by Zack Wyatt
“Boys,” Burton called to his men, “stand at ease. I don’t know what that ship out there is up to. But until it does something, all we can do is wait. Might as well grab yourself a little grub. Simpson and Grant will keep watch. Hall and Tyler, spell them after you’ve eaten.”
“I’ve got a passel of jerky in my saddlebags,” Jess said, grinning up at Sands. “Want some?”
Sands nodded as he lowered himself to the ground and leaned against the palm. He tried not to think about the fish swimming in the bay—fish he had planned to eat for his supper. A twist of jerky would at least keep his stomach from rumbling.
“Sands. Sands, wake up. Captain Ike wants to talk with you.” Jess’s insistent voice and hand on Sands’ shoulder brought him from a restless sleep. “Come on, wake up.”
“Not sleeping, just resting my eyes.” Sands pushed his hat back from his brow, stretched, and stood. “What’s happening?”
Jess shook his head and shrugged. “Captain Burton’s back in the trees about fifty yards or so. Sent word he wanted to talk with you.”
“The ship?” Sands glanced over his shoulder to the motionless vessel anchored in the middle of the harbor.
“Been sitting there since you dozed off,” Jess said. “Doesn’t seem to be in much of a hurry to get anywhere.”
“That’s for damned sure. Where’d you say the captain was?”
Sands followed Jess’s pointing finger to a stand of three pines. Burton and five of his men sat cross-legged on the ground in the shade. Lifting his rifle from where it leaned against the palm, Sands glanced at Jess, arched his eyebrows in question, then hastened to the pines. Burton motioned for him to seat himself.
“Me and the boys have been trying to piece things together,” Burton said as Sands lowered himself atop a carpet of dried pine needles. “Can’t say we’ve come up with much. But it appears to us that the ship is waiting for something.”
That fact appeared obvious to Sands, but he didn’t say so.
“Could be there’s more ships it’s supposed to meet in the bay before it lands its soldiers,” Burton continued. “After all, one ship can’t carry an invasion army by itself. On the other hand, a man would expect an invasion fleet to come rolling in together.”
“If there’s more than one ship, they could have been separated during a storm,” Sands suggested. “Perhaps the other ship or ships sank.”
Burton rubbed at a chin rough with stubble. “We’ve considered that. Vessels coming up from Mexico tend to hug close to the coast. In case of a storm, they could find refuge easily. Which is not to say there wasn’t a storm, and it didn’t wreck part of Santy Anna’s invasion force. But somehow that doesn’t sit right with me.”
“You think that ship out there might be something else,” Sands said rather than asked.
“That ship could be anything. She ain’t come in close enough to identify her as Mexican yet,” Burton replied.
“There’s no flag flying from her masts,” Sands pointed out. “Like the ship Dub Ferris and I sighted up coast...” Sands paused, his mind racing toward a conclusion he was certain Burton had reached. “You think this might be another ship carrying rifles.”
“Can’t discard the possibility,” Burton answered with a nod. “Which means that ship could be waiting for a signal from someone on shore. Someone who ain’t going to make this meeting because he’s laying six feet under the ground.”
“Professor Jonathan Peoples.” Sands saw what the ranger captain was driving at, but wasn’t certain how he fit in the overall picture. “How do I stand in all this? There’s no way Peoples is going to get out of his grave and signal that ship.”
“’Spect you’re right there.” Burton grinned. “However, the boys and I thought you might fill us in on Peoples and the first boat.”
“Everything was in my report to Captain Caldwell,” Sands replied.
“I’ve read over this report five times since we’ve been waiting here.” Burton pulled the pouch from his shirt and extracted Sands’ report. He glanced over it. “There’s a lot of things that aren’t mentioned ... here, for instance, you didn’t say what Peoples used to signal the ship.”
“He waved a white cloth in the air,” Sands answered without batting an eye.
Burton smiled. “I’m certain one of the boys is wearing a white shirt.”
Sands returned the captain’s smile. “You’re planning to decoy the ship.”
