“So we turn ’bout and head back like we chickened out?” said Lew.
“And then do what?” asked Clay.
“After dark, we switch back and come in another way, following that high ground to the north. Looks better than to the south.”
“And they can’t watch all the ways in, even if they think we may be tryin’ to fool ’em,” Lew said, studying the ground to the north.
“It’ll be some tough riding over unknown ground all night,” said Clay. “Then we hit them in the morning when they’re eating beans.”
Flaco hadn’t said nothing, but he was thinking. “There a way we can fool them more.”
We all looked at him.
“We do not attack in the morning,” said Flaco. “We hole up in the hills. Much rough ground up there. Then we scout San Miguel in the day and attack them before dark, tomorrow night. I think they be ready for us in the morning, but we do not come. Maybe then they think we really did leave.”
Clay and Lew looked at one another. “What you think, Lew?”
Lew nodded. “Scoutin’ that place is real good ideer and waitin’ like that puts surprise on our side.” He nodded again. “We can do this, Clay.”
Clay looked at me and Flaco. I suspect he was thinking the same as me about leaving the girls in that hell hole another night.
I gripped Clay’s shoulder. “This way gives us a better chance, better than if we go charging in there with them ready for us.”
“Yeah. Yeah, you’re right. Good going, boys. Let’s leave this place.
»»•««
It was a hard ride. Slow with stumbling horses. Gent even took a fall, and Snap too. The rain had let up and there were breaks in the clouds with the ghostly moon peeking at us sometimes. It was frosty cold. We could see our breath and the horses’ too when the moon gave us weak light. We didn’t really know where we were or exactly where San Miguel was. We’d got ourselves good and lost, which I guess is what we were trying to do.
Plodding along Flaco told us what little he knew of San Miguel. Maybe twenty houses, shacks really, people who wanted to be left alone, away from law and rules. There was a small hacienda with a wall around it on the west side of the place. That was El Xiuhcoatl’s fortaleza—stronghold. He had some kind of arrangement with the Rurales. They left him alone. He did whatever he wished from the peons. It had been maybe three years ago that Flaco’d been there. He couldn’t tell us much about the hacienda layout.
We headed back down the ridge, and right before dark we stopped and heated up cans of Boston baked beans, bacon, damp stale biscuits, and coffee too. Clay knew we’d need that to make it through this sleepless night.
Clay said it was midnight.
Lew picked us a campsite in a draw. He came up with another plan. He sent Musty and Jerry to build two fires a hundred feet apart on a ridge two miles behind us. They were to stoke them up and come back. The fires would burn out like campfires would. It might fool the banditos that a really big posse had been after them and was heading home.
With a sentry posted, we flopped in our bedrolls. The fire-starters straggled in way late. We didn’t know where Fred and the remuda were and hoped he wouldn’t go racing to the fires.
Clay woke me and Flaco at five. “Think you can find that place, San Miguel?” he whispered.
“Sí,” was all Flaco said.
“I hope so. We’ll be waiting here ready to go.”
Chapter Forty
The sun was readying to come up. The smell of wind-drifting mesquite smoke led us to San Miguel two hours after we started.
There wasn’t much to it. A muddy track with scattered adobes on both sides. Some houses were made of posts with mud-plastered mesquite limbs stacked between them like the corrals on the Dew. They had roofs made of layers of pointed yucca leaves and mud. Flaco called them jacalitos—shacks. A flooded arroyo ran along the north side of the village paralleling the track. There were pig and goat pens and free-ranging chickens. A few mules and burros stood sadly in potreros. The only movement was from animals and smoke trickling from chimneys or just a hole in the thatch roofs. It was boastful to call it a village, pueblecito—little village Flaco called it. The walled hacienda squatted at the far end, set further away from the village than Flaco remembered. Nothing fancy about it. The Dew cattle were scattered out beyond the hacienda. On a low hill sat the cemetery, looking livelier than the village.
Clay had given us a pair of little brass field glasses. Flaco showed me how to use them while we kneeled in the mesquite on an overlooking ridge. We counted only six horses in the hacienda’s compound. That didn’t look good.
