

  She leaned forward to kiss his chin. “I’ve found that if I do not make the first move, no move will be made. Men seem hesitant to try to seduce me. Oh, there was one—a neighbor boy, a Basque shepherd named Rico—but that was a long time ago. I have made love since, mostly with men who worked for Papa, but there have not been many in recent years. I am lonely, Mike. I want to lie with you on the floor here by the fire.”

  “I’m sorry if it sounds impersonal, but I don’t want to let this opportunity slip through my fingers.” She smiled coquettishly, appearing to stare at his chin, and tucked her lower lip under her two small front teeth. “And I am beginning to sense—or to feel—that you might not want to let this opportunity slip through my fingers, either.”

  “Nah,” Sartain grunted. “No, I don’t.”

  * * *

  As Sartain had suspected it would, the snow stopped sometime during the night.

  The next day dawned bright, clear, and cold, although it warmed up fast as the sun rose. He had breakfast with Celina and then kissed her goodbye, slid his Henry into his saddle scabbard, and rode off along the base of the ridge flanking the Otero ranch yard.

  Celina had told him he’d find High Canyon out this way. Once he crossed it, he climbed another ridge via a switchback trail and then dropped down into a little high-mountain park in which the old Basque shepherds’ cabin supposedly sat.

  Sartain just hoped it was there that Miguel Otero had stowed the loot. Otherwise, he was on a wild goose chase, and who knew what would become of the old Mexican rancher? The Revenger had promised Celina he’d bring her father back safely. He didn’t want to disappoint her.

  The creek came storming down from the northern ridge about two miles away from the ranch. The snow was melting fast. In fact, the ground was already bare in places, snake-like tendrils of fog replacing the snow that had recently melted. The creek, roughly a hundred feet wide, was flanked by pines and aspens, and its bed was lined with boulders.

  Sartain cursed as he watched the whitewater thunder down from the higher reaches. Though the rain and snow of the day before had stopped, the snow was melting and filling the cavity through which the creek flowed. Sartain probably should have waited a couple more hours, giving the snow time to melt and run off down the creek bed, but he’d thought there was a chance he could cross by midmorning, which it now was.

  He looked around.

  Maybe there still was a chance.

  He turned Boss off the main trail and into the aspens, riding along the raging water until he dipped down a steep slope and came to a relatively flat area. Here the water wasn’t running as violently as it had been up above. There was only one small rapid. It still slid over its gravelly bed at a fast clip, but the Cajun decided to try it.

  He urged the sure-footed horse forward. Boss lowered his head to sniff the water as though he was gauging its speed and force. He rippled his withers, shook his head, and plunged into the creek.

  The water rose a little higher than Boss’s knees as he high-stepped through it. When he was about ten yards from the opposite bank, his right hoof slipped on a stone, and the horse lunged to that side.

  Sartain’s left leg dropped into the icy water, soaking his pants to the knee. His calf went numb. He grabbed the saddle horn, leaned hard to his right, and held on for dear life. If he plunged into the frigid snowmelt, he’d be a goner before he could thaw himself out.

  With a shrill, angry whinny, Boss heaved himself back to all four hooves, lunged forward, and stormed out of the creek and up the opposite bank like a grizzly with a buckshot-peppered ass. His hooves clattered on the stones. When he got to the edge of the forest, he shook so hard that he nearly threw his saddle and rider.

  “Ah, quit actin’ like a sissy!” the Cajun admonished the mount. “You oughta be able to ford a creek twice that gnarly.”

  He grinned, relieved they’d made it, and patted the horse’s damp neck.

  He put Boss up the switchback that rose through the forest, on which tufts of melting snow occasionally rained down from overburdened branches, thudding on the damp ground. Birds sang, and squirrels chittered angrily at the interloper. Fog snaked up from the warming ground. The smell of mushrooms and pine was so strong, rising from the spongy forest duff, that it nearly took the Cajun’s breath away.

  He crested the ridge in a windy pass so bright it stung his eyes. There were larger patches of snow up here where it was cooler, but the sun was fast melting those, as well.