“Reckon that’s exactly what we have in mind, son.” Burton rubbed at the back of his neck. “Though we’d wait a couple more hours, until evening. Dusk will help disguise our decoy. It’d also help if you could remember what the medicine-show man was wearing.”
Better would be Peoples’ bright green wagon, but that was housed in a Bastrop barn several days’ ride away, Sands thought as he tried to remember the scene Dub and he had witnessed. “He wore a black stovepipe hat—no! The hat was tan. So were his pants. He was also wearing a brown or tan jacket with a plaid pattern in green.”
Burton’s smile grew to a wide grin. He turned to a blond ranger on his left. “Jay, you heard the man. Check with the boys and see what you can scrounge up.”
As the man rose and hastened away, Burton looked back at Sands. “Young feller, I guess there’s only one thing else I have to ask you—how’d you like to be this Professor Jonathan Peoples for a while?”
Sands merely nodded his acceptance.
Chapter Twelve
Sands reached out and took the stripped sweetgum sapling from Jess. The young tree had been hastily hewn from the ground with a hunting knife and its tender limbs hacked away. Sticky sap oozed from knotty cuts onto the ranger’s hand as he hefted the ten-foot pole and glanced to its top.
Tied there was a white woolen shirt that had come from Jess’s saddlebags—the flag with which Sands was to signal the ship still anchored at the center of Copano Bay.
“Careful with that, Josh,” Jess said with a wink. “It’s the only other shirt I own. Wouldn’t want you getting it dirty.”
The best Sands could manage in response to Jess’s attempt at humor was a tilt of the head and a weak smile. His thoughts were focused on the Mexican marines that would meet him on the beach—if the ship answered his signal. Mexican marines with rifles that could put an end to the life of Josh Sands in a hail of lead rifle balls were he to make one wrong move or if there were a single hitch in the plan Captain Burton had outlined.
That realization provided little comfort. There were too many unknowns in Burton’s plan. Perhaps the least of them was the night. And Sands could imagine a hundred things that might go wrong in the darkness. The night did strange things to men, especially men with rifles in their hands. A misplaced foot and the snap of a twig could bring those rifles to bear and leave him face down on the beach—dead.
“Take it slow and easy, son.” Burton stepped forward and clasped his shoulder. “And remember to do your best to act natural.”
Sands nodded, not feeling the least bit natural.
“Again,” Burton continued, “I’m sorry about having to send you out with this much light ... but we had to give the ship some daylight.”
Sands wasn’t worried about the light. The Mexican vessel was too far off the beach to do him any harm if those aboard didn’t fall for the ploy. The worst that could happen was that the ship would weigh anchor and sail from Copano.
His worries centered on what would happen if those on the ship believed he was Professor Jonathan Peoples come to greet them.
“And remember, we’re all here right behind you, son,” Burton said, squeezing his shoulder for encouragement. “Good luck.”
Sands didn’t reply, but hoisted his makeshift flagpole with white shirt tied atop and began walking toward the beach. What had appeared like a stroke of genius when Captain Burton first outlined his scheme now seemed as full of holes as a bucket that had been blasted with buckshot.
To begin with, his mismatched clothes, scrounged from rangers in the co
mpany, left something to be desired. The pants were perhaps the best, being only an inch or two too big for him in the waist. A pigging string, a small length of rope ordinarily used to tie the hooves of calves at branding time, kept the baggy breeches securely about his middle.
A store-bought flannel shirt from another ranger’s kit served as an imitation coat. Although the shirt was plaid, it was more green than it was brown. Burton had waved the discrepancy away, saying, “Surely Peoples changed his clothes once in a while.”
The hat, which either tried to slip down around his ears or blow off his head in the wind, was the worst. The ranger who had donated it to the cause had done so under loud protest, and with a full delineation of Burton’s family tree and his direct blood tie to several female dogs.
Sands couldn’t blame the man. The hat was new, purchased only a week ago during the ranger’s twenty-four hour stay in Corpus Christi while on courier duty. It was the first store-bought hat he had ever owned, having finally decided to discard the skunk-skin cap he had worn all his adult life. Neatly creased and brim gracefully rolled, it appeared to be worth every penny of the two dollars it had cost.