“You think they left?” I said to Flaco, who was peering at the pueblecito with the glasses.
“Well, they ain’t there.”
“Smart ass, you know what I mean.”
“Maybe they leave, but why? They want ransom monies, so why go away?” He was thinking again. “Maybe they out looking for us. Six horses—two guards, four girls stay here, maybe.”
That made my peepers open. Is she in there? “Then what are we waiting for? Let’s go get them.”
Flaco was already sliding down the gulley.
We had to take a roundabout way. Flaco said if we went down the arroyo, someone coming out for water might see us, even if it was barely light enough to see. We crossed the ankle-deep arroyo behind the hacienda and holed up in some sage. The back wall was about fifty feet from the arroyo. The adobe wall was six feet high, and there was a narrow plank gate with a path leading to the arroyo and flat clothes-washing rocks. There were some loopholes cut in the wall.
The only thing we heard was a goat bleating from inside the wall. We took off our spurs and hats, checked our revolvers.
Flaco looked all around and said, “Wait here. I go first.” He’d put on that yellow scarf.
Instead of sneaking up to the wall, he stood up and walked up there like he belonged. Made sense, he was a Mex after all. I could tell he was listening before he peeked over real fast like. He looked over again, taking his time, and ambled back.
He squatted down and drew in the wet dirt. “Here the house.” It was one-story, had a door in the back, four windows, no glass. There was another smaller square house to the right, two mesquite-built sheds, and an outhouse.
“We go over wall, look in windows, come back. You go left, look in back and end windows. I go right and also look at little house. I take longer so you don’t wait for me. Come back here.”
I nodded. “If I hear shooting I’ll come a running and…”
“If that happen, you run like hell, go back to Clay. Is more important you get word to Clay.”
He was right, but I had a different idea. I wasn’t running like hell if she was in there.
We walked to the wall and Flaco repeated the routine. Over we went. I looked back across the rocky arroyo. It was a long way to cover on the other side if we had to run for it.
Behind the house were loose chickens, a goat pen, and a burn pile with charred bloody rags and pig parts. I went to the first window to the left of the door. I feared at any second that door would fly open. I kept my pistol in hand. The room was dark and quiet, couldn’t see a damn thing. Flaco looked in his first window and suddenly ducked down. He nodded at me, held up a finger, but shook his head. I took that to mean there was one man in the room, but no girls. He ducked under the window and headed for the next. I did the same.
As I eased up, I saw the light of a candle through the gauzy ragged curtain. A man sat on the edge of a bed against the wall. I eased down, waited and looked again. He stood wearing long johns and pulled on pants. In the bed was a girl, piled black hair. I ducked down again, my heart pounding. Was it Marta or maybe Inés? I really had to make myself look again, half fearing the man would be staring at me. He wasn’t. He leaned over the bed and slapped the girl on the butt. She said something harsh and sat up with hair falling over her shoulders. The girl was naked. I couldn’t help staring at her big jugs. It wasn’t
Marta or Inés—some girl older than them. Somebody’d had a warmer night than me. That made me miss Marta all the more.
I felt glad it wasn’t Marta and disappointed at the same time. I kept looking at the girl. I ain’t got time for this. The bandito said something else to her, and standing up she slapped at him, her jugs bouncing. He grabbed her arm, twisted it, and shoved her back on the bed.
I didn’t need to see no more of that game. I went under the window and around the corner, after first taking a quick peek around. The first window on the end had a heavy curtain, and the room was black behind it. I listened, didn’t hear anything. The next window was the same, but I heard a man coughing. I listened, but it sounded like a lone man and maybe hurt. I couldn’t stand it in there any longer. I went round to the back and over the wall. I didn’t see Flaco nowhere.
I waited a long time, but the place stayed quiet. I kept telling myself he was being extra special careful. Flaco came over the wall so sudden it made me jump.
“Come, we go.”
We crossed the arroyo, almost forgetting our spurs and hats. I didn’t like this because it didn’t look like we were going to be rescuing any girls. Maybe he hadn’t seen them either.