  He stared down into the park Celina had described via her father’s eyes. It was a heavenly place ringed with low, rocky ridges. Granite boulders were strewn about like the toys of a giant child. The park slanted off to Sartain’s left, where a pond of flawless turquoise ringed with spindly, bare aspens flashed in the sun.

  Sartain looked around for the Basque shepherds’ shack. Celina had told him it would be in the park. Where, exactly, she hadn’t indicated. Not having seen it, maybe she hadn’t known. Sartain thought he’d find it easily enough.

  He started down the slope, meandering around boulders.

  From somewhere in the park below, a pistol cracked, echoing flatly.

  So much for the serenity of the view...

  Chapter 17

  Sartain drew sharply back on Boss’s reins and automatically reached for his rifle.

  As he shucked the Henry from the scabbard and cocked it, another shot flatted out, its echo dwindling quickly. A man shouted something from too far away to be clearly heard.

  The shout was followed by another pistol shot.

  The shooter couldn’t have been shooting at Sartain, not with a pistol from so far away. Still, the Cajun swung down from the saddle, ground-reined Boss, and strode down the slope, continuing to weave around the boulders that had obviously tumbled from the far ridge, which was a massive chunk of jutting granite.

  As he stepped around another boulder, he stopped and dropped to a knee.

  On the far side of the park, roughly a hundred yards away, lay the remains of the shepherds’ hut. It could have been mistaken for just another pile of rocks that had fallen from the crag, but this pile was roughly the shape of a small house.

  Most of the rear wall still stood, although the other three walls had badly disintegrated. But what caught the brunt of the Cajun’s attention were the two men standing in front of the place. Miguel Otero was farther away from the cabin than Chick Beacham. The men were separated by about twenty feet. They faced each other. Beacham was staggering around with a bottle in one hand and a pistol in the other. His left foot was still wrapped.

  “Dance, I told you. Consarnit, you chili-chompin’ old bastard!”

  Beacham leveled the pistol and flames lapped from the barrel. The bullet plumed dust around Otero’s mule-eared boots. The pistol’s crack reached the Cajun’s ears a wink after he’d seen the gun’s orange blossom.

  Otero stood still, stoically facing Beacham.

  “Damn!” The Revenger raked out.

  He looked around carefully, then moved to his right, circling around behind the old stone house and Beacham. When he’d gone about fifty yards to his right, he dropped down the slope. There were no covering boulders near the house so he had to crouch, keeping the ruin between him and the obviously drunk outlaw.

  Otero probably had him in sight by now. If so, the Cajun hoped the old man wouldn’t inadvertently give away his position.

  As he worked his way toward the stone shack’s nearest rear corner, Sartain saw a box on the ground to the left of the shack, near the front and where Beacham was trying to get Otero to dance.

  The strongbox. The lid was open. The pale shapes of coin sacks shone, humping up above the box. One sack lay on the ground, the sunlight glinting on the gold spilling from the sack’s open mouth.

  When Sartain had reached the shack’s rear wall, Beacham laughed loudly and then stifled his laughter to shout, “Come on, you damn greaser son of a buck. I’m celebratin’! I’m a rich man, and as a rich man, I order you to
dance, peon!”

  The pistol barked again and the bullet spanged shrilly off a rock.

  “Please, Señor Beacham,” implored Otero, holding his hands out palms up, “I beseech you to stop this. There is your gold. You promised that when I took you to the gold, you would let me return to my ranch and my daughter. She needs me badly, señor. I’m sure she is very worried.”

  “I’m gonna let you go, I’m gonna let you go,” Beacham said as Sartain moved slowly, keeping his head low, along the shack’s left wall. “Just as soon as you dance a little Mescin jig for me.”

  He took another swig from the bottle and stumbled around drunkenly on his bad foot. Then his voice rose with rage. “If you don’t dance for me, I’m gonna blow your consarned head off!”

  Sartain stopped at the shack’s front corner and loudly racked a cartridge into the Henry’s breach. Standing straight and tall, he leveled the rifle at Beacham, who stood twenty feet away from him and slightly to his right.

  “Hold it, Beacham! Drop that pistol, or I’ll blow one through your ear!”

