Dead Time

by William W. Johnstone; J. A. Johnstone

  “Rurales?” Fallon asked.

  “No. Bandidos.” Gomez looked into the distance. “We enter the land of the worst of my race. Killers. Young and old.” His head shook with a genuine sadness. “They butcher their own villages, terrorize their own people. They are evil. Me? I am just a thief. Sometimes a killer. But usually just a thief. I do not make war on my own people. I rob gringos, mostly Tejanos. I am not like those . . .” His last word was in Spanish, and Fallon did not know its meaning, but he had a pretty good guess.

  “Do you plan on robbing us?” Fallon asked, and smiled, though he was dead serious.

  “It was considered, amigo. But I think it is better that I collect my money from the General—if we live that long—and send him off to Texas to fight his war and die gloriously. You would do well to ride with me, amigo. You. Me. We would be like your Frank and Jesse James. For we are brothers.”

  “Which one are you?” Fallon asked. “Frank or Jesse?”

  The Mexican’s laugh felt genuine. “Which one is still alive, my friend? He would be my choice.”

  He started to walk away, laughing, but turned around, and his eyes and voice turned serious again.

  “If we are attacked,” Gomez said. “Do not show mercy. These”—he spit instead of cursed—“are heartless butchers. Kill them. Send them all to hell, for surely they will do that to us all if they are given a chance.”

  * * *

  On the third morning, in a camp in an arroyo so that travelers would be unlikely to spot them from the trails, one man did bring up the matter of money.

  “General!” he called out. “You promised us fifty dollars.”

  Fallon watched the man, a lean, swarthy Texan with a black beard and a pair of revolvers holstered on two gun rigs that hung low on what little hips he had. Fallon also looked at the men standing behind him, now moving away in case their general decided to start blasting with his big LeMat.

  Since arriving in Mexico, Fallon had observed the men riding with this army. He had yet to see Aaron Holderman, which was good. Maybe Holderman had been sent with the party that rode east along the railroad tracks. Holderman certainly had motivation to go there, for the money that he knew Fallon had tossed out of the moving train. Those chances, however, were slim. But having even a modicum of hope made Fallon feel a little better.

  “Me and the boys,” the Texan drawled, “want to get paid, boss.”

  “When we return to Texas, Private,” the General replied.

  “You said as soon as we got to Mexico. I give you a few days to live up to your word.”

  Fallon stirred the cold beans in his plate.

  Justice turned to Merle. “Shoot that blowhard, Captain,” he whispered. “Shoot him now. That will serve as a lesson to these other rapscallions with mercenary hearts.”

  “It will serve as a reason to riot, sir,” Merle answered.

  “He’s right,” the Ranger Bennett agreed.

  Well, Fallon thought, at least the men didn’t obey every order their psychotic leader issued.

  “I want my money!” the blowhard demanded.

  “And you shall get it, and a double eagle as a bonus, my friends,” he said. “But not now. The money, our payroll, is on its way to our Lexington and Concord, our Fort Sumter—where we launch our glorious campaign.”

  Which, Fallon knew, would not appease men with mercenary hearts.

  Justice must have known that, too, for he added: “But I have five bottles of cognac left. Excellent vintage.” He nodded at the buggy. “You may help yourselves, but if there are any fisticuffs, any loud voices, any act that might compromise our mission, our destiny, and you will be put to the sword.”

  It wasn’t exactly the kind of speech that Grant, Lee, or Washington likely would have given, but it did the job.

  “What do you think, Harry?” Justice asked.

  “You’re out of cognac,” Fallon replied.

  The man laughed. “You have a fine wit, suh. Do you know why I continue to allow you to drive my phaeton?”

  Fallon shrugged.

  “I have lost Barney Drexel,” he said. “He was my captain. I have need for a captain. Oh, I know, Bennett and Merle are captains, but you have leadership abilities and you have been fighting the late war, the war we never should have lost, in your own way.”

  Fallon remained quiet.

  “You are also brave.”

  Fallon shrugged again.

  “Would you like to be a captain in the New Confederate Army for Justice?”

  “What about Gomez?”

  “A greaser?” The man chortled. “Surely you jest, suh. The greaser will get some pesos, and, once victory is obtained, maybe that land south of the Nueces River. For the love of God, I never understood why Texas wanted it so badly in the first place. It’s just a bunch of desert, befitting only scorpions, rattlesnakes, and tarantulas.”