We went back to the mesquite we’d first spied from. Flaco sat. “You see them? I didn’t.”
That was a letdown. “No, I didn’t.” Now what?
“I only see two men and a woman and little girl, cooking.”
“I saw one man, heard another, and saw a girl, older, not one of ours.”
He shook his head. “They no have a guard out. If girls there I think they have guard.”
I wasn’t feeling so good about this. “Now what?”
“We go back to horses. Then I go talk to them.”
“You’re going talk to them?”
“Sí, no problem.”
“This I gotta see.”
“You will. Wait here as safe as in your mama’s arms.”
That had never been a safe place for me, but I understood what he meant.
From out of his warbag tied behind his saddle Flaco pulled a gray Rurales jacket. Seeing my surprise, he said, “I take yesterday.” He was thinking ahead again. “Hard to find one with no holes.” He changed the yellow bandito scarf for his red Rurales necktie. “You wait here. If something bad happen, you ride back to Clay. Tell him El Xiuhcoatl leave with the girls. Maybe go to Las Norias, maybe someplace else.”
I was feeling worse and worse.
Wearing the gray jacket and red necktie, he rode as plain as day through the village and right up to the stronghold gate. He hitched his horse and banged on the gate. That hombre has got some balls.
Watching with the glasses, I could see two men saddling horses. They turned real quick with one pointing a rifle. He stayed back as the other one looked over the wall. He was saying something to Flaco and then opened the gate.
Well, I be damned.
The bandito stood there talking to Flaco. It looked like he wanted Flaco to come inside the house, but he didn’t—smart. Another man came out, and they all talked with some arm waving going on. Soon they shook hands all around, and Flaco and one man came out the gate talking some more. They shook hands again, and Flaco mounted. The banditos watched him ride off. I kept my rifle on them and would shoot if they raised a gun. It was probably way too far to reach them, but it’d make them duck and Flaco could run for it between the houses.
Flaco ambled on up the road. The men went back in. Nothing happened, that is until three Rurales rode past me. I didn’t even hear them coming forty yards away. Rounding a rock outcropping Flaco rode right into them, and they had pistols pointed at him. There wasn’t a thing I could do, not against three Rurales crowded around him.
He sat his horse with his hands up. Two Rurales dismounted and ordered him off. There was a lot of hot talk going on. One of them swung at him with a pistol, but he ducked it. That pissed the Rurale off, and he started pistol-whipping Flaco something serious, driving him to his knees. I got pissed with their kicking Flaco. The one doing the whipping shouted something, and the third man dismounted and took off his lariat.
What the hell? There ain’t no trees for a hanging. The other man got his lariat too. The pistol-whipper—the leader I guess—had his gun shoved in Flaco’s face and the other dropped a loop over him and cinched it under his arms. They knocked him over and started kicking him. Then they tied the other rope around his legs above his knees. They tied the ropes off to their saddle horns.
Oh shit! I shouldered my rifle. At least Flaco was on the ground, and the Rurales were standing giving me clear shots. One man remounted. I wanted to get closer to be sure, but there was no time, and they’d see me coming. Then something jumped into my head. When I shoot, the horses might bolt, even one of them and Flaco’d be torn in two or at least bad hurt. Shoot the horses first, bigger targets anyways. I took careful aim at the shoulder of the horse with the mounted man, just forward of his knee. I knew I’d have to shoot the other horse, and then still had three armed men to deal with. I didn’t take time to think about what a long chance this was. Shoot the damn horses!
I fired.
The horse dropped its head and rolled over to the left onto its rider. The other horse humped its back, got white-eyed, and I got it in the shoulder. It dropped to its rump, tried to get up and slumped over toward me. The leader’s horse took off. The dismounted leader turned toward me bringing up his pistol. I hit him in the arm, and he twisted sideways. Instead of giving him a second bullet I fired at the third man, who had both pistols out and according to the smoke, was firing at me. I hit him in the head, and he went over his horse. Another pistol went off, the man pinned under his horse. I shot the leader again, and he stepped back, tripping over Flaco and fell onto his back. The leader arched his belly up and kicked his legs, and the pinned fella fired again. I ran forward and as he tried to rise up on an elbow, I put two more in him. The second horse kicked some, and I shot it in the head.