Or had appeared that way. Two rangers had taken the hat, ridden a couple miles inland, built a fire, put a pan of water on to boil, then struck the hat into the steam. The creased crown now poked straight into the air with its rounded top pushed inward to imitate a stovepipe. Of course the brim, now standing stiff as a board without the slightest trace of a roll, had been far too wide. A hunting knife had remedied that minor problem.
Mismatched or not, there was nothing Sands could do about his attire as he stepped on the beach. The disguise either worked or it didn’t. And there was only one way to find out. He lifted the sapling high and waved the shirt-flag back and forth.
Minutes later, the ship answered by raising the sails on her foremost mast. Although he could not see it, he knew that as those sails unfurled, the anchor was being drawn from the sea, and the ship slowly slipped through the water toward the beach.
Sands stood and watched the vessel’s slow progress for several minutes before planting his flagpole securely into the sandy beach. The setting sun would be below the horizon and stars would be blinking in the sky before the anchor was dropped again—as Burton had planned. Those on board would need more than a white flag to guide them in the darkness.
Walking back into the coastal forest, Sands found the dried twigs and branches that, had been carefully piled there earlier by rangers. As he bent down to gather an armload of the wood, he glanced up. Captain Burton’s head poked around the trunk of an oak; he winked his approval, then ducked back.
Three trips to and from the woods, and Sands had neatly piled the branches on the beach. A dried wad of moss and his tinderbox were all that were needed to begin the fire. When the moss was aflame, he edged in the twigs he had placed beneath the pile to serve as kindling. They caught fire within seconds and the larger branches minutes later.
When Sands turned toward the bay, only the rosy glow of sunset tinted a rapidly darkening sky. Lanterns winked alive on the ship in answer to his bonfire beacon.
So far, so good; he gave his silent approval to the situation. To this point all had gone as Captain Burton had planned. Now there was nothing to do but wait. Which he did, standing before the blaze so that he presented only a dark silhouette to those on the decks of the ship.
An hour after the last rays of the sun had faded and blackness reigned in the sky, Sands heard the rustle of brush behind him and the whisper of bare feet on sand. This was the next stage of Burton’s plan. Well beyond the flickering light of the fire and hidden by the night, the ranger company fanned out about his position in a tight semicircle.
Sands sucked at his teeth. Now all he had to worry about was what awaited him on the ship that grew closer with each passing moment. To be certain, Burton’s guess about Peoples had been right, but that was no guarantee that this ship was only carrying another crate of rifles for the medicine-show man. Mexican marines could be aboard—the first wave of a Mexican invasion. If that were the case, the men surrounding him would be of little use. He and they would be dead within a matter of minutes.
Memories of all the nights he had spent patrolling the hill country around San Antonio rushed through Sands’ mind. Protecting the frontier from Comanches was something he understood. Standing here in the open like a target in a turkey shoot wasn’t his idea of ranging. He’d rather face—
A loud splash from out in the bay brought his mind from its woolgathering. Where he wanted to be and where he was were two different things. The splash was the sound of the ship’s anchor dropping. He and the men hidden in the darkness around him were committed to whatever, whoever, waited on the vessel.
Slipping a hand to his backside as though reaching into a back pocket of his pants, Sands freed his hunting knife from its scabbard and eased it handle first up the sleeve of his shirt. Slightly curved fingers about the tip kept the blade securely within the sleeve. All he had to do was open his fingers, and the handle would drop down into his palm when he was ready for it.
He would have felt more secure with a pistol. But his Colt was too hard to conceal—and Burton wanted no gunshots if at all possible. Besides, he attempted to reassure himself, if all went as the ranger captain had outlined, the knife would be all he needed.
The movement of lanterns aboard the ship drew Sands’ attention. He peered into the darkness, unable to see what was happening on the ship’s deck. He did hear a heavy splashing, then the hollow sound of waves striking an empty boat.
Tensing, he waited for sounds of another boat being lowered over the side. Nothing came.
Instead he saw two lanterns being handed down to the small craft in the water—a light fore and aft. And those in that landing craft? He couldn’t discern its occupants, but only one boat came toward the shore accompanied by a steady rhythm of oars slicing through the water.