  “What do I have to do?” Fallon asked.

  “Kill, suh. You have to kill. You have to kill, kill, kill, kill, kill. Learn to hate. Hate with all your heart. And then kill the men you hate. And kill the men you have to in order to stay alive.”

  Fallon gave the General a quick nod. “I’m getting pretty good at that,” he said. The sad part, Fallon understood, was that he had not lied. He was damned good at killing. He had killed more men in the past months since he had joined the American Detective Agency than he had during his entire career as a deputy marshal. And since Joliet, he had learned to hate. There were still some men that he had to kill, not to stay alive, but because he hated them.

  “Good. You will be a captain. In due time. I still want to get to know you a little better. But once we reach our final camp, I will introduce you to my other captain. Then we will toast our upcoming glory. Our new nation. Our independence. And our wealth.”

  “I look forward to meeting him, sir,” Fallon said, “and serving ably under your command.”

  Justice slapped Fallon’s leg. “Bully for you, suh. You shall like Captain Ehrlander. He isn’t the fighter you are. But Chris has brains. He has tenfold the brains of most men, and is slippery as a wet eel.”

  Chris Ehrlander. Now Fallon knew for sure. Ehrlander was in that deep with Justice.

  “I look forward to meeting Captain Ehrlander, sir,” Fallon said again, and he thought:

  And then sending him to hell because I hate his guts.

  * * *

  They resumed their march the next evening. When they turned south a few days later, they began traveling in the daylight. Long days. Days that drained the strength of the men and the horses. And they were out of 1851 cognac.

  It was moving south that troubled Fallon.

  He figured they would be heading back to Texas, perhaps crossing the Rio Grande around Brownsville, but now they traveled deeper into Mexico. He tried to remember those maps he had seen.

  It was late in the next day, with dust blowing in his eyes, and General Justice as irritable as the tired horses pulling the buggy, that Fallon understood where Justice was taking his men. And why.

  Then a bullet blew out the left gray horse’s brains.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  The horse dropped in a heap, stopping the buggy suddenly and pitching Josiah Jonathan Justice to the ground while spilling the LeMat onto the phaeton’s floor. Fallon dropped the reins, set the brake, and dived as bullets riddled the leather seats and splintered the box in the back that once had held many bottles of vintage cognac.

  Hooves thundered. Guns roared. Men shouted. Other men screamed. Above that, Fallon could make out the shouts and curses in rapid-fire Spanish. Chaos and carnage surrounded him. The other gray horse was killed. A horse shot past the phaeton, dragging its rider, one boot caught in the stirrup, behind him until a barrage of gunfire killed that horse.

  Fallon grabbed the LeMat. He heard a horse slide to a stop. Rolling over, Fallon thumbed back the hammer of the heavy French weapon. A bullet slammed into the wooden floor inches from Fallon’s face, sending slivers of w
ood into his cheek.

  The man was Mexican, sitting atop a clay bank, with a giant sugar-loaf sombrero on his big head. He was dark-skinned, dark-eyed, and wore a suit of black suede. The pistol he carried had to be one of those relics from the War Between the States, maybe a Walker, probably a Dragoon, but it was being cocked and if that man didn’t kill Fallon, the one behind him—thinner, clean-shaven, but a Mexican bandit who held a repeating rifle—most certainly would.

  Fallon squeezed the trigger, and the roar of the LeMat deafened him, the flash of flame and smoke blinded him, and the kick of the big pistol just about tore his right hand from his arm.

  He somersaulted off the buggy, landed on his stomach, jarring his ribs but not knocking the breath out of him. Beside him, General Justice had risen to a seated position and was unbuttoning his Confederate frock coat, cursing as he fumbled with the myriad brass buttons.

  “Confound it,” the General roared, likely dazed. A bullet clipped the purple ostrich plume from Justice’s hat, which somehow had remained on the man’s big white head. “Confound it. I must find my .36.”