“You good?” I shouted.
Flaco disgustedly tossed the chest rope off. I bent to help with the leg rope. “Go to look at the hacienda! What’s happening there?” he told me.
Grabbing my rifle, I ran around the limestone outcropping and saw two banditos riding hell bent up the slope. One other was in the courtyard saddling. I didn’t expect to hit nothing, but I fired the remaining six rifle shots, and it sure enough did the job because the two scurried into the mesquite pronto.
Flaco was up and running, holding a revolver in one hand and a knife in the other. Now I knew why the leader arched and kicked the way he done, a knife’ll do that. Lashing and spurring our horses cruel mean, we crashed down through the mesquite. We didn’t stop until we’d put a ridge between us and San Miguel. For all I knew, we’d next meet up with them boys from Del Rio what stole Slick’s watch.
Chapter Forty-One
“Old friends of yours?” I asked.
“They know me from yesterday. They tell me no quarter for despiadado…cold-blooded killing their Capitán.”
We rode in silence for a while. He was still shook and rubbing the knots on his head. Can’t say I blamed him. After some time, he told me what he’d learned. It wasn’t nothing good.
»»•««
Flaco laid it out to everyone, except a couple of lookouts Lew had posted. In the meantime, Gent had been out scouting and ran across Fred and the remuda.
Flaco told them about us sneaking up on the hacienda—Clay wasn’t happy the girls weren’t there. I wolfed down the cold beans and bacon, and broke off pieces of hard crusty bannock they’d saved for us. Next, he talked about the run-in with the Rurales. They’d sure enough had remembered him in regards to the white flag. Then he told about riding back to the hacienda. He’d figured the Rurales were in cahoots with El Xiuhcoatl. He’d pretended he had a message for El Xiuhcoatl to see what he could find out. The banditos had no reason not to believe him. The ones left there were all wounded from the raid on the Dew. Three of them not to
o serious, but the other was bad enough to leave behind. The three were going to leave because of the Texican posse after them. The extra horses were either lame or wounded. El Xiuhcoatl had left with his sixteen men maybe a couple of hours before me and Flaco got there. They thought the americanos might come back with more men. They were heading to Las Norias.
“Well, hell, you never know what that bastard’s thinking,” grumbled Clay. “You get anything out of them about the girls.”
“I say I heard they kidnap some girls. They say they take two American and two Mexican girls.” Flaco looked at Clay. “I sorry boss, I thought best not to ask no more, or they get suspicious.”
“I understand, amigo.”
“They about five or six hours ahead of us.”
It seemed to me like the closer we got the further away she was.
“Then we need to start moving.”
“Mount up, boys,” Lew ordered. “Dodger, bring up Fred.”
Clay said to me, “I’m of mind to head to the hacienda and see what we can get out of the man they left behind, but we need to stay after them.”
“No sense teasing something that ain’t bothering ya none,” said Musty.
Lew rode up. “What I’m worryin’ ’bout is ’em figurin’ out we’re only eleven. They’ll see us sooner or later.”
“Any ideas?”
“Once we make contact…”
Clay glared at Lew.
“Once we catch up with ’em, we hang back, stay in eyeball contact with ’em with scouts.
“Bud, Flaco,” said Clay.
“We’re on it, boss.”
“I’ll spell you with Gent and Dodger.”
»»•««
We rode hard all day, changed horses in the early afternoon, and saw neither hide nor hair of the Fire Serpents. Only saw their tracks. There were over twenty horses—probably had some spares—and a couple of mules.
“You know anything about Las Norias?”
“It means waterwheel,” said Flaco.
“Anything else?”
“Nope.” After a few moments, he said, “This place we go, this land inside the big loop of the Rio Grande with Texas on three sides, it is called El Huerto del Diablo—the Devil’s Orchard.”
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