Sands released an overly held breath in a soft sigh. Maybe Burton had guessed correctly. From all appearances, this ship was only bringing another supply of rifles for Peoples.
Still presenting only a silhouette of himself for those who came from the sea, Sands waited and watched the landing craft as it was caught in the waves and rolled up on the beach. Cold sweat prickled over his body as he saw the six Mexican marines jump from the boat and haul it onto the beach.
Seconds later another six marines stepped over the side and handled rifles to their companions. Last over the prow of the craft was an officer in a plumed hat. Except for a case of rifles, the scene Sands now witnessed might have been a repeat of the one he and Dub had first seen near the Louisiana border.
“Saludo, Señor Peoples.” The officer called out a greeting as he started up the beach toward Sands. To each side of him, the marines fell into two files, rifles resting on their shoulders.
Panic railed through Sands’ brain. Burton failed to mention one very important aspect of the plan: Sands was expected to talk, to answer the officer approaching him. Sands had only heard Peoples speak once; he had no hope of imitating the man. Did Peoples speak Spanish?
Sands took a risk. If Peoples had been in Texas for more than a few days, he would have picked up a few basic Spanish phrases since it was a second language to most Texians. Stepping toward the officer, Sands waved and called out, “Como esta?”
Simultaneously, he lifted his right arm as though he intended to shake the officer’s hand. Easily, the hunting knife in his sleeve slipped downward. His palm closed about the handle as he arm shot upward to firmly plant the honed tip of the blade at the officer’s throat.
“Haga un malhecho, y cortare su gareanta a oreja hasta oreja.” Sands threatened to open the officer’s gullet from ear to ear if he made one false move. “Comprende?” Marine rifles swung from shoulders. A chorus of cocking hammers came from around the ranger as muzzles were leveled at him.
Sands ignored them and stared into the officer’s wide eyes. “Digales rendi
n las armas o usted esta muerto. Rindan sus armas!” The officer gave the command for his men to shoulder arms as Sands had commanded.
The men hesitated and he spoke again. “Pongan, sus rifles abajo! Ese hombre esta loco y desea matarme!”
A humorless smile touched the corners of Sands’ mouth. The marines cautiously shouldered their rifles as the officer repeated his command and told them Sands was a crazy man who was going to murder him. He had to agree with the man; he was crazy for getting himself in a position like this. But he had no intention of killing the man—as long as the officer did as ordered.
The officer’s eyes rolled from his men back to Sands. Then in perfect English, he said, “Now what, my friend? It seems we are at a stalemate. You have me, but my men will cut you down should your blade slip.”
“Not quite, amigo,” Sands answered, explaining that Captain Burton and his men had the bonfire surrounded.
“Surely, you don’t expect me ...” The officer’s words were cut short by the sound of cocking rifle hammers that came from out of the night around them. The man swallowed and said, “It seems I was mistaken. What is it you require of me?”
“I just want you and your men to go on a little walk with me.” Sands jerked his head toward the woods. “Tell you men to lay down their rifles and follow us.”
The officer did, and the marines hesitantly complied, then followed their commander who was led by a madman with a knife into the Texas woods.
Chapter Thirteen
Isaac Burton rose from the small campfire he had ordered built deep in the woods, away from the searching eyes aboard the ship. Rubbing the stubble on his chin and neck, he stared at Mexican naval Captain Jorge Ramirez for a long, silent moment.
“Captain, I hope you’ve told me the truth ... your life depends on it,” Burton finally said.
Ramirez held out his arms, as though he were pleading. “I assure you, captain, all I have said is the truth. My Vigilante is not a fighting vessel, merely a merchant ship recently impressed into naval service by my government. You presently hold captive every marine she carried ...” Sands, still in his mismatched disguise, listened while Ramirez quickly repeated everything he had said in the last hour; that his ship did not carry troops, but supplies that were to be concealed here at Copano Bay for a Mexican invasion force that would follow; that he didn’t know when that invasion was to come or how many men would be in that force.