  Fallon brought the LeMat up, found the lever at the end of the hammer, and flipped it into the standard position. Justice had set the striker up, so that it would fire the smoothbore center barrel. Fallon came up, aiming the LeMat at the two bandits. Quickly, he saw enough and dropped back down. He stared at the gun in his hand, knowing now why the LeMat was called the “grapeshot” revolver. The blast from the twenty-gauge barrel had killed both bandits, wounded the first one’s horse, and sent the other horse loping and kicking its way toward the nearest hills.

  Another rider swung around the buggy, struggling to turn the horse and get a clear aim with the Winchester Yellow Boy—or a cheap Mexican copy of the .44 caliber carbine. Fallon raised the LeMat and sent a .40 caliber ball into the man’s brisket. He groaned and dropped out of the saddle, and his horse galloped toward the Gulf of Mexico.

  Fallon had fired twice, one from the cylinder, the other from the shotgun barrel. He had eight shots left.

  A man, more like a boy, wearing the white cotton clothes of a peon, sandals and a beaten straw hat, ran around the other side. He held an old Enfield rifle, bigger than he was, but was bringing the stock to his shoulder when something popped to Fallon’s left and just behind him. A geyser of crimson sprayed from the center of the kid’s chest, and the crucifix the boy wore flew upward, then back onto his dead body when the kid hit the ground.

  “Vermin!” Justice shouted, and rose to his feet. “Scum of the earth. Dirty, rotten, low-down, thieving greasers! You will get no part of Texas when I have conquered it. For when I am finished with President Grant, I shall take Mexico for my own—just because I can.”

  Holding a Navy Colt in his right hand, Justice marched to the dead boy and put another bullet into the corpse’s chest.

  Grant? Fallon wet his lips, tried to see through the dust. Ulysses S. Grant hadn’t been president in years. Hell, Grant had been dead for more than five years.

  Two riders galloped out of the blinding dust. Fallon raised the LeMat again, then stopped. He stared at General Josiah Jonathan Justice, who walked toward the approaching bandits, the Navy .36 pistol hanging at his side as he strode. The wind drove dust into Fallon’s eyes, and he had to lower himself behind the rear wheel of the buggy. He spit out sand, wiped his face, and saw the cotton and sugarcane king walking fearlessly. A bullet tore a hole in the crown of his Hardee hat. Another whined off a rock at his left foot. The riders bore down. The General kept walking.

  Suddenly a bullet ricocheted off the iron rim of the wheel.Fallon spun, dropped, raised the LeMat, and put a bullet into a gunman’s stomach. The man dropped his pistol, clutched his belly, and fell to his knees. He pitched forward, pushed himself off, and staggered off to the south. Fallon raised the LeMat, stopped, and spun around. That man had a bullet in his gut. He was dead, just didn’t know it, and soon would wish he could just die.

  Fallon raised the LeMat again.

  He needed Justice alive. He needed Justice to get back to his camp. If the General got killed in this ambush, Fallon might never be able to catch up with Chris Ehrlander—and kill him for murdering Fallon’s wife and daughter.

  Fallon pulled back the hammer, but instantly General Justice brought the Navy up in speed that did not match the maniac’s age and ability. Yet Fallon saw the blasts from the Navy’s barrel and heard two distinctive reports, and both riders pitched backward off their horses.

  “Scoundrels!” Justice yelled. “Have you no decency? You ambush us instead of meet us head-to-head in proper battle! How dare you? I shall exterminate your miserable race!”

  Fallon ran to the General and grabbed the thick woolen sleeve of the man’s new gray coat.

  “Unhand me, suh,” Justice wailed as he turned around and started to bring up the pistol. “Or we shall meet on the field of honor.”

  “General!” Fallon said. “It’s me, sir. Harry.” He pushed the General down and brought up the LeMat again. A bullet knocked off Fallon’s hat. The big revolver spoke again and a man spun around, staggered to his right, made the sign of the cross, and fell, spread-eagled, on his back.

  All Harry Fallon thought about was how to stay alive and somehow keep Josiah Justice alive. Mexican renegades were attacking American renegades—a renegade army that had, if you looked at it one way, invaded Mexico. The New Confederate Army for Justice was fighting its first major battle with one objective:

  Stay alive!

  The Mexicans were fighting for reasons of their own. Weapons that could help them overthrow Porfirio Díaz. Wagons. Money (if they could find much).

  It seemed a stupid reason for men to fight.