  Beacham had frozen, pistol aimed at Otero. He glanced at Sartain and started to lower the pistol, but then raised it again, again taking aim at the Mexican as he said, “No, no. You drop that Henry, Mr. Revenger, sir, or you’re gonna have an awful time scoopin’ this bean-eater’s brains out of the grass.”

  Sartain cursed himself for not shooting the man in the back before Beacham knew he was here. Live and learn. He just hoped he hadn’t learned that lesson at Otero’s expense.

  Beacham shook his head with mock sadness. “Sure would be a shame, me havin’ to kill that poor blind girl’s old man. Who’d take care of her then?”

  “Señor, please!” said Otero in frustration, stomping one foot.

  “What led you here, Beacham?” Sartain wanted to know.

  Beacham chuckled, easing his weight off his bad foot. “Process of elimination, mostly. Besides, the Mex here seemed to be the only one not looking for the gold, which meant he must have knowed where it was. You gonna make me shoot him?”

  “All right,” Sartain said, depressing the Henry’s hammer. “I’m gonna set it down.”

  Beacham glanced over his shoulder at Sartain, who leaned forward to set the rifle on the ground.

  “Look!” screamed Otero suddenly. “I am going to dance a jig for you now, Señor Beacham!”

  Laughing and whooping as though he’d gone insane, Otero jumped up and down, stomping his feet and waving his arms. It was the distraction Sartain needed. He raised the Henry once more, racked a shell into the chamber again, and fired three times quickly from his hip.

  Beacham had turned his head forward again. As the bullets punched into his back and his left side under his arm, he triggered his revolver wildly and stumbled forward and sideways, cursing. He got his bad foot tangled up with the good one and hit the ground in a patch of melting snow.

  The outlaw cursed, writhing on his back. “I just knew I was never gonna live to spend that gold.” He looked up at Sartain. He was dying fast, blood turning the snow to pink slush. “How do you suppose I knew that?”

  Sartain lowered the Henry and stared down at the outlaw. “I don’t know, Chick. Maybe you’re smarter than you look.”

  Beacham almost smiled at that. Then he grunted, and his head sank back against the snow. He lay still, staring up at the cerulean sky between half-closed lids.

  Sartain looked at Otero.

  “Let’s get you back to your ranch, señor. Your daughter is worried sick about you.”

  * * *

  Otero’s and Beacham’s horses were tied in a natural rock shelter behind the shack, where they’d been tucked away from last night’s snowstorm. There was a mule there, too—the big Missouri mule the outlaws had originally used to haul the gold.

  Sartain and Otero rigged up all three mounts, then wrestled the heavy strongbox onto the mule’s back and into the wooden cradle-like packsaddle. They strapped it fast with rawhide and rope.

  When they reached the creek, it was still rushing and roaring down its steep bed but not with as much violence as before. Still, they forded the stream where Sartain had crossed earlier, having an easier time of it now that much of the snow had melted in the higher reaches, and headed on back to the ranch.

  The Cajun led the big, lumbering mule by its lead rope.

  They rode into the yard from the backside, angling away from the flanking ridge. The mule brayed, probably smelling the hay and oats in the barn. Boss whinnied his own anticipation of a hearty meal. The calls echoed in the thin high-altitude air.

  It was late in the afternoon, the long shadows angling out from the stone and wood cabin and outbuildings turning velvet. There was a wintery bite to the fresh, clean mountain air.

  As they rode around to the front of the cabin, Sartain saw several horses in the corral. They hadn’t been there when he’d ridden out earlier. He didn’t recognize the mounts from Otero’s cavvy—a steel dust, a skewbald paint, and a sleek cream.

  Wait a minute, he did recognize the cream. That was Dixie’s horse. And the paint belonged to Dewey Dade.

  Before he could fully wrap his mind around the thought, Otero said sharply, “Mierda!”

  Sartain followed the Mexican’s horrified gaze toward the cabin. The Cajun’s heart lurched and hammered.

  Celina stood on a chair on the gallery. There was a rope around her neck, which was tied to a beam about a foot above her head. A red bandanna had been tied over her mouth. Her sightless eyes stared into the yard, lines of terror cutting across her forehead.