  Justice’s Colt rang out again. Fallon didn’t know if the General’s aim had been true, for Justice was firing over Fallon’s shoulder, and now Fallon was pushing Justice hard to the ground. Again, he brought up the LeMat to kill or wound some other enemy charging him, but this time, Fallon wasn’t quite quick enough.

  He never heard the shot—for the country was filled with gunfire and echoes, and screams and thundering hooves—or even saw the muzzle flash from the revolver as the bandido fanned the hammer.

  Fallon felt the punch in his left shoulder, felt the fire, and tasted the blood. He dropped to the ground, still clutching the LeMat and trying to fire it, but he couldn’t see. The dust and pain blinded him, and his shoulder burned like blazes. He had trouble breathing, but, damn it, he told himself: “You aren’t dying. You aren’t dying. Not yet.”

  He didn’t realize he was speaking the words. He just wanted to find that low-down snake who had put a slug in his shoulder.

  A shadow crossed Fallon’s face, but after blinking away sweat, all he could make out was a dim figure. A figure in gray. And hair that seemed to be as white as snow.

  Something latched on to Fallon’s right wrist. Fallon fought, but that just wasted what little energy and strength he had left. The LeMat was wrenched from Fallon’s grip. He heard three quick blasts.

  His right hand, no longer holding the heavy revolver, came up, found the shoulder, and pressed down as tightly as he could against the bleeding, burning hole.

  “Captain Alexander!” General Josiah Jonathan Justice shouted. “Captain Alexander, do you hear me? Open your eyes, mister, that is a direct order! Open your eyes!”

  Fallon thought his eyes were open. He tried again. And this time he saw the grim face of the General, his facial hair and skin blackened in spots by gunpowder, whitened in places by alkali dust.

  “We are not retreating, Captain,” Fallon thought he heard Justice say. “We are regrouping, suh, and victory shall be gained. On your feet, Captain. Let us fall back, but we march in order, suh. We march in order.”

  When Fallon did not move, Justice reached down, shoving the LeMat into his waistband beside the Navy Colt, and jerked Fallon to his feet.

  Fallon almost blacked out. The world spun around and around, and his stomach turned over.<
br />
  “You shall pay my laundress, Captain,” Justice said, “for removing your vomit. I paid two hundred dollars in New Orleans, suh, for this uniform.”

  The General was stark raving mad, but he seemed to understand that if he let go, Fallon would be falling flat on his face. He wasn’t marching anywhere.

  A Mexican ran toward them, lifting a machete. Holding onto Fallon with his left arm, Justice drew the Navy with his right, thumbed back the hammer, squeezed the trigger, and when it snapped on an empty chamber, he reversed the grip and threw the revolver. The butt caught the enemy in the forehead and sent him to the ground. As the killer rose, shaking his head, while fumbling around the ground for the machete, Justice found the LeMat and blew out the bandit’s brains.

  Now he started toward what appeared to be a fort. A fort? No, Fallon realized, it was one of the wagons. The wagons had been rounded into not exactly a circle, but some kind of a redoubt. That’s where General Justice planned to regroup.

  Regroup. Fallon shook his head. Like Custer at the Little Big Horn.

  “General! General! General!” Fallon’s eyes barely opened. “Let me help.”

  Juanito Gomez came into view, shoving a smoking Remington revolver into his holster. Fallon wasn’t sure how far they had come, but the fort, the wagons filled with guns and ammunition, did appear somewhat closer. He still heard shouts and gunfire. He smelled death and dust. And his shoulder hurt like hell.

  Gomez slid to a stop. He raised both hands. “¿ Qué eres . . . ?” the Mexican began.

  A splotch of crimson appeared high in Gomez’s shirt, and he twisted and turned and dropped to his knees.

  The outlaw looked confused. Blood seeped from one corner of his mouth. “¿Por qué razón hizo . . . ?”

  “Do not speak Mexican to me, you scoundrel!” Justice yelled, and continued to help Fallon along, toward the dying bandit. “You undoubtedly led us into this ambush.”

  The man raised his left hand. His right tried to find the revolver he had dropped. “Para Dios . . .” he began, but never finished his prayer. The LeMat spoke again, and the bullet ripped through Juanito Gomez’s hand and blew out the man’s right eye.