  Raucous laughter bellowed from the big bear of a man standing beside her, in front of the cabin’s open door. He must have stood a good six and a half feet tall. He wore a long bear robe and had a long, tangled salt-and-pepper beard. He had two big Colt pistols holstered around his waist, and the flaps of his heavy coat had been tucked back behind them.

  On his head was a ragged fur muskrat hat. He had a pipe wedged in the corner of his mouth and a Henry rifle much like Sartain’s own in his big, gloved hands.

  He threw his head back, laughing. It was a deep-throated, hearty explosion that echoed loudly around the yard.

  “You two done look like you come home to find the three bears in your beds!”

  The man laughed even louder.

  Then the laughter was cut off abruptly and his face, with its hard, gray eyes, clouded up and appeared about to storm, his rugged cheeks above the beard turning dark red. “If you don’t throw down your guns, I’m gonna give this chair here a little nudge with my foot.”

  He stepped sideways and kicked a leg of the chair, causing it to bark as it scraped a few inches sideways. Celina cried out behind the bandanna as she desperately repositioned her feet.

  “Like that, see?” said the big man, laughing again.

  “Please, Señor Hadley!” cried Otero, quickly shucking his pistol and tossing it to the ground. “Do not hurt her! I beseech you!”

  “Hadley,” Sartain muttered. “Rench Hadley...”

  “Before your eyes, Sartain.” Hadley hardened his eyes again. “Your turn. Step down from your horse and very slowly toss all your guns on the ground, then my assistants will gather them up and put them somewhere they can’t cause any trouble.”

  A figure materialized in the doorway behind Hadley—a female shape. Then Dixie McKee stepped out of the cabin, holding a carbine in her gloved hands. Dewey Dade walked out behind her, his right arm in a sling. He held his Spencer in his right hand.

  Dixie did not meet Sartain’s gaze. The kid did, although his eyes owned a sheepish cast.

  “Figures,” Sartain said as he lightened himself of his LeMat and Henry.

  Dixie came down the steps, picked up the rifle and the big pistol, and stepped back. She looked at Sartain but did not say anything.

  “You disappoint me, girl,” The Revenger said.

  She drew a breath, then let it out slowly. “Gold makes a person do crazy things, Mike.”

 
She glanced at Miguel Otero, who had swung down from his horse to stand looking worriedly at his daughter and holding his horse’s reins. “I’m sorry, Miguel. I saw you and Mike talking, and something told me you’d told him about the gold. Since you know everything that goes on in this neck of these mountains, I figured you probably knew about the gold too.”

  Sartain said, “How did you come to throw in with Hadley?”

  “He rode into Hard Winter yesterday. Wanted me to show him the way out here. Promised me and Dewey here a cut of the gold if we helped him.”

  “You see,” Hadley said, “when I was last here, I was in no condition to pay close attention to where I was. All I knew was that I’d left the gold with the bean-eater.”

  “You break out of jail?” Sartain asked.

  “Ain’t never been a jail could hold Rench Hadley.” The big outlaw looked at Otero. “We’ll be enjoyin’ your hospitality tonight, señor. Tomorrow, we’ll be pullin’ out. The girl an’ me, anyways.” He glanced at Dewey Dade. “There’s no room on my trail for a snot-nosed kid. Dixie...well, she’s another story.”

  Dixie lowered her eyes, cheeks coloring slightly with shame.

  “You do disappoint me, girl,” Sartain said slowly, meaning it, feeling the disenchantment in every bone.

  Otero strode forward. “Please, señor, my daughter!”

  “Go ahead and cut her down,” Hadley said. “She’s got work to do. Kitchen work. I’m so hungry, my belly’s thinkin’ my throat’s been cut.”

  As Otero cut Celina down from the roof beam, Dewey Dade came up behind Dixie and stood before Sartain. “I do apologize, Mr. Sartain. You saved my life. But that doesn’t give you the right to take all that gold for yourself.”

  Hadley laughed. “Sartain, you have gone from a very rich man to a very poor one very quickly. How do you like that?”

  “He was not taking the gold for himself, señor,” Otero told the big bear-like outlaw as he removed the rope from around Celina’s neck. “He was taking it back to its rightful owners. You must let him do this. The gold is evil! Everyone who becomes involved with it dies. It is a curse on these mountains!”